The New York Times: Trump Attacks W.H.O. Over Criticisms Of U.S. Approach To Coronavirus
President Trump lashed out on Tuesday at the World Health Organization, choosing a new political enemy to attack and threatening to withhold funding from a premier health institution even as a deadly virus ravages nations around the globe. “We’re going to put a hold on money spent to the W.H.O. We’re going to put a very powerful hold on it and we’re going to see,” Mr. Trump said during the daily coronavirus briefing at the White House, accusing the organization of having not been aggressive enough in confronting the virus. “They called it wrong. They call it wrong. They really, they missed the call.” (Shear, 4/7)

Politico: Trump Announces, Then Reverses, Freeze On Funding For World Health Organization
Minutes later, though, the president walked back the declaration, telling reporters that he was “looking into it” and conceding that a global pandemic was “maybe not” the best time to freeze funding for the international organization. “I mean, I‘m not saying I‘m going to do it, but we are going to look at it,” Trump said, denying his comments from minutes earlier when pressed by reporters. “I said we’re going to look at it. We’re going to investigate it, we're going to look at it. But we will look at ending funding.” (Forgey and Oprysko, 4/7)

Stat: Trump Pledges To Put A Hold On U.S. Funding For World Health Organization
The U.S. has provided the agency with $893 million during the agency’s current two-year funding period, which includes about $236 million in dues. That funding accounts for about 14.67% of the WHO’s total funding, according to the organization’s website. The WHO is also notoriously cash-strapped; the annual dues members companies pay to support its annual budget have been frozen for more than a decade. The WHO has been sounding the alarm over the coronavirus since early January. By late February the group’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, urged countries to prepare — before the U.S. had widespread community transmission of the virus. The WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic on March 11. (Florko, 4/7)

The Hill: Trump Considering Suspending Funding To WHO 
The WHO said in early February that widespread travel bans that interfere with international travel and trade were not necessary to prevent the spread of COVID-19, days after the Trump administration announced it would restrict travel coming into the U.S. from China. It did not take particular issue with the president's travel restriction. “They actually criticized and disagreed with my travel ban at the time I did it, and they were wrong. They’ve been wrong about a lot of things. They had a lot of information early, and they didn’t — they seemed to be very China-centric. We have to look into it,” Trump told reporters. (Chalfant, 4/7)

The Hill: Graham Backs Trump, Vows No Money For WHO In Next Funding Bill 
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Tuesday pledged to cut funding for the World Health Organization (WHO) in Congress's next appropriations bill unless it makes changes to its leadership. Graham said during an appearance on Fox News that he would use his position as chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee overseeing foreign operations to ensure the WHO did not get funding from the U.S. (Wise, 4/7)

The New York Times: Trump Ousts Coronavirus Spending Watchdog Glenn Fine
President Trump moved on Tuesday to oust the leader of a new watchdog panel charged with overseeing how his administration spends trillions of taxpayer dollars in coronavirus pandemic relief, the latest step in an abruptly unfolding White House power play against semi-independent inspectors general across the government. The official, Glenn A. Fine, has been the acting inspector general for the Defense Department since before Mr. Trump took office and was set to become the chairman of a new Pandemic Response Accountability Committee to police how the government carries out the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief bill. But Mr. Trump replaced Mr. Fine in his Pentagon job, disqualifying him from serving on the new oversight panel. (Savage and Baker, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Trump Challenges Authority, Independence Of Agency Watchdogs
In four days, Trump has fired one inspector general tied to his impeachment, castigated another he felt was overly critical of the coronavirus response and sidelined a third meant to safeguard against wasteful spending of the coronavirus funds. The actions have sent shock waves across the close-knit network of watchdog officials in government, creating open conflict between a president reflexively resistant to outside criticism and an oversight community tasked with rooting out fraud, misconduct and abuse. (Tucker, Daly and Jalonick, 4/8)

Reuters: Trump Removes Top Coronavirus Watchdog, Widens Attack On Inspectors General
It was the Republican president’s most recent broadside against the federal watchdogs who seek to root out government waste, fraud and abuse following his removal on Friday of the intelligence community’s IG and his sharp criticism of the one who oversees the Department of Health and Human Services. Glenn Fine, acting Defense Department inspector general, was named last week to chair a committee acting as a sort of uber-watchdog over the federal government’s response to the new coronavirus, including health policy and the largest economic relief package in U.S. history. (Lambert and Brice, 4/7)

The New York Times: Trump’s Inspector General Has Expressed Dim Views Of Congressional Oversight
Amid the blur of President Trump’s impeachment proceedings in December, the Government Accountability Office received a terse message from the White House regarding its investigation into why security aid to Ukraine was withheld. The inquiries of Congress’s nonpartisan watchdog arm had already been rebuffed by the Defense Department and it received spotty responses from the White House Office of Management and Budget. On Dec. 20, a White House lawyer made clear that there would be no further cooperation. (Rappeport, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Trump Removes Inspector General Glenn Fine, Who Was Tasked To Oversee Coronavirus Stimulus Spending
“We wanted inspectors general because of an out-of-control president named Richard Nixon, and this president is trying to destroy them,” said Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight. “What’s happened this week has been a total full-on assault on the IG system.” (Nakashima, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Trump Removes Watchdog Who Heads Panel Overseeing Pandemic Stimulus Spending
“Basically, the message that has now been sent very loudly and clearly throughout the United States government, to inspectors general and everybody else, is don’t displease this guy because you’re liable to lose your job. It’s the chilling effect,” Sen. Angus King (I., Maine) said of the president in an interview. Presidents generally have unilateral authority to remove inspectors general, but they have traditionally avoided doing so because they are seen as independent watchdogs. With Mr. Fine’s ouster, the Environmental Protection Agency’s watchdog, Sean O’Donnell, who was appointed in January, has stepped in as acting inspector general at the Defense Department, officials said. (Kesling, Restuccia and Volz, 4/7)

Politico: Trump Removes Independent Watchdog For Coronavirus Funds, Upending Oversight Panel
Democrats blasted Trump's decision. "The sudden removal and replacement of Acting Inspector General Fine is part of a disturbing pattern of retaliation by the president against independent overseers fulfilling their statutory and patriotic duties to conduct oversight on behalf of the American people," said Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a statement. Senate Minority Leader ripped Trump's "corrupt action" and said he is trying to sideline "honest and independent public servants because they are willing to speak truth to power and because he is so clearly afraid of strong oversight." (Cheney and O'Brien, 4/7)

ABC News: Trump Abruptly Removes Inspector General Named To Oversee $2T In Stimulus Spending 
Fine, who served for 11 years at as the Department of Justice inspector general, will now return to the position of principal deputy inspector general for the Department of Defense, Allen told ABC News. In that deputy role, he was no longer eligible to lead the stimulus watchdog group. “President Trump is abusing the coronavirus pandemic to eliminate honest and independent public servants because they are willing to speak truth to power and because he is so clearly afraid of strong oversight," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement. (Siegel, Mallin and Khan, 4/7)

Bloomberg: Trump Team Preps Plans To Reopen Economy That Depend On Testing
The White House is developing plans to get the U.S. economy back in action that depend on testing far more Americans for coronavirus than has been possible to date, according to people familiar with the matter. The effort would likely begin in smaller cities and towns in states that haven’t yet been heavily hit by the virus. Cities such as New York, Detroit, New Orleans and other places the president has described as “hot spots” would remain shuttered. (Parker, 4/7)

Politico: The Reasons Why The U.S. Isn’t On Track To Open Up
President Donald Trump and other officials are boasting that the United States is now testing nearly 700,000 people each week for the coronavirus. But that’s not enough to catch every case of the disease or to provide the kind of data needed to lift social distancing measures and allow people to go back to work. And because testing capacity remains inadequate, it’s unclear when we’ll get there. Labs nationwide are overwhelmed by patient samples flooding in as they continue to face a shortage of critical supplies. A rapid test described by Trump in mid-March as a “game changer” that would soon be available in doctors offices is still hard to come by for many Americans. (Lim, 4/7)

The Hill: Fauci: Country Should Be In 'Good Shape' To Reopen Schools In The Fall 
Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Tuesday that he thinks the country will be in “good shape” for reopening schools by the start of next school year in the fall. “Bottom line is, no absolute prediction, but I think we're going to be in good shape,” Fauci said at a White House news briefing when asked whether he thinks schools will be able to start on time next school year. (Sullivan, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Government And Businesses Turn Attention To Eventual Reopening Of $22 Trillion U.S. Economy
Dr. Fauci said a first condition is a steep drop in the number of cases. “You’ve got to make sure you are absolutely going in the right direction.” Then, he said, “you gradually come back. You don’t jump into it with both feet.” The federal government has yet to put in place the kind of nationwide testing, tracing and surveillance system that public health experts say is needed to prevent another surge in coronavirus cases when social distancing eases. That includes identifying people who are asymptomatic and can also spread the coronavirus, health experts said. (Armour and Hilsenrath, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Listen: Dr. Anthony Fauci On How Life Returns To Normal
In today’s episode of The Journal podcast, we talk to Dr. Anthony Fauci about what it will take to open America back up after the coronavirus pandemic. “It isn’t like a light switch, on and off,” said Dr. Fauci, a member of President Trump’s task force on the pandemic and head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “It’s a gradual pulling back on certain of the restrictions to try and get society a bit back to normal.” (4/7)

The Associated Press: CDC Weighs Loosening Guidelines For Some Exposed To Virus
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is considering changing its guidelines for self-isolation to make it easier for those who have been exposed to someone with the coronavirus to return to work if they are asymptomatic. The public health agency, in conjunction with the White House coronavirus task force, is considering an announcement as soon as Wednesday, Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday. Under the proposed guidance, people who are exposed to someone infected would be allowed back on the job if they are asymptomatic, test their temperature twice a day and wear a face mask, said a person familiar with the proposal under consideration. (Miller, 4/8)

The Washington Post: White House Lacks National Strategy For Key Coronavirus Tests
Three months into the coronavirus epidemic, the Trump administration has yet to devise a national strategy to test Americans for the deadly disease — something experts say is key to blunting the outbreak and resuming daily life. In the absence of a national plan, several states are developing their own testing systems, but the emerging picture varies widely. States with more money and robust medical sectors have devised comprehensive plans, while others lag far behind. (Eilperin, McGinley, Mufson and Dawsey, 4/7)

The Washington Post: White House, Trump Among First To Use Abbott Rapid Coronavirus Tests Sought By Communities
As communities across the country desperately seek access to emerging rapid-turnaround covid-19 tests, one place already using them is the White House, where guests visiting President Trump and Vice President Pence have been required to undergo the exams since last week. The procedure is the latest of new safeguards aimed at protecting the health of the nation’s top elected officials from the novel coronavirus, which has sickened some prominent global leaders. (Nakamura and Dawsey, 4/7)

CNN: Donald Trump's White House In Chaos On Virus' Most Tragic Day 
The chaos and confusion rocking President Donald Trump's administration on the most tragic day yet of the coronavirus pandemic was exceptional even by his own standards. Trump set out Tuesday to cement his image of a wartime leader facing down an "invisible enemy" at a dark moment as the country waits for the virus to peak and with the economy languishing in suspended animation... But instead of putting minds at rest, Trump's wild performance instead put on a display many of the personal and political habits that have defined his tumultuous presidency. (Collinson, 4/8)

ABC News: Birx Avoids Treating Her Grandchild With High Fever, Cites Fear Of Infecting Trump 
White House coronavirus task force coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx knows how tough the social distancing guidelines can be, revealing one "sacrifice" on Monday that, she says, has personally challenged her. Birx said she opted out of visiting her granddaughter over the weekend, despite the 10-month-old having "a fever of 105" and Birx feeling a responsibility as the doctor of the family -- calling it an illustration of the sacrifices everyone must also take to slow the spread of COVID-19. (Cathey, 4/7)

CNN: New White House Press Secretary Downplayed Pandemic Threat And Said Democrats Were Rooting For Coronavirus 
New White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany repeatedly downplayed the threat of the coronavirus in comments made in February and March, a CNN KFile review has found. In radio and television appearances, McEnany, in her role as spokeswoman for President Donald Trump's 2020 campaign, said the administration had the rapidly spreading coronavirus "under control" and said that because of travel restrictions enacted by the President, "we will not see diseases like the coronavirus come here." (Kaczynski and McDermott, 4/7)

Meanwhile, in more testing news —

Modern Healthcare: Walgreens Expanding Drive-Through COVID-19 Testing
Walgreens Boots Alliance is expanding its COVID-19 drive-through testing capabilities beyond Chicago and will use Abbott Laboratories' fast-results test at its sites. Last month, Walgreens selected Chicago as its first testing location, primarily for health care and other vulnerable front-line workers. That site, in southwest suburban Bolingbrook, has been doing 150 tests a day. (Barker, 4/7)

NBC News: Tested Positive For Coronavirus? Health Workers May Share Your Address With Police
In a growing number of cities and states, local governments are collecting the addresses of people who test positive for the coronavirus and sharing the lists with police and first responders. Law enforcement officials say this information sharing — which is underway in Massachusetts, Alabama and Florida, and in select areas of North Carolina — will help keep officers and EMTs safe as they respond to calls at the homes of people who have been infected. The first responders can take additional precautions in those cases to avoid being exposed to the virus, state health departments and local police officials say. (Glaser and Schuppe, 4/8)

ABC News: Intelligence Report Warned Of Coronavirus Crisis As Early As November: Sources 
As far back as late November, U.S. intelligence officials were warning that a contagion was sweeping through China’s Wuhan region, changing the patterns of life and business and posing a threat to the population, according to four sources briefed on the secret reporting. Concerns about what is now known to be the novel coronavirus pandemic were detailed in a November intelligence report by the military's National Center for Medical Intelligence (NCMI), according to two officials familiar with the document’s contents. (Margolin and Meek, 4/8)

