The New York Times: G.O.P. Scrambles To Respond To Public Demands For Police Overhaul
Congressional Republicans, caught flat-footed by an election-year groundswell of public support for overhauling policing in America to address systemic racism, are struggling to coalesce around a legislative response. Having long fashioned themselves as the party of law and order, Republicans have been startled by the speed and extent to which public opinion has shifted under their feet in recent days after the killings of unarmed black Americans by the police and the protests that have followed. The abrupt turn has placed them on the defensive. (Edmondson and Fandos, 6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Republicans Craft Own Police-Overhaul Proposals
The Republicans’ plan will respond to the “obvious racial discrimination that we have seen on full display on our television screens over the last two weeks,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.). The early support for legislative changes could quickly fizzle in an election year or be derailed by policy debates. But Republicans said there was a new willingness to engage on the issue, and recent polls have shown broad public concern over police treatment of black Americans. (Peterson and Duehren, 6/9)

The Washington Post: McConnell Taps Lone Black GOP Senator To Lead Republican Effort On Police Reform
Senate Republicans have tapped the lone black lawmaker in their ranks to draft legislation on police reform amid a public outcry and dramatic shift in opinion about law enforcement in the wake of George Floyd’s death. The fate of Floyd — a black man who suffocated under the weight of a white police officer’s knee more than two weeks ago — and the subsequent protests that flared across the country have prompted scrutiny of racial injustice in policing and demands for action. (DeBonis, Kim and Itkowitz, 6/9)

Politico: Republicans Eye Police Reform — And Search For Trump's Blessing
“Donald Trump … has great respect for Tim Scott. He looks to him a lot for this kind of a thing,” said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). Trump “isn’t going to lead on it right now. But he could get behind it.” Republicans have had mixed success waiting for Trump to get them across the finish line on controversial issues. Add in a pandemic and a presidential campaign in which Trump is touting his law-and-order bona fides and a deal faces steep odds. But without Trump, police reform doesn’t have a shot in a critical moment for the movement. (Everett, Zanona and McGraw, 6/9)

Reuters: Washington, D.C. Approves Police Reforms After Days Of Protests Against Racism
The district council for Washington, D.C. on Tuesday approved a raft of police reforms after days of protests against police brutality and racism in the U.S. capital and nationwide, sparked by the death of African-American George Floyd in police custody. The emergency legislation, approved by a unanimous vote, comes as a number of cities rethink approaches to policing but falls short of calls by some civil rights activists to defund city police departments. (6/9)

The Washington Post: D.C. Council Passes Police Reform Legislation 
The unanimous action, part of a nationwide response to the protest movement, infuriated the D.C. police union yet left activists clamoring for more drastic steps, including a reduction in the police budget. The emergency legislation — which includes a ban on the use of chemical irritants or rubber bullets on peaceful protesters — passed with a veto-proof majority, despite a stern letter from Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) that urged lawmakers to slow down and hold public hearings. (Zauzmer and Nirappil, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Two Years After Her Son Was Shot By D.C. Police, A Mother Hopes Reforms Bring Answers
Hundreds of protesters who minutes earlier had been dancing in the street fell silent when Kenithia Alston described the fatal shooting of her son by D.C. police. Her voice breaking, Alston detailed a futile effort to get information about his killing and a more than year-long, unsuccessful fight to persuade Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) to publicly release body-camera footage. (Chason and Hermann, 6/9)

Los Angeles Times: L.A. Police Killings: Tracking Homicides In Los Angeles County Since 2000 
In the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis, The Times has compiled a database of cases where people died at the hands of law enforcement in Los Angeles County. Since 2000, there have been nearly 900 killings by local police that were ruled a homicide by county medical examiners. Almost all of the dead were men, nearly 80% were black or Latino. More than 98% were shot to death. (6/9)

The Associated Press: Videos Of Black Men Dying In Custody Surface In OK, LA
Videos of Black men dying or being beaten in police custody have surfaced in Oklahoma and Louisiana, including one of a man who told officers: “I can’t breathe.” That footage, from a May 2019 arrest in Oklahoma City, was eerily similar to video showing George Floyd’s death last month in Minneapolis police custody, which has ignited massive peaceful protests and scattered violence in cities across the U.S. Floyd, a Black man who was unarmed and handcuffed, pleaded for air as a white officer pressed a knee on his neck for several minutes. (6/10)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF District Attorney Boudin Expands Services To Help People Victimized By Police Violence
San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin launched a new policy Tuesday that expands the scope of his office to include services to crime victims and witnesses of police violence.In San Francisco and elsewhere, violent confrontations with police are often documented only from the perspective of an officer’s report. Boudin said this narrative has effectively excluded victims of police wrongdoing from the types of aid afforded to other crime victims, including funeral expenses, medical expenses and mental health counseling. (Cassidy, 6/9)

Boston Globe: Behind Calls To Defund Police, A Refrain Long-Held By Police Themselves
As calls to defund police departments around the country have risen in the wake of the killing of a Black man, George Floyd, by a white officer from the department where Davis once served, activists are echoing something police themselves have long maintained: The police cannot fix all of society’s problems, from mental health crises to homelessness to students misbehaving in school. (Lotan, 6/9)

Dallas Morning News: Most Dallas Council Members Consider Defunding The Police And Using Money For Other Services
In the past, the Dallas City Council has strongly supported the police department. Nine months ago it unanimously approved a $517 million police operating budget that beefed up salaries for midcareer officers. But as the council tries to address ongoing demonstrations against police violence, more members say they’re open to “defunding” — or reallocating resources from public safety into other city services. (Norimine, 6/9)

Stateline: After George Floyd, Some School Districts Cut Ties With Police
Some school leaders want to replace the armed officers who patrol school hallways with nurses, counselors or unarmed guards — who, they say, can help keep students safe without reminding them of police officers who have killed George Floyd and other unarmed black people. The Minneapolis Board of Education and the school superintendent of Portland, Oregon, both announced last week that they’ll no longer hire police officers. Denver is poised to follow, and student protesters are calling for similar changes from Phoenix to Chicago amid nationwide anti-racism protests and, increasingly, calls to reduce the funding and responsibilities of police departments. (Quinton, 6/10)

And the issue could shape the 2020 election —

NPR: Joe Biden Has Come A Long Way On Criminal Justice Reform. Progressives Want More
Former Vice President Joe Biden has mostly responded to the aftermath of George Floyd's death by contrasting his governing and leadership style with President Trump's. But the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee has also laced his speeches, interviews and campaign statements with policy specifics. Biden has called for a federal ban on police chokeholds, a new federal police oversight commission, new national standards for when and how police use force, more mandatory data collection from local law enforcement, and more power for the Department of Justice to investigate local police departments, among other changes. (Detrow, 6/10)

Politico: Trump’s MAGA Base Finds Its Own Rallying Cry: Defend The Police
First, it was socialism. Then it was antifa. Now, with the latest protests sweeping the nation, President Donald Trump’s base has found its newest foil: the snowballing movement to drastically reduce the size and budgets of police departments to constrain discriminatory law-enforcement practices. The rallying cry of the far left is now becoming the rallying cry of the right, energizing the MAGA movement to defend the police. (Nguyen, 6/10)

Detroit Free Press: Whitmer Says She Supports 'The Spirit' Of 'Defund The Police,' Then Clarifies
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said in an interview Tuesday she supports "the spirit" of defunding the police as a way of reallocating resources, but later tried to clarify her remarks in an interview with the Free Press. Whitmer made the comments in a live Instagram interview on "The Root" with senior reporter Terrell Jermaine Starr. (Egan, 6/9)

The Washington Post: How The Black Lives Matter Movement Went Mainstream
The three words were once a controversial rallying cry against racial profiling and police violence. Now, “Black lives matter” is painted in bright yellow letters on the road to the White House. Celebrities and chief executives are embracing it. Even Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican former presidential candidate, posted the phrase on Twitter. (Del Real, Samuels and Craig, 6/9)

Politico: 'A Seismic Quake': Floyd Killing Transforms Views On Race
Public opinion on race relations and police misconduct has shifted dramatically since the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, with Americans significantly more likely to say they believe in systemic racism and side with the wave of protesters who have stormed the streets to demonstrate against police brutality. Six in 10 white Americans now say racism is “a big problem” in society, an enormous increase from polls taken when Barack Obama was president. More than 2-in-3 say Floyd’s killing reflects broader problems within law enforcement in the United States. (McCaskill, 6/10)

The Associated Press: Trump Eyes Racial Equality Debate Through Economic Lens
In his comments since George Floyd died, President Donald Trump has shared lots of opinions about the need for “law and order,” about fighting crime and the dangerous ideas of the “liberal left.” When it comes to addressing racism, not so much. Trump has remained largely silent on that, except to argue that a strong economy is the best antidote. He insists he’s “done more for the black community than any president since Abraham Lincoln.” (Superville, Madhani and Lemire, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Coronavirus Obliterated Best African-American Job Market On Record
Near the end of a decadelong economic expansion, African-Americans were finally finding some financial stability. Unemployment had reached record lows, and their wages had begun rising modestly. Anthony Steward, 34, a Milwaukee cook, personified that progress. In 2018, he said, he left his $10.50-an-hour corporate-cafeteria job for one paying $15 at Fiserv Forum, home of basketball’s Milwaukee Bucks, serving steaks, chicken wings and eggplant mozzarella for luxury-box guests. (Morath and Omeokwe, 6/9)

USA Today: Indianapolis Council Declares Racism A Public Health Crisis
The Indianapolis city-county council unanimously passed a resolution declaring racism as a public health crisis in Marion County, following a tense few weeks of protests that have rocked the nation while coronavirus disproportionately tears through black communities. The resolution was passed by a new council that plans to study and address racial disparities in the city. (Pak-Harvey, 6/9)

The Washington Post: 'A Man Was Unjustly Killed Here': Interracial Families Face Challenge Explaining George Floyd's Death To Their Children
Hope and Josh Melton decided to bring their 5-year-old daughter, Izzy, to the intersection where George Floyd was killed by a police officer here so she could begin to process the events that appeared to be gripping her parents' attention. They bought white poster board in bulk, colored markers and sunscreen, and headed into the city from their home in Blaine, 15 miles north. Izzy and her father knelt by the flowers on the sidewalk in front of Cup Foods at 38th and Chicago. (Klemko, 6/9)

The New York Times: 2020 Is The Summer Of The Road Trip. Unless You’re Black.
If there’s one thing the people behind car and R.V. companies, state tourism boards, national and state parks and hotels agree on right now, it’s that the summer of 2020 will be the summer of the road trip. With the country reopening, travel industry experts say people are planning short trips to destinations relatively close to home. By driving they can control the number of people they interact with, how many stops they make on the way and whether to take a detour or not — all things they can’t control on a plane. (Mzezewa, 6/10)

Los Angeles Times: Despite Coronavirus, Experts Back Protests For Health Reasons
Any type of large gathering brings a risk of spreading the coronavirus. Yet a number of health experts are supporting protests being held nationwide in response to the death of George Floyd. Why is that? Many health experts note that racism is the root cause of longstanding public health disparities that date back to the founding of the United States. (Lin and Shalby, 6/9)

The New York Times: Where Protesters Go, Street Medics Follow
When Safa Abdulkadir, a first-year medical student at the University of Minnesota, attended a protest in Minneapolis in response to the killing of George Floyd, she had no intention of putting her medical knowledge to use. It was May 26, one day after Mr. Floyd was killed, and although Ms. Abdulkadir was attending the demonstration as a protester, she made a point of wearing her white lab coat, a common symbol of medical professionals and students. “I went more as a sign that there is someone in the medical community who is here supporting the cause,” Ms. Abdulkadir said. “I wanted my people to feel as though I was there and supporting them, and feel my presence.” (Grillo, 6/9)

Kaiser Health News/Politifact: Barr Says Police Didn’t Use Chemical Irritants To Clear Area By DC Church. They Did.
On a Sunday morning news show, U.S. Attorney General William Barr said federal officers used no chemical irritants to disperse a crowd of people near a Washington, D.C., church President Donald Trump was due to visit. Appearing on CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” Barr said the U.S. Park Police and Secret Service used “standard crowd control” methods during the June 1 action. Host Margaret Brennan reminded him that the Park Police had said chemical irritants were used. (Greenberg, 6/10)

Reuters: D.C. National Guard Responding To Protests Test Positive For Coronavirus
Some Washington D.C. National Guard troops have tested positive for the coronavirus after being deployed to the city to respond to protests over the death of an African-American man in police custody, the military said on Tuesday. About 1,300 D.C. National Guard troops were sent to the capital to back law enforcement during demonstrations that erupted over the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man who died in Minneapolis police custody after being pinned beneath a white officer’s knee for nearly nine minutes. (6/9)

