Category Archives: Corona Virus

Joe Rogan has told his Instagram followers he has been taking ivermectin, a deworming veterinary drug formulated for use in cows and horses, to help fight the coronavirus. The Food and Drug Administration has warned against taking the medication, saying animal doses of the drug can cause nausea, vomiting and in some cases severe hepatitis. Michael S. Schwartz/Getty Images hide caption

Joe Rogan has told his Instagram followers he has been taking ivermectin, a deworming veterinary drug formulated for use in cows and horses, to help fight the coronavirus. The Food and Drug Administration has warned against taking the medication, saying animal doses of the drug can cause nausea, vomiting and in some cases severe hepatitis.

Joe Rogan, the mega-popular podcast host who has suggested that young, fit people don't need to get the COVID-19 vaccine, has announced he tested positive for the virus, but is feeling fine thanks to a cocktail of unproven medical treatments.

In an Instagram video, the 54-year-old host of The Joe Rogan Experience, said he felt "very weary" on Saturday and got tested for the coronavirus the following day.

"Throughout the night I got fevers, sweats, and I knew what was going on," Rogan told his 13.1 million followers.

After the diagnosis, he said he "immediately threw the kitchen sink at it."

His methods included taking ivermectin, a deworming veterinary drug that is formulated for use in cows and horses. While a version of the drug is sometimes prescribed to people for head lice or skin conditions, the formula for animal use is much more concentrated. The Food and Drug administration is urging people to stop ingesting the animal version of the drug to fight COVID-19, warning it can cause nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, neurologic disorders and potentially severe hepatitis requiring hospitalization.

Rogan added that his treatments also included monoclonal antibodies, Z-pack antibiotics and a vitamin drip for "three days in a row."

"Here we are on Wednesday, and I feel great," he said.

Rogan has won legions of dedicated listeners by courting controversy on his show. In October, he came under fire for interviewing far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on his Spotify show. More recently, he faced criticism after saying that young and otherwise healthy people don't need a COVID-19 vaccine.

"People say, do you think it's safe to get vaccinated? I've said, yeah, I think for the most part it's safe to get vaccinated. I do. I do," Rogan said in an April 28 episode of the podcast.

"But if you're like 21 years old, and you say to me, should I get vaccinated? I'll go no. Are you healthy? Are you a healthy person?"

Rogan continued, "If you're a healthy person, and you're exercising all the time, and you're young, and you're eating well, like, I don't think you need to worry about this."

He later explained he is not "an anti-vax person" and joked he is not "a respected source of information, even for me."

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Joe Rogan Says He Has COVID-19 And Has Taken The Drug Ivermectin - NPR

Mike Berry, his wife Kari, and their four kids contracted COVID-19 in January. Mike, who was active with no underlying conditions, suffered severe symptoms and nearly lost his life.

I woke up in the hospital with a body that didnt function anymore, Mike said. I had to learn how to breathe, walk, stand, sit. All the things we take for granted. My main goal through it all was to be back with my family.

Eight months later, hes still fighting to get better.

My life now revolves around physical therapy and kidney dialysis three times a week, Mike said. Any activity, even talking, makes it difficult for me to breathe. I'm on oxygen 24/7. The longest lasting effects have been kidney failure, which Im in right now, and lung damage.

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We don't want to have to see others go through the same thing, said Keri, Mikes wife. Just because youre lucky enough to survive COVID-19, doesnt mean its over. Our lives are forever changed.

We spoke with a young woman named Abigail who decided to speak out for the same reason.

I wouldnt wish this on anyone, Abigail said.

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Abigail works in healthcare and contracted COVID-19 in March of 2020. Her case was much less severe, but like Mike, she still suffers from persistent side effects of the virus, months after beating it.

I slowly started to notice my functioning kept worsening, Abigail said. The new phase of this has been debilitating migraines. For me, the aftereffects have been worse than the actual virus.

These COVID-19 survivors with lingering symptoms are known as long-haulers.

According to a study from the University of Washington, more than one in four COVID-19 patients are long-haulers.

Some of the most common long-haul COVID-19 systems are breathing difficulties, extreme fatigue, brain fog, and kidney problems. But doctors say people have also reported digestion issues, hair loss, heart problems, anxiety, and depression.

Abigail has found some help through a program at Froedtert and the Medical College of Wisconsin called the Post-Covid Multi-Specialty Clinic, which is seeing a lot of these long haulers.

Dr. Rahul Nanchal, who is a critical care provider in the Intensive Care Unit, is among those leading the clinic.

This is the first time in a very long time weve seen a new infectious disease that has affected millions of people in such a short amount of time, said Dr. Nanchal. We are charting a new course in all of this and are trying to provide care as best we can. People are suffering from these long-term symptoms. Its affecting their quality of life. The more we endeavor to monitor them, and help them, the faster we can find solutions.

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Father recovering from severe COVID-19 symptoms 8 months later - WTMJ-TV

Los Angeles County recorded eight coronavirus outbreaks last week in its K-12 schools up from three the previous week. The latest outbreaks led to 72 student infections, an increase from 40 the week before.

