First Edition: Nov. 13, 2020

KHN: ‘Breakthrough Finding’ Reveals Why Certain COVID Patients Die
Dr. Megan Ranney has learned a lot about COVID-19 since she began treating patients with the disease in the emergency department in February. But there’s one question she still can’t answer: What makes some patients so much sicker than others? Advancing age and underlying medical problems explain only part of the phenomenon, said Ranney, who has seen patients of similar age, background and health status follow wildly different trajectories. (Szabo, 11/13)

KHN: Clots, Strokes And Rashes: Is COVID A Disease Of The Blood Vessels?
Whether it’s strange rashes on the toes or blood clots in the brain, the widespread ravages of COVID-19 have increasingly led researchers to focus on how the novel coronavirus sabotages blood vessels. As scientists have come to know the disease better, they have homed in on the vascular system — the body’s network of arteries, veins and capillaries, stretching more than 60,000 miles — to understand this wide-ranging disease and to find treatments that can stymie its most pernicious effects. (Stone, 11/13)

KHN: Black Hair Matters: How Going Natural Made Me Visible
The night before I chopped off my hair, I got nervous. This decision felt bigger than me, given all the weight that Black women’s hair carries. But after three months of wearing hats and scarves in a pandemic when trips to the hairdresser felt unsafe, I walked into a salon emotionally exhausted but ready to finally see my natural hair. (Anthony, 11/13)

KHN: Stanford Vs. Harvard: Two Famous Biz Schools’ Opposing Tactics On COVID
At the Stanford Graduate School of Business in Northern California, the stories got weird almost immediately upon students’ return for the fall semester. Some said they were being followed around campus by people wearing green vests telling them where they could and could not be, go, stop, chat or conduct even a socially distanced gathering. Others said they were threatened with the loss of their campus housing if they didn’t follow the rules. “They were breaking up picnics. They were breaking up yoga groups,” said one graduate student, who asked not to be identified so as to avoid social media blowback. “Sometimes they’d ask you whether you actually lived in the dorm you were about to go into.” (Kreidler, 11/13)

KHN: KHN On The Air This Week 
KHN Editor-in-Chief Elisabeth Rosenthal discussed how to manage unexpected health care costs with CBSN on Wednesday. And KHN chief Washington correspondent Julie Rovner discussed the Affordable Care Act case before the Supreme Court with WBEZ’s “Reset” and WDET’s “Detroit Today” on Tuesday and with WHYY’s “Radio Times” on Wednesday. (11/13)

KHN: KHN’s ‘What The Health?’: Transition Interrupted
Five days after the election was called for President-elect Joe Biden, President Donald Trump has not conceded — and instead ordered his administration not to begin the transition of power. That could have serious ramifications for health care, particularly as nearly every state is experiencing a spike in COVID-19 cases. One piece of good news is that early results for a coronavirus vaccine made by Pfizer look promising. But that vaccine, even if it is approved soon, won’t likely be ready for wide distribution for several months. (11/12)

The New York Times: Pandemic Shatters More Records In U.S., As States And Cities Tighten Restrictions
Public health officials in the United States announced more than 160,000 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, the first day over 150,000 since the pandemic began — an alarming record that came just over a week after the country first experienced 100,000 cases in a single day. The pandemic has risen to crisis levels in much of the nation, especially the Midwest, as hospital executives warn of dwindling bed space and as coroners deploy mobile morgues. More than 100,000 coronavirus cases have been announced nationwide every day since Nov. 4, and six of the last nine days have broken the previous record. (11/13)

The Washington Post: ‘Catastrophic’ Lack Of Hospital Beds In Upper Midwest As Coronavirus Cases Surge
Covid’s long, dark winter has already arrived in the Upper Midwest, as cases and deaths surge, snatching lives, overwhelming hospitals, exhausting health-care providers and raising fears that the region’s medical system will be completely overwhelmed in the coming days. As coronavirus cases grow across the United States — up 70 percent on average in the past two weeks, with an average of 130,000 cases per day nationally — the situation is particularly acute now in the Upper Midwest and Plains states, with North and South Dakota leading the nation in new cases and deaths per capita over the past week, according to Washington Post data. (Gowen and Bailey, 11/12)