Politico: Trump Says He Didn’t Know Of, Still Hasn’t Seen Navarro Memos On Possible Pandemic
President Donald Trump on Monday denied that he’d ever seen a handful of memos, written and circulated through the White House by his top trade adviser beginning in January, that warned the coronavirus could cost the country trillions of dollars and imperil the lives of millions of Americans. At the White House during a coronavirus task force news briefing, the president said he’d learned of Peter Navarro’s memos, the contents of which were first disclosed on Monday night, only a few days ago, but he asserted that the documents lined up with his travel restrictions for foreigners coming from China. (Oprysko, 4/7)

Politico: Kushner’s Team Seeks National Coronavirus Surveillance System
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner’s task force has reached out to a range of health technology companies about creating a national coronavirus surveillance system to give the government a near real-time view of where patients are seeking treatment and for what, and whether hospitals can accommodate them, according to four people with knowledge of the discussions. The proposed national network could help determine which areas of the country can safely relax social-distancing rules and which should remain vigilant. But it would also represent a significant expansion of government use of individual patient data, forcing a new reckoning over privacy limits amid a national crisis. (Cancryn, 4/7)

Stat: Will We Give Up Privacy For Security After Covid-19? 
In a span of weeks, the novel coronavirus has turned the nation’s roiling health privacy debate on its head. Concerns about what Google and Facebook might be doing with patients’ sensitive health information have receded, and instead, Americans are being asked to allow surveillance of their daily movements and contacts, and even their temperature and other physiological changes. By tapping into people’s phones and medical records, researchers and public health authorities are hoping to more swiftly identify and isolate potentially infected patients and corral a pandemic that is outrunning them despite unprecedented restrictions on daily life. (Ross, 4/8)

Reuters: 'I Own It:' U.S. Navy Secretary Resigns Over Handling Of Coronavirus-Hit Carrier
Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly resigned on Tuesday after he faced mounting backlash for firing and ridiculing the commander of a U.S. aircraft carrier who pleaded for help stemming a coronavirus outbreak onboard. Modly’s resignation highlighted the U.S. military’s struggle to meet increasingly competing priorities: maintaining readiness for conflict and safeguarding servicemembers as the virus spreads globally. (Ali and Stewart, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly Resigns After Insulting USS Theodore Roosevelt's Ousted Captain, Brett Crozier
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper, who accepted Modly’s resignation, said in a memo that he had “the greatest respect for anyone who serves our country, and who places the greater good above all else.” “Secretary Modly did that today, and I wish him all the best,” Esper said. The decision comes after Modly traveled from Washington to Guam on Monday to give a speech to the 5,000-member crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, whose commander, Capt. Brett Crozier, Modly removed last week. (Lamothe, Sonne and Kim, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly Resigns In Wake Of USS Roosevelt Comments
“After mismanaging the COVID-19 outbreak on the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt, it became obvious that Acting Secretary Modly had forfeited his ability to lead the Navy,” said Rep. Adam Smith (D., Wash.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. Mr. Modly’s resignation capped a month in which sailors on the Theodore Roosevelt were stricken by the coronavirus at sea, with the virus rapidly spreading among the crew, leading Capt. Brett Crozier, the commander, to write and distribute a memo demanding support getting the sailors off the carrier. After the memo was leaked to news organizations, Mr. Modley relieved him of duty, saying Capt. Crozier went outside the Navy’s chain of command. (Lubold and Goldon, 4/7)

Politico: Navy In Crisis: Top Leader's Resignation Roils Service In The Middle Of A Pandemic
An aircraft carrier sidelined by a coronavirus outbreak. A promising captain fired for requesting help as infections spread among his 5,000 sailors. And a service leaderless once more, after the acting Navy secretary resigned Tuesday following an uproar over a profanity-laced address to the ship’s crew. The Navy has weathered its share of crises, and in the past few months saw the previous Navy secretary forced out over his handling of a war crimes case, and the man selected to be its top admiral instead retire due to an improper professional relationship with a former staffer who was accused of making unwanted sexual advances to several women. (Seligman, 4/7)

The Hill: Navy Chief Resigns Amid Uproar Over Handling Of Aircraft Carrier Coronavirus Crisis
In the speech aboard the Roosevelt, Modly said that if Crozier didn’t think the letter would leak, he was “too naive or too stupid to be a commanding officer of a ship like this.” Alternatively, Modly said, if Crozier leaked the letter on purpose, that would be a “serious violation” of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. (Kheel, 4/7)

Politico: Sailor Aboard 4th U.S. Aircraft Carrier Tests Positive For Coronavirus
A sailor assigned to the USS Nimitz, a Bremerton, Wash.-based aircraft carrier, tested positive for Covid-19 last week after experiencing symptoms while on board the ship, according to three defense officials familiar with the matter. The positive test makes the Nimitz the Navy's fourth aircraft carrier so far to report a positive case among crew members. (Bertrand and Seligman, 4/7)

Politico: Most Americans On Food Stamps Must Shop At Stores, Risking Coronavirus Exposure
Most of the 42 million Americans who receive food stamps aren’t allowed to use them to shop for groceries online — and some lawmakers and state governments are rushing to change that as the newly jobless flood onto the rolls of the nutrition assistance program. Only six states allow online purchases with benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. Of those, Alabama and Nebraska launched online shopping only in recent weeks as the coronavirus pandemic erupted. (Crampton, 4/7)

NBC News: COVID-19 Crisis Heaps Pressure On Nation's Food Banks
In an average month, Brian Barks, the CEO of Food Bank for the Heartland, spends about $73,000 buying food to distribute to people in need across Nebraska and western Iowa. Last month, as the coronavirus was spreading across the U.S., he spent $675,000. That's a nearly tenfold increase, because Food Bank for the Heartland, like food banks and pantries across the country, is facing a steep drop-off in the bread and butter of its operations: food donated by supermarkets and farms. (Abou-Sabe, Romo, McFadden and Longoria, 4/8)

The New York Times: Families With Food Allergies Struggle With Bare Shelves
Like many Americans these days, Lisa M. Delmont is kept up at night by worry. But for Ms. Delmont, it’s the empty grocery store shelves that bring on dread. Her 2-year-old son, Benjamin, is severely allergic to milk, eggs, cashews, pistachios and bananas, so she has to be judicious about the items she brings home. Exposure to the wrong food could send Benjamin into anaphylactic shock, something that has happened three times since he was born. “I am way more terrified of taking him to an E.R. now than I’ve ever been,” said Ms. Delmont, 35, of Jacksonville, N.C. (Athas, 4/7)

The New York Times: With Demand Soaring, Congress Weighs Adding $250 Billion In Small-Business Aid
Rushing to shore up a $2 trillion economic stimulus effort that is already under strain, Congress could move as early as this week to approve another $250 billion in aid for small businesses, after the Trump administration asked for additional funds to support an overwhelming demand for help. The request for a quick infusion of more money, which Republican and Democratic leaders acknowledged was necessary, signaled a recognition among lawmakers and the administration that the historic economic stabilization package enacted only two weeks ago to help businesses survive the economic damage of the coronavirus pandemic did not go nearly far enough. (Cochrane and Tankersley, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Lawmakers, White House Vow To Quickly Provide More Small-Business Loans
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) said he was aiming to pass a bill by the end of this week. With lawmakers out of town, Mr. McConnell will need agreement with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) to pass the measure through unanimous consent or a voice vote. Lenders have been inundated with applications for the funds since the program launched on Friday. (Duehren, Rudegeair and Davis, 4/7)

The Hill: Phase-Four Virus Relief Hits A Wall 
Pressure is building on Congress to pass another round of coronavirus relief legislation, but Republicans and Democrats have different ideas about what’s needed and how fastDemocrats want to move swiftly while GOP aides warn it’s unlikely a fourth bill will pass before May. (Bolton, 4/7)

The New York Times: Small Business Aid Program Stretches Agency To Its Limits
Five days after the start of a $349 billion emergency effort to get money into the hands of small businesses, the agency at the heart of the program is emerging as its biggest bottleneck. The Small Business Administration, lightly staffed and working with aging technology, has been caught unprepared for the onrush of demand from desperate small-business owners who urgently need these loans as the coronavirus stalls the economy. In a boom year, the agency backs $30 billion of small-business loans — about the same amount that banks are now seeking on behalf of their customers in a day. (Flitter, McCabe and Cowley, 4/7)

ABC News: 'Hot Mess': Small Businesses Besieged By Problems Getting Coronavirus Loans 
Michael Shemtov is struggling to keep his small cafe in Charleston, South Carolina, afloat. He has already shuttered nine of his restaurants in that state and Tennessee amid the financial fallout of the coronavirus pandemic, with a total of 300 staff now out of work through no fault of their own. For Shemtov, who is now down to a skeleton crew of 10 employees at The Daily and is struggling to hold on, getting a loan from the federal government’s new $350 billion government-backed, low-interest loan program, known as the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), means the difference between life and death for his business, a sentiment echoed by scores of small businesses across the country whose owners spoke with ABC News. (Turner, Parks and Kolinovsky, 4/7)

Politico: Bankers Plead With Trump: Fix Small Business Rescue Plan
Frustrated bankers on Tuesday directly appealed to President Donald Trump to fix problems with a Small Business Administration system that is holding them back from issuing $350 billion in government-backed loans designed to avert mass layoffs during the coronavirus pandemic. Trump discussed the state of the so-called Paycheck Protection Program on a teleconference with several of the biggest U.S. banks and small lenders. Attendees on the call included the CEOs of Bank of America, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. (Warmbrodt, 4/7)

Politico: Dems Eye Medicaid Incentives For Next Coronavirus Rescue Package
Democrats are considering a new strategy to win over Obamacare holdouts in the states: generous enticements to expand Medicaid in the next coronavirus rescue package. In an interview, Sen. Doug Jones (D-Ala.) is hoping that any future relief measure from Congress includes his bill with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) that would fully pay for states to cover working-age adults for three years, just as the government did for early expansion states in the first days of the Affordable Care Act. (Levine, 4/7)

Reuters: Wobbly U.S. Fiscal Response Could Deepen Coronavirus Recession
The U.S. government’s massive effort to nurse the economy through the coronavirus crisis was billed as a send-money-and-don’t-sweat-the-details flood of cash to people and businesses in a $22 trillion system that has ground to a halt. So far, the checks are not in the mail. From technological glitches to confusion over the fine points of policy, the delays are mounting. The federal government’s muddled response risks deepening and lengthening a recession already historic for the speed of its onset. (Schneider and Lawder, 4/8)

ProPublica: How The Coronavirus Bailout Repeats 2008’s Mistakes: Huge Corporate Payoffs With Little Accountability
In 2008, the first of the once-in-a-lifetime economic calamities of most of our lifetimes engulfed the country and the world. Now, just over a decade later, we get to experience the second. How well the country responded to the 2008 global financial crisis is still subject to debate. After the crisis peaked in September 2008 and the government intervened with various bailout programs, the financial system and corporate America stabilized. Corporate profits were rising again by the second half of 2009. (Eisinger, 4/7)

ProPublica: Yes, Trump Hotels Do Appear To Qualify For Coronavirus Bailout Benefits.
Last month’s $2 trillion bailout bill barred President Donald Trump, his family or other officials from benefiting from one of the law’s giant loan programs. But as reporters noticed, there was no such language included for other elements of the bailout. Some provisions of the bailout are particularly beneficial to businesses like Trump’s. There is no evidence that any provisions in the bailout were written specifically to benefit the president. It’s also not known whether the Trumps will seek such aid. (Cramer, 4/8)

NBC News: Retail Has Been On Life Support — Coronavirus Could Pull The Plug
With hundreds of thousands of stores closed nationwide, the coronavirus pandemic is accelerating dramatic changes across the retail industry that had been underway well before the viral outbreak hit the U.S., according to analysts. "Retail has been on life support," said Ian Ross, principal of the commercial real estate investment firm Somera Road. "Dozens of these companies were on the verge of financial collapse, and I have a hard time believing they're not going to collapse because of this." (Miranda, 4/7)

The New York Times: Voting In Wisconsin During A Pandemic: Lines, Masks And Plenty Of Fear
Even before voting began, there were lines outside polling locations that stretched for several blocks. Some poll workers wore hazmat suits. Nearly every voter wore a face mask, removing it only to make small talk that reflected a combination of determination and grim humor about the extraordinary experience of voting amid a deadly pandemic. For thousands of people across Wisconsin on Tuesday, fears of the coronavirus outbreak did not stop them from participating in the state’s elections, where critical races such as the Democratic presidential primary and a key state Supreme Court seat were being decided. (Herndon and Burns, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Wisconsin Primary: Long Lines Form In Milwaukee As State Proceeds With Elections Under Court Order
When Ellie Bradish and her husband showed up Tuesday morning at Milwaukee’s Riverside University High School, it was their third attempt to vote in Wisconsin’s spring elections. The absentee ballots they requested never showed up, she said. The couple tried to vote at a drive-through site last weekend, but the wait was two hours long. So they took their final chance in person despite fears of coronavirus infection, trying to keep a safe distance from the hundreds of others waiting in line. (Viebeck, Gardner, Simmons and Larson, 4/7)

Politico: Rain, Hail, Lawsuits And The Coronavirus Crisis Fail To Halt Wisconsin Election
“So many people across Wisconsin faced the impossible choice of casting their ballots and protecting themselves and their families. That’s a choice that no one should have to make,” Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler said. “I think whatever the thought is of what Republican leadership did today, it’s going to change significantly in retrospect when people learn they were exposed to coronavirus at polling places. Weeks and months from now, this will be a completely different conversation." (Korecki, Montellaro and Oprysko, 4/7)