But in a sign that school-based COVID-19 safety measures are showing promise, fewer students and staff were exposed to the coronavirus in these outbreaks: 211 people were exposed last week, down from 238 in the prior week the same week that classes began in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the second-largest in the nation.

This most likely reflects improved understanding of who is exposed, and great work by schools working to mitigate exposures and unnecessary quarantine of students by using cohorting, distancing strategies and seating charts in their classrooms, L.A. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said.

Many of the outbreaks are tied to athletic activities or because COVID-19 protocols were not followed. An outbreak is defined by linked cases involving three or more people in which transmission probably occurred at schools or school activities.

Of 17 school outbreaks identified since the beginning of August, eight were tied to youth sports, and another eight to classrooms. The classroom outbreaks have resulted in the infections of 117 students and seven staff members; one person has been hospitalized, Ferrer said.

The risk factors for transmission in schools include inconsistent and incorrect mask use indoors, visibly sick people showing up to school, lack of ventilation measures and lack of physical distancing in places like hallways, cafeterias, break rooms and playgrounds, as well as classrooms, where distancing cannot often done due to lack of space. State and county guidelines encourage but do not mandate physical distancing in classrooms.

Findings from these outbreaks suggests that transmission risk is highest where there is close, unmasked contact with symptomatic people, Ferrer said.

Between Aug. 15-29, among 1.5 million students and 200,000 staff members in Los Angeles County, there were 5,207 reports of coronavirus cases among students and 729 among staff.

But many of the coronavirus cases that are being identified are occurring at schools or sites where there are only one or two cases. Of 1,871 schools and related sites reporting coronavirus cases, 720 of them reported three or more cases.

L.A. Unified has launched an ambitious coronavirus testing program, which requires the screening of every student, teacher and staff member more than half a million people once a week for the foreseeable future. The effort is so vast that the number of tests done weekly through L.A. Unifieds program is equal to more than 50% of the countys weekly test results, according to data provided by the Department of Public Health.

The largest portion of these cases are identified through routine screening, and these are really people who are, in fact, asymptomatic, Ferrer said.

Still, its important to identify these cases so that infected people are removed from the classroom until they recover and are no longer contagious, she said.

Even as many schools in L.A. County have reopened, the overall number of new coronavirus infections countywide has actually declined.

Overall, L.A. County has reported an average of 2,596 new cases per day over the last week. Thats down 25% from two weeks ago, when many schools began to reopen.

The test positivity rate a metric measuring the proportion of tests that confirm coronavirus infection has also decreased notably, from 3.5% on Aug. 17 to 2.5% as of Tuesday.

Los Angeles Countys school-aged children remain in a better position than children in other parts of the country. There are some parts of the nation where pediatric COVID-19 hospitalization rates are at the highest point in the pandemic.

But in L.A. County, COVID-19 hospitalization rates for children are nowhere near [what] they were during our winter surge, Ferrer said.

This pattern may reflect the fact that many adults are vaccinated and that most people are wearing masks, Ferrer said.

Still, the concern about the Delta variant has caused L.A. County health officials to retain a stricter quarantine standard in schools than required by California for at least a few more weeks.

L.A. County officials have ordered unvaccinated students who had close contact with an infected person for at least 15 minutes in one day while within six feet of that person to be sent home and quarantined for at least eight days.

The state, meanwhile, does not require a quarantine for the close contact if both the infected person and close contact were wearing masks during the entire time of exposure.

Ferrer said she wanted to see a couple more weeks of data before relaxing the quarantine standard, to be sure that youre not creating an unintended consequence of creating a lot of spread in schools. COVID-19 vaccines are authorized only for those age 12 and older.

L.A. County health officials, however, did recently eliminate weekly testing requirements for all youth athletes or associated staff if they are fully vaccinated or have a documented coronavirus infection within the last 90 days. Also, weekly testing is no longer required for children younger than 12 if playing outdoors.

The Department of Public Health also removed a requirement that youth athletes and staff get a coronavirus test within 72 hours of a game.

In the Wednesday briefing, Debra Duardo, the superintendent of the Los Angeles County Office of Education, said that three L.A. County school districts have adopted vaccine mandates. Two of the three districts she named, ABC Unified and the Palmdale School District, said the information was incorrect and they do not have a student vaccine mandate. The third district, Culver City Unified, has approved a mandate for students, but it has not yet gone into effect.

A county spokesperson later corrected this information.

Duardo also named 13 districts that are considering vaccines mandates, but the spokesperson said this information is not confirmed and may have changed since an Aug. 19 school district survey.

But there are school systems exploring the option, including Los Angeles Unified and the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified, according to officials in those districts.

The L.A. teachers union has called for mandating vaccines for students.

Times staff writer Laura Newberry contributed to this report.

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L.A. school COVID outbreaks increase, some tied to athletics - Los Angeles Times

MIAMI The unexpected and unwelcome coronavirus surge now unfolding in the United States has hit hardest in states that were slow to embrace vaccines. And then there is Florida.