NBC News: Washington, D.C., National Guardsmen Test Positive For COVID-19
"National Guard personnel are social distancing and use of PPE measures remained in place where practical throughout the entire National Guard support to assist local and federal law enforcement responding to the civil unrest in the District of Columbia," the branch said in a statement. "All Guardsmen who are suspected to be at high risk of infection or have tested positive for COVID-19 during demobilization will not be released ... until risk of infection or illness has passed." (Kube, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Ridership Surges From Protests And Region’s Reopening Prompt Metro To Tweak Coronavirus Recovery Plan
Spurred in part by the surge in ridership from last weekend’s protests, Metro has tweaked its pandemic recovery plan to add capacity on trains and buses as the Washington region continues its reopening. Metro is in the “stabilization” phase of its coronavirus recovery plan, operating about 35 percent of normal service. The transit agency doesn’t plan to increase service significantly until school is back in session this fall, when service could be at 75 to 80 percent, officials said. (George, 6/9)

Dallas Morning News: Dallas Will Open Pop-Up Coronavirus Testing Site For Protesters
Protesters who have taken to the streets of Dallas and North Texas suburbs to rally against police brutality and racism qualify for a federally subsidized coronavirus test.A pop-up testing site near American Airlines Center is expected to open Wednesday for protesters to walk up to get tested, a spokeswoman for Parkland Health & Hospital System said. (Garcia, 6/9)

Dallas Morning News: Texas Lawmakers Welcome ‘Surge’ In COVID-19 Testing For Minorities, But Say More Is Needed
After harsh criticism that Texas is not doing enough to test minority communities for COVID-19, Gov. Greg Abbott announced on Monday an effort to expand testing in underserved areas and communities with high minority populations. Abbott said the effort was part of the state’s ongoing push to work with local governments, public health officials and emergency management offices to identify places that need additional testing and rapidly increase that capacity. (Barragán, 6/10)

CNN: Why A Wellness Routine Is Your Top Priority Amid Protests And The Pandemic — And How To Start 
As states gradually reopen even as the pandemic wears on, many of us are concerned about our health and well-being. Especially now, with some continuing to stay at home and social distance while others join the throngs at nationwide Black Lives Matter protests, it may even be a priority. From state to state, the loosening of restrictions vary, and within our local communities, the reality is that not only do people have different ideas on what constitutes social distancing but for many others still, in the face of racial inequality, the desire to create social change far outweighs the potential risk of spreading or catching the virus. (Drayer, 6/9)

The Hill: CrossFit CEO Steps Down After Furor Over George Floyd Remarks 
CrossFit CEO Greg Glassman announced his resignation Tuesday following uproar over comments he made about George Floyd, the unarmed black Minneapolis man whose death has sparked a wave of protests throughout the country. "On Saturday, I created a rift in the CrossFit community and unintentionally hurt many of its members. Since I founded CrossFit 20 years ago, it has become the world’s largest network of gyms. All are aligned in offering an elegant solution to the vexing problem of chronic disease," Glassman said in a statement. "I cannot let my behavior stand in the way of HQ’s or affiliates’ missions. They are too important to jeopardize," he added. (Budryk, 6/9)

The New York Times: Fauci Warns That The Coronavirus Pandemic Is Far From Over
In a wide-ranging talk to biotech executives, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci delivered a grim assessment of the devastation wrought around the world by the coronavirus. Covid-19 is the disease that Dr. Fauci always said would be his “worst nightmare” — a new, highly contagious respiratory infection that causes a significant amount of illness and death. “In a period of four months, it has devastated the whole world,” Dr. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Tuesday during a conference held by BIO, the Biotechnology Innovation Organization. “And it isn’t over yet.” (Grady, 6/9)

Politico: Fauci Calls Coronavirus His 'Worst Nightmare' As Infectious Disease Expert
Fauci explained that he’d long feared the emergence of a brand new, respiratory-borne viral illness with both a significant degree of transmissibility and mortality. “We’ve had outbreaks that have had one or two or three of those three or four characteristics but never all four,” he said. Coronavirus, he noted, checked all of those boxes, and had “indeed turned out to be my worst nightmare.” (Oprysko, 6/9)

The Hill: Fauci Says Coronavirus His 'Worst Nightmare' And Far From Over 
Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the virus surprised him with "how rapidly it just took over the planet." "This took about a month to go around the world," Fauci said. "When is it going to end? We're still at the beginning of it." Fauci said other outbreaks such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), HIV and Ebola "had a degree of containment and finiteness to them from the very beginning," he said. (Weixel, 6/9)

CNN: Dr. Anthony Fauci's 'Worst Nightmare' Is Covid-19 
It was "unexpected how rapidly," it would spread, he said. "It just took over the planet," Fauci added, "And it isn't over yet." Fauci also said there is still a lot to learn about the long-term negative effects of Covid-19 infection on patients. "The thing that we don't yet fully appreciate is what happens when you get infected and you get serious disease and you recover? What are the long-term durable negative effects of that infection?" Fauci said. (Christensen and Crespo, 6/10)

Bloomberg: Covid-19 Pandemic Is Far From Over, Anthony Fauci Warns 
Fauci, the head of the infectious disease agency since 1984, has emerged early on as one of the leading voices in the battle by President Donald Trump’s administration against the pandemic. His statements have sometime run counter to the president’s on topics such as when and whether restrictions should be eased, and he and the White House virus task force have recently been sidelined with fewer appearances before the media. The U.S. has more coronavirus cases than any other country, with about 2 million, and leads the world in pandemic deaths with more than 112,000. Meanwhile, as states such as New Jersey lift stay-at-home orders, Trump has cheered the revival of U.S. employment numbers and stock-market gains.(Lauerman and Griffin, 6/10)

Politico: White House Goes Quiet On Coronavirus As Outbreak Spikes Again Across The U.S.
The coronavirus is still killing as many as 1,000 Americans per day — but the Trump administration isn’t saying much about it. It’s been more than a month since the White House halted its daily coronavirus task force briefings. Top officials like infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci have largely disappeared from national television — with Fauci making just four cable TV appearances in May after being a near fixture on Sunday shows across March and April — and are frequently restricted from testifying before Congress. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump is preparing to resume his campaign rallies after a three-month hiatus, an attempted signal to voters that normalcy is returning ahead of November’s election, and that he’s all but put the pandemic behind him. (Diamond, 6/10)

NBC News: Fact Check: Trump Blames Testing For Spike In COVID-19 Cases. Experts Fault Reopening Of States.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly blamed testing as the reason for documented spikes in the number of COVID-19 cases across the U.S. — but data and public health experts attribute the surge to the easing of lockdown restrictions just weeks ago. "By the way, when you do more testing, you have more cases. We have more cases than anybody because we do more testing than anybody. It's pretty simple," Trump said Friday in the White House Rose Garden. (Timm, 6/10)

The Washington Post: Safety Net Providers Get $25 Billion To Keep Them Going
Federal health officials announced a new round of financial help Tuesday to ease the financial strains on safety-net health-care providers in the coronavirus pandemic, committing $25 billion to hospitals and other providers of care for the nation’s poorest patients. The Department of Health and Human Services plans to devote $10 billion of that amount to about 750 hospitals that treat many patients on Medicaid or who are uninsured, officials said. (Goldstein, 6/9)

Modern Healthcare: HHS' New $35 Billion In Grants Target Medicaid, Safety Net, Hot Spot Providers
A senior HHS official said that providers who submit revenue information could expect to see funds as soon as 10 days after submission. HHS backed off a similar timeline estimate the department gave to Medicare providers during the general distribution tranche. After a month of that portal being open, only 23% of available funds had been sent to providers that submitted paperwork. "On April 22, HHS committed to getting Medicare providers roughly 2% of their revenue. On June 9, HHS committed to getting Medicaid providers roughly 2% of their revenue. While the timing and process may not have been appreciated, the equity is," McDermottPlus Consulting vice president Rodney Whitlock said. (Cohrs, 6/9)

Modern Healthcare: Federal Aid Shouldn't Spark 'Opportunistic' Post-Pandemic Mergers, Biz Groups Say
Now that healthcare providers have received billions in federal aid to offset their COVID-19 losses, some business groups, regulators and lawmakers want to ensure the money doesn't fuel a wave of predatory consolidation. Their concern is that some of the $175 billion in grants Congress set up to keep healthcare providers afloat at the height of the pandemic could unintentionally help large, well-resourced companies buy up smaller ones that were weakened by the crisis. (Bannow, 6/9)

The New York Times: Connecticut Hospitals Ordered To Allow Visitors For Patients With Disabilities
Connecticut’s top health official on Tuesday ordered hospitals that were barring visitors because of the coronavirus to make exceptions for patients with disabilities, after a complaint that the policy violated the civil rights of people who were unable to obtain adequate care for themselves. A family member or care provider, the order says, may now accompany a patient who has a mental, intellectual or physical impairment and requires special assistance. (Fink, 6/9)

Modern Healthcare: HHS Drops Civil Rights Complaint Against Connecticut
HHS closed a civil rights complaint against Connecticut after the state issued an executive order to ensure that people with disabilities have access to support persons during the COVID-19 pandemic, the agency said Tuesday. Connecticut's executive order mandates hospitals and other acute care facilities to allow a designated support person to visit a patient with a disability. Family members, service providers or others knowledgeable about the needs of the person with a disability can serve as a designated support person, HHS said in a statement. (Brady, 6/9)

The New York Times: This Nurse Is Leading The Fight For Safer Hospitals
In early January, before most people in the U.S. had even heard of Covid-19, Bonnie Castillo called a meeting with two trusted health care deputies at the country’s largest union of registered nurses. Castillo was alarmed by news reports about how a virus — so mysterious it didn’t yet have a name — was ravaging Wuhan, China, and asked the union’s director of health and safety and its industrial hygienist to go through some scientific reports. As she listened, Castillo, the executive director of National Nurses United and a former intensive care nurse, grew worried. The disease, they told her, was spreading rapidly. (Rani, 6/9)

Kaiser Health News: At-Home Care Designed For COVID Likely Here To Stay At Cleveland Hospital
In late March, Andrea Laquatra began to feel sick. At first, it was an overwhelming fatigue, and the 32-year-old Cleveland mother of two tried to push through it. A fever, headaches and body aches soon followed. Then she noticed she’d lost her senses of taste and smell. By March 23, Laquatra could no longer deny the nagging fear she’d had since first falling ill: She might have COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, which by then had been detected in every state. (Zeitner, 6/10)

Modern Healthcare: Trump Administration Pushes For Reopening Healthcare Facilities
The federal government is urging healthcare facilities to reopen in states that have relatively low and stable incidence of COVID-19 cases, illustrating a delicate balance between increasing access to care while ensuring providers are adequately prepared to mitigate contamination and safety concerns. (Kacik, 6/9)

Boston Globe: Rhode Island Failed To Use Minority Contractors For $34 Million In Field Hospital Work 
Governor Gina M. Raimondo’s administration spent $34 million to build and equip field hospitals in response to the coronavirus pandemic without providing a dime for minority contractors, a situation that Latino and Black leaders called “inconceivable,” “disappointing,” and “unacceptable.” State law requires that minority business enterprises must receive at least 10 percent of the dollar value of state purchases and construction projects. But because of the urgency of the public health crisis, the administration waived that requirement in order to award contracts quickly. (Fitzpatrick, 6/9)

Modern Healthcare: CMS Star Ratings Don't Indicate COVID-19 Cases, Deaths, Data Show
A nursing home's overall CMS star rating does not correlate directly to its COVID-19 caseload or related deaths, according a Modern Healthcare analysis of federal data. CMS on June 1 said that "early analysis shows that facilities with a one-star quality rating were more likely to have large numbers of COVID-19 cases than facilities with a five-star quality rating." However, CMS on June 4 explained that nursing homes with the largest outbreaks were those with lower inspection ratings. (Christ, 6/9)

The Associated Press: Outcry As Some Nursing Homes Try To Grab Stimulus Checks
Compounding the hardships of the coronavirus, some nursing homes have demanded that low-income residents turn over their $1,200 economic stimulus checks, a cash grab lawmakers want to halt. On Tuesday, Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., called on the Health and Human Services inspector general’s office to issue a warning to nursing homes and assisted living facilities that such practices are “improper and unlawful.” (Alonso-Zaldivar, 6/9)