ABC News: As Nation Battles Coronavirus, Wisconsin Election Forges On With In-Person Voting 
After a chaotic series of emergency orders and legal challenges, Wisconsin’s election unfolded Tuesday against the backdrop of a country waging war with a surging global pandemic. President Trump urged voters to head to polls tweeting "“Wisconsin, get out and vote NOW for Justice Daniel Kelly. Protect your 2nd Amendment." (Karson and Cunningham, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Wisconsin Voters Forced To Choose Between Health, Democracy
If Wisconsin was a test case for voting in the age of coronavirus, it did not go well for many voters. Thousands were forced to congregate for hours in long lines on Tuesday with no protective gear. Thousands more stayed home, unwilling to risk their health and unable to be counted because requested absentee ballots never arrived. Voters reported being afraid, angry and embarrassed by the state’s unwillingness to postpone their presidential primary elections as more than a dozen other states have already done. (Peoples and Bauer, 4/8)

The New York Times: Rulings On Wisconsin Election Raise Questions About Judicial Partisanship
In a pair of extraordinary rulings on Monday, the highest courts in Wisconsin and the nation split along ideological lines to reject Democratic efforts to defer voting in Tuesday’s elections in the state given the coronavirus pandemic. Election law experts said the stark divisions in the rulings did not bode well for faith in the rule of law and American democracy. “Election cases, more than any other kind, need courts to be seen by the public as nonpartisan referees of the competing candidates and political parties,” said Edward B. Foley, a law professor at Ohio State University. “It is therefore extremely regrettable that on the very same day, on separate issues involving the same Wisconsin election, both the state and federal supreme courts were unable to escape split votes that seem just as politically divided as the litigants appearing before them.” (Liptak, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Voting-Rights Disputes In Virus Era Spark Court Battles
Wisconsin’s chaotic primary may just be the beginning. Both major parties are preparing for a monthslong, state-by-state legal fight over how citizens can safely cast their ballots should the coronavirus outbreak persist through November’s election. The outcome of the court battles — expected to litigate mail-in voting rules, voter identification requirements and safe access to polls — may have a significant impact on how many people turn out to vote in hundreds of elections across the country, including the White House race. It will likely play out in presidential battlegrounds amid an already roiling debate over voting rights and protecting access to the ballot. (Riccardi, 4/8)

Politico: Biden: ‘We Cannot Delay’ November’s General Election
Former Vice President Joe Biden argued Monday that November’s presidential election should not be delayed, even if the coronavirus pandemic forces changes to the way voting is conducted. “I’d much prefer to have on — you know, in-person voting, but it depends. It depends on the state of play,” Biden told NBC’s “Today” show in an interview that aired Tuesday. “But we cannot, we cannot delay or postpone a constitutionally required November election.” (Forgey, 4/7)

The New York Times: How Delays And Unheeded Warnings Hindered New York’s Virus Fight
A 39-year-old woman took Flight 701 from Doha, Qatar, to John F. Kennedy International Airport in late February, the final leg of her trip home to New York City from Iran. A week later, on March 1, she tested positive for the coronavirus, the first confirmed case in New York City of an outbreak that had already devastated China and parts of Europe. The next day, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, appearing with Mayor Bill de Blasio at a news conference, promised that health investigators would track down every person on the woman’s flight. But no one did. A day later, a lawyer from New Rochelle, a New York City suburb, tested positive for the virus — an alarming sign because he had not traveled to any affected country, suggesting community spread was already taking place. (Goodman, 4/8)

The Associated Press: 'A Lot Of Pain.' NY Has Biggest 1-Day Jump In Virus Deaths
New York state reported 731 new COVID-19 deaths Tuesday, its biggest jump since the start of the outbreak, dampening some of the cautious optimism officials have expressed about efforts to stop the spread of the virus. The state’s death toll grew to 5,489. The alarming surge in deaths comes as new hospital admissions have dropped on average over several days, a possible harbinger of the outbreak finally leveling off. (Villeneuve, Matthews and Hill, 4/8)

The Wall Street Journal: Seven Days, Hundreds Of Deaths: New York’s Worst Week Yet Tests Its Coronavirus Response
Sharon Pollard, director for respiratory care at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, N.Y., had eight ventilators left and needed more. Overnight, at least 17 new patients required them. Teams at the hospital unloaded ventilators delivered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The machines were bound for a central depot to distribute to many other hospitals. Ms. Pollard asked if they would leave some at her hospital, which had more than 400 coronavirus patients, many of them growing worse and others still arriving. She asked for 25 and got 15. “We’ll take anything,” she said. (Evans, 4/7)

CIDRAP: New York Sees Record 1-Day Rise In COVID-19 Deaths
Neighboring New Jersey also reported its greatest daily increase in deaths—229 fatalities. Governor Phil Murphy announced today he was extending social distancing measures in that state for another 30 days. "Everybody watching: Stay at home," Murphy said during a press conference. "I hate to break people's bubbles, but we're just not close." Murphy said today the state has 44,416 total cases and at least 1,232 deaths. (Soucheray, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Global Coronavirus Death Toll Passes 81,000 As Some Lockdowns Tighten
Contributing to the national record, New York, New Jersey, Louisiana and Illinois reported their highest daily death tolls from the new coronavirus Tuesday, reflecting a precipitous climb in U.S. fatalities even as officials in some of the hard-hit states cautiously advised their outbreaks were starting to slow. Confirmed infections in the U.S. were more than double that of any other nation, at more than 396,000, according to the Johns Hopkins data. American deaths from the virus rose to 12,722, and 20,191 have recovered. (Calfas, Ping and Hinshaw, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Amid Death, Experts See Glimmers Of Hope On Pandemic
U.S. authorities on Tuesday reported 30,700 more people infected with the novel coronavirus and over 1,800 more deaths — the highest daily death toll so far. But amid the grim data, some officials said they saw grounds for hope that the pandemic’s devastation would at least not be as bad as the direst projections. (Dennis, Wan and Fahrenthold, 4/7)

ABC News: Experts Urge Caution On Possible 'Flattening' Of Coronavirus Cases: 'Can't Say We're Out Of The Waters And Safe' 
Epidemiologists urge Americans not to gain a false sense of confidence and continue to practice social distancing, even as the number of confirmed cases of novel coronavirus appears to be slowing in some states. In New York, the state most impacted by the virus, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said there was a "possible flattening of the curve" on Monday after the total number of hospitalizations, intensive care unit admissions and daily intubations were down. In New Jersey, the second-most affected state, Gov. Phil Murphy similarly said that the state saw its "very first potential signs the curve may be finally flattening." (Torres, 4/8)

The Wall Street Journal: What Does A Coronavirus Peak In New York Mean?
The number of new Covid-19 cases in New York appears to be stabilizing, sparking hope among officials that the disease may finally be near its peak in the U.S. epicenter of the pandemic. But health experts caution that the public needs to be clear on what that prospect means. Officials track numerous data points related to the new coronavirus, which causes Covid-19, from daily intubations to deaths. A key figure is the number of new hospitalizations, which can overwhelm health-care systems if they exceed capacity. (Campo-Flores, 4/8)

The New York Times: In N.Y.C., The Coronavirus Is Killing Men Twice As Often As Women
In its inexorable spread across New York City, the coronavirus is exacting a greater toll on men than women. Not only are men infected in greater numbers, new data show, but they are also dying at nearly twice the rate of women. To date, there have been nearly 43 Covid-19 deaths for every 100,000 men in the city, compared with 23 such deaths for every 100,000 women, according to figures reported by the city’s health department. And men are being hospitalized with severe disease at higher rates. The data, while disturbing, do not come entirely as a surprise. (Rabin, 4/7)

The New York Times: Their Grandmother Left By Ambulance. Then They Could Not Find Her.
The emergency medical technicians who rushed into Maria Correa’s room in protective gear found a pulse. They told the family in Queens that they were taking her to Jamaica Hospital Medical Center, one of many health care facilities in New York City overwhelmed by the coronavirus outbreak. But when her family called the hospital the next day to check on her condition, they were told she was not there. (Otterman and Watkins, 4/7)

The New York Times: Coronavirus Was Slow To Spread To Rural America. Not Anymore.
Grace Rhodes was getting worried last month as she watched the coronavirus tear through New York and Chicago. But her 8,000-person hometown in Southern Illinois still had no reported cases, and her boss at her pharmacy job assured her: “It’ll never get here.” Now it has. A new wave of coronavirus cases is spreading deep into rural corners of the country where people once hoped their communities might be shielded because of their isolation from hard-hit urban centers and the natural social distancing of life in the countryside. (Healy, Tavernise, Gebeloff and Cai, 4/8)

ABC News: Disaster In Motion: Where Flights From Coronavirus-Ravaged Countries Landed In US 
An ABC News joint investigation with its owned television stations sheds new light on the likely flow of the coronavirus from global hotspots into the U.S. and provides a glimpse the toll the virus has taken on some of the first Americans to interact with international travelers: airport workers. From December through March, as severe outbreaks cropped up in China and then Italy and Spain, among others, thousands of flights from the hard-hit nations poured into U.S. cities, according to an ABC News analysis of more than 20 million flight records obtained from the tracking service Flightradar-24. (Kelly and Thomas, 4/7)

NPR: Coronavirus Peaks By State: How Social Distancing Measures Are Helping
As COVID-19 surges in places throughout the country, Americans are left to wonder, "When will my state hit its worst point?" A widely cited model offers some predictions. The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation's COVID-19 projections were cited in recent White House briefings and take into account how the pandemic is playing out in several countries around the world. (McMinn, 4/7)

The Associated Press: DC Fights To Enforce Distancing And Braces For Looming Surge
Pick-up basketball games. Crowds gathering at an outdoor fish market. Family hikes along trails in Rock Creek Park. The warmer weather is bringing violations of social distance guidelines in the nation’s capital, even as health officials predict the city could become one of the next U.S. hot spots in the COVID-19 pandemic. More than 1,200 people have tested positive, with 22 deaths, in Washington. But national and local health officials predict that the worst is yet to come. (Khalil, 4/8)

The Washington Post: D.C. Council Freezes Rent Hikes But Omits Undocumented Immigrants From Covid-19 Relief Bill
The D.C. Council on Tuesday passed sweeping coronavirus relief legislation that freezes rent increases and makes it easier for inmates to win early release. City leaders also promised to offer assistance to undocumented residents, who do not qualify for unemployment insurance or stimulus checks, after dropping provisions meant to help them. (Nirappil and Lang, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan Forms Coronavirus 'Strike Teams' To Combat Nursing Home Outbreaks
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has launched statewide “strike teams” to respond to the crisis of coronavirus outbreaks at nursing homes and other group living facilities, and he announced a crackdown on businesses that violate social distancing restrictions. Extended-care facilities for the elderly are especially vulnerable to the coronavirus, with high concentrations of at-risk patients and the potential for clusters of fatalities. (Schneider, Cox and Wiggins, 4/7)

The Hill: Coronavirus Watch: Where The Virus Is Spiking Across The Country 
New York and New Jersey both reported the largest number of deaths from the novel coronavirus in one day in their states on Tuesday, even as some data suggested they were at least approaching the apex of their crises. New York, which has seen far more cases than any other state so far, reported a total of 731 deaths on Tuesday, the highest one-day surge the state has seen. Yet the statistics suggest it may be on a downward curve. (Moreno, 4/7)

ProPublica/The Arizona Republic: A School On Navajo Nation Stayed Open. Then People Started Showing Symptoms.
As some schools on the nation’s largest Native American reservation were ordered to close on account of the coronavirus, students at Rocky Ridge Boarding School in northeast Arizona continued attending class. School wasn’t supposed to be in session on March 16. Gov. Doug Ducey had declared that public schools would be closed as the state attempted to control the spread of the coronavirus. (Woods, 4/7)

Kaiser Health News: ‘When It Starts Getting Into Your Local Hospital, It Becomes Real’
The folding chairs outside the windows appeared late last month, after the maintenance staff at St. James Parish Hospital labeled each window with a patient room number so families and friends could at least see their loved ones battling COVID-19. Yet even this small solace the Louisiana rural hospital can offer is tainted for clinical nurse educator Leslie Fisher. She has to remind the family members to take shifts to properly social distance from one another — even when their loved ones could be in their final moments. (Weber, 4/8)

The Wall Street Journal: Appeals Court Allows Texas To Ban Most Abortions During Coronavirus Pandemic
A federal appeals court on Tuesday allowed Texas to suspend most abortions in the state during the coronavirus public-health crisis, a move that could quickly send the issue to the Supreme Court. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in a 2-to-1 ruling, lifted a trial judge’s restraining order that prevented the state from curbing abortions on the grounds that it would save medical resources. In times of great emergency, states can reasonably restrict constitutional rights to protect public safety, the court’s majority said. (Kendall and Findell, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Inside A Makeshift Hospital That Will House Hundreds Of R.I. Coronavirus Patients
The first thing you notice about the old Lowe’s on Davisville Road in Quonset is how clean it is for a building that has been used only intermittently since the home improvement store closed in 2011. If this were a different moment, the vacant facility would be perfect for a recreation center. With 22-foot ceilings and 146,000 square feet of wide open space, a dozen indoor basketball courts could easily be built and there would still be room left over on the perfectly smooth gray concrete floor for a roller skating rink. (McGowan, 4/8)

Houston Chronicle: Over 12,000 Texas Children's Employees To Get Pandemic Stipend 
Employees at Texas Children's Hospital are getting stipends up to $500 during the COVID-19 outbreak, hospital president Mark A. Wallace announced Tuesday.Full-time employees will receive a $500 check this Friday, while part-time employees will receive $250. Over 12,000 workers at the hospital will receive the stipends, said Jenn Jacome, a Texas Children's Hospital spokeswoman. (Wu, 4/7)