While leaders in that state also refused lockdowns and mask orders, they made it a priority to vaccinate vulnerable older people. Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, opened mass vaccination sites and sent teams to retirement communities and nursing homes. Younger people also lined up for shots.

Mr. DeSantis and public health experts expected a rise in cases this summer as people gathered indoors in the air-conditioning. But what happened was much worse: Cases spiraled out of control, reaching peaks higher than Florida had seen before. Hospitalizations followed. So did deaths, which are considerably higher than the numbers currently reached anywhere else in the country.

Its a very sad, sad moment for all of us, said Natalie E. Dean, a biostatistician at Emory University who until recently worked at the University of Florida and has closely followed the pandemic in the state. It was really hard to imagine us ever getting back to this place.

The Florida story is a cautionary tale for dealing with the current incarnation of the coronavirus. The United States has used the vaccines as its primary pandemic weapon. But Florida shows that even a state that made a major push for vaccinations Florida ranks 21st among states and Washington, D.C., in giving people of all ages at least one shot can be crushed by the Delta variant, reaching frightening levels of hospitalizations and deaths.

Clearly the vaccines are keeping most of these people out of the hospital, but were not building the herd immunity that people hoped, Mr. DeSantis said at a news conference this past week. Youve got a huge percentage of people adults that have gotten shots, and yet youve still seen a wave.

Morgues and crematories are full or getting there. Public utilities in Orlando and Tampa have asked residents to cut back on water usage so liquid oxygen, which is used in water treatment, can be conserved for hospitals. As of Friday, Florida was recording an average of 242 virus deaths a day, nearly as many as California and Texas combined, though a few states still had a higher per capita rate, according to public health data tracked by The New York Times.

Floridas pandemic data, more scant since the state ended its declared Covid-19 state of emergency in June, reveals only limited information about who is dying. Hospitals have said upward of 90 percent of their patients have been unvaccinated. Exactly why the state has been so hard-hit remains an elusive question. Other states with comparable vaccine coverage have a small fraction of Floridas hospitalization rate.

The best explanation of what has happened is that Floridas vaccination rates were good, but not good enough for its demographics. It has so many older people that even vaccinating a vast majority of them left more than 800,000 unprotected. Vaccination rates among younger people were uneven, so clusters of people remained at risk. Previous virus waves, which were milder than in some other states, conferred only some natural immunity.

And Florida is Florida: People have enjoyed many months of barhopping, party-going and traveling, all activities conducive to swift virus spread.

Unlike in places like Oregon, which is clamping down again, adopting even outdoor mask mandates, Mr. DeSantis continues to stay the course, hoping to power through despite the devastating human toll. A Quinnipiac University poll released this past week found that Mr. DeSantiss approval rating was 47 percent.

He and other state officials have sought to steer away from measures that could curtail infections, banning strict mask mandates in public schools. The biggest school districts imposed them anyway, and on Friday, a state judge ruled that Florida could not prevent those mandates, a decision the Department of Education plans to appeal.

Florida has experienced more deaths than normal from all causes, not just Covid-19 throughout the pandemic. In the early weeks of 2021, with cases surging and the vaccine rollout kicking off, the state averaged 5,600 deaths each week, about a third more than typical for that time of year, according to mortality figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The deaths dropped and then went back up.

These excess deaths are important, both because a number of Covid-19 deaths occur outside hospitals, and because the virus may contribute to deaths from other causes as a result of the strain on the health system.

In the first week of August, the state recorded another 5,600 deaths. But because mortality rates normally drop during summer months, the figure was more than 50 percent above whats typical.

Sept. 2, 2021, 12:52 p.m. ET

Were seeing a ton of people calling us to report the Covid deaths, said Dr. Stephen J. Nelson, the Polk County medical examiner. Theyre typically young people that have been sick for a while.

The picture of who is dying, however, is complicated.

About 82 percent of people 65 and older in the state are fully vaccinated, about average for the nation. That has still left a relatively large number of older people about 819,000 unvaccinated or only partially vaccinated, said Jason L. Salemi, an epidemiologist at the University of South Florida. If the unvaccinated also take fewer other precautions, he added, that would put them directly in the viruss path.

The Delta variant is exceptional at finding vulnerable populations, he said.

The situation in nursing homes, where infections can spread swiftly, has also been problematic. While vaccination rates among older Floridians as a whole have been good, the rate of nursing home residents who are fully vaccinated an average of 73.1 percent in each home is lower than every state but Nevada, according to the C.D.C. About 47.5 percent of nursing home staff members were fully vaccinated as of Aug. 15, the lowest of any state but Louisiana.

Older people are also more likely to have immune deficiencies and comorbidities, making them more susceptible to breakthrough infections and hospitalizations, noted Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious-disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco. And some, though not all, data have suggested that immunity against infection has waned in older, vaccinated adults; the Biden administration has indicated that those people will be among the first in line for booster shots.

