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TULSA, Okla. – President Donald Trump promoted his rally here on Saturday as an opportunity to reignite his reelection campaign and move past the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 120,000 Americans and devastated the economy. He claimed that nearly 1 million people had requested tickets and boasted, “We’ve never had an empty seat, and we certainly won’t in Oklahoma.” Instead, he addressed his supporters, most of them unmasked, in a 19,000-seat arena with many spots unfilled, hours after his campaign had announced that six members of the advance team staffing the event had tested positive for the virus. He used his platform to belittle testing, which public health experts say is required to contain the outbreak. Because the strategy reveals what the president characterized as trivial cases, his direction was to curtail it. “So I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down,’ ” he said, as the audience cheered. There was no massive overflow audience; the area outside the arena had emptied out by early evening, and plans for Trump to address the audience outside were quickly scrapped. The campaign blamed protesters; there were only scattered efforts to block entrances, which were resolved by police. The campaign said quarantine procedures had gone into effect for the infected staff members and those in “immediate contact” with them. Meanwhile, Tulsa County reported 136 new cases Saturday – marking another high for both single-day and average cases – while the state as a whole reported 331 new infections. Upon entering the rally grounds, attendees were handed blue face coverings – which many chose not to wear – and directed through a maze of metal fencing, which led to a touchless temperature screening conducted by volunteers in purple smocks. Most police officers and National Guard soldiers on the rally grounds also chose not to wear face coverings. Outside the security perimeter, arguments erupted between protesters and the president’s supporters at street corners near the arena, where they traded cries of “Black lives matter” and “all lives matter.” One protester was arrested at the BOK Center, a private venue leased by the Trump campaign.
Hopes for a return to normal life after the coronavirus hinge on the development of a vaccine. But there’s no guarantee, experts say, that a fully effective COVID-19 vaccine is possible. That may seem counterintuitive. So many brutal viral diseases have been conquered by vaccination — smallpox, polio, mumps — that the technique seems all but infallible. But not all viral diseases are equally amenable to vaccination. “Some viruses are very easy to make a vaccine for, and some are very complicated,” says Adolfo García-Sastre, director of the Global Health and Emerging Pathogens Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. “It depends on the specific characteristics of how the virus infects.” Unfortunately, it seems that COVID-19 is on the difficult end of the scale. A closely related virus of the same family, SARS, circulated in Asia from late 2002 to mid-2003 and killed more than 700 people. “They really are very similar viruses, both virulent and contagious,” says Rachel Roper, a professor of immunology at East Carolina University who took part in efforts to develop a SARS vaccine. Given the similarities of the diseases, their response to vaccination would likely be close to identical. So it’s troubling that when researchers conducted animal testing on prospective SARS vaccines, they ran into difficulty. The two versions that they tested both successfully triggered the host animal’s immune system to produce antibodies, but neither was very effective at protecting against the illness. “People think, ‘Oh, if you make antibodies to it, it’s going to be protective,’” says Roper. “That’s not necessarily true. We were able to induce an immune response, but it wasn’t good enough to really protect against the disease.”
It’s possible, Roper fears, that COVID-19 could be a virus that proves resistant to vaccination. “This may be one,” she says. “If we have one, this is going to be it, I think.” The FDA has never approved a vaccine for humans that is effective against any member of the coronavirus family, which includes SARS, MERS, and several that cause the common cold. Continue reading “We Might Never Get a Good Coronavirus Vaccine”
Wall Street predicts the White House will push through approval of one or maybe even two Covid-19 vaccines to help bolster Donald Trump’s chances before the U.S. presidential election. While scientists, including the nation’s top virus expert Anthony Fauci, have set their eyes on a vaccine by early 2021 at the earliest, sell-side research analysts have been bringing in experts to weigh in on the possibility of a shorter timeline – ahead of the Nov. 3 vote. That date is increasingly important as Democratic challenger Joe Biden gains steam, with more Americans scrutinizing the Trump administration’s handling of both the pandemic and the nation’s divisive racial inequities. There were 13 experimental coronavirus vaccines being tested in humans and more than 120 others in earlier stages of development, according to the World Health Organization’s latest count, although new trials are moving forward at record speed. Biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies including AstraZeneca Plc and Moderna Inc. have been ramping up production and promising supplies of millions of doses of their still experimental vaccines before the year ends.
“All the datapoints we’ve collected make me think we’re going to get a vaccine prior to the election,” Jared Holz, a health-care strategist with Jefferies, said in a phone interview. The current administration is “incredibly incentivized to approve at least one of these vaccines before Nov. 3.”