Houston Chronicle: 'I Had To Stop Everything.' New Restrictions Due To Coronavirus Leave Prospective Parents On Hold 
The American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) issued new guidelines on March 17 in response to the coronavirus crisis. The requirements ceased any new fertility treatments - including ovulation induction, intrauterine inseminations, in vitro fertilization (IVF) and egg freezing. (Peyton, 4/7)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Kemp Set To Extend Emergency Powers To Combat Coronavirus
About three weeks ago, wary lawmakers ventured into the Georgia Capitol for an uneasy special session to grant Gov. Brian Kemp emergency powers. The process was expected to last an hour. It ended up lasting nearly a full workday. Now, as the governor nears a decision to extend those powers unilaterally, that March 16 rendezvous at the Gold Dome takes on greater importance. And a compromise after negotiations stalled that day spares legislators of an uncomfortable return to the Capitol. (Bluestein, 4/8)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Georgia COVID-19 Deaths Surge, And A Rural County Coroner Reels
The deaths at Pelham Parkway reflect the rapidly mounting toll of the coronavirus pandemic across Georgia. The virus has hit the elderly and people with chronic illnesses especially hard, and it is leaving a disproportionately deadly wake in sparsely populated, rural areas such as Mitchell County, 200 miles south of Atlanta. (Judd, 4/7)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: CDC Says It Did Not Advise Louisiana To Stop Naming Nursing Homes With Coronavirus Cases
When Louisiana health officials announced they would no longer name individual nursing homes with coronavirus cases, they said they came to that decision in consultation with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But a CDC spokesman said Tuesday that the agency had not advised the state one way or the other, saying that the decision to name individual nursing homes is up to the state Department of Health. (Roberts III and Karlin, 4/7)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: New Orleans Moving Homeless Residents To Hotel In New Orleans East Amid Coronavirus Pandemic 
About half of the 190 homeless people temporarily housed at the Hilton Garden Inn on Gravier Street are being moved to a hotel in New Orleans East, where they can continue to isolate themselves during the coronavirus pandemic. The move by state and city officials is aimed at lowering the density of homeless people at the Hilton. (Baurick, 4/7)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: 'I'm Flooded With Work': Many Lawyers, Accountants In High Demand Due To Coronavirus Rescue Package
The coronavirus has cost tens of thousands of workers in Louisiana their jobs.But the pandemic has generated more work for many lawyers and accountants from clients navigating the massive disruptions wrought by stay-at-home orders and seeking guidance on loans, grants and other aid contained in the $2 trillion federal pandemic rescue package. (Bridges, 4/7)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Cortez Masto, Horsford Urge Feds To Remember Clinics 
Nevada officials are concerned that money in the $2.2 trillion relief bill being distributed under the discretion of the Trump administration could leave out Las Vegas employer- and union-sponsored clinics where 150,000 Las Vegas workers and families get their health care. To make matters worse, the officials cite the state’s health care workforce shortage — which ranks 47th for all states for physicians per 100,000 residents — as the need to funnel funds and assistance to Nevada clinics. (Martin, 4/7)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Coronavirus In Nevada Prisons Would Endanger Inmates, Staff
Gregory Kerkorian, an heir to the “father of the Las Vegas megaresort,” turned 74 inside a Nevada prison on Monday. He’s serving a one- to four-year sentence at Southern Desert Correctional Center on animal cruelty charges. His lawyers say that keeping him behind bars during the coronavirus pandemic amounts to cruel and unusual punishment for a man who suffers from high blood pressure and psoriasis and is susceptible to infections. (Ferrara, 4/7)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Coronavirus In Wisconsin: Death Toll Nears 100
As the number of deaths in Wisconsin from coronavirus neared 100 on Tuesday, with more than half coming in Milwaukee, officials moved to reduce crowds on public buses and open treatment areas at State Fair Park and on the grounds of a St. Francis seminary.  The statewide death toll from COVID-19 was 95 by late Tuesday, according to records and county websites monitored by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Seventeen of the state's 72 counties have reported at least one death. Milwaukee County has reported 51 deaths. (Diedrich, 4/7)

Cincinnati Enquirer: COVID-19 Rapid Testing's Coming To Cincinnati. What You Should Know.
Some urgent care facilities in the Cincinnati region have begun to offer COVID-19 rapid testing. But what is rapid testing and what could it mean for you? Until recently, the only approved tests for the novel coronavirus analyzed nasal swabs to search for RNA of the virus. (Knight, 4/7)

Los Angeles Times: Amid Coronavirus, California To Get 200 Million Masks A Month
Gov. Gavin Newsom said Tuesday that California has secured a monthly supply of 200 million N95 respiratory and surgical masks to help protect healthcare workers and other essential personnel at the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic in the state. “We decided enough’s enough. Let’s use the power, the purchasing power of the state of California, as a nation-state,” Newsom told MSNBC host Rachel Maddow. “We did just that. And in the next few weeks, we’re going to see supplies, at that level, into the state of California and potentially the opportunity to export some of those supplies to states in need.” (Willon, 4/7)

Politico: California To Spend Nearly $1B For 200 Million Masks Per Month
Newsom said that in the last 48 hours, “We just inked a number of contracts in the last few days that gives me confidence to say that … we have secured through a consortium of nonprofits — and a manufacturer here in the state of California — upwards of 200 million masks on a monthly basis. … We're confident we can supply the needs of the state of California, and potentially the needs of other Western states.’’The names of the specific suppliers have not been released. It is unclear how California's massive purchase may affect the ability of other states and nations to obtain protective equipment that remains in high demand across the world. (Marinucci, 4/8)

Los Angeles Times: Newsom Says California Coronavirus Curve Is 'Bending'
Nearly three weeks after ordering Californians to stay home, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Tuesday that the state’s efforts are slowing the spread of the novel coronavirus and “bending the curve.” “Let me give you a sense of optimism, in terms of the curve in California bending: It is bending, but it’s also stretching,” Newsom said at a news conference. (Luna, 4/7)

Los Angeles Times: Coronavirus: L.A. Mayor Orders Wide Use Of Face Coverings
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti announced an order Tuesday evening requiring all residents to wear a face covering when visiting the majority of essential businesses, in hopes that it will protect workers and slow the spread of the coronavirus. Effective Friday, residents must wear a mask, bandanna or other type of covering over their noses and mouths when in grocery stores, pharmacies, hardware stores, coin-operated laundry services, restaurants, hotels, taxis, ride-hail vehicles and several other essential businesses. (Reyes, Parvini and Cosgrove, 4/7)

NBC News: Los Angeles Mandates Face Coverings
Residents of the city of Los Angeles will have to wear face coverings if they venture out to grocery stores, pharmacies or other essential businesses allowed to serve the public amid a statewide stay-at-home order. "Every Angeleno will share this responsibility with employers: to keep workers and everybody else safe, which is why we are requiring customers to wear face coverings to enter those businesses," Mayor Eric Garcetti said Tuesday in issuing the facial covering mandate, which takes effect Friday. (Douglas and Romero, 4/7)

Politico: Shopping In LA? Cover Your Face Or Get Tossed, Garcetti Orders
In the city of 4 million residents, essential business employees will also be required to wear face coverings, and employers must cover the costs of purchasing such items. Included in the order was a call for businesses to ensure that every worker has access to a clean restroom and offer them the opportunity to wash their hands every 30 minutes. “We need to protect every worker on the front lines of this crisis,” Garcetti said. “Each one of us is a first responder in this emergency. Every employer should keep employees safe, and so should Angelenos patronizing these businesses." (Nieves, 4/7)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Finally Shares Crucial Data On Coronavirus Hospitalizations, Demographics
San Francisco released a torrent of demographic data and other details about the city’s coronavirus outbreak on Tuesday, after repeated requests from residents and health care leaders for more complete information about who is being hit hardest by the disease. Every county health department in the Bay Area except Alameda now publishes similar information, although only San Francisco breaks down cases by race and ethnicity. Alameda County public health officials said they planned to release more data on Wednesday. (Thadani, Palomino and Allday, 4/7)

San Francisco Chronicle: UCSF Lab Accelerates Processing Of Coronavirus Tests In Bay Area, All For No Cost 
UCSF has opened a lab in San Francisco that can process thousands of coronavirus diagnostic tests from all nine Bay Area counties’ public health departments for free — significantly increasing the Bay Area’s testing capacity at a time the state is working aggressively to get more residents tested and obtain test results faster. UCSF created the lab in Mission Bay over eight days in March, after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order March 12 that loosened restrictions on clinical labs. (Ho, 4/7)

KQED: Student, Parent And Now Homeschool Teacher: UC Students Say They Need Relief 
Since the coronavirus pandemic shut down education as we know it, parents are adjusting to educating kids at home and students are adjusting to remote learning. Parents like Paredes, who are themselves students, are doing both.“I'm taking care of my kids full-time, I'm still trying to do classes on Zoom while preparing three meals a day for a house of four,” he said. “It's a lot to manage.” According to the most recent U.S. Department of Education data available, more than one in five undergrads across the country was raising kids in 2015-2016, half of which were single parents. (Rancaño, 4/7)

Kaiser Health News: Postcard From The Edge: L.A. Street Vendors Who Can’t Stop Working
One day last week, on a sunny, beautiful Los Angeles afternoon, 23-year-old Alex Salvador Morales set up shop on a sidewalk near downtown, selling freshly cut pineapple, mango and watermelon in quart-sized plastic cups for $5. Before the pandemic, fruit stands like his dotted streets on days like this, one every few blocks on the busy stretches. With millions of people staying home amid the COVID-19 pandemic, however, business was so bad that many of Salvador Morales’ fellow fruit vendors hadn’t bothered to show up. (Almendrala, 4/8)

The Hill: States Battle Each Other For Equipment In Supply Chain Crunch 
States across the country are racing to stockpile ventilators, personal protective equipment (PPE) and necessary medical supplies as they prepare for brutal surges of coronavirus cases in the coming weeks and months. But a bottleneck in the global supply chain has forced those states to compete with each other, and often with the federal government, for limited supplies. In many states, governors have reached deals with suppliers only to have those suppliers tell them later that they received a better price from another state. (Wilson, 4/7)

CNN: US States Race To Fight The Nearly 400,000 Coronavirus Cases With Long-Awaited Medical Shipments
The United States is quickly approaching 400,000 coronavirus cases, and states grappling with the overwhelming numbers are bringing in medical equipment and medication to battle the virus. The national death toll has reached 12,910, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. The nation's hospitals have struggled to treat the virus as rising cases have put increasing pressure on personal protective equipment and ventilators. But deliveries have sought to alleviate the shortages. (Holcombe, 4/8)

Stateline: Competing Hospitals Cooperate To Meet The Crisis
For hospitals, among the nation’s biggest and most competitive businesses, giving up lucrative surgeries to make way for a competitor’s overflow of patients does not come naturally. But as COVID-19 threatens to overwhelm the American health care system, U.S. hospitals are cooperating in unprecedented ways. In addition to postponing elective surgeries and other procedures, they are transferring children from adult hospitals to pediatric hospitals and sharing staff, equipment and supplies. One health care system has gone as far as creating a COVID-19-only hospital. (Ollove and Vestal, 4/8)

The Wall Street Journal: At FEMA, Companies Offer Critical Coronavirus Supplies The Government Can’t Buy
More than 1,000 companies responded to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s call about two weeks ago to provide needed supplies to fight the coronavirus pandemic, according to a person familiar with the matter. As of early Monday, only three companies had supplies the agency could actually buy. Many of the offers, for items ranging from protective medical gear to tests and body bags, didn’t work out, according to people familiar with the matter, because some companies have asked for payment up front, something FEMA can’t agree to. Another issue: Some companies have oversold what they can actually get to FEMA. (Levy, 4/7)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: UPS Manages Airlift Of Healthcare Supplies For Feds
UPS launched a two-week operation to run 25 cargo flights carrying masks, gloves, surgical gowns and other equipment for the health care industry under the federal government’s Project Airbridge. The airlift of shipments from China, Malaysia, Honduras and other countries is an initiative of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and companies including health care distributors. (Yamanouchi, 4/7)

The Washington Post: Many Triage Plans Prioritize Pregnant Women, Health Care Workers, Even Politicians Over The Elderly And Disabled
No group in America today is more beloved than health-care workers. People sing to them from balconies, tweet about their heroism and memorialize them in portraits with faces bruised by masks. Recognizing their sacrifices — as well as their essential role — Pennsylvania officials recently adopted new guidelines giving doctors, nurses and others fighting covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, preferential access to scarce ventilators in a shortage. But the idea makes some uncomfortable. (Cha and McGinley, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Who Gets A Ventilator? New Gut-Wrenching State Guidelines Issued On Rationing Equipment 
Massachusetts health officials issued guidelines Tuesday to help hospitals make gut-wrenching decisions about how to ration ventilators, should they become overwhelmed with coronavirus patients and run out of critical treatments. The guidance, which is not mandatory, asks hospitals to assign patients a score that gives preference to healthier patients who have a greater chance of surviving their illness, and living longer overall. (Kowalczyk, 4/7)

WBUR: Thinking Through The Unthinkable: How Mass. Hospitals May Decide Who Gets A Ventilator In The COVID-19 Surge
If a hospital has more critically ill patients than it can manage, who gets an intensive care bed and who doesn’t? Who gets a ventilator? The Massachusetts Department of Public Health is out with guidelines that address some of the most challenging questions doctors and nurses will face during the pandemic. (Bebinger, 4/7)

Stat: Ventilators Are Overused For Covid-19 Patients, Doctors Say 
Even as hospitals and governors raise the alarm about a shortage of ventilators, some critical care physicians are questioning the widespread use of the breathing machines for Covid-19 patients, saying that large numbers of patients could instead be treated with less intensive respiratory support. If the iconoclasts are right, putting coronavirus patients on ventilators could be of little benefit to many and even harmful to some. (Begley, 4/8)

ABC News: Recovering Coronavirus Patient Talks About ICU Experience: 'I Owe My Life To A Ventilator' 
Upon waking up six days after being put on a ventilator due to the novel coronavirus, David Lat says his first conversation with his husband was about the books he’d asked for. He said he was unaware of the “hell” his family had gone through. Lat, a former federal prosecutor and founder of the website Above The Law, says he returned home April 1 after spending 17 days at New York University’s Langone Health fighting the novel coronavirus, COVID-19. As hospitals across the country warn of shortages in these critical devices, Lat said he wouldn’t be alive without one. (Rivas, 4/7)

