The Associated Press: Grim Count: US Virus Toll Passes Trump's 60,000 Marker
President Donald Trump likes to talk about the most, the best, the thing that nobody has ever seen. Now he is trying to make a virtue of a lower number, arguing that the efforts of his administration have warded off a far greater death toll than otherwise would have been seen. But the reported U.S. death toll on Wednesday crept past 60,000, a figure that Trump in recent weeks had suggested might be the total death count. (Superville, 4/30)

Reuters: U.S. Coronavirus Outbreak Soon To Be Deadlier Than Any Flu Since 1967 As Deaths Top 60,000
America's worst flu season in recent years was in 2017-2018 when more than 61,000 people died, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Preventihere. The only deadlier flu seasons were in 1967 when about 100,000 Americans died, 1957 when 116,000 died and the Spanish flu of 1918 when 675,000 died, according to the CDC. (Shumaker, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: U.S. Coronavirus Deaths Top 60,000 As New Data Show Economic Toll
The death toll, which has now surpassed some previous projections, shows the continuing challenge in estimating the severity of the outbreak. In late March, the Trump administration estimated between 100,000 and 240,000 people could die. About two weeks later, Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in an interview with NBC that the toll was likely to be closer to 60,000. Models released in early April by the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation showed a similar result. Those models projected the rate of deaths would peak mid-April, and they estimated 61,545 fatalities by Aug. 4. New models from the institute now project 72,860 deaths by Aug. 4. (Ansari and Boston, 4/29)

The Hill: US Surpasses 60,000 Deaths Due To Coronavirus 
The United States has now surpassed 60,000 domestic deaths from the novel coronavirus, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. accounts for roughly a quarter of the global deaths related to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, according to the Johns Hopkins data citing reported figures. More than 1 million Americans have tested positive for the virus since the first U.S. case was confirmed on Jan. 21. (Chalfant, 4/29)

CIDRAP: CDC: US COVID-19 Death Toll Likely Higher Than Reported
The US COVID-19 death toll officially stands at 60,316 among 1,034,884 cases, according to a tracker maintained by USA Today, but new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that death rates in seven hard-hit states are likely much higher, as total deaths in those states were almost 50% higher than normal from Mar 8 to Apr 11. (Soucheray, 4/29)

The Washington Post: U.S. Reports 66,000 More Deaths So Far This Year
The United States has suffered at least 66,000 more deaths than expected this year, a toll that includes the devastation directly caused by the coronavirus pandemic and a sharp rise in fatalities not attributed to the virus, the government reported late Wednesday. The new report from the National Center for Health Statistics shows 33,756 covid-19 deaths and 32,325 from all other causes since Jan. 1. Other causes include heart attacks, accidents, overdoses, cancer and a wide variety of other fatal diseases. (Bernstein, 4/29)

The Associated Press: A 1st: US Study Finds Gilead Drug Works Against Coronavirus
For the first time, a major study suggests that an experimental drug works against the new coronavirus, and U.S. government officials said Wednesday that they would work to make it available to appropriate patients as quickly as possible. In a study of 1,063 patients sick enough to be hospitalized, Gilead Sciences’s remdesivir shortened the time to recovery by 31% — 11 days on average versus 15 days for those just given usual care, officials said. (Marchione, 4/29)

The New York Times: Remdesivir Shows Modest Benefits In Coronavirus Trial
The improvement in recovery times “doesn’t seem like a knockout 100 percent,” Dr. Fauci conceded, but “it is a very important proof of concept, because what it has proven is that a drug can block this virus.” Sitting at Dr. Fauci’s side, President Trump said, “Certainly it’s positive, it’s a very positive event.” In past weeks, he has repeatedly hailed remdesivir as a potential “game changer,” despite spotty evidence. Business leaders, scientists and politicians alike are scrambling to find ways to fight an insidious epidemic and to reopen a devastated economy. The virus has claimed at least 60,000 lives in the United States, and more than 200,000 worldwide. There have been precious few reasons for optimism, and the markets seized on the news. (Kolata, Baker and Weiland, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Hopes Rise For Remdesivir, A Covid-19 Drug Therapy, As U.S. Passes 60,000 Dead
The study showed only a marginal benefit in the rate of death. Fauci said that a death rate of 8 percent for those taking the drug versus 11 percent for those taking the placebo is not statistically significant but that the results will undergo further analysis. The drug must be given intravenously over five to 10 days, and the NIAID trial results apply only to hospitalized patients. Remdesivir is not intended for use in the majority of patients, estimated to be 80 percent or more, who are infected with the novel coronavirus but do not require hospitalization. (Gearan, Rowland and McGinley, 4/29)