AP: Virus Surge: Schools Abandon Classes, States Retreat
School systems in Detroit, Indianapolis, Philadelphia and suburban Minneapolis are giving up on in-person classes, and some governors are reimposing restrictions on bars and restaurants or getting more serious about masks, as the coast-to-coast resurgence of the coronavirus sends deaths, hospitalizations and new infections soaring. The crisis deepened at hospitals, with the situation so bad in North Dakota that the governor this week said nurses who test positive but have no symptoms can still work. Idaho clinics struggled to handle the deluge of phone calls from patients. And one of Utah’s biggest hospital systems is bringing in nearly 200 traveling nurses, some of them from New York City. (Smith and Murphy, 11/13)

The New York Times: What Places Are Hardest Hit By The Coronavirus? It Depends On The Measure 
The coronavirus is tearing across the United States at an alarming pace. Hospitals are filled to perilous levels. More than 120,000 new cases are being identified every day. And ever higher and more miserable records — of states’ cases, of positive testing rates, of hospitalizations — are being set, day after day. A pandemic that was once raging in New York and later across the Sun Belt is now spread so widely across the country that any number of cities and states might now be considered the worst off, depending on the measurement used. (Smith, Harmon, Tompkins and Fuller, 11/12)

The Hill: Fauci Urges American Public To Double Down On COVID-19 Safety Measures Amid Surge 
Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, called on Americans to double down on health precautions like wearing a mask or face covering, social distancing and more as COVID-19 cases continue to spike across the country. (Pitofsky, 11/12)

The Hill: Trump Campaign Adviser Corey Lewandowski Tests Positive For Coronavirus 
Corey Lewandowski, a senior adviser to President Trump's reelection campaign, has tested positive for the coronavirus, a source familiar with the matter confirmed on Thursday. Lewandowski is the latest person in Trump's orbit to contract the virus since Election Day, though it was not immediately clear when he became infected. (Samuels, 11/12)

Reuters: Alaska Congressman Who Ridiculed Coronavirus Now Says He Has COVID-19 
The Alaska congressman who once ridiculed the seriousness of the novel coronavirus, calling it the “beer virus,” said on Thursday he is now infected with it. The announcement by Republican Representative Don Young, 87, comes as the state’s governor on Thursday warned that health-care and public-safety systems were at risk of being overwhelmed by the rapid spread of the virus across Alaska. (Rosen, 11/12)

AP: Trump, Stewing Over Election Loss, Silent As Virus Surges
President Donald Trump has publicly disengaged from the battle against the coronavirus at a moment when the disease is tearing across the United States at an alarming pace. Trump, fresh off his reelection loss to President-elect Joe Biden, remains angry that an announcement about progress in developing a vaccine for the disease came after Election Day. And aides say the president has shown little interest in the growing crisis even as new confirmed cases are skyrocketing and hospital intensive care units in parts of the country are nearing capacity. (Madhani and Miller, 11/13)

The Washington Post: Chad Wolf Planning Latin America Trip Amid Staff Concerns About Coronavirus 
Acting Department of Homeland Security secretary Chad Wolf is making plans to travel to several countries in Latin America next month, a proposal that has raised concerns about the necessity of such a trip in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic. ... There are no major conferences for Wolf to attend in the region that week, and at least one person familiar with the outlines of the plan referred to the trip as “a boondoggle.” “There are no specific events requiring the travel,” the person said. “The region is hard-hit by covid and embassies will be hard-pressed to deal with so many visitors in a covid-safe way.” (Miroff, 11/12)

The Hill: Biden's COVID-19 Strategy: Lockdowns, Mask Mandates And More 
President-elect Joe Biden is likely to impose stiff COVID-19 response measures on America once in office. Biden staked his campaign’s closing argument on coronavirus, attempting to draw the starkest and most salient contrast with President Trump. Having narrowly won on this central commitment, he must not just confront coronavirus, but he must be definitively seen doing so. (J.T. Young, 11/12)