Boston Globe: As More Grocery Store Workers Die, Employees Call For Better Protection 
Several dozen Boston-area grocery store workers and their supporters protested outside the Ink Block Whole Foods in the South End Tuesday, wearing face masks and holding signs such as “Essential not disposable” as they demanded employers provide gloves and masks, additional paid sick leave, and time-and-a-half hazard pay during the coronavirus pandemic. (Johnston, 4/7)

In other supply chain news —

The Washington Post: Coronavirus Toilet Paper Shortage: Why It's So Hard To Find Amid A Global Pandemic
When the history of the coronavirus pandemic is written, the vanishing of toilet paper might rank as just a footnote in an otherwise dark and frightening account. But it might be a very long, complex and even wise footnote, because toilet paper — or rather, the lack of it — turns out to reveal a great deal about who we are and how we behave in a crisis. It showed David Cohen something about the nature of humanity: As a checkout guy at a supermarket in Asheville, N.C., he saw people buying absurd amounts of toilet paper, but he also saw people reach the cashier’s counter and decide suddenly to consider those who have less. (Fisher, 4/7)

ProPublica: A Nurse Bought Protective Supplies For Her Colleagues Using GoFundMe. The Hospital Suspended Her.
Olga Matievskaya and her fellow intensive care nurses at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center in New Jersey were so desperate for gowns and masks to protect themselves from the coronavirus that they turned to the online fundraising site GoFundMe to raise money. The donations flowed in — more than $12,000 — and Matievskaya used some of them to buy about 500 masks, 4,000 shoe covers and 150 jumpsuits. She and her colleagues at the hospital celebrated protecting themselves and their patients from the spread of the virus. (Allen, 4/7)

CNN: Detroit Hospital Nurses Refuse To Work Without More Help, Ordered To Leave 
Emergency room nursing staff at a Detroit hospital were told to leave Sunday night after they refused to work and demanded more nurses be brought into their overrun emergency room, health care workers there told CNN. The night shift ER nurses at Sinai-Grace Hospital refused to leave the break room until hospital administrators brought in more nurses to help out, a physician at the hospital told CNN. (Murphy, Young and Carpenter, 4/7)

The New York Times: New Battle For Those On Coronavirus Front Lines: Child Custody
Last month, Dr. Bertha Mayorquin, a New Jersey physician, told her soon-to-be ex-husband that there was a change in plans. After two weeks of providing treatment by video as a precaution against the coronavirus, she would resume seeing patients in person. But when she left work on a Friday to pick up her two daughters for the weekend, her husband, Wendell Surdukowski, presented her with a court order granting him sole temporary custody of the young girls. His lawyer had convinced a judge that Dr. Mayorquin could expose the children, 11 and 8, to Covid-19. (Twohey, 4/7)

The New York Times: How The Four Seasons In N.Y.C. Became A Dorm For Hospital Workers
Just a few weeks ago, it was typical for personal assistants to make reservations for thousand-dollar rooms at the Four Seasons Hotel New York for their high-profile bosses. But in late March, a worried mother calling on behalf of her physician assistant son to get a free room became the norm. The iconic Billionaires’ Row hotel had just announced that it would house medical professionals battling the Coronavirus. “My mom, I think she must have been one of the first to reach out,” said the 31-year-old, whose hospital asked him to remain anonymous. He had been living on Long Island and commuting for two hours each way to his job in Manhattan. Now he’s a 20-minute walk to the hospital. (Krueger, 4/7)

ABC News: 1,300 NYC First Responders Back At Work After Recovering From Coronavirus Or Its Symptoms 
As more than 1,300 New York City first responders return to work after recovering from the novel coronavirus or calling out sick with symptoms of the virus, they're responding to a rapid increase in 911 calls for cardiac arrest, the FDNY said on Tuesday. The city's firefighters, paramedics and emergency medical technicians (EMT) are responding to "a record numbers of calls, and they continue to meet this unprecedented challenge head on,” said Fire Commissioner Dan Nigro. "I am incredibly proud of the men and women of this department who are demonstrating every single day throughout this pandemic why they are known as the best and the bravest." (Katersky and Carrega, 4/7)

The New York Times: ‘Thanking God For My Breath’: Dispatch From New York’s Frontline
One Sunday last month Dr. Dara Kass reported to an emergency room in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. In some ways, it was a morning just like any other. She chugged a coffee, scrubbed in, greeted her co-workers. She was sent to an area of the E.R. designated for patients with respiratory issues. And that’s when the morning took a turn — it was Dr. Kass’s first day on coronavirus duty. Instead of the normal abdominal pains and headaches, nearly every patient that Dr. Kass saw had the same telltale Covid-19 symptoms: cough, fever, shortness of breath. And tensions among the E.R. staff were running high. (Goldberg, 4/7)

ABC News: Volunteer EMT Corps: 'Nothing Compares' To What They're Seeing In New Jersey Town 
In Teaneck, New Jersey, volunteer EMTs are constantly answering potential and confirmed COVID-19 calls, sometimes wearing mechanics overalls to protect themselves from being exposed. "We have never seen anything like this before ever in our history," said Jacob Finkelstein, captain of Teaneck Volunteer Ambulatory Corps. "We've been around for a long time since 1939. I've heard from members who've been here through other, similar, situations through AIDS, through SARS. Nothing compares to what we are seeing now in Teaneck." (Ramos, O'Brien, Margolin and Francis, 4/7)

PBS NewsHour: What These New York EMTs Are Seeing As They Respond To COVID-19 Cases 
New York remains the epicenter of the U.S. coronavirus outbreak. Medical teams there are facing a surge of seriously ill patients, and doing so while concerned about their own level of protection from the disease. (William Brangham, 4/7)

ABC News: Anesthesiologists Hailed As Special Heroes In Fight Against Coronavirus
Health care workers across the U.S. have risen to the occasion in combating the coronavirus pandemic. Skilled practitioners place themselves in harm's way to save lives -- but some medical professions face more dangers than others. Anesthesiologists, in particular, have a vast skill set that makes them extremely valuable to care teams that manage critically ill COVID-19 patients, explains Dr. Yemi Odugbesan, physician anesthesiologist and adjunct professor of anesthesiology at Rocky Vista University College of Osteopathic Medicine. (Baldwin, 4/8)

WBUR: 'How Long Do I Plan To Stay? As Long As It's Necessary': This Home Health Care Worker Is Quarantining With Her Client 
Frontline health care workers in Massachusetts hospitals are preparing for a projected surge in COVID-19 cases over the coming weeks. At the same time, home health care workers are fighting the coronavirus on a different front, trying to keep their clients out of emergency rooms by bringing treatment and support into the homes of the elderly and disabled. (Dooling, 4/7)

Boston Globe: As Cases And Deaths Rise, Baker Announces Funds For Health Care Providers
Governor Charlie Baker on Tuesday announced a plan to pump $800 million into Massachusetts health care providers, as many struggle financially amid a coronavirus crisis that has now killed more than 350 residents and threatens to strain the system’s limits with a crush of new patients. The announcement came as the state reported 96 new deaths in Massachusetts due to the outbreak, bringing the total to 356. (Logan, McDonald and Andersen, 4/7)

State House News Service: Mass. Urged To Unlock Pool Of Foreign Health Care Workers To Fight Pandemic 
Lawmakers are calling on Gov. Charlie Baker to let health care professionals trained in other countries join the state's COVID-19 fight, and a recent Board of Registration in Medicine move will allow some international medical graduates who've also trained in the U.S. to receive temporary licenses here. As Massachusetts prepares for a surge in coronavirus cases and the corresponding demand for medical care and supplies, the state has taken a series of steps aimed at augmenting the available health care workforce. (Lannan, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Coronavirus Continues To Sideline Dozens Of Boston’s First Responders 
The coronavirus pandemic continues to sideline dozens of Boston’s first responders, with members of the city’s police, fire, and EMS departments out because of the disease, or potential exposure to it, according to authorities. As of Tuesday, 45 Boston firefighters were self-isolating because of a potential exposure to a COVID-19 case, said Brian Alkins, a department spokesman. To date, that department, which has 1,400 members, has had 15 firefighters test positive for the novel coronavirus. (McDonald, 4/7)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Physician Practice Warns That It May Permanently Close Because Of The COVID-19 Pandemic
Advanced Pain Management, a large physician practice, said that it may have to lay off 50 employees permanently at its clinics in Greenfield next month because of the postponement of elective procedures during the COVID-19 pandemic. The physician practice also may be forced to close its clinics permanently unless it can obtain financing and address other matters, according to a letter notifying the Department of Workforce Development of the pending layoffs. (Boulton, 4/7)

CNN: This Librarian Is Using 3D Printing To Fight Coronavirus 
A doctor in New York asked for help to alleviate the shortage of personal protective equipment for health care workers on the front lines of the coronavirus fight. A librarian stepped in to help. Now Madiha Choksi, a research technologist at the Columbia University Libraries, is a key member of a group of partners and volunteers that have made over 7,500 protective face shields to distribute to New York City-area hospitals. (Crespo, 4/7)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Stolen N95 Masks Returned To New Orleans Convention Center Coronavirus Hospital
Eighty N95 respirator masks meant to protect staffers at a makeshift hospital for recovering coronavirus patients in New Orleans’ Ernest N. Morial Convention Center have been returned to the facility after authorities said a high-ranking official there allegedly stole them last week. (Vargas, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Chinese Community Collects Masks For Boston Area Healthcare Workers 
More than 400 members of Boston’s Chinese community are working together to collect masks for healthcare workers fighting on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic. The grassroots effort began when Shuang Li heard a friend complaining about not having enough masks at the hospital where they work , according to a statement released by the group of volunteers. (Stanton, 4/7)

Kaiser Health News: ‘An Arm And A Leg’: Superheroes Of ‘Stuff’ Help Health Workers In NYC
“An Arm and a Leg” is back — sooner than we expected  — with stories about how COVID-19 intersects with the cost of health care and how we can all respond. We’re calling it SEASON-19. We start in New York City — which many health experts say is a couple of weeks ahead of the rest of the country in fighting the pandemic — with a story about people coming together and making do in a crisis. (Weissmann, 4/8)

The Hill: Drugmaker Caps Insulin Costs At $35 To Help Diabetes Patients During Pandemic 
Pharmaceutical manufacturer Eli Lilly said Tuesday that it will limit the out-of-pocket cost of insulin to $35 per month to offset financial hardships due to the coronavirus pandemic. The co-pay cap will cover the majority of the company’s insulin, including the Humalog injection, and is open to the uninsured as well as commercially insured people, but not to Medicaid, Medicare or Medicare Part D patients, Reuters reported. (Budryk, 4/7)

Stat: Lilly Lowers Most Insulin Costs To $35 A Month In Response To Covid-19
The move, which will also reset copay cards to the same monthly $35 level, comes amid ongoing angst over the cost of the diabetes treatment. Insulin, in fact, has been something of a poster child for the national debate over prescription drugs costs. Long before the pandemic caused financial hardship for millions of Americans, a growing number of people with diabetes were rationing the medicine, taking trips to Canada to purchase lower-cost insulin, and protesting outside offices of the largest insulin manufacturers. (Silverman, 4/7)

Reuters: Eli Lilly Lowers Insulin Costs As Coronavirus Crisis Deepens
“Enabling a $35-per-month insulin co-pay regardless of employment status will help many Americans in this difficult time,” said CEOs Aaron Kowalski and Thom Scher of non-profit organization JDRF-Beyond Type 1 Alliance. However, patients with government insurance such as Medicaid, Medicare, Medicare Part D or any State Patient or Pharmaceutical Assistance Program are not eligible for the scheme, Lilly said. (4/7)

The Associated Press: New $35 Co-Pay Now Available Through Lilly Insulin Value Program In Response To COVID-19 Crisis In U.S.
Representatives at the Solution Center can also direct people to affordability options that may reduce their out-of-pocket costs further – such as free insulin for people with minimal income, or no income at all, that has been donated by Lilly to non-profit organizations. “Too many people in the U.S. have lost their jobs because of the COVID-19 crisis, and we want to make sure no one goes without their Lilly insulin,” said Mike Mason, president, Lilly Diabetes. “We’ve been providing affordability solutions for a long time, but more is needed to help people during this unprecedented period. People with commercial insurance, as well as those without insurance at all, are eligible, and the process is quick and simple. We want people who need help to call us.” (4/7)

Prescription Drug Watch: For news on rising drug costs, check out our weekly roundup of news coverage and perspectives of the issue.