Then there are the younger people, who now make up a larger share of Florida virus deaths. Before June 25, people under 65 made up 22 percent of deaths. Since then, that proportion has risen to 28 percent.

Fifty-six percent of people between the ages of 12 and 64 in Floridas 10 largest counties are fully vaccinated, which is consistent with national figures. But in the rest of the state, that figure is only 43 percent, and in 27 counties, less than 1 in 3 residents in the age group is fully vaccinated.

The heart-wrenching deaths of children remain rare. The deaths of young and middle-aged adults have become routine.

My mom had no prior illnesses she was strong as an ox, said Tr Burrows, whose 50-year-old mother, Cindy Dawkins, died from Covid-19 on Aug. 7. There was literally nothing wrong with her. This just came out of nowhere.

Ms. Dawkins, a mother of four who worked in a restaurant in Boynton Beach, began to feel ill shortly before her birthday, as the family was en route to celebrate in Orlando. Ms. Dawkins developed a cough and shortness of breath. Four days later, she went to a hospital. Doctors placed her on a ventilator. Thirty-two hours later, she was dead.

Her son said she had not gotten vaccinated because she feared possible side effects.

Those who did not get vaccinated are only part of the explanation behind the surge. Many states slammed by the virus earlier developed deep reservoirs of natural immunity from prior infections, affording them higher levels of protection than would be evident from vaccination rates alone.

Not so in Florida. Compared to other states, Florida was spared as devastating a wintertime wave of cases as ravaged other parts of the country in part because warm weather made it possible for people to gather outdoors. That was a boon to Floridas economy and its political leaders but a liability come summertime, when the state was unable to rely on the same wall of natural immunity that is now helping to shield places walloped by the virus this winter.

People have underestimated the role of natural immunity, Dr. Chin-Hong said. Wherever you get hit hard, you kind of get a reprieve from the virus.

There is some question as to whether Floridas vaccination rates, especially in places like Miami and Orlando, might have been inflated by tourists getting shots. Regardless, vaccinations appear to be making Covid-19 cases less severe in Miami-Dade County, which had one of the states highest vaccination rates, according to research by Dr. Jeffrey Harris, a physician and emeritus professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Beyond that, the hot weather has driven people indoors and attracted hordes of vacationers, creating the conditions for Delta to spread. For all of the focus on vaccines, scientists said, the viruss path remains highly dependent on how closely people are packed together, where people are congregating and what precautions they are taking.

For other states whose residents will head indoors as temperatures drop in the fall and winter, Florida offers an important lesson, Dr. Dean said: As in the beginning of the pandemic, hospitalizations need to be kept in check.

The minimum thing we should be achieving is to keep those hospitalization numbers low so its not straining the health care system, because that doesnt just affect Covid patients it affects everyone, she said.

And policymakers, she said, must realize that vaccination rates need to be higher than previously thought to control a more contagious virus variant.

Things can get out of hand, she said. I do believe that this could happen in other states, too.

Lisa Waananen contributed reporting. Kitty Bennett contributed research.

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What Went Wrong With the Coronavirus Pandemic in Florida - The New York Times

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When the security guard at Methodist Hospital San Antonio met the visitor at the door of the childrens emergency room on a Saturday afternoon in early August, the officers request was simple: The man needed to get a temperature screening to make sure he showed no early signs of COVID-19 before entering the hospital.

The man refused, became agitated and began angrily shouting, pulling out his camera to record the guard and hospital staff.

The scene got so tense that San Antonio police were called, but the man whose identity and reason for wanting to enter the hospital werent included in a police account of the incident stormed off in anger before the officer could arrive.

It was, relatively speaking, a small blow-up, but Texas hospital workers and health care officials say incidents like it have been rising in both number and intensity this summer as tensions boil during the delta-fueled fourth surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations.

Our staff have been cursed at, screamed at, threatened with bodily harm and even had knives pulled on them, said Jane McCurley, chief nursing executive for Methodist Healthcare System, speaking at a press conference five days after the incident in the childrens ER. It is escalating. Its just a handful at each facility who have been extremely abusive. But there is definitely an increasing number of occurrences every day.

Nurses and hospital staffers are historically vulnerable to workplace violence due to the nature of their jobs, where they deal with people who are having bad reactions to street drugs or mental breaks and often have to give bad news to patients or family already in extreme pain or emotional distress.

Half of all Texas nurses reported verbal and physical abuse at work in 2016 - the last year Texas health officials surveyed them about it.

But the pandemic has exacerbated the stress that can escalate into threats and violence, as people are now contending with not just the virus but also job loss and other stresses, said Karen Garvey, vice president of patient safety and clinical risk management at Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas.

Garvey said confrontations at Parkland just this year have included people being punched in the chest, having urine thrown on them and inappropriate sexual innuendos or behaviors in front of staff members. The verbal abuse, the name-calling, racial slurs weve had broken bones, broken noses.

Visitors and patients assaulting hospital staff was an epidemic before the pandemic it was just silent to the public, she added. Health care workers have been dealing with this for years, and its become more pronounced with the COVID pandemic.