WBUR: Banned From Nursing Homes, Families See Shocking Decline In Their Loved Ones 
Family members often are an integral part of the care residents in nursing homes receive. They make sure meals are being eaten, clothes are being changed. They also offer invaluable emotional support. Without it, the consequences can be dire. NPR spoke to several families about what's happened since the mid-March visitor ban. All reported seeing shocking declines in their loved ones. (Jaffe, 6/9)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Federal Coronavirus Nursing Home Death Data Wrong, Nevada Officials Say 
Federal officials erroneously inflated COVID-19 deaths among Nevada nursing home residents, state health officials are contending. (Davidson, 6/9)

The Associated Press: Feds Seek $225M Fine For Pair Who Made A Billion Robocalls
The U.S. communications regulator on Tuesday proposed a $225 million fine, its largest ever, against two health insurance telemarketers for spamming people with 1 billion robocalls using fake phone numbers. The Federal Communications Commission said John Spiller and Jakob Mears made the calls through two businesses. State attorneys general of Arkansas, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas also sued the two men and their companies, Rising Eagle and JSquared Telecom, in federal court in Texas, where both men live, for violating the federal law governing telemarketing, the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. (Arbel, 6/10)

CNN: FCC Seeks Record Fine Against Alleged Scam Operators Who Made 1 Billion Robocalls
The record-breaking penalty, announced Tuesday, is the largest proposed fine in FCC history. It targets Texas-based Rising Eagle for allegedly spamming consumers in more than a half-dozen states, including Arkansas, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas. The calls, which took place in the first half of 2019, allegedly attempted to sell consumers fake, short-term health insurance plans from major insurance carriers such as Aetna and Cigna. Victims lured in by the alleged scam were then pitched policies from other providers that were Rising Eagle's clients, the FCC said. (Fung, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Coronavirus Hospitalizations On The Rise In Nine States Since Memorial Day
As the number of new coronavirus cases continues to increase worldwide, and more than a dozen states and Puerto Rico are recording their highest averages of new cases since the pandemic began, hospitalizations in at least nine states have been on the rise since Memorial Day. In Texas, North and South Carolina, California, Oregon, Arkansas, Mississippi, Utah and Arizona, there are an increasing number of patients under supervised care since the holiday weekend because of coronavirus infections. The spikes generally began in the past couple weeks and in most states are trending higher. (Pell, Buckner and Dupree, 6/9)

CNN: US Coronavirus: 19 States See Rising Cases And Arizona Is Asking Its Hospitals To Activate Emergency Plans 
Health experts have long warned about a second peak in Covid-19, and now a rise in cases has pushed Arizona to tell its hospitals to activate emergency plans. Arizona is one of the 19 states with the trend of new coronavirus cases still increasing. While 24 are trending downward, seven states' trends are holding steady. Nationally more than 1.9 million people have been infected by the virus and more than 112,000 have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. (Holcombe, 6/10)

NBC News: 'We Are Still In A Pandemic': In Some States, Summer Months May Not Provide A Hoped-For Lull
Businesses are slowly reopening. "Six feet apart" seems to be shrinking in distance. Face coverings are optional in most places. Some may believe the COVID-19 pandemic is ending in the United States, but in truth, "we are still in a pandemic," according to Dr. Jay Butler, head of the COVID-19 response at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many people in the U.S. remain vulnerable to the disease, and the pandemic will continue as long as there's a readily transmissible virus and a population with little or no immunity to it, Butler told NBC News. (Edwards, 6/9)

Los Angeles Times: California Coronavirus Cases Remain On Upward Trajectory
The number of coronavirus infections throughout California continues to rise steadily as counties further lift stay-at-home restrictions amid increasing efforts to restore the battered economy. On Monday, health officials reported nearly 3,100 cases, bringing the total to more than 134,000 infections in the state. California surpassed 100,000 cases a little less than two weeks ago and has reported at least 2,000 infections every day since. (Shalby, 6/9)

San Francisco Chronicle: Too Much, Too Soon? Bay Area Reopening Despite Recent Surge In Coronavirus Cases 
The Bay Area is rolling forward with reopening the economy even as coronavirus case counts are comparable to or much higher than the earliest days of the outbreak, when the region made the unprecedented move to begin sheltering in place. Several counties in the Bay Area, which remains more conservative than the rest of California in its pandemic response, are moving to reopen at a steady clip despite recent surges in cases. The region as a whole is reporting as many new cases each week now as in March, reversing several weeks of declining numbers. (Allday, 6/9)

Reuters: Arizona Calls For Emergency Plan As COVID-19 Spikes After Reopening
Arizona again told hospitals to activate the coronavirus emergency plans after cases spiked following reopening, turning it into a U.S. virus hotspot along with neighboring Southwest states. The state’s stay-at-home order ended on May 15, and its cases have increased 115 percent since then, leading a former state health chief to warn Arizona may need new social distancing measures or field hospitals. (Hay, 6/9)

Kaiser Health News: New Coronavirus Hot Spots Emerge Across South And In California, As Northeast Slows 
Mass protests against police violence across the U.S. have public health officials concerned about an accelerated spread of the coronavirus. But even before the protests began May 26, sparked by the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, several states had been recording big jumps in the number of COVID-19 cases. The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Robert Redfield, registered his concern at a congressional hearing Thursday. (Bebinger, Farmer and Fortier, 6/10)

The New York Times: Gov. Cooper Orders Ace Speedway To Shut Down
Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina has ordered an auto racing track in a rural part of the state to close after it staged events with packed stands, despite restrictions on gatherings, and became a flash point in the discussion on safely restarting sports. The governor’s order said Ace Speedway, 65 miles northwest of Raleigh, the state capital, must issue public notices that its races and all other events are canceled until further notice. The speedway’s next racing events had been scheduled for June 19. As of early Tuesday afternoon, the speedway’s Facebook page had no future events listed. (Garrett, 6/9)

ABC News: North Carolina Racetrack Ordered To Close For Defying Executive Order 
Under the state's executive order, as of May 22, sporting venues with a capacity of at least 500 people must limit the number of attendees to 25. ACE Speedway has a 5,000-seat capacity. The racetrack has acted in "open defiance" of the governor's orders, the health department said. Its abatement order noted that on May 23, the Alamance County racetrack had "possibly as many as 4,000 spectators" who came in "close proximity." (Deliso, 6/9)

CNN: ACE Speedway Ordered Shut Down After Holding Races To Near-Capacity Crowds Despite Virus Restrictions 
Alamance County Sheriff Terry S. Johnson has already said he wouldn't enforce the crowd restrictions, calling the state's targeting of ACE Speedway unfair. "I have found through research and contacts with other Sheriffs in the state, that numerous speedways and Go Cart Tracks ran this weekend in North Carolina with no action being taken on those owners or even warnings given," Johnson said in a letter to the governor's office on Saturday, according to CNN affiliate WXII. (Kim, 6/9)

The New York Times: Inside The Newly Spotless Subway: ‘I’ve Never Seen It Like This’
In Grand Central Terminal, the nexus of commuter rails and subway lines linking Midtown Manhattan to the far reaches of New York City and its suburbs, the usual blur of fast-paced commuters vanished. Subway cars lurched through a system eerily devoid of stray plastic bags, unidentifiable liquids and, notably, people. In stations, the loop of prerecorded announcements that seep into New York’s collective subconscious (“Stand clear of the closing doors, please”) offered a new message to riders: “Please, do your part to reduce crowding.” (Goldbaum, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City’s Homeless Population Has High Covid-19 Mortality Rate
Advocates called on New York City and the state to better protect homeless people from Covid-19 in a report charting how the coronavirus pandemic has disproportionately affected the homeless. The report, published Tuesday by advocacy group Coalition for the Homeless, found that the age-adjusted mortality rate for sheltered homeless people in New York City was 321 deaths per 100,000 people, compared with a citywide average of 200 deaths per 100,000 people. Mortality rates were higher for the roughly 19,000 single adults living in dormitory-style shelters where social distancing often isn’t possible, the report’s authors found. (Berger, 6/9)

ABC News: California Tech CEO Charged In Coronavirus Test Fraud Case 
The president of a Silicon Valley medical technology company was charged Tuesday with misleading investors by falsely claiming the company had developed a government-approved blood test for the new coronavirus — the first criminal securities fraud prosecution related to the COVID-19 pandemic, federal officials said. Mark Schena, the president of Arrayit Corporation, was charged with one count of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud after authorities said his company billed Medicare $69 million for coronavirus and unnecessary allergy tests. (Rodriguez, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Northern Virginia To Ease Coronavirus Restrictions Friday; Northam Says Students Will Return To School This Fall
Northern Virginia and Richmond will move to the next phase of shutdown recovery starting Friday, Gov. Ralph Northam announced, as data shows the novel coronavirus appears to be slowing its spread across the region. The looser restrictions include opening restaurants for indoor dining at half capacity and allowing gyms and fitness centers to reopen indoors at 30 percent capacity. Most of Virginia entered Phase 2 earlier this month, but Northern Virginia and Richmond were granted delays because they had been hit harder by the pandemic. (Sullivan, Hedgpeth and Lumpkin, 6/9)

Politico: Virginia Governor Allows Reopening Of K-12 Schools As Soon As This Summer
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam on Tuesday said that the state will allow schools to slowly resume in-person classes this summer and in the fall. But school districts also will have discretion on how to implement Northam's plans and may decide their schools will have additional restrictions, depending on local public health conditions. So, for example, schools in Northern Virginia worried about continued Covid-19 infections could decide to hold physical classes but also continue some remote learning. (Gaudiano, 6/9)

CNN: Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam Announces Phased State Plans For Reopening Schools In The Fall 
For students in Virginia, the end of summer break will mean a return to classes -- in-person. Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam on Tuesday announced that all schools will open for students next year, ridding parents and students of the looming uncertainty following closures and a move to remote learning due to Covid-19. (Lee, 6/9)

Dallas Morning News: Dallas County Reports 298 Coronavirus Cases — Matching Its Daily High — And 7 Additional Deaths
Dallas County reported seven additional deaths from the coronavirus Tuesday, as well as 298 new cases of COVID-19 — matching its single-day record for cases. The deaths include three Dallas residents: a woman in her 40s, a woman in her 50s and a man in his 70s. A Mesquite woman in her 30s, a Garland woman in her 50s, and two residents of long-term facilities — an Irving man in his 70s and a Seagoville woman in her 80s — also died. (Jones, 6/9)

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee County Implements Face Mask Policy As COVID-19 Cases Rise
With the coronavirus continuing to spread, Milwaukee County will now require all employees and members of the public who use county facilities to wear a face covering.Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley issued a "universal face mask policy" Tuesday. The policy requires all employees, contractors, vendors, volunteers, service users and members of the public who are entering county facilities to wear a face covering. This includes the airport and county buses. (Hein, DIrr and Hauer, 6/9)

KQED: Will Newsom Back Benefits For Undocumented Californians? 
The Coronavirus pandemic and recent protests over the use of excessive force by police have laid bare what many knew before: Income and wealth inequality and all its consequences are rampant throughout the California, especially in communities of color. This week, as legislative leaders and Gov. Gavin Newsom hammer out a final state budget agreement, we'll learn the fate of two programs aimed at helping one segment of that population: undocumented seniors and a tax credit for low income working families. (Shafer and Orr, 6/10)

KQED: Will California Voters Support New Taxes To Avoid Painful Budget Cuts? 
When supporters of increasing commercial property taxes, reshaping property tax transfer rules and legalizing sports gambling began formulating initiatives to put before voters in November, California's economy was riding high — unemployment was at historic lows and state coffers were flush with fat surpluses. With less than five months until Election Day, campaigns are now facing a different reality. California's economy has cratered due to the pandemic, leaving lawmakers scrambling to fill tens of billions of dollars in lost revenues. (Marzorati, 6/9)

Politico: Appeals Court Nixes Order To Shrink Prison Rolls Because Of Virus
A divided federal appeals court has overturned a judge's order that required a federal prison in Ohio hard hit by the coronavirus to cut its inmate population by sending medically vulnerable prisoners home or to other prisons. A panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals split 2-1 as it struck down the lower court's order to thin the ranks at the Elkton Federal Correctional Institution in Lisbon, Ohio, after a Covid-19 outbreak there that has cost 19 lives. More than a quarter of the roughly 2,000 inmates at Elkton have tested positive for the virus. (Gerstein, 6/19)