Reuters: CDC Removes Unusual Guidance To Doctors About Drug Favored By Trump
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has removed from its website highly unusual guidance informing doctors on how to prescribe hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine, drugs recommended by President Donald Trump to treat the coronavirus. The move comes three days after Reuters reported that the CDC published key dosing information involving the two antimalarial drugs based on unattributed anecdotes rather than peer-reviewed science. (Roston and Taylor, 4/7)

CNN: CDC Updates Website To Remove Dosage Guidance On Drug Touted By Georgia, Florida And Trump 
Hydroxychloroquine is an anti-malaria drug that has not been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to treat coronavirus. With anecdotal reports that the drug offers benefits against the virus, the FDA did issue a limited Emergency Use Authorization to distribute it from the national stockpile. Previous guidance for doctors included dosages for hydroxychloroquine, even though the agency said the "optimal dosage and duration" to treat coronavirus is still unknown. (Holcombe, Christensen and Sutton, 4/8)

The Hill: CDC Updates Website To Remove Dosage Guidance On Drug Touted By Trump 
The website continues to note that "[t]here are no drugs or other therapeutics approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to prevent or treat COVID-19." The CDC did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill regarding the change. The removal was first reported by Reuters. The update comes as medical experts express skepticism over Trump’s confidence in the drugs, which he suggested he may take himself and was touting as recently as a Tuesday night interview on Fox News. (Axelrod, 4/7)

NBC News: Mayo Clinic Cardiologist: 'Inexcusable' To Ignore Hydroxychloroquine Side Effects
As the U.S. scales up purchase and use of the drug hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus patients, a leading Mayo Clinic cardiologist is sounding a warning: Anyone promoting the drug also needs to flag its rare but serious — and potentially fatal — side effects. President Donald Trump has repeatedly touted the potential benefits of hydroxychloroquine, which has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration to treat malaria, lupus and other autoimmune ailments but hasn't yet been proven effective and safe in treating the coronavirus. (Przybyla, 4/7)

Vox: Is Trump Making Money By Touting Hydroxychloroquine To Treat Coronavirus? Not Much, If At All, Per Financial Records.
President Donald Trump’s aggressive support for the unproven idea of using the lupus and malaria drug hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus has puzzled public health experts, journalists, and others for weeks.A Monday New York Times report appeared to offer one possible new explanation: financial interest — his own, and that of those close to him. However, Trump’s Sanofi stake is indirect and rather small — he owns shares through a fund that includes a diverse array of stocks. As Vox’s Emily Stewart noted, a government official repeatedly promoting a product made by a company they have a minute stake in would be a very inefficient way to be corrupt (Collins, 4/7)

Stat: The Rare Investment Tool Behind Some Health Tech Coronavirus Projects
Extraordinary times call for extraordinary financing instruments, according to one California venture capital firm. A San Francisco-based early-stage investor, Fifty Years, has offered $25,000 to 14 of the health tech companies it’s already invested in, all of which are now working on coronavirus-related projects — and that money is coming with far fewer strings than usual. It’s hoping the extra money will allow its portfolio companies to produce tests, treatments, or basic needed supplies like masks or hand sanitizers. (Sheridan, 4/8)

The New York Times: Jack Dorsey Vows To Donate $1 Billion To Fight The Coronavirus
Jack Dorsey, the chief executive of Twitter and Square, said on Tuesday that he planned to donate $1 billion, or just under a third of his total wealth, to relief programs related to the coronavirus, in one of the more significant efforts by a tech billionaire to fight the pandemic. Mr. Dorsey said he would put 28 percent of his wealth, in the form of shares in his mobile payments company Square, into a limited liability company that he had created, called Start Small. Start Small would make grants to beneficiaries, he said, with the expenditures to be recorded in a publicly accessible Google document. (Isaac, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: Medicare Advantage Telehealth Expansion Needs Critical Changes, Experts Say
While the healthcare industry is generally supportive of the CMS' efforts to expand telehealth services under Medicare Advantage, it has some problems with the policy details. It's also split on network adequacy standards for dialysis patients and united against the agency's proposal to change how it weighs patient experience in its Star Ratings system. (Brady, 4/7)

Boston Globe: In A Huge Shift Because Of Coronavirus, Most Doctors Now ‘Seeing’ Patients By Phone Or Video
Where does it hurt? When doctors at Boston’s renowned teaching hospitals ask patients that question these days, it’s usually in a video conference or telephone call, even when physicians are treating people for life-threatening illnesses such as cancer and heart disease. Three weeks after Governor Charlie Baker ordered health insurers to cover telehealth in an effort to limit the spread of the new coronavirus, most outpatients at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute are “seeing” their physicians remotely. (Saltzman, 4/7)

Indianapolis Star: Telehealth Therapy During The Coronavirus Pandemic: What To Know
As Indiana sees staggering increases in the number of people seeking help for mental health and addiction during the coronavirus pandemic, state officials are encouraging Hoosiers to utilize telehealth. Experts say the uncertainty of the pandemic is causing many people extra stress and anxiety. For those with existing mental health conditions, the impact is exacerbated. (DePompei, 4/8)

Modern Healthcare: HCA Healthcare Opens Up COVID-19 Data Portal On Google's Cloud
For-profit hospital chain HCA Healthcare is encouraging other hospitals to share COVID-19 data through a new project it unveiled Monday, dubbed the COVID-19 National Response Portal. HCA's vision is for hospitals across the U.S. to share data on COVID-19 testing results, critical-care beds, ventilator utilization and patient discharges, which the platform can aggregate to aid in response to the novel coronavirus. Illustrating the spread of the pandemic could help hospitals plan for challenges such as patient surges. (Cohen, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: Possible $42 Billion Cost For COVID-19 Hospitalizations Among Uninsured
Treating the nation's uninsured for COVID-19 could cost hospitals as much as $42 billion, according to estimates from the Kaiser Family Foundation. But with job losses mounting by the day, that figure could soar, further crowding out federal relief funds that hospitals say they need for other purposes, such as extra staffing, personal protective equipment, or making up for lost revenue from the pandemic. (Livingston, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: Connecticut Governor Limits Hospital Billing To Uninsured
Connecticut's Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont on Tuesday issued an executive order that would only allow hospitals to bill uninsured patients for the Medicare price of their COVID-19 care. HHS Secretary Alex Azar said April 3 that the federal government is considering using a provider emergency fund to pay hospitals back at Medicare rates for costs incurred treating uninsured patients. Lamont's order prohibits hospitals from billing uninsured COVID-19 patients until the governor issues further orders on how federal reimbursement funds will be distributed. (Cohrs, 4/7)

In other health insurance news —

Kaiser Health News: Pandemic Delays Federal Probe Into Medicare Advantage Health Plans
Federal health officials, citing a need to focus on the COVID-19 pandemic, have temporarily halted some efforts to recover hundreds of millions of dollars in overpayments made to Medicare Advantage health plans. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services says the decision will allow insurers and the agency to “focus on patient care,” and will last “until after the public health emergency has ended.” Critics aren’t convinced that’s a wise idea. (Schulte, 4/8)

The Washington Post: African Americans Are At Higher Risk Of Death From Coronavirus
As the novel coronavirus sweeps across the United States, it appears to be infecting and killing black Americans at a disproportionately high rate, according to a Washington Post analysis of early data from jurisdictions across the country. The emerging stark racial disparity led the surgeon general Tuesday to acknowledge in personal terms the increased risk for African Americans amid growing demands that public-health officials release more data on the race of those who are sick, hospitalized and dying of a contagion that has killed more than 12,000 people in the United States. (Thebault, Tran and Williams, 4/7)

The New York Times: Black Americans Face Alarming Rates Of Coronavirus Infection In Some States
“This is a call-to-action moment for all of us,” said Lori Lightfoot, the mayor of Chicago, who announced statistics of the outbreak in her city this week. African-Americans account for more than half of those who have tested positive and 72 percent of virus-related fatalities in Chicago, even though they make up a little less than a third of the population. “Those numbers take your breath away, they really do,” said Ms. Lightfoot, who is the city’s first black woman elected as mayor. She added in an interview that the statistics were “among the most shocking things I think I’ve seen as mayor.” (Eligon, Burch, Searcey and Oppel, 4/7)

CNN: Why Black Americans Are At Higher Risk For Coronavirus
A combination of structural factors means that black people are getting infected more and dying more of coronavirus, said Dr. Camara Phyllis Jones, a family physician and epidemiologist. "What's happening is black folks are getting infected more because they are exposed more, and once infected they're dying more because they have their bodies -- our bodies -- have born the burden of chronic disinvestment (and) active neglect of the community," she said. "When I look at it is because of structural racism, which puts us in the forward facing jobs so that we are exposed and less valued and don't have the protection that we need." (Levenson, 4/7)

Los Angeles Times: 'A Crisis Within A Crisis': Black Americans Face Higher Rates Of Coronavirus Deaths
In Michigan, black people have died at more than eight times the rate of white people. In Illinois, they have died at nearly six times the rate. In Louisiana, the difference is fivefold. Public health experts said those figures reflected deep-rooted social and economic inequalities. Not only are black Americans less likely to be insured and able to afford testing, but they are more likely to have underlying medical conditions such as asthma, diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease that could put them at higher risk for severe illness. (Jarvie and Hennessy-Fiske, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Coronavirus May Be Hitting Harder In Black And Latino Communities 
The state’s two largest community health centers, in East Boston and Lawrence, have encountered a disproportionately large surge of coronavirus cases among Spanish-speakers. Among COIVD-19 patients at Massachusetts General Hospital are four times more Latinos than are typically patients at the hospital. Boston has what appear to be high concentrations of infection in neighborhoods home to large Black, Latino, and immigrant communities in Hyde Park, Mattapan, and East Boston. (Ryan and Lazar, 4/7)

ABC News: Coronavirus Government Response Updates: Trump, Fauci Confirm Black Communities Especially Hard Hit 
Trump and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top expert on infectious diseases, both took the podium to address the disproportionate number of deaths in black communities, which Trump called "terrible" and a "tremendous challenge." "We have a difficult problem of exacerbation of a health disparity. We have known literally forever that diseases like diabetes, hypertension, obesity and asthma are disproportionately afflicting the minority populations, particularly the African-American," Fauci said, adding that those are the same conditions that "lead to a bad outcome with the coronavirus." (Phelps, Cathey and Haslett, 4/7)

The Washington Post: For Some Black Americans, Anxiety About Wearing Face Coverings In Public May Keep Them From Doing So
The recommendation from the White House that Americans wear cloth face coverings is causing concerns among those who fear that doing so could expose some people of color to other kinds of threats. On the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, the government provides information on how to wear face coverings. (Scott, 4/7)

WBUR: Pressley Wants Race-Specific Coronavirus Data Requirement In Next Relief Bill 
Rep. Ayanna Pressley is leading a call by the Congressional Black Caucus demanding the next coronavirus relief package require federal authorities to collect and report race-specific data. Pressley told WBUR that she and Rep. Robin Kelly, of Illinois, made the ask in a letter to Democratic leadership Tuesday. (Atkins, 4/7)

NPR: Doctors Say A 'Cytokine Storm' Might Be Why Some COVID-19 Patients Crash
It's a strange and tragic pattern in some cases of COVID-19: The patient struggles through the first week of illness, and perhaps even begins to feel a little better. Then suddenly they crash."We've seen some patients rapidly worsen," says Dr. Pavan Bhatraju, an assistant professor at the University of Washington who works in the intensive care unit at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. "They initially were just requiring a little bit of oxygen. In 24 hours they're on a ventilator." (Brumfiel, 4/7)

NBC News: Plasma Treatment Being Tested In New York May Be Coronavirus 'Game Changer'
As patients with COVID-19 continue pouring into emergency departments and intensive care units across the nation, an old treatment that has been adapted for a new disease is being tested in New York. In the past few days, the Mount Sinai Hospital System has injected more than 20 very sick coronavirus patients with a "convalescent serum" based on the blood plasma of people who have recovered from the disease. (Ferguson, McFadden and Martinez, 4/7)

CNN: Covid-19 Death Rate Rises In Counties With High Air Pollution, Study Says
You are more likely to die from Covid-19 if you live in a county in the United States with higher levels of long-term air pollution, according to new research released Tuesday by Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. "We found that an increase of only 1 gram per cubic meter in fine particulate matter in the air was associated with a 15% increase in the Covid-19 death rate," said lead author Francesca Dominici, co-director of the Harvard Data Science Initiative. (LaMotte, 4/7)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Air Pollution Could Make Coronavirus More Severe For Some Louisianans 
Data released by the state Department of Health shows that pre-existing conditions such as diabetes and kidney disease are playing a major role in the death rate of coronavirus in Louisiana. But a growing body of research indicates that long-term exposure to air pollution can also be a factor. (Sneath, 4/7)

NBC News: Coronavirus Lockdowns Have Sent Pollution Plummeting. Environmentalists Worry About What Comes Next.
Traffic-free roads, plane-free skies and widespread brick-and-mortar closings have made the planet a beneficiary of the coronavirus pandemic — but only in the short term. Li Shuo, senior climate and energy policy officer at Greenpeace in Beijing, said it's not time to "pop the champagne corks" just yet. (Denne, 4/7)

ABC News: Single-Use Plastic Gloves Seem Like A Good Idea During Coronavirus, But Here's The Problem
People around the world are taking precautions to keep germs at bay amid the coronavirus pandemic, like wearing disposable gloves or masks in public, but the temporary solution could lead to another problem: litter. News feeds online have filled up with photos of used personal protective equipment strewn about on sidewalks, streets and other public areas. (McCarthy, 4/7)

GMA: Interest In Home Births Spikes Amid Coronavirus: What Expectant Moms Need To Know 
Expectant women today are facing a question they likely never expected to have to ask in their pregnancy -- how to give birth during a pandemic. The question has led some women to look online for answers, specifically on home births. Searches on Google for information on home births have increased markedly as the novel coronavirus has spread in the United States and pictures of hospitals full of patients with COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, have consumed the news and social media. (Kindelan and Pelletiere, 4/7)

NPR: For Alzheimer's Patients And Their Families, Coronavirus Can Mean Loving From Afar
Before coronavirus, Ken Gregersen spent most days with his wife, Evie, who has Alzheimer's and lives in a care facility near Des Moines, Iowa. "I would go and give her breakfast, lunch and dinner practically every day," Gregersen says. "We're a very close couple and we've been married 67 years." Then the facility began restricting visits as part of an effort to protect its residents from coronavirus. (Hamilton, 4/7)

Los Angeles Times: Why Coronavirus Quarantine Can Give You Vivid Dreams
What do a tidal wave, a lethal injection and masses of thin white worms have in common? They are all images that have cropped up in dreams people are having about the coronavirus pandemic. Many people are reporting more vivid dreams while self-quarantining, taking to social media to comment on the phenomenon. Take a moment to think back on your dreams over the past few weeks. Have they seemed a little more intense — or upsetting — than usual? (Schnalzer, 4/7)