The pandemic-related rise in tensions across the U.S. is not unique to the hospital industry. Airlines are reporting an increase in aggressive passengers as flight attendants take self-defense classes. Police are reporting an increase in violent crime and road rage incidents.

A similar phenomenon emerged last year when retail and grocery workers became front-line enforcers of mask mandates and limits on gatherings and indoor activities. And it resurfaced last month when parents aggressively confronted teachers at schools over oft-changing mask rules.

But unlike airlines, which can permanently ban passengers, hospitals are more limited in how they can respond or prevent those instances.

A 2013 Texas law made it a felony to assault an emergency room nurse, but legislation that would have expanded that to include nurses in other areas of a hospital died in the Texas Senate earlier this year. A bill addressing the issue is currently being considered in Washington by the U.S. Congress.

With hospitals reporting historic nursing shortages as the pandemic drags on, the fear is that the alarming rate of escalation will be the last straw for nurses who are physically worn out after fighting a pandemic for 18 months, thin on compassion for people who need care after choosing not to be vaccinated and afraid for their own personal safety, said Houston pediatrician Dr. Giancarlos Toledanes.

With the escalation of this violence toward health care workers, were going to lose the workers that are deemed essential, Toledanes said. If the problem continues to compound, then I think its going to make it much more difficult to staff these hospitals.

The Texas Department of State Health Services doesnt track incidents of aggression against hospital staff outside of its regular surveys, the next of which will be done next year, a spokesperson said.

But as health officials across Texas watch hospital ICUs and pediatric units overflow with record numbers of mostly unvaccinated people, they say the surge in aggression toward health care workers is obvious.

Many of the problems being reported in recent months include disagreements over masking and screening protocols that people dont have to follow in other places, particularly after most mandatory protocols were banned in recent months by Gov. Greg Abbott, officials said.

Confrontations are sometimes caused by hours- or dayslong waits in emergency rooms that are so full of COVID-19 patients that there is no room for anyone else, health care workers said.

Tempers are high, said Carrie Kroll, director of advocacy for the Texas Hospital Association. To the point where some systems are putting a security guard at check-in because family members are getting so abusive over the masking and some of the other screening things they need to do.

Families are often upset when they cant visit someone due to COVID-19 rules that limit the number of people who can be bedside or even come inside the hospital, said Serena Bumpus, director of practice at the Texas Nurses Association.

When our family members are sick, we want to be there by their side, and its not that easy to be by our loved ones side anymore because of this increase in the number of COVID patients in our facilities, she said.

At the Katy campus of Texas Children's Hospital west of Houston, Toledanes said some parents get verbally abusive over rules that require them to wait for COVID-19 test results before more than one parent is allowed into a room with a sick child.

With their child in the hospital and theyre the only ones handling everything, it obviously gets stressful, he said. Its escalated a lot more, especially now that weve gotten a little bit stricter with our policies due to the surge.

The threats follow health care workers online as well, and often have to do with philosophical differences over what have become political hot buttons such as masking and vaccinations, Toledanes wrote in a recent column for the online medical magazine MedScape.

Online, healthcare workers, who advocate for masking or vaccination, are often subject to death threats, threats to family members, and verbal abuse on social media, he wrote. Veiled threats of we know who you are and we will find you follow physicians who advocate for masking in schools.

At Parkland, some of the administrations actions to protect the workers include a staff of six mental health peace officers known as the Law Enforcement Intervention for Environmental/Patient Safety staff who are specially trained to respond to high-risk incidents, Garvey said. Administrators have developed a flagging system in the patient record which identifies patients who have been identified as known risks to staff, she said.

Some hospitals have hung signs in hallways reminding families to be courteous and patient with the overworked staff.

In mid-August, the escalating reports prompted the Texas Hospital Association to take to social media with an image of an exhausted nurses face, mask pulled below her chin.

Dont forget the person behind the mask, the image reads.

McCurley said that the increasing violence this year is made worse by the contrast in attitudes workers are seeing now compared with a year ago, when the public seemed to understand that nurses and hospital staff were standing between them and the deadly pandemic.

We were seen as health care heroes and our community responded with love and support, food and gifts, drive-by parades, buses and motorcycles and airplanes, and we felt so much love and support. It gave us the courage to go in and face our own fears of the unknown in the beginning, McCurley said at the August press conference. Today, those health care workers are experiencing abusive behavior by patient families. Its unfathomable that its occurring, and it has to stop.

Disclosure: Texas Children's Hospital and the Texas Hospital Association have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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Verbal and physical attacks on health workers surge as emotions boil during latest COVID-19 wave - The Texas Tribune

As a new coronavirus wave accelerated by the Delta variant spreads across the United States, many Republican governors have taken sweeping action to combat what they see as an even more urgent danger posed by the pandemic: the threat to personal freedom.