KQED: As COVID-19 Surges Through Prisons, Guards And Inmates Sue
Massive — and lethal — outbreaks of the coronavirus have been surging through not only the Otay Mesa facility, but a number of state and federal prisons in California. As of Monday, 3,018 state prison inmates had tested positive for COVID-19, along with 408 employees of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The biggest outbreaks have been at Chuckawalla Valley State Prison, Avenal State Prison, the California Institution for Men and the California Institution for Women. And 12 inmates have died, all at the California Institution for Men in San Bernardino County, as well as one CDCR staff member. (Hendricks, 6/9)

Stat: ‘We Don’t Actually Have That Answer Yet’: WHO Clarifies Comments On Asymptomatic Spread Of Covid-19
A top World Health Organization official clarified on Tuesday that scientists have not determined yet how frequently people with asymptomatic cases of Covid-19 pass the disease on to others, a day after suggesting that such spread is “very rare.” The clarification comes after the WHO’s original comments incited strong pushback from outside public health experts, who suggested the agency had erred, or at least miscommunicated, when it said people who didn’t show symptoms were unlikely to spread the virus. (Joseph, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Are Asymptomatic People Spreading The Coronavirus? A WHO Official’s Words Sparks Confusion, Debate
A comment by a WHO official on Monday — calling such asymptomatic transmissions “very rare” — touched off a furious scientific debate over the unresolved question and attracted widespread criticism of the organization. Less than 24 hours later, the WHO convened a special news conference to walk back its comments, stressing that much remains unknown. But the comment from Monday had already spread widely and been seized upon by conservatives and others to bolster arguments that people do not need to wear masks or maintain social distancing precautions. (Wan and Berger, 6/9)

The Hill: WHO Seeks To Clarify Widely Criticized Statement On Asymptomatic Spread 
Another distinction Van Kerkhove made in clarifying Tuesday is that she was referring to truly asymptomatic people, and not people who are presymptomatic, meaning they do not have symptoms at the moment but will later. Presymptomatic people and those with mild illness that someone might not even notice can transmit the virus, meaning that someone should not assume the absence of symptoms means they are not infectious. "People who are not showing symptoms can still spread the disease; it's just that they're likely pre-symptomatic rather than truly asymptomatic," tweeted Jeremy Konyndyk, senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development. "Keep wearing those masks. Keep distancing." (Sullivan, 6/9)

ABC News: WHO Says Remarks About 'Rare' Asymptomatic Spread Of Coronavirus Were ‘Misunderstanding’ 
But the ripple effects of her initial comments already had public health specialists perplexed. For months, scientists have said that even people without obvious symptoms can transmit the virus, and that these asymptomatic people carrying the disease are potentially part of the global pandemic. (Johnson, 6/10)

USA Today: Coronavirus: WHO Walks Back Comments On Asymptomatic Spread
Some public health experts noted Kerkhove’s failure to support her claim with published studies, while others rushed to her defense. “It makes sense,” Dr. Faheem Younus, chief of infectious diseases at the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Health, said on Twitter. “Each cough may emit ~3000 and sneeze ~40,000 droplets from a symptomatic patient. The risk is much less with asymptomatic.” (Rodriguez, 6/9)

Politico: WHO Backs Off Claim That People Without Virus Symptoms Aren't Transmission Risk
The controversy comes at a tumultuous time for the WHO. President Donald Trump said last month blasted the agency's coronavirus response and said the U.S. would withdraw its support. A Trump administration official confirmed U.S. funding to the WHO has been suspended. Several prominent Republicans jumped on Van Kerkhove’s initial statements as evidence the United States could safely, and completely, reopen. “Good News! People who catch coronovirus but have no symptoms rarely spread the disease. Translation: sending kids back to school does not require millions of test kits,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) tweeted on Monday. His tweet has been shared more than 11,000 times and liked at least 25,000 times as of Tuesday afternoon. (Ehley, 6/9)

CIDRAP: WHO Clarifies Evolving Assessment Of Asymptomatic COVID-19 Spread
Another big question is what proportion of people are truly asymptomatic and never progress to having any symptoms and what proportion reported as asymptomatic actually have mild disease. "We're 6 months into a pandemic, there's a huge amount of research that's being done, but we don't have that full picture yet," Van Kerkhove said. (Schnirring, 6/9)

Reuters: Coronavirus Patients Most Infectious When They First Feel Unwell: WHO
Studies show people with the coronavirus are most infectious just at the point when they first begin to feel unwell, World Health Organization (WHO) experts said on Tuesday. This feature has made it so hard to control spread of the virus that causes COVID-19 disease, but it can be done through rigorous testing and social distancing, they said. “It appears from very limited information we have right now that people have more virus in their body at or around the time that they develop symptoms, so very early on,” Maria van Kerkhove, a WHO epidemiologist and technical lead on the pandemic, told a live session on social media. (Nebehay, 6/9)

The New York Times: In The W.H.O.'s Coronavirus Stumbles, Some Scientists See A Pattern
Even as the World Health Organization leads the worldwide response to the coronavirus pandemic, the agency is failing to take stock of rapidly evolving research findings and to communicate clearly about them, several scientists warned on Tuesday. In a news briefing on Monday, a W.H.O. official asserted that transmission of the coronavirus by people without symptoms is “very rare.” Following concerted pushback from researchers, officials on Tuesday walked back the claim, saying it was a “misunderstanding.” (Mandavilli, 6/9)

The New York Times: Exploring The Links Between Coronavirus And Vitamin D
In the past decade, studies have found that taking vitamin D can lower the odds of developing respiratory infections like the cold and the flu, especially among people who have documented deficiencies. Now scientists are trying to find out whether vitamin D might also help protect against Covid-19. Some scientists believe that people with vitamin D deficiencies have weak or abnormal immune responses that make them more susceptible to developing Covid-19 and experiencing severe symptoms. (O'Connor, 6/10)

Reuters: Widespread Mask-Wearing Could Prevent COVID-19 Second Waves: Study
Population-wide face mask use could push COVID-19 transmission down to controllable levels for national epidemics, and could prevent further waves of the pandemic disease when combined with lockdowns, according to a British study on Wednesday. (Kelland, 6/9)

CNN: Face Masks Make Sex Safer In The Time Of Covid-19, New York City Health Department Advises 
The New York City Health Department is encouraging people to "be creative" in its updated guidelines to help people have safer sex during the Covid-19 pandemic. While the department still urges people to stay home as much as possible and minimize contact with others, the guidance says that during the pandemic people "will and should have sex." The guidelines were created to reduce the risk of spreading Covid-19. They've been updated periodically to reflect the changing understanding of the disease. (Christensen, 6/10)

Stat: Doctors Race To Understand What Covid-19 Means For People With HIV
Larry Pike has already survived one pandemic. The 76-year-old Seattle retiree has been living with HIV for 22 years. When Covid-19 hit Seattle, he grew worried. “Just like HIV,” he said, “there’s that ‘Who’s next?’ sort of thing.” Sure enough, on March 4, the day Amazon asked area workers to stay home, Starbucks announced it would hold a “virtual only” annual shareholders meeting, and Boeing asked its employees not to fly, Pike woke up with a sore throat and a cough. He was alarmed, but then felt better in a day and a half. “I thought, OK, I missed that,” he recalled. (McFarling, 6/10)

ABC News: Virologists Vigorously Debunk New Study On Origins Of The Novel Coronavirus 
In the latest development in a dramatic saga about the origins of the novel coronavirus, virologists around the globe have fiercely debunked yet another claim that the virus was man-made. This time, the allegation stemmed from a team of researchers from Britain and Norway, who warned in a research paper that current efforts to make a coronavirus vaccine are likely to fail because scientists have fundamentally misunderstood the virus SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19. (Anoruo and Adigun, 6/9)

Reuters: Retracted COVID-19 Studies Expose Holes In Vetting Of Data Firms
The scramble to research the novel coronavirus has exposed weaknesses in the vetting of healthcare data being supplied by a growing number of U.S. firms, a flaw that forced two of the most respected medical journals to pull studies last week. The Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) retracted COVID-19 studies over questionable patient health data supplied by a small company called Surgisphere. (Humer and Taylor, 6/9)

Stat: Could A Common Enzyme Be Key To Protecting Lungs From Covid-19?
When a person is infected with the novel coronavirus, the deadliest symptoms often show up in the lungs. The reason is now well-understood: The virus enters through ACE2, an enzyme that is commonly found on the surface of lung cells and that, ordinarily, helps tamp down inflammation. When it’s interrupted, inflammatory forces run amok. But ACE2 is far more than just an entryway for infection, and scientists say the enzyme could point the way to a much-needed treatment for Covid-19. (Garde, 6/10)

CIDRAP: COVID-19–Linked Syndrome In Kids New, Distinct, Studies Suggest 
Two new studies involving a total of 75 children published yesterday in JAMA showed that the pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome linked to COVID-19 is novel and different from Kawasaki disease (KD) and toxic shock syndrome (TSS). One study involved 58 children admitted to eight hospitals in the United Kingdom with COVID-19 who met the criteria for pediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome temporally associated with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (PIMS-TS) from Mar 23 to May 16. (Van Beusekom, 6/9)

The Washington Post: Covid-19 Patients Who Survive The ICU Have A Long Road Home
For the fortunate covid-19 patients like Sosa who survive intensive care and long stretches on ventilators, the journey home can be an arduous and lonely one that runs through places like Burke. Their survival is testament to the lifesaving value of some of the world’s most sophisticated medical interventions, but their deficits reveal the toll of the disease and of hospitalization itself. Their futures can depend on what happens here. “A lot of the time, it’s a win to get discharged from the hospital,” Lucke said. “Everyone forgets there are so many things that go on before you actually make it home, if you can make it home.” (Bernstein, 6/9)

The New York Times: Georgia Voting Meltdown Leads To Uproar: ‘I Refuse Not To Be Heard’
Georgia’s statewide primary elections on Tuesday were overwhelmed by a full-scale meltdown of new voting systems put in place after widespread claims of voter suppression during the state’s 2018 governor’s election. Scores of new state-ordered voting machines were reported to be missing or malfunctioning, and hourslong lines materialized at polling places across Georgia. Some people gave up and left before casting a ballot, and concerns spread that the problems would disenfranchise untold voters, particularly African-Americans. Predominantly black areas experienced some of the worst problems. (Fausset, Epstein and Rojas, 6/9)

Reuters: Long Lines, Voting Machine Problems Fuel Investigations In U.S. State Of Georgia
The missteps in Georgia, which had delayed its primary from March, are likely to raise alarms about how well states will handle voting if the coronavirus is still raging when Republican President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden meet in the Nov. 3 presidential election. Many voters complained of hours-long waits and voting machines that were not operating. Raffensperger said the problems were most acute in metropolitan Atlanta’s Fulton and DeKalb counties, although the Georgia Democratic Party said it received reports of problems “in every corner of the state.” (Whitesides and Cornwell, 6/9)

The Associated Press: 'Chaos In Georgia': Is Messy Primary A November Harbinger?
It raised the specter of a worst-case November scenario: a decisive state, like Florida and its “hanging chads” and “butterfly ballots” in 2000, remaining in dispute long after polls close. Meanwhile, Trump, Biden and their supporters could offer competing claims of victory or question the election’s legitimacy, inflaming an already boiling electorate. “I feel like we’re struggling as a country right now to hear people who really need to be heard,” said Atlanta resident Ross Wakefield, a 28-year-old white software engineer who waited nearly four hours to vote and watched others “peace out and bail” on the line. “This does not give me a lot of confidence that we’re doing that.” (Barrow, 6/10)

The Washington Post: In Georgia, Primary Day Snarled By Long Lines, Problems With Voting Machines — A Potential Preview Of November
Many new poll workers brought on to replace those who had bowed out because of fears of the virus were unfamiliar with new ballot-marking devices that were deployed statewide for the first time Tuesday, replacing a paperless electronic voting system that a federal judge had declared insecure. Even before the pandemic struck, election security experts had questioned whether officials had enough time to provide adequate training for their use in the primaries. (Gardner, Lee, Willis and Glionna, 6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: In A Warning For November, Voters Endure Long Lines In Georgia’s Primary Election
“For November, we need to do a much better job of planning for the tens of millions of Americans who are going to be voting in person,” said David Becker, executive director and founder of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, who has been working with the Georgia secretary of state’s office. “We need to offer options for voters.” Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, said Tuesday that his office has opened an investigation into problems in the Atlanta metropolitan area’s Fulton and DeKalb counties to determine how to resolve these issues before November’s election. (Corse, 6/9)

Politico: ‘A Hot, Flaming Mess’: Georgia Primary Beset By Chaos, Long Lines
It took LaTosha Brown three hours to vote at her polling site in Atlanta. Brown, co-founder of Black Voters Matter, said it took her nephew six hours to vote on Friday during early voting hours. “We have got to stop making voting a traumatic damn experience for black voters. Everything has to be a traumatic experience,” said Brown. “The secretary of state needs to resign. ... They always blame it on local officials.” (Montellaro and Barron-Lopez, 6/9)