The New York Times: Embracing The Uncertainties
What happens when scientists do acknowledge uncertainty is the question behind a study, published March 23 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences. It explored “The Effects of Communicating Uncertainty on Public Trust in Facts and Numbers.” “The accusations of a post-truth society, and claims that the public ‘had had enough of experts,’ prompted us to investigate whether trust in ‘experts’ was lowered by their openly admitting uncertainty about what they know,” said Dr. Spiegelhalter, one of the principal investigators. The study’s findings suggest that being transparent about uncertainty does not harm the public’s trust in the facts or in the source. (Roberts, 4/7)

Modern Healthcare: Drug Treatment Programs Now Facing Two Health Crises
Opioid treatment programs are now working through concurrent health crises. Patients rely on the facilities for obtaining medication-assisted treatment. But providers are trying to reduce the number of in-person visits and the risk of patients being exposed to COVID-19. (Henderson, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Lives Lost: A Louisiana Grandmother 'Took Care Of Everyone'
Mary Louise Brown Morgan kept a garden full of rosebushes and just about every kind of fruit tree, from plums to satsuma oranges to kumquats. And when the lawn surrounding her south Louisiana home grew too high, the 78-year-old grandmother climbed on her lawnmower to cut it herself. “She had the most beautiful yard on the block,” said her grandson, Steve Morgan. (Santana, 4/8)

Modern Healthcare: Cancer Patients Face Treatment Delays And Uncertainty As Coronavirus Cripples Hospitals
The federal government has encouraged health centers to delay nonessential surgeries while weighing the severity of patients' conditions and the availability of personal protective equipment, beds and staffing at hospitals. People with cancer are among those at high risk of complications if infected with the new coronavirus. It's estimated 1.8 million people will be diagnosed with cancer in the U.S. this year. More than 600,000 people are receiving chemotherapy. (Stone, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Italy, Spain ICU Pressures Decline, But Emotional Toll Rises
Maddalena Ferrari lets herself cry when she takes off the surgical mask she wears even at home to protect her elderly parents from the coronavirus that surrounds her at work in one of Italy’s hardest-hit intensive care units. In the privacy of her own bedroom, where no one can see, the nursing coordinator peels away the mask that both protects her and hides her, and weeps for all the patients lost that day at Bergamo’s Pope John XXIII Hospital. “We’re losing an entire generation,” Ferrari said at the end of one of her shifts. “They still had so much to teach us.” (Winfield, Murru and Parra, 4/8)

CIDRAP: Experts In Italy, Asia Share COVID-19 ICU Experience, Warnings
Median patient age was 63, and 1,304 (82%) were male. A total of 363 patients (23%) were 71 years and older, while 203 (13%) were younger than 51. Of the 1,043 patients with available data, 709 (68%) had at least one underlying illness, including 509 (49%) with high blood pressure, 223 (21%) with cardiovascular disease, 188 (18%) with high cholesterol, and 42 (4%) with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.High blood pressure was 23 percentage points more prevalent in patients who died (63%, 195 of 309 patients) than in those released from the ICU (40%, 84 of 212). All patients older than 80 had at least one underlying illness, as did 496 of 650 patients older than 60 (76%). (Van Beusekom, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Italy’s Economic Pain Shows Burden Of National Coronavirus Lockdowns
Italy’s month-old lockdown is slowing the coronavirus, but its economy is gasping for breath. Manufacturers in March had their worst month since records began, and are warning the government that they could lose customers to German and other foreign competitors unless factories reopen soon. Restaurants that have survived world wars are in danger of never opening again. Agriculture needs to find at least 200,000 seasonal workers, who normally come from abroad, before fruit and vegetables start rotting in the fields. (Sylvers and Stancati, 4/7)

The New York Times: Japan Declared A Coronavirus Emergency. Is It Too Late?
For months, Japan has confounded the world by reporting a relatively low rate of coronavirus infections without imposing the kind of stringent measures used by other nations. As the country now declares a state of emergency in the face of a worrisome rise in cases, medical experts are wondering whether the move on Tuesday has come just in time to avoid calamity, or is too little, too late. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, in announcing that the declaration would apply to Japan’s biggest population centers for the next month, painted an optimistic picture. (Rich, Ueno and Inoue, 4/7)

Politico: How Europe Failed The Coronavirus Test
They could have known. They should have prepared. They didn’t listen. Europe, in early April, remains the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic — where the outbreak, uncontrolled, morphed into catastrophe. Nearly 50,000 dead. More than 600,000 infected. And the devastation is far from over. (Herszenhorn and Wheaton, 4/8)

The New York Times: China Ends Wuhan Coronavirus Lockdown, But Normal Life Is A Distant Dream
China on Wednesday ended its lockdown of Wuhan, the city where the coronavirus first emerged and a potent symbol in a pandemic that has killed tens of thousands of people, shaken the global economy and thrown daily life into upheaval across the planet. But the city that has reopened after more than 10 weeks is a profoundly damaged one, a place whose recovery will be watched worldwide for lessons on how populations move past pain and calamity of such staggering magnitude. (Zhong and Wang, 4/7)

The Associated Press: Masked Crowds Fill Streets, Trains After Wuhan Lockdown Ends
After more than two months indoors, Wuhan resident Tong Zhengkun was one of millions of people enjoying a renewed sense of freedom when the Chinese city’s 76-day coronavirus lockdown was lifted Wednesday. “I haven’t been outside for more than 70 days,” an emotional Tong said as he watched a celebratory light display from a bridge across the broad Yangtze River flowing through the city. “Being indoors for so long drove me crazy.” (McNeil, 4/8)

Reuters: China's Wuhan Ends Its Coronavirus Lockdown But Elsewhere One Begins
While China has managed to curb its coronavirus epidemic the measures to contain it have exacted a heavy economic and social toll, with many residents in recent days expressing relief as well as uncertainty and worry over lingering danger of infection. “I’m going to see my parents,” Wang Wenshu told Reuters as she waited to check in at Wuhan’s Tianhe airport, which reopened on Wednesday. (Goh and Suen, 48)

The Wall Street Journal: Fear Lingers In Wuhan As China Eases Lockdown
Epidemiologists, U.S. intelligence sources and Wuhan residents suspect that Chinese authorities substantially undercounted infections and deaths over the past several months, especially in Wuhan, in part to boost President Xi Jinping’s image. Such doubts, combined with the reports of new asymptomatic cases, are triggering fears of a potential second wave of infections that could undermine Beijing’s claim to have tamed the virus. The accuracy of China’s data—and how the virus behaves in Wuhan after April 8—is critical for many other countries looking to China for how to manage their crises, including what happens when lockdowns are lifted in hard-hit areas. (Page, Khan and Strobel, 4/7)

The New York Times: China’s Coronavirus Battle Is Waning. Its Propaganda Fight Is Not.
For months the Chinese government’s propaganda machine had been fending off criticism of Beijing’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak, and finally, it seemed to be finding an audience. Voices from the World Health Organization to the Serbian government to the rapper Cardi B hailed China’s approach as decisive and responsible. But China could not savor the praise for long. In recent days, foreign leaders, even in friendly nations like Iran, have questioned China’s reported infections and deaths. A top European diplomat warned that China’s aid to the continent was a mask for its geopolitical ambitions, while a Brazilian official suggested the pandemic was part of China’s plan to “dominate the world." (Wang, 4/8)

The Wall Street Journal: To Curb The Coronavirus, Hong Kong Shows The World Masks Work
With the U.S. government recommending Americans wear facial coverings to curb the new coronavirus, this mask-obsessed city directly in the path of the pandemic’s first wave is an example of a community that started early—and remains convinced that masks helped slow the contagion. Hong Kong should have been slammed by Covid-19. The city of 7.5 million is among the world’s most densely populated and has the world’s busiest overland border crossings with mainland China. (Lyons, 4/8)

The Washington Post: Chinese Factories Go To Extremes To Fend Off Second Wave Of Coronavirus Cases
Disinfect hands and shoes at the factory gate. Bring your own towel. No sunny-side-up eggs. Chinese companies are going to extreme lengths to stave off new coronavirus outbreaks as they reopen for business. It will be a crucial test of whether a country can keep the infection curve flat after lifting social distancing. (Dou, 4/8)

Bloomberg: Inoculating The World May Mean Reviving Old Curbs On Patents
German Chancellor Angela Merkel described the coronavirus as the greatest challenge facing her country since the end of World War II. Germany’s parliament took that message to heart as part of a package to fight the virus, extending powers to suspend patent rights, a tool last used in the country in 1949. Governments around the world are reviving rarely used legislation or pledging new measures to ensure that they have the drugs they need to battle the pandemic. Israel last month invoked an emergency patent-suspension clause in its 1967 code for the first time, allowing it to import a generic version of AbbVie Inc.’s Kaletra, which has shown signs of combating coronavirus. (Miller, Matussek, Decker and Bodoni, 4/1)

Stat: Big Employers Could Have Saved Money If More Biosimilars Had Been Used
If some of the largest U.S. employers had used biosimilar versions of a pair of widely used brand-name biologic medicines two years ago, they could have saved an average of $1.5 million and their employees would also have spent hundreds of dollars less, according to a new study. Nearly all of the savings would have been realized if those 13 companies had relied on biosimilar versions of Remicade, a popular treatment for rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease, among other ailments. (Silverman, 4/2)

Stat: Alnylam And Dicerna, Onetime Rivals, Announce A Ceasefire 
Rival biotechs Alnylam and Dicerna are announcing a ceasefire. The two companies, which are both developing drugs based on the Nobel Prize-winning technique known as RNA interference, announced an accord Monday intended to harmonize two of their drug programs. The biotechs are working on two sets of rival drug candidates: Each has a drug candidate that targets alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency — a rare genetic disease that affects a person’s lungs and liver, and each also has a candidate that targets primary hyperoxaluria type 1, a rare genetic disorder. (Sheridan, 4/6)

Bloomberg: Zentalis Pharmaceuticals Climbs In Debut After Expanded IPO
Zentalis Pharmaceuticals Inc., a clinical-stage cancer treatment developer, rose 29% in its trading debut after raising about $165 million in an initial public offering. The company’s shares, which surged as much as 50% from the $18 offer price, closed Friday at $23.20, giving the firm a market value of $798 million. Zentalis sold 9.18 million shares on Thursday at the top of a marketed range, after expanding the IPO from 7.65 million shares. (Tse, 4/2)

FiercePharma: Bristol Myers, Acceleron's Reblozyl Moves Closer To Blockbusterland With New Blood Disorders Nod
As a potential blockbuster drug touted by Bristol Myers Squibb during its Celgene buyout, Reblozyl’s future success was in large part dependent on an approval for a group of bone marrow disorders called myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS). Now, it has that nod. On Friday, Bristol Myers and partner Acceleron Pharma said the FDA has greenlighted Reblozyl to treat anemia in MDS patients with ring sideroblasts, a low-risk subtype of the blood cancer in which red blood cells contain a ring of excess iron. (Liu, 4/6)

FiercePharma: Merck's Keytruda Inches Toward Another Biomarker-Based OK With Latest Priority Review
Merck & Co.’s immuno-oncology competitors have tried, so far fruitlessly, to use the investigational biomarker tumor mutational burden to help them win approvals. But regulators apparently like what they’re seeing from Merck where TMB is concerned. The FDA has awarded the pharma giant a priority review for the use of solo Keytruda in previously treated patients with high tumor mutational burdens, no matter where those tumors are in the body. The move will shorten the regulatory timeline, bringing the deadline for the agency’s verdict up to June 16. (Helfand, 4/7)

Health Affairs: Alternative Drug Purchasing Arrangements Do Not Justify Raising The Prices Medicaid Pays For Brand Drugs
As the prescription drug pipeline fills with very high-cost gene therapies and specialty drugs, affordability and access are top of mind for federal and state policy makers and patients. Drug manufacturers are aggressively promoting alternative purchasing arrangements as a better way for private insurers, state Medicaid programs, and employers to pay for new prescription drugs with very high launch prices. Some of these arrangements include pay-over-time contracts and outcomes-based contracts that have rebates linked to measurable clinical endpoints. These arrangements, when taken at face value, may seem to make high-cost drugs more affordable. However, they may do little or nothing to discourage excessive launch prices for new drugs and could instead merely facilitate them. (Edwin Park and Andrea Noda, 4/3)

Los Angeles Times: ‘Pharma Bro’ Martin Shkreli Wants Out Of Prison To Find A Cure For Coronavirus
One little-noticed consequence of the novel coronavirus crisis might be an outbreak of chutzpah. That’s a possible explanation for an audacious request by Martin Shkreli, the notorious “pharma bro” known for jacking up the price of old drugs to which he had acquired the rights, the better to reap profits from the needs of their desperate users. (Michael Hiltzik, 4/7)

Pennlive.Com: Drug Affordability Boards Will Backfire, Harm Consumers
The coronavirus outbreak has become a worldwide emergency, and has led to serious concerns about medical shortages, including the availability of prescription drugs. While some states, including Pennsylvania, are trying to cap the price of prescription drugs, sometimes by creating so-called “affordability boards,” their policies will only lead to greater shortages and threaten public health. (Oliver McPherson-Smith and Steve Pociask, 4/6)

The Daily Advitiser: Senator Kennedy Can Cut Drug Prices Without Embracing Big Government
Americans are more concerned about health care than virtually any other issue, according to a recent Gallup poll. The outbreak of COVID-19 has only exacerbated those worries. The pandemic has put the health of millions of Americans in jeopardy. And those suffering from chronic illnesses are particularly vulnerable. They stand a higher risk of complications-- even death -- if they contract the virus. (Shane Comeaux, 4/3)