In Florida, Ron DeSantis has prevented local governments and school districts from enacting mask mandates and battled in court over compliance. In Texas, Greg Abbott has followed a similar playbook, renewing an order last week to ban vaccine mandates.

And in South Dakota, Kristi Noem, who like Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Abbott is a potential 2024 candidate for president, has made her blanket opposition to lockdowns and mandates a key selling point. Arriving by horseback and carrying the American flag, she advertised the states recent Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, which drew half a million people, as a beacon of liberty.

Ms. Noem brushed aside criticism from Democrats and public health experts about the gathering, which was followed by a local Covid spike, saying on Fox News that the left was accusing us of embracing death when were just allowing people to make personal choices.

The actions of Republican governors, some of the leading stewards of the countrys response to the virus, reveal how the politics of the partys base have hardened when it comes to curbing Covid. As some Republican-led states, including Florida, confront their most serious outbreaks yet, even rising death totals are being treated as less politically damaging than imposing coronavirus mandates of almost any stripe.

Freedom is good policy and good politics, Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican and ally of Mr. Abbotts who has introduced federal legislation to end mask decrees and to forbid federal vaccine passports, said in an interview.

Mr. DeSantis has become a symbolic face of the battle, as President Biden has urged Republican governors opposed to mandates to at least get out of the way. This week, Mr. DeSantiss education commissioner withheld funds from two school districts that made masks mandatory.

Most top Republicans, including every Republican governor, have been vaccinated and have encouraged others to do so. But most have also stopped short of supporting inoculation requirements and have opposed masking requirements.

In many ways, Republican leaders are simply following Republican voters.

Skepticism about masks, vaccines and the rules governing them is increasingly intertwined with the cultural issues that dominate the modern Republican Party. The fear over losing medical freedom has become part of the broader worry that cancel culture is coming for conservatives way of life.

And while opposing pandemic edicts is a limited-government stance, the forceful approach of governors is at odds with the long-held principle of local control, making it the latest Republican Party orthodoxy to be cast aside since the beginning of the Trump era, along with free trade and limited spending.

The intensifying conservative mistrust of the news media and opposition to the directives of elite institutions and experts Dr. Anthony S. Fauci is now so reviled by some that Mr. DeSantis sold merchandise saying Dont Fauci My Florida have cleaved the country into two factions guided by alternative sets of beliefs.

One outlier among Republican governors is Larry Hogan, a moderate who leads Democratic-dominated Maryland. He recently required that hospital and nursing home employees be vaccinated.

Frankly, its confusing to me as to why some of my colleagues are mandating why you cant wear masks, or mandating that businesses cant make their own decisions about vaccines, or mandating that school systems cant make decisions for themselves, Mr. Hogan said in an interview. And then theyre talking about freedom? It just doesnt make sense to me.

The pandemic, public health officials say, is now largely one of the unvaccinated, and the virus is raging particularly in conservative states with far lower inoculation rates and more relaxed attitudes toward group gatherings. Of the 10 states with the most cases per capita in recent days, nine voted Republican in last years presidential race and nine are led by Republican governors, according to The New York Times coronavirus database.

Republican leaders posture, particularly on keeping schools from requiring masks, does not appear popular across the wider electorate. In Florida, a Quinnipiac poll released last week found that 60 percent of residents supported compulsory masks in schools.

But among Republicans, that figure was inverted: 72 percent of Mr. DeSantiss party said they opposed universal masking requirements in schools. The poll showed that a plurality of Republicans in the state also opposed a mask requirement for health care workers, a measure that is popular among independents.

Many Republicans are out on an island by themselves, said Whit Ayres, a veteran G.O.P. pollster. It may be a safe political place for some primary electorates at the moment. But ultimately you have to win a general election.

Sept. 2, 2021, 12:52 p.m. ET

Governors nationwide almost uniformly reject the idea that political considerations have shaped their Covid policies. Politics have played no role, said Ian Fury, a spokesman for Ms. Noem.

The offices of Mr. DeSantis, Mr. Abbott, Ms. Noem and other Republican governors did not make them available for comment. But advisers to multiple Republican governors said the widespread distribution of vaccines had changed the governing calculus when it came to masks and shutdowns. Both Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Abbott have focused on opening antibody treatment sites for those who contract the virus.

As Florida became the first state to reach a new peak in deaths since vaccines became freely available, Mr. DeSantis has remained steadfast in keeping schools from requiring masks without a parental opt-out.

We say unequivocally no to lockdowns, no to school closures, no to restrictions and no to mandates, Mr. DeSantis said at a conservative conference in July.

These choices by governors carry a range of risks.

One Republican strategist privately lamented, only half-jokingly, that the party was going to kill off part of its own base with its vaccine hesitancy. Former President Donald J. Trump recently told donors at a New York Republican Party fund-raiser that he hoped his supporters would get vaccinated because we need our people, according to two attendees.

Even Mr. Trump is not immune from blowback, however. He received a rare rebuke from his base at an August rally in Alabama after he urged people to get vaccinated. Take the vaccines, he said. I did it. Its good.