The Washington Post: GOP Expects To Move Its Convention To Jacksonville After Dispute With North Carolina Over Pandemic Safeguards 
Seeking a city willing to allow a large-scale event amid the coronavirus pandemic, Republicans have tentatively settled on Jacksonville, Fla., as the new destination for the premier festivities of the Republican National Convention in August, according to three Republican officials briefed on the plans. (Linskey and Dawsey, 6/9)

The Hill: Koch-Backed Ad Campaign Urges Congress To Make Coronavirus Changes Permanent 
The political arm for the network of groups led by Charles Koch is putting six-figures behind a new digital campaign ad urging Congress to enshrine into law some of the changes to the health care system that have allowed for greater flexibility for medical professionals during the coronavirus pandemic. The new ad from Americans for Prosperity (AFP), which will run on Facebook for the rest of the month, features Dr. Camille Honesty, an internal medicine specialist from Kansas City who praised the looser restrictions on medical care that she says were a necessity during the pandemic. (Easley, 6/10)

The Washington Post: Senators Seek Investigation Into Project Airbridge Deliveries Of Protective Medical Gear
Three Democratic senators on Monday requested an independent investigation into the arrangement forged between the federal government and six for-profit companies to rapidly transport protective medical gear from overseas to the front lines of the U.S. coronavirus pandemic. The Trump administration has said it created the initiative — called Project Airbridge — to ease crippling shortages of personal protective equipment, or PPE. Under the arrangement, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has spent approximately $154 million to fly supplies secured by the six companies from overseas into the United States. (Brittain and Stanley-Becker, 6/9)

The Associated Press: VA Says It Lacks Adequate Medical Gear For 2nd Virus Wave
The Veterans Affairs Department on Tuesday defended itself against criticism of past shortages of masks and other medical gear to protect employees from the coronavirus but acknowledged its current supplies may not be enough to handle a second wave. Dr. Richard Stone, the top health official at VA, said at the height of the pandemic its 170 medical centers were going through 250,000 N95 masks per day — a “daunting amount.” (Yen, 6/9)

The New York Times: U.S. Limits Virus Aid For Masks, Gloves And Other Medical Gear Abroad
Relief workers are broadly restricted from using United States funding to buy surgical masks, gloves and other protective medical gear to confront the coronavirus overseas, in order to keep that equipment available for health providers in America, according to regulations issued Tuesday by the United States Agency for International Development. The new rules did grant an exception: The money can be used to buy equipment if it is produced in the part of the world where it would be used. (Jakes, 6/9)

Politico: In Absence Of Federal Action, Farm Workers’ Coronavirus Cases Spike
Coronavirus outbreaks among farm workers are popping up in rural communities across the country, sparking fears within the agriculture industry that cases will skyrocket as harvest season stretches into summer. In the coming weeks, more crews will be sent into fields to pick, pack and ship ripening crops. About a quarter of the 2.5 million-person workforce follows the harvest into other regions, bringing concerns that migratory workers could spread the disease to more farms and states. (Crampton, 6/9)

Los Angeles Times: Salinas Farmworkers Crowd Homes, Spreading Coronavirus
A bed fills most of the room that Odilia Leon shares with her five children. In one corner, a dresser spills over with clothes. For the cramped room in a two-bedroom unit behind a house in east Salinas, she pays $1,050 a month. It’s what she can afford as a fieldworker picking strawberries, her job for the last nine years. A couple with three children rents the other room. In all, 11 people share a living room and kitchen. There is one bathroom. (Gomez, 6/9)

Bloomberg: Coronavirus Outbreaks At U.S. Food Plants Raise Specter Of More Food Shortages
A caravan of vehicles decorated with black ribbons and memorial pictures crawled through Yakima, Wash., last week to mark the death of David Cruz, a 60-year-old fruit warehouse employee who died after contracting coronavirus. The county, a hub of agricultural activity where workers jam into often crowded factories to package apples and other foods, has the highest per-capita infection rate on the West Coast. It’s a grim reality that’s playing out across the country as COVID-19 spreads beyond the meat processing plants that have captured the national spotlight. (6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Fastest-Rising Food Prices In Decades Drive Consumers To Hunt For Value
Food makers are designing value packs, and supermarkets are restoring promotions, aiming to offset disruptions wrought by the coronavirus pandemic that have led to the fastest rise in food prices in more than four decades. While food companies and supermarkets say they have reopened plants and resolved supply constraints that contributed to higher prices, they also expect prices to remain elevated because of increased costs for labor and transportation. Companies are buying equipment and reconfiguring factories and stores to keep people safe from the new coronavirus. Some of those changes are adding costs that are trickling down to shoppers. (Gasparro and Kang, 6/9)

The New York Times: Can A Vaccine For Covid-19 Be Developed In Record Time?
In the history of medicine, rarely has a vaccine been developed in less than five years. Among the fastest to be developed was the current mumps vaccine, which was isolated from the throat washings of a child named Jeryl Lynn in 1963. Over the next months, the virus was systematically “weakened” in the lab by her father, a biomedical scientist named Maurice Hilleman. Such a weakened or attenuated virus stimulates an immune response but does not cause the disease; the immune response protects against future infections with the actual virus. Human trials were carried out over the next two years, and the vaccine was licensed by Merck in December 1967. (6/9)

The New York Times: Coronavirus Vaccine Tracker
Researchers around the world are developing more than 125 vaccines against the coronavirus. Vaccines typically require years of research and testing before reaching the clinic, but scientists are racing to produce a safe and effective vaccine by next year. Work began in January with the deciphering of the SARS-CoV-2 genome. The first vaccine safety trials in humans started in March, but the road ahead remains uncertain. Some trials will fail, and others may end without a clear result. But a few may succeed in stimulating the immune system to produce effective antibodies against the virus. Here is the status of all the vaccines that have reached trials in humans, along with a selection of promising vaccines still being tested in cells or animals. (Corum and Zimmer, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Coronavirus Vaccine Candidates’ Pivotal U.S. Testing To Start This Summer
The federal government plans to fund and conduct the decisive studies of three experimental coronavirus vaccines starting this summer, according to a lead government vaccine researcher. These phase 3 trials are expected to involve tens of thousands of subjects at dozens of sites around the U.S., John Mascola, director of the vaccine research center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in an interview. Meant to determine a vaccine’s safety and effectiveness, they would mark the final stage of testing. (Loftus, 6/10)

NPR: Producing Enough Vaccine For The Coronavirus Means Companies Have To Start Now
Once upon a time, developing a new vaccine was a step-by-step process that went from concept, to design, to tests in humans, to regulatory approval, to manufacturing. It was a process that could take a decade or more. But the urgent need for a COVID-19 vaccine has radically changed all that. Now, the hope is the entire process can be completed in a year or less. (Palca, 6/10)

Reuters: Potential COVID-19 Vaccine From China Shows Promise In Animal Tests
A potential COVID-19 vaccine being developed by Chinese researchers showed promise in trials in monkeys, triggering antibodies and raising no safety issues, researchers said, and a human trial with more than 1,000 participants is under way. The vaccine candidate, called BBIBP-CorV, induced high-level neutralising antibodies that can block the virus from infecting cells in monkeys, rats, guinea pigs and rabbits, researchers said in a paper published in online by the medical journal Cell on Saturday. (6/10)

Reuters: Japan's AnGes Speeds Towards 2021 Rollout In Coronavirus 'Vaccine War'
Japanese biotech AnGes Inc expects its coronavirus vaccine to be ready as early as the first half of 2021, if it can overcome supply chain and production hurdles, the company’s founder said. The Osaka-based firm had a headstart in the potential COVID-19 vaccine development by repurposing its hypertension vaccine that had already passed through high safety and regulatory standards and other hurdles. (Swift, 6/10)

ABC News: Out Of The Lab And Into People’s Arms: A List Of COVID-19 Vaccines That Are Being Studied In Clinical Trials 
The world's leading drug companies, universities and governments are racing to develop a vaccine for COVID-19, the disease that has taken more than 400,000 lives globally. Of the 133 candidates being explored, ten have been approved for human trials, according to the World Health Organization... Here are the companies leading the global race for a coronavirus vaccine. (Nunez, 6/9)

Reuters: Gilead's Remdesivir Prevents Lung Damage In COVID-19 Study On Monkeys
Gilead Sciences Inc’s (GILD.O) antiviral drug remdesivir prevented lung disease in macaque monkeys infected with the new coronavirus, according to a study published in the journal Nature on Tuesday. The findings were first reported in April by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) as a “preprint,” prior to traditional academic validation provided by a medical journal. (6/9)

CNBC: Gilead's Remdesivir Slows Disease Progression In Monkeys With COVID-19
Remdesivir has been cleared for emergency use in severely-ill patients in the United States, India and South Korea. Some European nations are also using it under compassionate programs. Trials of the drug in humans are ongoing, and early data has shown the drug helped patients recover more quickly from the illness caused by the new coronavirus. In the study, 12 monkeys were deliberately infected with the coronavirus, and half of them were given early treatment with remdesivir. (6/9)

In other pharmaceutical news —

Reuters: Temasek-Backed Tychan To Start Human Trials Next Week For COVID-19 Treatment
Singapore’s Tychan, a biotechnology firm backed by state investor Temasek Holdings, said it will begin human clinical trials next week for a potential monoclonal antibody treatment for COVID-19. The first phase of the trial to be conducted on 23 healthy volunteers will take about six weeks to evaluate the safety and tolerability of TY027 - a monoclonal antibody that specifically targets SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. (6/10)

The New York Times: How’s The Economy Doing? Watch The Dentists
If not for coronavirus, you’d expect your local dentist office to be doing just fine. Dentist offices tend to be stable businesses that stick around for decades, unlike restaurants that open and close frequently. Dentists earn a healthy salary — a median of $159,000 — and offer services with no clear substitute. If you need your teeth cleaned or a cavity filled, the dentist is the only option. This makes them, in the eyes of some economists, the perfect barometer for gauging the country’s recovery from the shock of the pandemic. (Kliff, 6/10)

ABC News: Lawmakers From Both Sides Of The Aisle Frustrated Over Coronavirus Relief Fraud 
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle were frustrated in their attempts Tuesday to learn specifically how a potential fourth phase of coronavirus relief could be protected from fraud. At Tuesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Chairman Lindsey Graham, a Republican, and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, both appeared unsatisfied with Justice Department and law enforcement officials who said it was too soon to discuss specific details of their ongoing investigations. (Owen, 6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Hassett Sees Another Stimulus Bill From Congress Before August Recess
A top economic adviser to President Trump said the White House “would definitely support” another round of aid to shore up the economy as U.S. businesses begin to reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic. White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett said Tuesday the odds of a “Phase Four” stimulus package “are very, very high,” even if data on output and jobs continue to surpass expectations. On Friday, the Labor Department reported that U.S. employers added 2.5 million jobs in May and that the unemployment rate, which economists had expected to soar to 19.5%, instead fell to 13.3%. (Kiernan, 6/9)

Reuters: With Crisis Response In Place, Fed Looks To Long Term
The Federal Reserve completes its latest policy meeting on Wednesday with attention turning from its massive response to the coronavirus pandemic and toward its still-developing plans to strengthen and lengthen a nascent economic recovery. (Schneider, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Fed Debates How To Set Policy For The Post-Pandemic Economy
Federal Reserve officials could take preliminary steps Wednesday to clarify how they will provide more support to the economy now that interest rates are pinned near zero. The Fed is unlikely to announce major policy changes after its policy meeting Wednesday but will explain its thinking through Chairman Jerome Powell’s news conference and its new economic projections. (Timiraos, 6/10)

Politico: Social Distancing Will Suppress Recovery Despite Emergency Aid, CBO Chief Says
Congress mounted a $3 trillion response to the pandemic but any boost in economic activity will be “tempered” as long as some social distancing continues, the director of the Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday. CBO Director Phillip Swagel also said in a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that additional emergency aid for state and local governments would increase the federal deficit, but help reduce the size of tax hikes and budget cuts that governors and local officials will be forced to consider. (Emma, 6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Second Pandemic Wave Would Inflict Big Economic Cost, Says OECD
A second wave of lockdowns to counter a resurgent novel coronavirus would deal a terrible blow to a global economy already facing a severe contraction, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Wednesday. In its latest report on the global outlook, the Paris-based research body released one of the gloomiest forecasts for growth yet published by an international financial institution. The OECD said it expected the global economy to contract by 6% this year if a second wave of infections and containment measures can be avoided. (Hannon, 6/10)