The Hill: Mississippi Governor Says He Will Fight National Lockdown If Biden Proposes One
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves (R) said his state will not comply with a mandatory six-week national quarantine should President-elect Joe Biden try to enforce one when he enters office. “We’re not going to participate in a nation-wide lockdown,” Reeves said during a Facebook Live COVID-19 update on Thursday, citing a Biden adviser’s suggestion that a collective effort to quell the coronavirus for longer than a month could prove successful. (Polus, 11/12)

AP: Biden Has Room On Health Care, Though Limited By Congress
President-elect Joe Biden is unlikely to get sweeping health care changes through a closely divided Congress, but there’s a menu of narrower actions he can choose from to make a tangible difference on affordability and coverage for millions of people. With the balance of power in the Senate hinging on a couple of Georgia races headed to a runoff, and Democrats losing seats in the House, Biden’s proposals for a public health insurance option and empowering Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices seem out of reach. Those would be tough fights even if Democrats controlled Congress with votes to spare. (Alonzo-Zaldivar, 11/3)

Politico: Klain: Delayed Transition Could Hamper Coronavirus Vaccine Preparations 
The Trump administration's refusal to acknowledge Joe Biden's electoral victory could hinder the incoming team's preparations on pressing issues, including the distribution of a coronavirus vaccine, Biden's future chief of staff said Thursday. In his first public interview since being named chief of staff, Ron Klain called the current administration's stonewalling of Biden's transition "unreasonable," but added that the president-elect's preparations for the transfer were underway within legal limits. (Choi, 11/12)

The Washington Post: Democrats Allege GOP Refusal To Accept Election Results Is Imperiling U.S. Coronavirus Response
Congressional Democratic leaders accused Republicans on Thursday of refusing to confront the dramatically worsening coronavirus pandemic and instead acquiescing to President Trump’s false insistence that he won last week’s presidential election. Republicans dismissed the attacks and Trump didn’t weigh in at all, with his only public comments coming through a series of Twitter posts that included false claims of electoral success. As Washington has become paralyzed over the past 10 days, 1 million new people have tested positive for the virus as death numbers are climbing rapidly. (Werner, 11/12)

The Wall Street Journal: Biden’s Penchant For Bold Stimulus To Test His Deal-Making Skills 
When Joe Biden takes office in January, a main focus will be continuing to pull the country out of the economic hole caused by the pandemic. He has been there before, running the Obama administration’s recovery plan as vice president. The priorities Mr. Biden touted during the financial crisis 12 years ago, and the lessons his team learned from that downturn, offer clues to how he’ll handle this one. (Schlesinger, 11/12)

Politico: Alito's Politically Charged Address Draws Heat
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito delivered an unusually inflammatory public speech Thursday night, starkly warning about the threats he contends religious believers face from advocates for gay and abortion rights, as well as public officials responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Speaking to a virtual conference of conservative lawyers, the George W. Bush appointee made no direct comment on the recent election, the political crisis relating to President Donald Trump’s refusal to acknowledge his defeat or litigation on the issue pending at the Supreme Court. (Gerstein, 11/13)

AP: Justice Alito: COVID Restrictions 'Previously Unimaginable'
Alito was particularly critical of two cases earlier this year where the court sided with states that, citing the coronavirus pandemic, imposed restrictions on the size of religious gatherings. In both cases, the court divided 5-4 in allowing those restrictions to continue with Chief Justice John Roberts siding with the court’s liberals. In May, the high court rejected an emergency appeal by a California church challenging attendance limits at worship services. The justices turned away a similar challenge by a Nevada church in July. Alito said in both cases the restrictions had “blatantly discriminated against houses of worship” and he warned that “religious liberty is in danger of becoming a second-class right.” (Gresko, 11/13)

The Washington Post: Justice Alito Says Pandemic Has Resulted In ‘Unimaginable’ Restrictions On Individual Liberty
Alito said he was not criticizing officials for their policy decisions — “I’m a judge, not a policymaker” — and said before launching into the speech that he hoped his remarks would not be “twisted or misunderstood.” (Barnes, 11/12)

