HHS’ $5B ‘Project NextGen’ Aims To Develop New Coronavirus Shots, Drugs

Axios: Exclusive: Inside HHS' Plan To Develop Next-Generation COVID Treatments
The Biden administration is pouring billions of dollars into the development of future coronavirus vaccines, trying to develop a sequel to Operation Warp Speed even as the public health emergency ends. The Department of Health and Human Services is fleshing out targets and putting an organizational framework around the $5 billion "Project NextGen," which will operate similarly to the Trump-era public-private partnership in speeding the development of new treatments. (Gonzalez, 5/11)

The Independent: Scientists Inch Closer To Covid Vaccine That Provides Lifelong Protection 
Scientists have shown that a new Covid vaccine provides more durable protection against the novel coronavirus in animals than existing ones, an advance that may lead to a better therapeutic offering lifelong immunity against the virus. ... The new vaccine, dubbed MT-001, may provide longer-lasting protection in humans against many variants of the virus, according to the study, published recently in the journal Vaccines. (Sankaran, 5/10)

The BMJ: What Is The Future For Covid Drugs And Treatments? 
It’s not so much about “new” treatments as continuing research to prove effectiveness of drugs we already know work in practice, says Janet Diaz, who leads clinical management at the World Health Organization’s Health Emergencies Programme. (Looi, 5/10)

The covid emergency and Title 42 come to an end —

The New York Times: The U.S. Built A European-Style Welfare State. It’s Largely Over. 
In the early, panicked days of the pandemic, the United States government did something that was previously unimaginable. It transformed itself, within weeks, into something akin to a European-style welfare state. Congress rapidly fortified the social safety net, making it much stronger than at any point. It made policies like Medicaid and food stamps more generous. It created new federal benefits like paid sick and caregiving leave, and free school lunches. And it made some pandemic benefits, like stimulus checks and child allowances, nearly universal. The government is estimated to have spent about $5 trillion helping individuals and businesses since March 2020. (Miller and Parlapiano, 5/11)

KFF Health News: The Crisis Is Officially Ending, But Covid Confusion Lives On
The formal end May 11 of the national public health emergency for covid-19 will usher in lots of changes in the way Americans get vaccines, treatment, and testing for the coronavirus. It will also change the way some people get their health insurance, with millions likely to lose coverage altogether. (5/11)

The New York Times: U.S. Ends Last Covid Travel Barrier, Vaccine Mandate For Foreign Arrivals 
International passengers traveling to the United States no longer have to show proof of vaccination against Covid as of midnight Thursday, when the coronavirus health emergency officially ended. The Biden administration dropped its requirement for coronavirus testing last June but kept in place its vaccination policy for foreign travelers. In February, the House of Representatives voted to end the last remaining pandemic restrictions on May 11. (Yeginsu, 5/12)

The Washington Post: Thousands Of Migrants Overwhelm The U.S.-Mexico Border As Title 42 Expires 
As the midnight expiration time passed, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas posted a video statement to Twitter, warning that “people who arrive at the border without using a lawful pathway will be presumed ineligible for asylum.” He also warned that 24,000 Border Patrol agents and officers and thousands of troops and contractors are on hand to enforce the policy. “Do not believe the lies of smugglers,” he said. “The border is not open.” (Mata III and Miroff, 5/12)

More on the spread of covid —

San Francisco Chronicle: COVID At New ‘Tipping Point’ Says UCSF’s Bob Wachter, Experts
Bay Area epidemiologists, infectious disease experts, and public health officials agree that we are in a much better place now than when the emergency order was enacted by the former administration in March 2020. However, they said, it is too soon to declare closure. “It no longer meets my definition of a pandemic,” said Dr. Bob Wachter, the chair of the department of medicine at UCSF. Still, he added that there’s no lingo in epidemiology to accurately describe the ongoing threat from the virus that has subsided but remains a threat. “Nobody has quite invented that word.” (Vaziri, 5/11)

CIDRAP: COVID-Related Stress, Depression May Have Altered Placentas During Pregnancy
Maternal stress and depression amid the COVID-19 pandemic can alter the structure, texture, and other characteristics of the placenta during pregnancy, although the long-term neurodevelopmental impact on children is unknown, according to an ongoing observational study published yesterday in Scientific Reports. Researchers from MedStar Washington Hospital Center and Children's National Hospital in Washington, DC, used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to compare the placentas of 63 pregnant women without known COVID-19 exposure during the pandemic with 165 control patients who were pregnant before the pandemic. (Van Beusekom, 5/11)

AP: Illinois Gov. Pritzker Signs Law That Gives Benefits To Chicago First Responders Disabled By COVID
Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Wednesday signed a law providing full disability benefits to Chicago police officers and firefighters struck by COVID-19 before vaccines were available, presiding over an emotional statehouse ceremony which marked the end of a financial struggle for responders including the brother of Comptroller Susana Mendoza. The Act-of-Duty law, HB3162, ensures disability benefits of 75% of salary plus health insurance for anyone unable to work after contracting the coronavirus from March 9, 2020, when the flare-up intensified in Illinois, until June 30, 2021. The law grants them the presumption that they picked up the illness on the job. (O'Connor, 5/10)