Bangor Daily News: Mainers, Americans Deserve Lower Prescription Drug Prices
For the first time in a long time, it feels like we have bipartisan consensus on an important issue: the out-of-control prices of prescription drugs. President Donald Trump called on Congress during his State of the Union address to pass a bipartisan solution to address the cost of prescription drugs, and lawmakers in both the House of Representatives and the Senate have backed measures that would tackle the problem. (Scott Strom, 4/7)

Politico: Trump Broke The Agencies That Were Supposed To Stop The Covid-19 Epidemic
[Surgeon General Jerome] Adams’ metaphor of this as our new “9/11 moment” is more apt than he likely intended: Comparing the events is about more than just a story of casualties—it is also a story about government’s failure. Both Pearl Harbor and the 9/11 attacks occurred, in part, because the U.S. government and intelligence failed to see the attacks looming. We were caught unprepared, and Americans paid for that mistake with their lives. After 9/11, we swore to never let that happen again. “Never again” was the mantra handed down to the nation’s leaders by George W. Bush in the White House on September 12. (Garrett M. Graff, 4/7)

The New York Times: For Coronavirus, Trump Is Not The Wartime President We Need
Donald Trump declared himself a “wartime president” just three weeks ago. On Twitter, he proclaimed “WE WILL WIN THIS WAR.” At last, he seemed to grasp the gravity of the Covid-19 crisis facing the world. Bluster aside, Mr. Trump is correct: This is war, the most consequential since World War II, and he is in charge. Unfortunately, few of his actions display the leadership we need from a wartime commander in chief who is confronting a viral version of World War III. (Susan E. Rice, 4/7)

CNN: Why Trump Doesn't Want To Wear A Mask 
The new symbol of patriotism in pandemic-stricken America is a medical mask. And no surprise that President Donald Trump -- ever the defiant and self-involved Baby Boomer -- says he would only wear one if he "thought it was important." At a press Friday, he said "I think wearing a face mask as I greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens, I don't know. Somehow, I don't see it for myself," adding, "I just don't." (Michael D'Antonio, 4/7)

Boston Globe: Why A Traumatized Nation Is Having Trouble Staying Home 
Given the current wartime reality in health care facilities battling COVID-19, it can be difficult to understand why all of us are not taking social distancing and stay-at-home measures more seriously. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo recently called group gatherings in Central Park “insensitive . . . arrogant . . . [and] self-destructive,” channeling his anger and frustration at seemingly uncaring citizens. But while anger and blame are understandable reactions to people who are not heeding the public health call, they don’t help us understand or change individual behavior — or make it more likely for people to follow the restrictions that we all need to follow in order to safeguard thousands or even millions of lives. (Benjamin Herbstman and Holly Blatman, 4/7)

CNN: Southern Governors' Bizarre Response To Covid-19
My 15-year-old daughter Lyric noted how flimsy she thought the barriers blocking public beach access seemed. The aluminum barriers stood just a few feet high and could be felled by a brisk wind gust. It would be easy for just about anyone to climb over or walk around. They were placed up and down the oceanfront in South Carolina after Gov. Henry McMaster ordered public beach accesses closed. At that time, he declined to implement a statewide stay-at-home plan, giving us the distinction of being one of a dwindling number of states to not be under such an order. (Issac Bailey, 4/7)

Stat: A Doctor And A Deli Manager: Essential Personnel In Covid-19 Fight
In the morning, my fiance and I wake up, get dressed for work, blow each other a socially distanced kiss goodbye and head off into what feels like a battle.I work in a hospital. When I get there, I don my armor: scrubs, a mask, a gown, and gloves. He works in a supermarket deli. His armor: a hairnet and an apron. Although our battle grounds are vastly different, in many ways they are the same. (Michelle Myles, 4/8)

The New York Times: Italy Is Sending Another Warning
Everyone knows Italy’s story by now. The first European nation to be hit hard by the coronavirus, it has become a harbinger for the rest of Europe and America. First, there was the lockdown. Then the sight of a health care system stretched to the point of collapse and the terror of a rising death count. Now, nearly a month after the country went into lockdown, Italy is sending another warning. The economy is in trouble, bound for a major contraction. And the precariously situated workers — self-employed, seasonal, informal — are suffering the most. It’s not clear how much longer they can survive. (Bethan Jones and Fabio Montale, 4/7)

Boston Globe: We Need Health Security, Not Just Health Care 
The immediate global priority is to slow the spread of COVID-19 to save lives and to allow time for a viable vaccine to be developed. But the pandemic must also prompt a fundamental shift in our thinking toward health security. Health security means thinking about threats to health and how to combat them, not simply responding once people are already sick. This mindset shift is the prerequisite for any determination never again to allow a global pandemic to take hold. (Noubar Afeyan and Ara Darzi, 4/8)

The New York Times: Late In The Game, Russia Steps Up To Covid-19
“I was stuck at home for too long, had to go for a ride,” a friend from Moscow shouted into his phone several weeks ago, trying to outyell the noise around him on a trip, it turned out, to St. Petersburg. “We’re going to hit a bar here and get some drinks, will call.” He then disappeared from the video chat, in which I could see people behind him, walking along a familiar St. Petersburg street. I get very different dispatches from friends who live in a small town in Italy. There they stay home and tell me about relentless police raids against wanderers in the streets. A friend in Berlin says it is OK to go out, but not to gather in groups of more than two. (Maxim Trudolyubov, 4/7)

Cincinnati Enquirer: Protecting Civil Rights During And After COVID-19 Pandemic
What values are driving the government response to the COVID-19 pandemic? Are the virus-related measures burdening the civil rights of the communities we serve in our law practice in a fair and equitable manner compared to the majority population? Are we honoring our commitment to equal protection and non-discrimination? We see mixed results, and we see some useful lessons for our community post-pandemic. (Al Gerhardstein and Jennifer Branch, 4/6)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: We Can Increase Transparency On COVID-19 And Still Respect Privacy
Narrow restriction of local information about confirmed cases of COVID-19 begs the question: What is the appropriate balance between protecting an individual’s identity and the public’s right to information during a public health crisis? The Georgia Department of Public Health — like many state health departments — provides daily updates on confirmed COVID cases, broken down by county. While these numbers and how they change over time are informative, Georgians are eager to know more, specifically how the coronavirus is manifesting in their communities. (Clare Norins, 4/7)

Los Angeles Times: Coronavirus Disproportionately Killing Minorities Is No Coincidence 
As COVID-19 spreads across the United States, Americans can see the grim daily tallies of the cases and deaths, broken down by geography, age and sex. Only a few jurisdictions, however, are breaking down the numbers by racial and ethnic groups as well, and the story those figures tell when they’re available is disturbing. In Michigan, for example, African Americans accounted for 33% of COVID-19 cases and 41% of deaths as of Monday, though they represent only 14% of the overall population. In Chicago, 72% of the deaths have been among the city’s black residents, though they make up 29% of the population. The numbers are almost identical in Louisiana. (4/8)

The Washington Post: The CDC Must End Its Silence On The Racial Impact Of Covid-19
The early data suggest that the covid-19 pandemic is hitting black communities particularly hard. As of Monday, African Americans made up 27 percent of the population in Milwaukee County, Wis., but 70 percent of its covid-19 deaths. In Chicago: 30 percent of the population but 69 percent of deaths. And in Louisiana, the disparity is 32 percent and 70 percent. A similar divide can be seen in Michigan, where African Americans make up 14 percent of the population and, as of last Friday, accounted for 40 percent of covid-19 deaths. The disproportionate impact appears to be attributable to preexisting conditions — high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes and inadequate access to health care — that make African Americans more vulnerable to the disease. But the handful of examples above raises an urgent question: Does the effect hold true for African Americans throughout the country? (Spencer Overton, 4/7)

USA Today: On Coronavirus, Biological Age Is More Important Than How Old You Are
We hear constantly about the serious consequences of COVID-19 for older adults and the need to stay at home. Undoubtedly, the disease carries a disproportionate risk for them. In the United States, 80% of deaths from COVID-19 have occurred in adults age 65 and older. But here is the important part: The case fatality rate (the number of deaths among people who contract COVID-19) varies greatly across age groups in late life. Everyone over age 65 is not the same in the context of the pandemic. People who are 65 years old have rates of death — and likelihoods of recovery — vastly different from patients who are 85 years old. We need to stop lumping all older adults into one category and making decisions based on this blunt criterion. Doing so misses important differences across age. (Karen L. Fingerman and Kelly Trevino, 4/7)

CNN: The Risk To Native American Nations From Covid-19
The Indian Health Service, founded 65 years ago and criticized ever since, has encountered yet another major challenge: Covid-19 -- or as the Navajo call it Dikos Ntsaaígíí. Recent reports from the Navajo Nation, which straddles Arizona, Utah and New Mexico, have shown a sudden rise in cases, from about 10 people diagnosed two weeks ago to 216 on April 1, including 40 cases added in a single day. The latest tally from the Navajo Department of Health is 354, though the exact number of cases is difficult to determine because of different lines of reporting to state and Navajo health departments. (Sepkowitz, 4/7)

The Advocate: Tony Spell Is An Attention-Seeking Fool. That's Not What A Pastor Should Be.
We’re at war, all of us, collectively, with a highly contagious, invisible, and deadly enemy. Most are sacrificing, some more than others, doing what’s right, focused on lowering coronavirus-related deaths. Tony Spell’s fighting another battle. The pastor of Life Tabernacle in Central continues to bus in hundreds from surrounding parishes. He’s been charged by prosecutors for doing so. And yet on Tuesday, after those charges were filed, Spell once again filled his church with people. On the very day Louisiana had its highest number of coronavirus deaths to date, Spell turned his sanctuary into a potential breeding ground for a virus he claims is a hoax. (Dan Fagan, 4/5)

The Washington Post: Closed Houses Of Worship And Lonely Seders Aren’t A Surrender To Covid-19
The Passover seder has always been a multigenerational gathering of Jewish family and friends. But this year, amid the covid-19 pandemic, there is a communal consensus that no guests should be allowed to join the seder. The most significant Jewish celebration of the year, when Passover begins on Wednesday at nightfall, will be a muted affair.This is just the latest example of how the pandemic has forced religious groups to make difficult choices. Houses of worship have to decide whether they should remain open. Clergy have to decide whether they will continue to officiate at funerals and weddings. The coronavirus has put health at the top of the agenda and subordinated almost everything else. For many believers, though, prioritizing the secular while ignoring the spiritual is sacrilegious. Yet ultimately, ensuring people’s health and safety is a supreme act of spiritual care. (Chaim Steinmetz, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: The Art Of Coronavirus Modeling
Modeling the course of the coronavirus pandemic may still be as much art as science as projections are shifting as more information becomes available. The good news is that conditions in most of the country are less dire than early models predicted, and public-health experts will have to study the reasons to help the country emerge from this economically destructive shutdown. The so-called Murray model by the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation on Tuesday projected 81,766 fatalities over the next four months, which is about the same as it forecast two weeks ago. But predictions for individual states have shifted, sometimes dramatically. (4/7)

The New York Times: When Will There Be A Treatment For The Coronavirus?
For all of modern medicine’s advances, the immune system is still largely on its own when it comes to viruses: Of the 200 or so types that are known to infect humans, only about 10 have approved treatments, according to the science journalist Matthew Hutson. The race is now on to make the coronavirus the 11th: With a vaccine at least a year away, an effective treatment may be the country’s best hope for making a recovery before next year. But how close are researchers to finding a drug that works? Here’s a look at where things stand. (Bokat-Lindell, 4/7)

The Wall Street Journal: Billionaires Have Their Uses
Let us now speak in favor of billionaires. We refer specifically to Bill Gates, who was recently asked what good his fortune could do in this pandemic. “Governments will eventually come up with lots of money,” he replied on a TV show. “But they don’t know where to direct it. They can’t move as quickly.” The Microsoft mogul turned philanthropist said his “early money can accelerate things” in developing a vaccine against Covid-19. “For example, of all the vaccine constructs, the seven most promising of those, even though we’ll end up picking at most two of them, we’re going to fund factories for all seven,” he added. Rather than waiting to find out which vaccines are most effective and safe, and then building factories, Mr. Gates wants to ensure that the manufacturing capacity is ready to go immediately. (4/7)

NBC News: Coronavirus Shows Us Why The Time To Decide On End-Of-Life Care Is When You're Not Sick
We are emergency physicians who work on the front lines battling COVID-19 in academic and community emergency departments — and we are worried. We hope to save every person struck by coronavirus (or any other affliction), but the nature of life is that, sooner or later, we won't succeed. Limited supplies, like N95 masks, coupled with the possible need to ration resources, most notably ventilators, already haunts us. But the reality beyond the headlines is that, even if we could provide everything that every patient needed, it will often not be enough. (Dr. Rita A. Manfredi, Dr. Breanne Jacobs and Dr. James P. Phillips, 4/8)

Stat: Excluding Medical Students From Covid-19 Care Is Bad For Medicine
The devastating coronavirus pandemic is highlighting the dedication and courage of health care communities in the United States and around the world. Many aspects of the pandemic worry me, especially one related to the education of medical students and medical staffing in the U.S. (James R. Baker Jr., 4/8)

Boston Globe: Post-Coronavirus, How Will We Address The Trauma Health Care Workers Have Suffered? 
What we can also hear in their stories are the many ways that health care systems and governments have failed them. Hospital administrators and others must begin now to think about the short- and long-term mental health implications for this morally courageous group of nurses, physicians, and other front-line workers. (Connie M. Ulrich, 4/6)

Modern Healthcare: Ending Sheltering In Place Too Soon Will Be Catastrophic
Imagine trying to hold your breath. Some of us can hold it only for a few moments, others for a bit longer. Now imagine trying to hold your breath as someone starts taking the air out of your lungs. The impulse to breathe becomes much stronger. This is what is happening all over the country as we feel the effects of "sheltering in place." We sit at home watching the stock market fall and companies lay off employees or put them on furlough. We all want social distancing to end and for life to go back to normal. (Ira Bedzow and Adam E. Block, 4/6)