Stat: Placebo Patients Will Get Pfizer's Covid Vaccine. The Timing Is Complicated
Should patients who volunteer to be in Covid-19 vaccine studies, but who are assigned to get placebo, be offered the vaccine? As companies and regulators raced to start clinical trials in the summer, that question was left open. But for Pfizer and partner BioNTech, the answer now is not if but when. (Herper, 11/12)

AP: Feds Announce COVID-19 Vaccine Agreement With Drug Stores
Federal health officials have reached an agreement with pharmacies across the U.S. to distribute free coronavirus vaccines after they are approved and become available to the public. The goal eventually is to make getting a COVID-19 vaccine like getting a flu shot. Thursday’s agreement with major chain drug stores, grocery market pharmacies and other chains and networks covers about 3 in 5 pharmacies in all 50 states and U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico. (Alonso-Zaldivar, 11/12)

Stat: Pill For OCD And Anxiety May Prevent Worsening Covid-19, Early Study Says
A pill ordinarily prescribed to treat obsessive compulsive or anxiety disorder prevented symptoms of nonhospitalized Covid-19 patients from worsening compared to placebo, a small randomized controlled trial concludes, suggesting the drug’s immune-modulating effects could be further explored as a treatment for the disease. (Cooney and Herper, 11/12)

Politico: Labs Sound Alarm On Coronavirus Testing Capacity, Supplies
Clinical laboratories are warning they could soon face delays processing coronavirus tests, similar to slowdowns this summer, as infections again surge to record numbers across the country. The nation’s testing capacity has increased, but not fast enough to keep pace with the swarm of new cases. Over the past week, the U.S. conducted nearly 10 million coronavirus tests, an increase of 12.5 percent from the previous week, while confirmed cases rose 40.8 percent to more than 875,000. (Lim, 11/12)

Modern Healthcare: Nurses Say Hospitals Aren't Prepared For COVID-19 Surge During Flu Season
Nurses allege that U.S. hospitals don't have basic infection control and prevention measures in place as they face another surge of COVID-19 cases, this time during flu season. In a recent survey, National Nurses United, a nationwide union of registered nurses, found that only 18% of nurses worked in hospitals where there was surge capacity planning and preparation. (Christ, 11/12)

The Hill: Labs Warn Of Possible Delays In COVID-19 Test Results Amid Surge In Demand 
A top association for labs conducting coronavirus testing warned on Thursday that some labs could soon exceed their capacity and have to increase wait times for test results. The warning comes as coronavirus cases are surging across the country heading into the winter, increasing demand for tests and putting a strain on labs. (Sullivan, 11/12)

Crain's Cleveland Business: Cleveland Clinic Postpones Some Nonessential Procedures As COVID-19 Surges
As COVID-19 cases soar, Cleveland Clinic is postponing nonessential surgical cases that require an inpatient hospital stay at most of its Ohio hospitals for Friday, Nov. 13, and Monday, Nov. 16 in the interest of ensuring it has "the staffing and resources needed to continue safely caring for our patients," according to a statement from the system. This week, Ohio reached the highest number of new COVID-19 cases, cracking 6,500 in one day. In 50 days, COVID-19 patients in Ohio hospitals increased 350%, according to the Ohio Hospital Association. (Coutré, 11/12)

CIDRAP: Mega Study Shows Blacks, Asians Have Increased COVID-19 Infection Risk
A meta-analysis of 50 studies and 18,728,893 US and UK patients with COVID-19 found that black people were 2.02 times more likely and Asians 1.50 times more likely to be infected with COVID-19 compared with white people. The researchers also found that Hispanic people had a 1.77 adjusted risk ratio (RR), but none of the applicable studies had been peer reviewed. (11/12)

CIDRAP: Study: Only 1 Of 32 COVID Survivors Testing Positive Had Live Virus
A JAMA Internal Medicine research letter today finds that 18% of recovered COVID-19 patients test positive for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, but only 3% (1 of 32) carry replicating virus in their respiratory tract. Italian researchers studied 176 recovered COVID-19 patients admitted for post-acute follow-up treatment at Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS in Rome from Apr 21 to Jun 18. Patients had discontinued isolation according to current criteria—no fever for 3 consecutive days, improvement in symptoms, and two negative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test results for the virus, 24 hours apart. (Kuebelbeck Paulsen, 11/12)