USA Today: Coronavirus: Eviction Worries Mount As Moratoriums Lifted
When the spread of coronavirus shut down Elizabeth Anderson's bed-and-breakfast cleaning business in March, she lost her income and was unable to pay the rent on her house. That landed Anderson among thousands of Americans staring at the abyss of homelessness as states begin to lift moratoriums on evictions that have been in place since the start of the pandemic three months ago. So far, 24 states are now processing evictions again, and that number is expected to climb to at least 30 states by the end of June. (Braga, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Shoppers Surprise Retailers By Returning To Stores
Shoppers are returning to reopened stores faster than expected, according to retail executives. Macy’s Inc. Chief Executive Jeff Gennette said sales at reopened stores are down by about half compared with before the pandemic, which is better than the 85% decline the company had predicted. At Kohl’s Corp., stores are doing about three-quarters of their pre-pandemic sales volume, up from about two-thirds in late May, Chief Executive Michelle Gass said. (Kapner, 6/9)

Stat: Researchers Tap Location Data To Capture Effect Of Covid-19 Policies
In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, tech giants have chipped in on a panoply of efforts to shore up data that can help track, trace, and curb the spread of the virus, from Apple and Google’s collaboration on contact tracing technology to Amazon’s funding for several pandemic-related research projects. But an independent group of researchers thinks it has a better way to lend a hand. (Brodwin, 6/10)

Reuters: U.S. Student's App Offers Roadmap To Singapore Contact Tracing Tech
Singapore kicked off a global rush to develop contact tracing apps for the novel coronavirus when the city-state launched an apparently new system in March. But the project actually drew inspiration from a 2014 U.S. high school project that won an international prize but found no backers - until now. It all started when Rohan Suri created an app at Thomas Jefferson High School in Alexandria, Virginia, to tell his mom to leave home for the bus stop when he was seven minutes away. (Dave, 6/10)

State House News Service: Baker Introduces New COVID-19 Data Collection Bill 
One day after he signed a bill the Legislature sent him expanding COVID-19 reporting requirements, Gov. Charlie Baker filed a new data-collection proposal that he hopes will "put a finer point" on tracking the virus's impact. At a press conference in Lawrence, Baker said his bill would build on the law he signed by requiring more reporting of COVID-related data to the Department of Public Health, empowering the DPH to issue fines to any parties that do not comply, and by removing elder housing facilities from mandates to report health information about their tenants. (Lisinski, 6/9)

NPR: After COVID-19 Contact Tracing Comes Quarantine. Here's How That Works
As an infectious disease nurse during the COVID-19 pandemic, Debbie Sorensen works as a memory detective on a tight deadline. The mystery she's trying to untangle is where an infected person has been and who's been with them. Her sleuthing tools include a telephone, a wall calendar and the firm, but calming voice that comes with 20 years of experience with the Salt Lake County Public Health Department in Salt Lake City. (Becker, 6/10)

Stat: Medicare Leader Calls For Expanded Telehealth Access After Covid-19
President Trump’s top Medicare official said Tuesday that expanded access to telemedicine should continue after the coronavirus pandemic recedes and that officials are examining ways to act without waiting for legislation from Congress. “I can’t imagine going back,” said Seema Verma, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, told STAT during a live virtual event. “People recognize the value of this, so it seems like it would not be a good thing to force our beneficiaries to go back to in-person visits.” (Ross, 6/9)

Modern Healthcare: Apps Provide 'Rich' Opportunities For Data Security, ONC's Rucker Says
Apps will catch on as a dominant way patients seek access to their medical data, since—unlike existing technology—they're designed with patients in mind, the Trump administration's top health IT official said Tuesday, reaffirming a vision behind recent interoperability and information-blocking regulations. The rules from CMS and HHS' Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, released in March, will require healthcare providers and insurers to adopt technologies that will let patients download their medical data onto mobile apps. (Cohen, 6/9)

CNN: It's Still Safe To Perform CPR During The Pandemic, Study Says 
Imagine taking a walk in your neighborhood, carefully staying 6 feet apart from others to ensure social distancing. You see an elderly man collapse on the sidewalk, having a heart attack. Everything you've heard of late tells you to avoid close contact with strangers, especially the elderly, during the pandemic. Is it safe to perform CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) to try to save his life? Or are you risking being infected with the novel coronavirus or giving it to a dying man? (Prior, 6/10)

The New York Times: Farewell To Gummy Bear Jars: Tech Offices Get A Virus Safety Makeover
When employees at Salesforce, the cloud software giant based in San Francisco, eventually return to their office towers, they may find that the fun is gone from their famously fun-loving workplaces. No more chatting in the elevator. No hugging. No more communal snack jars.Before employees can even go into the office, they will be required to fill out online health surveys and take their temperature. If they pass the health screening and have a good reason to go in, Salesforce will schedule their shifts — and send them digital entry tickets for the lobby with an arrival time. In the lobby, employees will be asked to wait for the elevator on social-distancing floor markers and stand on other markers once inside the elevator. (Singer, 6/10)

The New York Times: What Jury Service During The Coronavirus Pandemic Looks Like
Dylan Potter, a public defender in Portland, Ore., found himself in late April searching for case law on what had been an obscure legal question: whether witnesses are allowed to wear masks. He found one decision on whether a confidential informant could testify in a ski mask (no), and another on whether Islamic veils were permitted in court (it depends). But nothing addressed what Mr. Potter was about to encounter: a jury trial in the midst of a pandemic in which face coverings have become a matter of health and safety. (Dewan, 6/10)

The New York Times: How Architecture Could Help Us Adapt To The Pandemic
The last class Joel Sanders taught in person at the Yale School of Architecture, on Feb. 17, took place in the modern wing of the Yale University Art Gallery, a structure of brick, concrete, glass and steel that was designed by Louis Kahn. It is widely hailed as a masterpiece. One long wall, facing Chapel Street, is windowless; around the corner, a short wall is all windows. The contradiction between opacity and transparency illustrates a fundamental tension museums face, which happened to be the topic of Sanders’s lecture that day: How can a building safeguard precious objects and also display them? How do you move masses of people through finite spaces so that nothing — and no one — is harmed? (Tingley, 6/9)

The New York Times: What If Working From Home Goes On … Forever?
Josh Harcus sells robots for a living. Robotic vacuum cleaners, to be specific — a model called the Whiz, which his employer, SoftBank Robotics America, released here last fall. The company, part of a group owned by the Japanese conglomerate, has deployed more than 6,000 of the robots around the world, including at Facebook headquarters. They look like something out of “Wall-E”: a rolling gray cylinder about thigh-high that trundles back and forth over carpets, sucking up dirt. Many of Harcus’s customers are major airports and hotel chains or the huge cleaning companies hired by them. SoftBank Robotics rents the units to clients, at an annual cost of $6,000 per machine. It’s an expensive lease, so all last fall and through the winter Harcus was traveling around, showing off the Whiz, pressing the flesh to convince customers of its value. (Thompson, 6/9)

PBS NewsHour: This Chart Can Help You Weigh Coronavirus Risks This Summer
While state and local governments have outlined multi-phase plans to reopen their economies from pandemic closures, many of us are without a roadmap for how to assess lingering risks as we begin to engage in aspects of public life after months of isolation. (Vinopal, 6/9)

The New York Times: When Will It Be Safe To Sing Together Again?
Imagine the scene: You’re at church, belting out a hymn, and the sound is so joyful that you turn, smiling, to look around. You notice a spray of spit coming from the mouth of the person next to you: One particularly large droplet arcs toward the person in front, then lands, right on their neck. Three months ago, you might have thought that moment was gross. Today, you’d probably find it frightening. In the space of a few months, group singing has gone from being something life-affirming to a potential source of disease, even death. (Marshall, 6/9)

The Hill: Substance Use Up Amid Pandemic: Survey 
Some people with substance use disorders have increased their usage during the pandemic, according to a survey released Tuesday. A survey of more than 1,000 people conducted by the Addiction Policy Forum found that 20 percent said they or a family member have increased substance use since COVID-19 began. Four percent reported overdoses, and 1 percent of those were fatal, according to the survey. (Hellmann, 6/9)

GMA: New Cancer Prevention Guidelines Call For No Alcohol Consumption 
In a major change, the American Cancer Society is now saying that cutting alcohol out of your diet completely is best for cancer reduction and prevention. "For the first time they’re saying not one drink a day for women, not two drinks a day for men," said Dr. Jennifer Ashton, ABC News chief medical correspondent and a board-certified OBGYN. "They’re saying the best thing you can do for your health is to avoid alcohol completely." (Kindelan, 6/9)

CNN: Probiotics Don't Do Much For Most People's Gut Health, Review Finds 
Whether contained in yogurt or stuffed into capsules and sold on pharmacy shelves, probiotics are popular among the health conscious, with millions of people around the world thought to use them. But a new report from the American Gastroenterological Association said that these so-called good bacteria don't do much for gut health — including digestive conditions like Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis or irritable bowel syndrome. (Hunt, 6/9)

CNN: A Woman's Eggs Choose Lucky Sperm During Last Moments Of Conception, Study Finds 
"Swipe right. Swipe left." On an evolutionary level, the finger flick of choice in the human mating game is often influenced by subconscious input from our most primal instincts. In females, for example, hormones present at ovulation can drive a woman to choose a cocky, confident man with a slight stubble and more masculine features... A fascinating new study finds those chemical-based preferences continue even after sex. Human eggs appear to "choose" which sperm will become the lucky winner in conceiving a baby. (LaMotte, 6/9)

Stat: As Biotech Drifts From Amyloid Hypothesis For Alzheimer's, Some Cling On
Two biotech CEOs are cautiously optimistic about the controversial amyloid hypothesis, which suggests a sticky brain plaque causes Alzheimer’s — a departure from most of the rest of the industry, which has largely abandoned the theory, once dogma, after a long string of clinical trial failures. But Susan Catalano, the co-founder and CSO of Cognition Therapeutics, said her company is still indirectly targeting it for drug development, in part because she thinks other researchers didn’t appreciate the different forms the plaque-forming substance can take. (Sheridan, 6/9)

The New York Times: The World Reopens, Despite Skyrocketing Coronavirus Cases
Two months ago, when there were roughly one million confirmed coronavirus cases and the primal politics of survival was sweeping the world, shutting down was the order of the day. This week, the number of cases soared past seven million, with 136,000 new infections detected on Sunday alone, the highest single-day total since the pandemic began. The order of the day? Reopening. Terrified after watching economies built over the course of decades hollow out in a matter of weeks, countries seem to be saying, in effect: Enough. (Santora, 6/9)

The New York Times: Brazil Coup: Threats Rattle Bolsonaro As Coronavirus Deaths Surge
The threats are swirling around the president: Deaths from the virus in Brazil each day are now the highest in the world. Investors are fleeing the country. The president, his sons and his allies are under investigation. His election could even be overturned. The crisis has grown so intense that some of the most powerful military figures in Brazil are warning of instability — sending shudders that they could take over and dismantle Latin America’s largest democracy. But far from denouncing the idea, President Jair Bolsonaro’s inner circle seems to be clamoring for the military to step into the fray. (Romero, Casado and Andreoni, 6/10)

The Washington Post: Coca Leaf Crash: Coronavirus Collapses Price Of Cocaine Ingredient
As a farmer eking out a living in Peru’s central jungle, Rubén Leiva grew one cash crop that seemed immune from global cycles of booms and busts. But the coronavirus pandemic has accomplished what neither other international crises nor a U.S.-backed “war” ever could: a collapse in the price of coca leaf, a natural stimulant that is the building block of cocaine. The great coca crash of 2020 — prices for the leaf in some regions of South America have fallen as much as 73 percent — illustrates the extent to which the pandemic is disrupting every aspect of global trade, including the traffic in illegal drugs. (Faiola and Chauvin, 6/9)

The Associated Press: COVID-19 Just The Latest Epidemic In Areas Struck By Disease
When Tariq Nawaz’s daughter was born a year ago, he borrowed money to pay for his wife’s cesarean delivery. Seven months later, they learned their baby had polio and sold the little bit of jewelry his wife had received for her wedding to pay mounting medical bills. Then the new coronavirus pandemic struck Pakistan, prompting a countrywide lockdown that closed even their village of Suleiman Khel, at the edge of a tribal region plagued by militants. Still in debt, Nawaz lost his job, his monthly paycheck of $95 and the means to provide treatment for the baby’s polio. (Gannon, 6/10)