Some in the crowd began to jeer; Mr. Trump appeared to soften his stance.

Thats OK, thats all right, he said. You got your freedoms, but I happened to take the vaccine.

Mr. Trumps political operation has clearly assessed where his base stands. FREEDOM PASSPORTS > VACCINE PASSPORTS, read one recent fund-raising text, selling $45 American flag shirts that declare, This is my freedom passport.

UnderstandVaccine and Mask Mandates in the U.S.

In Arkansas, Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, saw his partys pushback firsthand on a 16-stop tour to promote vaccination.

Mr. Hutchinson signed a law this spring banning mask mandates, but with cases rising again this month, he said he regretted it. In Siloam Springs, he was pelted with questions from frustrated constituents, including one woman who told him that she had been praying that God himself will step in so that Christians are not forced by their employers and a mandate to get the vaccine.

Yet even if God does not, I will not bow, she said to raucous cheers.

Then there is Ms. Noem, who last month accused other Republican governors of pretending they didnt shut down their states, that they didnt close their regions, that they didnt mandate masks. The remarks were widely interpreted to be aimed at potential 2024 rivals.

Mr. Cruz, who ran for president in 2016 and could again in 2024, predicted a reckoning for politicians, including Republicans, who had embraced pandemic edicts. Theres a range of politicians in terms of how long they shut things down, he said. In my view, the shorter the better. But that will certainly be a legitimate topic for discussion and debate.

Mr. Ayres, the Republican pollster, said that governors trying to control the virus policies of schools, employers and local officials were breaking with years of tradition on free enterprise and local control.

Liberty has never meant the freedom to threaten the health of others, Mr. Ayres said. That is a perversion of the definition of liberty and freedom.

Some governors who imposed mandates and lockdowns last year have even been targeted by state legislators who want to trim their powers.

In Ohio, the G.O.P.-controlled Legislature overrode a veto by Gov. Mike DeWine, a fellow Republican, of legislation that reined in his administrations emergency powers to manage the pandemic. After requiring masks to be worn last year in schools, he has not renewed the order this fall.

Mr. DeWine, who drew national attention for his fast and forceful response to Covid in early 2020, now faces a 2022 primary challenge from Jim Renacci, a former congressman. Mr. Renacci said the governors handling of the virus was a big part of his bid.

He said Mr. DeWine had now gone quiet on mandates because he realizes what he did the first time did not make Republicans happy.

A spokesman for Mr. DeWine said the need for mandates had changed since vaccines became freely available.

The most severe Covid outbreaks have been most concentrated in the South, and the Republican governors of Alabama and Mississippi have largely embraced the no-mandate ethos even as cases have climbed to new heights.

Gov. Tate Reeves of Mississippi renewed an emergency declaration in mid-August but set clear boundaries: There will be no lockdowns and there will be no statewide mandates, he said.

The same week, two field hospitals were installed in the parking lots of Mississippi medical centers.

Jennifer Medina contributed reporting.

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GOP Governors Fight Virus Mandates as the Party's Covid-19 Politics Harden - The New York Times

Health officials in Illinois have linked nearly 200 COVID-19 cases to two events a church camp for teens and a men's conference and the number of people who may have been exposed may be much greater and from multiple states.

An organization held a five-day church camp for teens and a two-day men's conference in June that have since been linked to a spike in cases following research by the Illinois Department of Public Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report Monday. The CDC did not name the organization.

As of mid-August, 180 COVID-19 cases had been linked to those who attended one of those events or to someone who had close contact with an attendee, the CDC said.

A majority of those cases, 122, were attributed to attendees, with 87 people contracting COVID-19 during the camp and 35 during the conference. Most of those cases, 104, were unvaccinated people.

Only five people were hospitalized, none of whom had been vaccinated, and no deaths were reported. But officials say that more than 1,000 people across at least four states could have been exposed through the two events, the CDC said.

The report points to these cases as an example of the dangers of hosting large events with little to no safeguards in place. Attendees at both events were not required to be vaccinated, and organizers did not require participants to get tested before allowing entry, the report says.

Nearly 300 teens between the ages of 14 and 18 attended the camp after traveling together in large groups on buses. They spent the week living and dining together and mingling with other campers, according to the CDC.

It's unclear whether masks were required, but the report says that a list of items to pack for the week did not include masks. Similarly, another 500 people attended the men's conference, where masks were also not required, the CDC says.

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Church Camp, Conference In Illinois Linked To Almost 200 COVID Cases : Coronavirus Updates - NPR

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WJW) The Ohio Department of Health held a press conference Thursday on the spread of COVID-19 in the state.

On Wednesday, 7,102 new coronavirus cases were reported by ODH.

That included 1,021 cases that were delayed because of a lab reporting issue between Aug. 15 to Aug. 25 that has since been resolved.

As of Wednesday afternoon, 2,566 people in Ohio are hospitalized with COVID-19.

The Ohio Hospital Association says 1 in 8 hospitalized patients are being treated for coronavirus.

In intensive care that number is 1 in 5.