Stat: Cancer Patients Hesitant To Participate In Trials Amid Covid-19 Concerns
Cancer clinical trials have seen a drastic drop in patient enrollment since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, driven in part by some institutions pausing recruitment in order to prevent the spread of the virus. Bringing enrollment numbers back up safely will prove crucial for researchers running clinical trials and the drug companies that sponsor them. (Runwal, 11/12)

NPR: Even With Health Insurance, Many Americans Still Struggle With High Health Costs 
When it comes to worries about high health care costs, having health insurance doesn't necessarily spare you, according to a study recently published in JAMA. Despite the gains in insurance coverage brought by the Affordable Care Act, high health care costs continue to plague many Americans, researchers found. Around 11 million Americans experienced "catastrophic medical expenses" in 2017, the last year the study covered — and privately insured people represented more than half of those. (Kendrick, 11/12)

Stat: Lawmakers Introduce Bill To Eliminate Use Of Dogs In Pharmaceutical Testing 
A bipartisan group of Congressional lawmakers has introduced a bill that would require the Food and Drug Administration to permit pharmaceutical companies to avoid running tests in dogs, an issue that has galvanized animal rights groups for years. The move comes amid growing criticism that the agency has failed to ease testing requirements, even as some drug makers have argued that such testing may sometimes be unnecessary. (Silverman, 11/12)

Modern Healthcare: 2.1 Million Patients Had Data Exposed In October-Reported Breaches
As of Thursday, HHS' Office for Civil Rights posted 59 data breach reports that healthcare providers, insurers and their business associates had submitted to the agency in October. In terms of patients affected, that's a 219.6% increase from October 2019, when organizations reported 53 breaches affecting nearly 677,300 patients. But 2.1 million is down from September, when 9.7 million patients had data exposed in a landmark 97 breaches—the highest number reported in a single month since OCR began tracking healthcare data breaches in 2010. (Kim Cohen, 11/12)

Stat: An FDA Adviser On Why His Panel Didn't Endorse Biogen's Alzheimer's Drug
The biggest question in biotech — other than whether Covid-19 vaccines will work — centers on Biogen and its years-long quest to win Food and Drug Administration approval for a polarizing treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. (Feuerstein, Garde and Tirrell, 11/13)

The New York Times: These Researchers Tested Positive. But The Virus Wasn’t The Cause. 
In mid-June, Timothy Wannier tested positive for the coronavirus. Within 48 hours of receiving his jarring result, he felt almost certain there had been a mistake. “The evidence was overwhelmingly obvious,” said Dr. Wannier, a geneticist at Harvard University. At the time, case numbers were down in Massachusetts, where he, his wife and two young children had been vigilantly sheltering in place for months. Dr. Wannier had no symptoms, and neither did any of his close contacts. To his knowledge, he had not been around the coronavirus at all. He had, however, spent the last couple days in a room teeming with pieces of the pathogen’s genetic material. (Wu, 11/12)

The Washington Post: Ivy League Cancels Winter Sports As Coronavirus Pandemic Worsens 
The Ivy League canceled its winter sports seasons, the conference announced Thursday, making it the first Division I college athletics conference to do so. The league — composed of Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton and Yale — made its decision amid an unprecedented spike in the coronavirus pandemic nationally. New coronavirus cases in the United States reached a record total of 145,835 on Wednesday, a number that was on track to be topped Thursday. (Bieler, 11/12)

The Washington Post: Maryland Football Players At Hotel After Game Is Canceled 
Maryland’s football players are quarantining at a hotel near campus after eight members of the team tested positive for the novel coronavirus. They moved into individual rooms Wednesday evening after their game against No. 3 Ohio State scheduled for Saturday was canceled. Coach Michael Locksley said the team plans to stay in the hotel until Sunday afternoon, but there is no timeline for when the players could return to practice. The Terrapins are scheduled to play Michigan State at home Nov. 21, and Locksley said the team is preparing as though the game will go on as planned. (Giambalvo, 11/12)