Reuters: Argentina's New Daily Coronavirus Cases Top 1,000 For First Time
Argentina confirmed more than 1,000 new cases of coronavirus on Tuesday as the rate of new infections continued to rise just days after it extended lockdown measures in the capital Buenos Aires, the country’s largest city and epicenter for the virus. Argentina’s Health Ministry logged 1,141 new cases in the past 24 hours, as well 24 deaths, pushing its totals to 24,761 cases and 717 deaths since the outbreak began in early March. (6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: Moscow, Center Of Russia’s Coronavirus Crisis, Emerges From Lockdown
Residents of the Russian capital emerged Tuesday from a strict coronavirus lockdown, a day after Moscow authorities announced they would lift key restrictions in a move Kremlin critics say is meant to project safety and normalcy ahead of two key events—even as infections in the city remain high. Muscovites, who had been ordered to remain at home for more than 10 weeks, can now go outside without limitation, visit hair salons and take part in certain other activities—the beginning of what officials say will be a phased reopening of the city. (Simmons, 6/9)

Reuters: WHO Recommends Pakistan Reimpose Intermittent Lockdowns As COVID-19 Cases Rise Sharply
The World Health Organization has recommended Pakistani authorities reimpose “intermittent lockdowns” of targeted areas to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus, stating the country did not meet the global body’s conditions for lifting restrictions. (6/9)

Reuters: France Will End Coronavirus Emergency Health Powers On July 10
France will end special government powers brought in to deal with the coronavirus pandemic on July 10 though it will retain the ability to curb gatherings and freedom of movement for four months, the prime minister’s office said. As coronavirus infections spiralled out of control in March, France passed “state of health emergency” legislation which gave the government the power to restrict civil liberties by decree without parliamentary approval. (6/10)

Reuters: Polish Scientists Design Remote-Controlled Ventilator To Fight COVID-19
A team of Polish scientists has designed a remote-controlled ventilator they hope will allow doctors to help critically ill patients breathe, but from a distance, in a bid to make medical personnel safer during the coronavirus pandemic. (6/10)

Los Angeles Times: South Korea On A Spending Spree With Coronavirus Stimulus
Choi Moon-soon fanned out his wad of coronavirus stimulus money for the cameras like a gambler flaunting hundred-dollar bills. He navigated the narrow aisles of a market in Gangwon province, walking between stalls stacked high with socks, hats and kitchen wares that in recent months had gathered dust. Cameras flashed with his every step. An entourage of dozens followed. (Kim, 6/9)

Bloomberg: Delhi Overwhelmed By Covid-19 Cases After City Eases Lockdown
India’s capital of 16 million people is set to be the latest city overwhelmed by Covid-19, and the worst may be yet to come. Authorities have requisitioned more hotels and community centers to be used as Covid-19 wards, while bodies are piling up in hospital morgues and crematoriums. Doctors and public health experts warn the city has yet to hit its peak and numbers are expected to keep rising through over the coming weeks. (Naqvi, 6/9)

Bloomberg: EU Points Finger At China, Russia For Covid-19 Disinformation
China and Russia were blamed for spewing out false and misleading online information about Covid-19 in a European Commission report that seeks to stem the “unprecedented” spread of fake news amid the pandemic. The two nations are among “foreign actors” that sought to “undermine democratic debate” and enhance their own image through “targeted influence operations and disinformation campaigns around Covid-19 in the EU,” the European Union’s executive authority said in the report, published on Wednesday. (Bodoni, 6/10)

USA Today: Eiffel Tower Reopens June 25 In Paris; Masks Are Mandatory For Guests
Want to visit the Eiffel Tower this summer? Bring a mask and be prepared to climb some stairs. French officials announced the Paris landmark will reopen June 25 at 10 a.m. local time. Among the safety measures being put in place: Guests ages 11 years and up will be required to wear masks, and the elevators are off-limits for now, along with the top floor. (Deerwester, 6/9)

USA Today: Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro Follows In Donald Trump’s COVID-19 Footsteps
He's shown disdain for facts and science-based recommendations. He's said the public will eventually realize they were "tricked" by governors and large parts of the media over a "measly little cold." He's embraced chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine as treatments for the coronavirus despite no evidence of the anti-malaria drugs' effectiveness in fighting the disease. As Brazil's coronavirus infections have surged to a level surpassed only by the United States, President Jair Bolsonaro, the leader of Latin America's largest country, has followed a near-identical coronavirus script to President Donald Trump. (Simoes and Hjelmgaard, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: Why Drug Companies May Resist Milking Covid-19 Treatments
The onset of Covid-19 has granted the drug industry a significant business opportunity. Whether manufacturers should take full advantage is more complicated than investors might appreciate. Gilead Sciences will likely set a commercial price for its antiviral treatment remdesivir in the weeks ahead, after donating its initial manufactured supply. A round of vaccine candidates is also in development from major drug companies such as Johnson & Johnson, Merck and Pfizer, as well as from promising biotech upstarts. (Grant, 6/9)

Bloomberg: Price Limits Will Scare Off Covid Vaccine Makers, Fauci Warns
The federal government shouldn’t force drug companies to lower the costs of Covid-19 vaccines and treatments but should encourage fair pricing, Anthony S. Fauci said Tuesday. “I have a lot of experience over the years dealing with pharmaceutical companies in which we’re trying to develop an intervention,” Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the National Institutes of Health, said. “And the one thing that is clear is that if you try to enforce things on a company that has multiple, different opportunities to do different things, they will walk away.” Fauci spoke at BIO Digital, the first virtual convention by the Biotechnology Innovation Organization. (Baumann, 6/9)

The Wall Street Journal: In Race For Covid-19 Vaccine, China Tries For A Coup
The U.S. is home to the world’s biggest and best-known pharmaceutical companies. But China is giving the U.S. a run for its money in the race to develop a vaccine for Covid-19—a feat that would instantly change the dynamics of the fight against the deadly virus, and the geopolitical competition between the U.S. and China. Beijing’s government, including its military and several state-backed firms, has committed hundreds of millions of dollars and cleared regulatory barriers to accelerate research and development. Even before a front-runner is clear, domestic drug manufacturers have begun ramping up production capacity as leader Xi Jinping vows to share a Chinese-backed vaccine with the world. (Deng, 6/5)

Bloomberg: FDA Misled Senators On China’s Role As Vital U.S. Drug Supplier
The Food and Drug Administration had to walk back testimony by an official at a Senate hearing last week after he downplayed the scale of China’s dominance of the drug supply chain in the U.S. The issue has come to the fore as the pandemic has prompted some in Congress and the Trump administration to question China’s role as the global supplier of key ingredients. The FDA says it’s able to police the safety of the U.S. drug supply regardless where it comes from, even as it’s had to suspend on-site inspections due to the virus. (Edney, 6/9)

Stat: Will The 'Patent Dance' Cause Amgen To Pull A Biosimilar Off The Market?
In a closely watched case, a federal appeals court must decide whether a biosimilar company should temporarily pull its product off the market because manufacturing plants may be changed, a move that could cause Americans to pay more for a brand-name biologic medicine — at least for a few months. At issue is an interpretation of federal law known as the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act, which is supposed to determine when biosimilar drugs can be launched. (Silverman, 6/5)

Stat: Wholesale Drug Prices — And Net Prices — Keep Falling For Most Drugs 
Amid continued political pressure on the pharmaceutical industry, a new analysis finds that brand-name drug makers increased their wholesale prices by 2.3% in the first quarter of this year, a much smaller boost than 3.2% hike that occurred during the same time a year ago. Meanwhile, after subtracting allowances such as rebates and discounts, net prices paid by health plans fell by 2.6%, compared with a 3.7% decline in last year’s first quarter, according to SSR Health, which tracks the pharmaceutical industry. (Silverman, 6/4)

FiercePharma: Remdesivir Stockpiling Could Help Push COVID-19 Drug Into Profitable Territory For Gilead: Analyst
Ever since the FDA last month cleared Gilead’s remdesivir for emergency use to treat COVID-19, investors have been wondering if the drug could possibly reap returns for the company, given the Big Biotech's vow to donate millions of doses and a lack of details on pricing plans beyond that. But one influential Wall Street firm does see a path to profitability for remdesivir—one that hinges on both commercial sales and governments around the world paying for the drug to build a stockpile after the current pandemic passes. (Weintraub, 6/4)

Stat: Sarepta's Gene Therapy For Rare Disease Shows Improved Muscle Function
Sarepta Therapeutics said Monday that three children born with a rare muscle-wasting disease called limb-girdle muscular dystrophy are showing durable improvements in strength and function a year after a one-time infusion of an experimental gene therapy. Three more children have been treated with a higher dose of the same gene therapy. Initial biopsy results from those patients, also reported Monday, show greater production of a key muscle protein with no added safety problems — suggesting the higher dose could lead to even larger improvements in muscle function. Those tests will be performed later this year, Sarepta said. (Feuerstein, 6/8)

Bloomberg: Dread Over Impending Anti-Huawei Law Grows At U.S. Companies
A quiet panic is spreading in Washington and corporate boardrooms that a law taking effect in two months, which bans Huawei Technologies Co. gear, will threaten the business of government contractors. Aerospace, technology, auto manufacturing and a dozen other industries are engaged in a lobbying frenzy ahead of an Aug. 13 deadline to comply with a far-reaching provision that was tucked into a defense spending bill two years ago. (Leonard and Banjo, 6/10)

The Wall Street Journal: New Treatments For Macular Degeneration Are On The Way
Scientists may be just a few years away from delivering new treatments for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of irreversible vision loss in people more than 50 years old. Over the past 15 years there has been only one class of successful AMD drugs, known as anti-VEGF agents, and they have worked for a minority of AMD sufferers. Now researchers are having success fighting AMD from new directions. (Oliver, 6/8)

Stat: The Next Record-Setting IPO: A Drug Company That Doesn’t Develop Drugs
Royalty Pharma, a business built on investing in other people’s medicines, is planning to raise $2 billion in what would be the drug industry’s largest-ever initial public offering. The company, founded in 1996, intends to sell 70 million shares at between $25 and $28 each. The offering, expected to price next week, would give it a market value of about $16 billion. The drug industry’s IPO record is currently held by Moderna, which raised about $600 million in a 2018 debut that valued it at above $7 billion. (Garde, 6/8)

Stat: Judge Rules AbbVie Didn't Unfairly Thwart Humira Competition
In a victory for AbbVie (ABBV), a U.S. federal judge ruled the drug maker did not unfairly thwart competition by striking deals with other companies that resolved patent lawsuits, but also resulted in delaying lower-cost biosimilar versions of its Humira medicine for several years. A lawsuit filed last year by unions, insurers and the city of Baltimore alleged that AbbVie “abused the patent system” and “erected significant barriers to entry to block biosimilar competition” by filing dozens of patents for Humira, its franchise product. Some of the more than 100 Humira patents — sometimes described as a “patent thicket” — extend to 2034. (Silverman, 6/9)

FiercePharma: AbbVie's Humira Defense May Keep Prices High, But It's Still Legal, Judge Rules
While AbbVie’s deals with biosimilar companies preserve high prices in the U.S. for several years, the company's strategy doesn't amount to an antitrust violation, U.S. District Judge Manish Shah wrote in an order Monday.  As AbbVie’s initial patent on Humira approached expiration, the company applied for dozens of follow-up patents. The plaintiffs—among them the City of Baltimore, an insurance trust fund for Miami police officers and a benefit plan for pipe trade workers in Minnesota—alleged AbbVie illegally blocked competition for Humira by obtaining a “patent thicket" and deploying it on would-be competitors. (Sagonowsky, 6/9)

Stat: China’s Biggest-Ever Nasdaq Biotech IPO Comes At An Awkward Time
Legend Biotech raised more than $400 million in a Nasdaq IPO on Friday, marking the largest U.S. debut for Chinese drug maker. But Legend’s Wall Street success arrives at an uncertain time for Chinese companies, as a bipartisan group of lawmakers is pushing a bill that could force it and scores of other companies off of U.S. exchanges. (Garde, 6/5)

Stat: Tiny Denmark Saves Lots On Biosimilar Humira, As Americans Pay Big Bucks
For those yearning for the day when biosimilars save the U.S. health care system huge amounts of money, consider a recent episode in Denmark. In October 2018, the patent expired on Humira, a big-selling biologic drug that is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, and other ailments. The Danish government moved quickly and began accepting bids from companies that make biosimilar versions, which are nearly identical variants that are expected to yield the same health outcomes, but cost less than pricey brand-name biologics. (Silverman, 6/3)