Ohio hospitals have 1,114 ICU beds available currently.

That includes both adult and pediatric hospitals.

ODH Director Bruce Vanderhoff, MD, MBA spoke at the press conference with Brian Taylor, MD, Inpatient Medical Director at Central Ohio Primary Care Hospitalists and Hector Wong, ICU Physician, and Head of Critical Care at Cincinnati Childrens Hospital.

Hospital staff is exhausted, Dr. Wong shared.

We can no longer say kids arent getting sick from COVID, Dr. Taylor said, comparing this stage of the coronavirus pandemic to 2020.

Were starting to see kids in the hospital, including the ICU, because of COVID, he shared.

Everyone in the ICU is seriously ill, and some of them are going to die, said Dr. Vanderhoff.

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1 in 8 people in Ohios hospitals treated for COVID-19 - WJW FOX 8 News Cleveland

Inmates do a deep cleaning in a cell pod to prevent the spread of COVID-19 at the San Diego County Jail in April 2020. A new study says crowded jails may have contributed to millions of COVID-19 cases across the United States. Sandy Huffaker/Getty Images hide caption

Inmates do a deep cleaning in a cell pod to prevent the spread of COVID-19 at the San Diego County Jail in April 2020. A new study says crowded jails may have contributed to millions of COVID-19 cases across the United States.

If the U.S. had done more to reduce its incarceration rate, it could have prevented millions of COVID-19 cases.

That's the conclusion of researchers who conducted what they say is the first study to link mass incarceration rates to pandemic vulnerability. Many of those preventable cases, they add, occurred in communities of color.

The U.S. jail and prison system acts as an epidemic engine, according to the study from researchers at Northwestern University and the World Bank.

That engine is driven by a massive number of people who, despite some counties' efforts to trim jail populations, have been cycling between cramped detention facilities and their home communities.

After analyzing data from 1,605 counties, the researchers linked an 80% reduction in the U.S. jail population to a 2% drop in the growth rate of daily COVID-19 cases.

Such a substantial drop in the incarceration level could have been achieved by instituting alternatives to jail for nonviolent offenses, according to the researchers Dr. Eric Reinhart of the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and Daniel Chen of the Toulouse School of Economics and the World Bank.

That 2% reduction is a conservative estimate, but it still represents a dramatic potential shift, Reinhart told NPR.

When compounded daily, Reinhart said in a Northwestern news release about the study, "even just a 2% reduction in daily case growth rates in the U.S. from the beginning of the pandemic until now would translate to the prevention of millions of cases."

Tens of thousands of deaths could also have been prevented, he said.

A red tag on a cell door signifies an active COVID-19 case for its inhabitants. The first medically vulnerable inmates in Minnesota were vaccinated at Faribault Prison in January. Aaron Lavinsky/Star Tribune/Getty Images hide caption

A red tag on a cell door signifies an active COVID-19 case for its inhabitants. The first medically vulnerable inmates in Minnesota were vaccinated at Faribault Prison in January.

The U.S. has long had the world's highest incarceration rate among industrialized countries reporting such statistics. During the pandemic, it has also reported more COVID-19 cases and deaths than any other country despite having less than 5% of the global population.

The new research, published Thursday in the journal JAMA Network Open, suggests those circumstances are directly related.

On average, U.S jails currently host some 650,000 detainees every day, according to Reinhart. The dynamic also includes more than 220,000 full-time jail staff, who commute back and forth from their homes each day, the study said.

Many of those detainees are held in custody for only short periods of time as they either await trial or serve short sentences. The U.S. jail population has a 55% weekly turnover rate, according to the study.

"This jail churn effectively produces epidemic machines that seed outbreaks both in and beyond jails, undermining public safety for the entire country," Reinhart said.

Citing crowded conditions and poor health care in jails and prisons, a summary of the study from Northwestern said the U.S. facilities "have effectively become infectious disease incubators," putting the country at a higher epidemiological risk.

The link between prisons and public health is one of the reasons Black and Hispanic communities have been disproportionately harmed by the coronavirus, the study's authors said.

The spread of the coronavirus between jails and communities "likely accounts for a substantial proportion of the racial disparities we have seen in COVID-19 cases across the U.S.," Reinhart said.

"Ultimately, this also harms all U.S. residents regardless of race, class or partisan affiliations, as disregarding the health of marginalized people inevitably causes harm albeit unevenly to everyone else in a society, too," he added.

The benefits of cutting the jail population would be magnified, Reinhart and Chen wrote, in counties with high proportions of Black residents as well as in urban areas with above-average population density.

The study's findings are based on data from jails that reduced their populations at rates from 20% to 50% during the pandemic in response to health risks from COVID-19.

The researchers sought to predict what the results would look like if the U.S. dropped its jail population by 80%, which would bring the country closer to the average rates seen in peer nations.

The study relied on data gathered at the county level from January 2020 to November, representing 72% of the U.S. population.

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Crowded U.S. Jails Drove Millions Of COVID-19 Cases, A New Study Says - NPR

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