The Hill: Hawaiian Airlines Letting Customers Trade Points For COVID-19 Test Kits 
Hawaiian Airlines is now allowing their customers to use their frequent-flier miles in exchange for COVID-19 test kits. The airline announced a partnership with Vault Health that provides members of their loyalty program with an opportunity to put their unused HawaiianMiles to use as air travel is down due to the global pandemic. (Polus, 11/12)

The New York Times: Teens In Covid Isolation: 'I Felt Like I Was Suffocating' 
The social isolation of the pandemic has taken a toll on the mental health of many Americans. But the impact has been especially severe on teenagers, who rely on their friends to navigate the maze and pressures of high school life. Research shows that adolescents depend on their friendships to maintain a sense of self-worth and to manage anxiety and depression. A recent study of 3,300 high school students found that nearly one-third reported feeling unhappy or depressed in recent months. (Goldberg, 11/12)

The Hill: CDC: Proportion Of Pediatric Emergency Room Visits For Mental Health Increased Sharply Amid Pandemic 
The proportion of mental health-related pediatric visits to hospitals are on the rise during the coronavirus pandemic, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) analysis released Thursday. The CDC data found mental health-related emergency room visits increased 31 percent for children between the ages of 12 and 17 from March to October compared to the same period in 2019. There was also a 24 percent increase in emergency room visits for children between the ages of 5 and 11. (Budryk, 11/12)

The Wall Street Journal: Tesla CEO Elon Musk Says He Tested Both Positive And Negative For Covid-19
Tesla Inc. Chief Executive Elon Musk, who has repeatedly played down the risk of the coronavirus since early in the pandemic, says he tested both positive and negative for Covid-19 on Wednesday and raised questions about the validity of such testing more broadly. Mr. Musk, on Twitter, said he was experiencing cold-like symptoms and, when taking four of the same tests administered on the same machine, had two results come back positive and two negative. (Wall, 11/13)

USA Today: Al Roker 'Relieved' To Be Home After Prostate Cancer Surgery
Al Roker appears to be in good spirits while sharing a health update. On Thursday, the 66-year-old "Today" show co-host and weatherman announced on Twitter that he's back home after undergoing surgery to have his prostate removed following his cancer diagnosis.  (Henderson, 11/12)

Boston Globe: Public Health Officials Fear Evictions Could Worsen COVID-19 Spike In Mass.
As the coronavirus devastated Massachusetts last spring, Governor Charlie Baker and the Legislature quickly approved a previously inconceivable law: a sweeping eviction moratorium that not only forestalled new evictions but also halted roughly 11,500 cases already in process. The impetus was economic, of course, but the law was also supposed to prevent more people from getting sick. State officials deemed it unwise to expel people from their homes while urging everyone to shelter in place. Evictions often lead families to double up with relatives or friends — precisely what public health officials hoped to prevent. (Greenberg, 11/12)

USA Today: Amazon, Walmart See Online Grocery Shopping With Food Stamps Surge Amid Coronavirus, Reports Say
Shopping for groceries online for delivery or curbside pickup has grown in popularity amid the coronavirus pandemic with many shoppers looking to make fewer trips to stores. And using Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, commonly referred to as food stamps, to pay for online grocery trips has been surging. (Tyko, 11/12)

USA Today: Fact Check: No Evidence Mask Wearers Arrive In ICUs With Pneumonia
“There’s no evidence of masks leading to fungal or bacterial infections of the upper airway or the lower airway as in pneumonia,” said Dr. Davidson Hamer, infectious disease specialist and professor of global health and medicine at Boston University. (Fauzia, 11/12)

AP: Over 100 Active Virus Cases At West Virginia Federal Prison
There are 107 active cases of the coronavirus among inmates at a federal correctional institution in West Virginia. Gilmer County Health Department announced the numbers on Wednesday. The county of about 8,500 in central West Virginia has two other active cases. The federal facility has nearly 1,300 inmates. (11/13)