Continue reading “Wall Street banking on a COVID-19 vaccine before US election”
The number of COVID-19 infections soared by 31,243 since yesterday’s update to reach 2,219,119 in the United States, Johns Hopkins University’s tally showed on Friday. The daily jump in coronavirus cases surpassed Thursday’s growth by nearly 5,000. Meanwhile, the death toll from the virus stood at 119,086 after 705 fatalities related to the infection were confirmed in the past 24 hours, topping the number of deaths confirmed in the day prior. Earlier today, a report said that White House Coronavirus Task members Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx advised United States President Donald Trump against holding a campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Saturday due to risks of the spreading of coronavirus during the event. One hundred thousand coronavirus deaths in the U.S. was the low estimate by year end. That figure, the bottom end of the White House’s best-picture scenario of 100,000 to 240,000 deaths, was reached in late May after the virus spread across the United States. Already, the death toll in the U.S. has eclipsed those of every other country.
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Six Trump campaign staffers on the advance team for the president’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma on Saturday have tested positive for the coronavirus, the Trump campaign confirmed to CBS News. According to the campaign, the staffers were immediately quarantined and will not have contact with any rally attendees. “Per safety protocols, campaign staff are tested for COVID-19 before events. Six members of the advance team tested positive out of hundreds of tests performed, and quarantine procedures were immediately implemented,” Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh said in a statement. “No COVID-positive staffers or anyone in immediate contact will be at today’s rally or near attendees and elected officials. As previously announced, all rally attendees are given temperature checks before going through security, at which point they are given wristbands, facemasks and hand sanitizer.” The rally, Mr. Trump’s first since March, is taking place at the Bank of Oklahoma Center, which holds 19,000 people, with an additional stage in the outdoor area adjacent to the venue that can hold several thousand more. Health experts have raised concerns about having so many people gathered in one place, particularly as the number of coronavirus cases continues to rise in Oklahoma and several other states. Although the campaign will be providing masks for rally attendees, it will not be mandatory to wear them. Several people waiting outside the Bank of Oklahoma Center ahead of the rally told CBS News they would not be wearing masks at the event. The online registration page for the rally included a legal disclaimer for attendees to acknowledge “that an inherent risk of exposure to COVID-19 exists in any public place where people are present.”
As of 2 a.m. Thursday, Gila River Hotels & Casinos shuttered all three of its properties for two weeks amid a recent rise in COVID-19 cases in Arizona. Leaders at Gila River Hotels & Casinos declined The Arizona Republic’s repeated requests to confirm the number of employees who have tested positive for COVID-19, saying that they will not disclose the information to “protect the privacy” of their workers. The Gila River Indian Community operates Lone Butte and Wild Horse Pass casinos near Chandler and Vee Quiva casino near Laveen. The announcement comes a week after a security guard at Lone Butte Casino died of complications related to COVID-19, according to his family. This is the second closure for the casinos. Like other tribal casinos across Arizona, Gila River’s three casinos shut down because of COVID-19 in mid-March. The Gila River casinos initially reopened May 15, the same day Gov. Doug Ducey lifted Arizona’s stay-at-home order. Casino and tribal leaders had promised to institute new safety measures when they reopened in May, including encouraging patrons to wear masks. During the two week closure, casino officials will “reassess its current safety standards” after evaluating its safety plan with the Gila River Indian Community Council and receiving “feedback from its community and team members.” On June 11, Robert Washington, a 68-year old security guard at Lone Butte Casino, died in a hospital from complications related to COVID-19, according to his family. Washington, who lived in Chandler, had returned to work in mid-May. His daughter, Lina Washington of Sacramento, said he was immediately concerned about safety measures at the casino. “The day after reopening, he was like, ‘Lina, it was awful, it was horrible. The line was around the corner. … Eighty percent of the people weren’t wearing masks,’” Lina Washington said. Unlike some other casinos in the Phoenix area, Gila River Hotels & Casinos were only requiring employees to wear personal protective equipment. Customers were encouraged, but not mandated, to wear masks. Lina Washington said this left her father, who was diabetic and had recently beaten prostate cancer, exposed. Gila River officials told The Republic that it strengthened its policy last week to mandate all patrons wear masks. In a statement, Gov. Stephen Lewis said the temporary shutdown will help protect casino employees and customers, as well as those who live in the Gila River community. “Like our sister tribes and businesses all over Arizona, we have tried to do what is best for all, while processing new information and new guidelines about the pandemic with little in the way of definitive guidance,” he said. Last week, the casinos also instituted the mandatory mask policy. According to a released statement, the casinos will use the closure to implement new safety measures, including:
All employees will continue to be paid in full throughout the closure and will receive full medical benefits, according to Gila River’s statement.