Stat: AstraZeneca Partners With RNA-Modifying Biotech Accent Therapeutics
Drug giant AstraZeneca is moving deeper into RNA-based therapies with a new partnership with the startup Accent Therapeutics, which is hoping to make therapies by manipulating enzymes that subtly change RNA. The deal announced Thursday is worth $55 million upfront with more than $1 billion on the table through milestone-based payments. It may be the first partnership a pharmaceutical company has forged with a company working on the concept, which has already attracted a lot of attention and investment. (Sheridan, 6/4)

Stat: Canadian Medical Groups Often Don't Disclose Pharma Funding In Guidelines
Many Canadian medical societies and specially focused disease groups fail to disclose industry funding in their clinical practice guidelines, a new analysis finds. Moreover, most of the organizations included conflict-of-interest statements in their guidelines, but also had a panel member with a conflict. (Silverman, 6/9)

Bloomberg: AstraZeneca And Gilead Ponder A Huge $240 Billion Gamble
There are good reasons for Britain’s AstraZeneca Plc to consider what would be the biggest pharmaceuticals deal in history by combining with U.S. peer Gilead Sciences Inc. They may not be good enough to offset the risks that go with mashing together drugmakers with a total market value of nearly $240 billion. AstraZeneca approached Gilead last month, Bloomberg News reported Sunday, although there are no formal talks underway. Gilead discussed the possible tie-up with its advisers but isn’t interested in selling to a larger rival right now, Bloomberg News added. (Chris Hughes, 6/7)

The Hill: In The Era Of COVID-19, States Need Practical Solutions To Address Health Care Costs
The vast human and economic devastation of the coronavirus is evident in the numbers: more than 100,000 American lives lost, 1.9 million infected and a national unemployment rate of 13.3 percent. While the curve appears to be slowly flattening, it goes without saying that the fallout will be substantial, particularly for states and communities. When it comes to overall health care spending, COVID-19 will further exacerbate already strained state budgets, particularly as millions of Americans shift from commercial insurance to Medicaid. (John O'Brien, 6/6)

Los Angeles Times: For God's Sake, Mr. President, Don't Inject Yourself With Insulin
Imagine if President Trump expressed surprise about how devastating cancer can be for millions of patients and their families. Imagine if he went on to muse, almost playfully, that perhaps he should give chemotherapy a try. Now you understand the mixture of stunned astonishment and dismay I felt, as a person with Type 1 diabetes, after Trump said the other day that maybe he should inject himself with insulin. (David Lazarus, 6/4)

Orlando Sentinel/Tampa Bay Tribune: New Medicare Policy Could Help Diabetes Patients
Last week, President Trump delivered on a central promise of his presidency — making prescription drugs more affordable. His new “Part D Senior Savings Model” will reduce out-of-pocket costs for millions of Medicare beneficiaries to just $35 a month. In the middle of a pandemic, this is a much-welcomed effort to save seniors money on their necessary medicines and boost overall health outcomes. (Kenneth E. Thorpe, 6/7)

Rockland/Westchester Journal: All Democrats But Schleifer Agree To Dump Pharma Stock If Elected
Citing price-gouging and high profits in the pharmaceutical industry, six of seven Democratic candidates in the race to succeed US Rep. Nita Lowey in the 17th  Congressional District today pledged to liquidate any direct stock holdings in pharmaceutical companies if they are elected. The lone candidate who did not join the pledge is former federal prosecutor Adam Schleifer, who holds between $26 million and $55 million in pharmaceutical stocks. That includes at least $25 million in stock at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, the Tarrytown-based company founded by Schleifer’s father, Leonard. (David McKay Wilson, 6/4)

The Washington Post: No, The Lockdowns Weren’t An Overreaction 
From the beginning of the pandemic, many conservatives have argued that the lockdowns were an overreaction to the novel coronavirus and that they are causing unnecessary economic pain. Recent studies, however, show that this argument is wrong. Lockdowns and other measures to inhibit the spread of covid-19 likely saved hundreds of thousands of lives in the United States alone. We know this because of the way the virus spreads exponentially. Without lockdowns and other measures, every infected person would come into contact with a large number of uninfected people every day. A certain percentage of those people would contract the disease and would then further spread the disease to other uninfected people. Left unchecked, diseases such as covid-19 become like a raging wildfire, burning everything in their path. (Henry Olsen, 6/9)

Stat: Collective Intelligence Will Deliver The Best Covid-19 Vaccine 
Imagine mobilizing the world’s brightest and most creative minds — from biotech and pharmaceutical industries, universities, government agencies, and more — to work together using all available knowledge, innovation, and infrastructure to develop an effective vaccine against Covid-19. A true “people’s vaccine” that would be made freely available to all people in all countries. That’s what an open letter by more than 140 world leaders and experts calls for. Unfortunately, that is not how the race for a Covid-19 vaccine is being run. The rules of that game are oblivious to the goal of maximizing global health outcomes and access. (Els Torreele, 6/10)

The New York Times: The Head Of A Hospital Grapples With Racism
The last 12 weeks will haunt me forever. At the Montefiore Health System, where I am the chief executive, the coronavirus has killed 2,204 patients and 21 members of our courageous staff, despite our best efforts. Now, as the pandemic has subsided and our Covid-19 caseload has dropped to 143 patients from a peak of 2,208 on April 12, the nation is coming to grips with another fearful crisis — the lethal effects of racism, the pain of which is all too familiar to me. (Philip O. Ozuah, 6/9)

The Hill: Why We Need A Moratorium On Investment Disputes During COVID-19
Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. On April 1, 2020, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres declared the COVID-19 epidemic the world’s greatest challenge since World War II. The wellbeing of billions of people, and potentially millions of deaths, still hang in the balance, especially in the poorer countries of the developing world. (James Bacchus and Jeffrey Sachs, 6/9)

NBC News: CrossFit CEO's Racist George Floyd Tweet Shows Gyms Can Be Fraught Places For Black People
Health and wellness has a racism problem and, as in many communities in which such inequities are often minimized or ignored, the movement for racial equality that has sprung up in the wake of George Floyd's killing in police custody has brought the ugliness faced by people of color to the fore. In a recent tweet that can only be described as bizarre, CrossFit founder and CEO Greg Glassman responded to a tweet about racism's being a public health issue by calling it "FLOYD-19." (Erika Nicole Kendall, 6/9)

The Hill: Help Save America's Independent Hospitals 
The thousands of independent hospitals serving communities across America now face an existential threat. The COVID-19 pandemic and flawed federal attempts to aid these hospitals have left them financially devastated. Unless Washington takes the right steps to help in the near future, many independent hospitals may be absorbed by larger health systems or close their doors for good. As a result, millions of Americans could face significantly higher health care costs and gaping holes in the health care system. (Kathleen Silard, 6/9)

Boston Globe: Massachusetts Should Borrow To Avoid Big Budget Cuts 
Massachusetts will soon face a budgetary reckoning because of a huge revenue shortfall caused by the pandemic-prompted economic slowdown. The conventional remedy to periodic budget crises caused by a soft economy — substantial spending cuts on state services like health care, state parks, and public higher education; income or sales tax increases; or a combination of the two — are unwise in this instance, and could even prolong the economic misery. Absent sufficient federal aid, the better solution is to borrow over several years to pave the way through the pandemic rough patch. (6/10)

The New York Times: I’m Mayor Of A Small City In Kentucky. We Can Safely Reopen.
The day after Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky closed restaurants and bars to in-person traffic in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, a veteran restaurant owner in my community turned to social media. “I have been in business for 30 years and I have been through some difficult times, including 1990, 2001 and 2007,” he wrote. “But I tell you this one really worries me.” (Alan Keck, 6/9)

Los Angeles Times: Crack Epidemic Set Tone For Police And Coronavirus Failures
What if the nation had met the crack epidemic of the 1980s with healthcare rather than with police and prison? How much more prepared might we have been today for a deadly viral pandemic, and how much more resilient in the aftermath, had we built out a public health infrastructure with treatment clinics, housing and other resources and supports aimed at restoring the health of American neighborhoods? What if we had recruited, trained and adequately paid a generation of clinicians, physicians, nurses, researchers, peer counselors and educators to deal with the drug crisis instead of buying tanks and armored cars for police and sending them into neighborhoods suffering the physical and social consequences of cheap crack cocaine? (6/10)

St. Louis Post Dispatch: Strong Evidence That Masks Really Help Contain The Contagion
The results are by no means scientific, but they sure are impressive. An unintended experiment in contagion containment occurred in Springfield, Missouri, last month when two hairstylists at a Great Clips salon worked on customers despite showing symptoms and ultimately testing positive for coronavirus infection. They potentially exposed 140 clients and six co-workers.Amazingly, none of those exposed tested positive or displayed symptoms after being placed on a two-week watch during the normal incubation period for the virus. One factor that might have figured heavily in this remarkable result: All staffers and clients had been required to wear masks, which help reduce the airborne transmission of tiny droplets exhaled by infected people. Despite the high potential for infection, the result in all 146 cases strongly suggests that masks and other precautionary measures help. (6/9)

Arizona Republic: Gov. Doug Ducey won't wear a COVID-19 face mask. He prefers to wear blinders
It would be a lot less annoying and a lot more honest if Gov. Doug Ducey simply said that he’s decided Arizona will not impose any more restrictions needed to save lives and is going full speed ahead – COVID-19 be damned. Just … say it. Instead, Ducey continues to pretend that he and his administration consider protecting the public health to be their top priority. ...At the same time, since Ducey lifted restrictions there has been a spike in COVID-19 cases and in hospitalizations. So much so that hospitals have been advised by Dr. Cara Christ, Arizona Department of Health Services director, to "fully activate" their emergency plans. (EJ Montini, 6/9)

The Detroit News: Keep Workers Safe, Healthy And On-The-Job
The labor movement has always led the charge in protecting working people from workplace injury, illness and death. We’ve all seen heroic workers on the news during the COVID-19 outbreak, working in jobs from health care to food service, risking their health and the health of their families in the process. The AFL-CIO has been working to advance protections in Michigan and federally to ensure we reopen the economy in a way that’s appropriately cautious and importantly, avoids a second wave of this awful virus. I’m grateful to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer for all the actions she’s taken to protect Michigan’s working families. Her efforts have truly saved lives. Now the Republican majorities in the Legislature need to step up and do right by working people and work with Democrats to pass laws that make sure that these protections stay in place for the future, because this crisis isn’t over yet. (Ron Bieber, 6/9)

Cleveland Plain Dealer: A Mother’s Plea Highlights Why All Ohio Juveniles In Detention Need To Be Sent Home Now
“They’re trying to kill my son.” With eyes overwhelmed by tears, a mother cried to me with these words. What made it harder was that I could not embrace her because these difficult times call for social distancing. As protests against police brutality ramp up across the country and uncertainty rises in the streets, surely I wanted to tell her: “Your son wasn’t sent to a prison to die.” But there are a number of children within youth prisons in Ohio, and across the United States who are at extreme risk of contracting COVID-19. (Basheer Jones, 6/9)

Dallas Morning News: Universities Must Put Students First As They Discuss Fall Semester
Summer is in full swing, which means colleges have now shifted gears fully from managing the turmoil of spring semester to planning for an already rocky fall semester. The University of Dallas and the University of Texas System have already announced plans to hold classes in person, though what that will look like still remains up in the air.A lot must go into readying campus for student life once again and adjusting protocols to welcome the many that will return, but that should not overshadow the responsibility these institutions have to those faced with barriers to returning. As Texas universities look to reopen, they must do so cautiously and consider the well-being of their students first. To do this, they must be open and communicative and actively acknowledge the different circumstances students are undergoing as they deal with the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. (6/9)

Tampa Bay Times: Coronavirus Is Hurting Florida’s Renters And Landlords. Here’s A Remedy.
Gov. Ron DeSantis brought temporary relief to thousands of desperate Floridians by extending the statewide moratorium on foreclosures and evictions. The extension, to July, buys time for renters and homeowners who’ve been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic to imagine how they’ll pay rent or their mortgage. But landlords and lenders are hurting, too. Now is the time to come up with a comprehensive plan that softens the blow for the most vulnerable players along the housing food chain, for this crisis will not end overnight. (6/9)

Boston Globe: In Minneapolis, An Anti-Brutality Blueprint For The City — And Possibly The Country — Could Be Drawn
For as long as Black people and other marginalized people are oppressed and brutalized in this country, there will be unrest. There will be protest. George Floyd deserves to rest in peace. And as we look at life after his death, we must make choices that allow us to live and thrive rather than fight to survive. We need justice to live in peace so we don’t have to die to find it. (Jeneé Osterheldt, 6/9)