NPR: Pandemic's Deadly Toll Behind Bars Spurs Calls For Change In U.S. Jails And Prisons
Prisoner's rights advocates are pleading for more action to help stop the deadly toll taken by the pandemic that has ravaged America's jails and prisons. Their calls come as the country grapples with increases in cases and hospitalizations from the coronavirus, forcing states and cities to impose tougher restrictions on public gatherings. The advocates want faster, early release of older and medically vulnerable inmates, those nearing their parole date, as well as non-violent prisoners with a track record of good behavior. (Westervelt, 11/12)

AP: Chicago Issues New COVID-19 Restrictions Before Thanksgiving
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot urged residents in the nation’s third-largest city to restrict social gatherings to 10 people, part of a renewed push announced Thursday to fight a COVID-19 surge. Lightfoot implored Chicagoans to “cancel the normal Thanksgiving plans,” saying the skyrocketing cases show no signs of slowing and urgent steps were needed immediately. She stopped short of making the limitations mandatory, calling them a progressive step: “I hope we don’t have to go any further than this.” (Tareen, 11/13)

AP: California Approves Billions For Stem-Cell Research
California voters have granted the state’s nearly broke first-of-its-kind stem-cell research program a desperately needed $5.5 billion cash infusion. Following Thursday’s vote count update, Proposition 14 had a 325,000-vote lead and 51% of the votes. It was the narrowest margin of victory for any of this year’s 12 ballot questions. (Rogers, 11/13)

Los Angeles Times: Super-Spreader Wedding Party Shows COVID Holiday Dangers
If you want to know why public health officials are so nervous about how much worse the COVID-19 pandemic will get as the holiday season unfolds, consider what happened after a single, smallish wedding reception that took place this summer in rural Maine. Only 55 people attended the Aug. 7 reception at the Big Moose Inn in Millinocket. But one of those guests arrived with a coronavirus infection. Over the next 38 days, the virus spread to 176 other people. Seven of them died. (Kaplan, 11/12)

The Washington Post: Guests At Maine ‘Superspreader’ Wedding Returned To Work Despite Showing Symptoms, Report Says
A rural Maine wedding became a deadly superspreader event because guests refused to wear masks and later showed up to work despite feeling sick, according to an analysis published in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly report. Though not explicitly identified in the report, the Aug. 7 gathering at the Big Moose Inn in Millinocket has received copious media coverage and become a cautionary tale about the dangers of mass gatherings. To date, it has been linked to seven deaths, all among people who did not attend the wedding. (Farzan, 11/13)

AP: US Military Flew Terminally Ill Bahrain Premier To America
The U.S. military flew Bahrain’s terminally ill prime minister to America for hospital care two months before his death, the State Department acknowledged Friday, underlining the importance of the island kingdom. The care offered to Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa came just after the U.S. military similarly flew Kuwait’s late ruling emir to the same Mayo Clinic hospital in Minnesota. Both countries host major U.S. military bases in the region and are considered major non-NATO allies, granting them military and economic privileges with America. (Gambrell, 11/13)

The New York Times: Measles Deaths Soared Worldwide Last Year, As Vaccine Rates Stalled 
Measles deaths worldwide swelled to their highest level in 23 years last year, according to a report released Thursday, a stunning rise for a vaccine-preventable disease and one that public health experts fear could grow as the coronavirus pandemic continues to disrupt immunization and detection efforts. The global death tally for 2019 — 207,500 — was 50 percent higher than just three years earlier, according to the analysis, released jointly by the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Hoffman, 11/12)

AP: Critics Speak Out On Tokyo Olympic Costs, Pandemic, Fairness
Three-time Olympic champion gymnast Kohei Uchimura wants the postponed Tokyo Olympics to happen next year. But he’s also talked openly about the skepticism in Japan where enthusiasm is muted by health risks, billions of dollars in taxpayer bills, and questions why the Games are a priority amid a pandemic. Polls over the last several months show Japanese — and Japanese companies — are divided about holding the Games, or doubtful they should be held at all. (Kageyama, Wade and Ueda, 11/13)