Walk into a newly reopened Las Vegas casino and you’ll see dealers wearing masks behind plexiglass shields, with sanitizer at the ready for both chips and hands. What you won’t see is gamblers paying for their wagers with their cell phones.
That’s because Nevada doesn’t allow digital payments on casino floors. No state does. But that could change — and quickly — because of the coronavirus pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommend “tap-and-pay to limit handling of cash” as part of good hygiene measures to prevent Covid-19. Given this, state legislatures and gaming regulators may be more motivated to permit mobile payments or digital wallets to help curb the spread of viral infections. Nevada gaming regulators will hold a hearing on cashless payments on June 25. Fifty-nine percent of people who visited a casino within the past year, said they are less likely to use cash in their everyday lives because of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a report released Tuesday by the American Gaming Association. “Any customers uneasy about using cash on the gaming floor due to health or safety concerns should have an alternate payment option available to them,” the gaming industry’s trade group said. AGA’s CEO Bill Miller has been encouraging tribal leaders, legislators and regulators to consider flexible rules that permit cash alternatives. “Casinos are really looking for some modernization in the industry that for too long has been almost entirely reliant on cash,” Miller said, in an interview. Penn National Gaming CEO Jay Snowden said during a second-quarter earnings call that his team must reimagine how casinos operate. “We’re still an industry, probably the last out there, that transacts only in cash,” Snowden said. “We’re working with our regulators right now to see if we can really accelerate this digitalization [of] payments on our properties. While physical casinos still deal with physical cash, digital payments are standard in mobile sports betting and online casinos, though in some states, customers are required to set up their initial account and/or deposits in person, with cash. Sightline Payments provides a digital payment solution called Play+ to leading casinos with online sports betting. It counts MGM Resorts, Caesars, Penn National, Draft Kings, FanDuel and William Hill among its customers. And in Pennsylvania, it provides Play+ to the iLottery. Sightline’s founder and CEO Kirk Sanford said Play+ can be used as digital payment no matter how a gambler antes up, whether through slot machines, table games or mobile gaming. “Winnings can be immediately cashed out and used for spending, both on-premise at the casino or off-premise, everywhere that accepts Discover cards,” Sanford said. Sanford envisions contactless payments replacing even the chips used at gaming tables. “It removes one more obstacle to the hygienic running of a gaming floor and reduces costs for constant cleaning,” Sanford said. In the case of Pennsylvania’s iLottery, Sanford said, “Think about trying to go to liquor store to redeem a ticket worth hundreds of dollars. The retailer may not want to hand out that much cash. It’s much easier with electronic payments because the winnings just get returned to the account.” There are other advantages. Linking a mobile wallet with a customer loyalty program creates opportunities for the casinos. And while casino customers, especially slot players, are an aging crowd, younger players might find it easier to bet with digital payments. “It’s figuring out how to make the casino floor approachable to new generations of people that don’t use cash at all,” said Miller.
As coronavirus outbreaks spike in some areas of the United States, Apple is planning to close retail stores located in Florida, Arizona, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Apple began reopening stores in the United States in May, and as of this week, 154 of the company’s 271 stores had been reopened. Coronavirus cases are climbing in some places in the U.S., however, and Apple is reclosing locations in affected areas. Apple will be closing eleven of its retail stores, but it’s not yet clear which stores are being closed. Apple had reopened all 18 of its stores in Florida, five in Arizona, three in North Carolina, and one in South Carolina. Apple in a statement said that it is temporarily closing stores in “an abundance of caution” and is closely monitoring the situation. Apple’s retail chief, Deirdre O’Brien in a letter to customers amid of store openings said that Apple will only reopen stores when its confident it can safely serve customers. Decisions to close or reopen stores are based on data evaluation, such as local cases, near and long-term trends, and guidance from national and local health officials. O’Brien warned that Apple would not hesitate to close stores again if coronavirus cases spiked. “These are not decisions we rush into — and a store opening in no way means that we won’t take the preventative step of closing it again should local conditions warrant,” O’Brien said. In stores that have reopened, Apple is implementing safety measures that include mandatory masks, social distancing, frequent cleaning, temperature checks, and more. In some locations, stores are open only for repairs and curb-side pickup, while others are open but with a limited number of people allowed in at one time.