COVID-19 News from Around the Web

Summer weather is enticing much of the world to emerge from coronavirus lockdowns as centers of the outbreak from New York to Italy and Spain gradually lift restrictions that have kept millions indoors for months. People are streaming back to beaches, parks and streets just as a heat wave hits southern Europe and spring-like temperatures allow Americans to shed winter coats. As they venture out again, most are keeping their distance and some are wearing masks. However, protests are also heating up from Germany to England to the United States, arguing the government restrictions demolish personal liberties and are wrecking economies.

The Trump administration on Friday rolled out a hyper-ambitious plan to develop and manufacture hundreds of millions of Covid-19 vaccine doses by the end of 2020, outlining an aggressive process that, if successful, would shatter conventional wisdom about the typical process for developing vaccines for emerging infectious diseases. At a Rose Garden press conference, the president and his deputies acknowledged their goal, dubbed “Operation Warp Speed,” was lofty.

The U.S. Navy says 13 sailors from the USS Theodore Roosevelt who had apparently recovered from the coronavirus and had received negative test results have now tested positive for a second time. In a statement released earlier on Saturday when five sailors were found to have retested positive, the Navy said the sailors had "met rigorous recovery criteria, exceeding CDC guidelines," including testing negative for the virus at least twice, but have now retested positive. The statement said the sailors had been monitoring their health and adhered to social-distancing protocols while on board the Roosevelt, which has been docked in Guam following an outbreak infecting hundreds of crew members. "These five Sailors developed influenza-like illness symptoms and did the right thing reporting to medical for evaluation," the statement said.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell expressed optimism Sunday that the U.S. economy can begin to recover from a devastating recession in the second half of the year, assuming the coronavirus doesn’t erupt in a second wave. But he suggested that a full recovery won’t likely be possible before the arrival of a vaccine. In an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes,” Powell noted that the economy was fundamentally healthy before the virus struck suddenly and forced widespread business shutdowns and tens of millions of layoffs. Once the outbreak has been contained, he said, the economy should be able to rebound “substantially.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a set of documents on Thursday designed to provide guidance on how childcare centers, schools, restaurants and bars, and other establishments could begin the process of reopening in the face of coronavirus. The direction comes after calls from lawmakers and state officials mounted for the CDC to weigh in on how regions should reopen their economies. The decision tools the agency released recommend that all workplaces hold off on reopening unless they are ready to protect employees at higher risk for severe illness, including those 65 and older and people of all ages with underlying medical conditions.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning doctors about a serious rare inflammatory condition in children linked with the coronavirus. In an alert issued Thursday, the CDC called the condition multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children. The agency’s case definition includes current or recent COVID-19 infection or exposure to the virus, a fever of at least 100.4 for at least 24 hours, severe illness requiring hospitalization, inflammatory markers in blood tests, and evidence of problems affecting at least two organs that could include the heart, kidneys, lungs, skin or other nervous system. The name and definition are similar to those used in Europe, where the condition was first reported several weeks ago.

A whistleblower who says he was removed from his government post for raising concerns about coronavirus preparedness told a congressional hearing on Thursday that the United States could face “the darkest winter” of recent times if it does not improve its response to the pandemic. Hours after President Donald Trump railed against him on Twitter, whistleblower Rick Bright testified to a U.S. House of Representatives panel about readiness for the outbreak. Bright was removed last month as director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA, a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services responsible for developing drugs to fight the coronavirus. “What we do must be done carefully with guidance from the best scientific minds. Our window of opportunity is closing. If we fail to improve our response now, based on science, I fear the pandemic will get worse and be prolonged,” Bright said during his testimony.