Reuters: Data On Gilead Drug Raises Hopes In Pandemic Fight, Fauci Calls It 'Highly Significant'
Preliminary results from a U.S. government trial showing that patients given remdesivir recovered 31% faster than those given a placebo, were hailed by Dr. Anthony Fauci as “highly significant.” “This is really quite important,” Fauci told reporters at the White House, likening it to a moment in 1986 “when we were struggling for drugs for HIV and we had nothing.” (Beasley and Mishra, 4/29)

ABC News: Trump, Fauci Tout 'Good News' From Remdesivir Drug Trial In Treating COVID-19 
The president, who in the past repeatedly encouraged COVID-19 patients to seek out a different, anti-malarial drug despite no strong evidence it helped, said that the results of the remdesivir trial were "good news." Trump has praised remdesivir in the past, too. "It's a beginning, it means you build on it," Trump said Wednesday. "I love that as a building block -- you know, just as a building block, I love that. But certainly it's a positive, it's a very positive event from that standpoint." (Gittleson, 4/29)

Reuters: Explainer: What Does New Data Say About Gilead's Experimental Coronavirus Drug?
The data also suggest a possible survival benefit with remdesivir, although the difference was not statistically significant, meaning it might have been due to chance and not Gilead’s drug. Comparing the drug to a placebo should give researchers definitive answers about remdesivir’s effect on the illness. While the study did meet its primary goal, the promising NIAID data are from an interim analysis. The trial’s final results will likely not be known until sometime next month. (Lapid, 4/29)

Politico: 'A Drug Can Block This Virus': Fauci Hails Covid-19 Treatment Breakthrough
Gilead said the data also suggests that people who received remdesivir early in their infection seemed to fare better than those that received it later. The study is not a traditional trial with a placebo arm to compare against remdesivir for effectiveness, earning Gilead some criticism from policy experts over sharing the news alongside the NIAID results. (Owermohle, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: U.S. Explores Emergency-Use Approval For Gilead Drug After Study Found It Helped Recovery From Covid-19
Federal health regulators are exploring whether to greenlight the emergency use of a Gilead Sciences Inc. drug in serious Covid-19 patients, after U.S. government researchers reported the therapy helped the patients recover faster. President Trump said he was pushing the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to grant the emergency-use authorization to the Gilead drug remdesivir. (Walker, 4/29)

Stat: Gilead CEO: We’re Going To Make Sure Remdesivir Is Accessible
On Wednesday Gilead Sciences, best known as a maker of HIV medicines, sent out a 177-word press release that led to a sigh of relief around the world: A study had shown that its experimental drug, remdesivir, had reduced the time it took for patients with Covid-19 to get better. The data were only preliminary, and many questions still remain, including the nature of the treatment effect in patients. But for Gilead’s chief executive, Daniel O’Day, it was a big moment. (Herper, 4/29)

NBC News: 'Clear-Cut' Evidence Coronavirus Drug Remdesivir Works, Fauci Says
Dr. Michael Saag, associate dean for global health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, said the results seemed promising. Antiviral drugs such as remdesivir tend to work earlier in the course of an illness, so "the thing that I think is important in this study is the patients had advanced disease," said Saag, who is not involved with any remdesivir trials. "I think they were trying to give it the toughest test they could." (Edwards, 4/29)

Boston Globe: Coronavirus Patients Taking Gilead’s Remdesivir Recovered Faster 
Massachusetts General Hospital was among 47 sites nationwide that participated in the study. There were also 21 sites in countries in Europe and Asia, according to NIAID. Gilead mentioned the NIAID study earlier on Wednesday, prior to the release of the preliminary data, and also shared results from its own late-stage trial of remdesivir in patients hospitalized with COVID-19. That study showed that patients treated for five days with the yet-to-be-approved medicine and those treated for 10 days with it had similar rates of improvement. (Saltzman, 4/29)

Reuters: WHO Declines Comment On Remdesivir In COVID-19, Hopes For Best
A top World Health Organization official declined comment on Wednesday on reports that Gilead Science’s remdesivir could help treat COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus, but said that further data was needed. “I wouldn’t like to make any specific comment on that, because I haven’t read those publications in detail,” Dr Mike Ryan, head of the WHO’s emergencies programme, told an online briefing in response to a question, adding it can sometimes take a number of publications to determine a drug’s efficacy. (4/29)

Reuters: Fauci Says Leak Concerns Fueled His White House Revelation Of Gilead Drug Results
The dramatic announcement by Dr Anthony Fauci in the Oval Office on Wednesday prompted concerns among scientists that the Trump administration was raising hopes about a coronavirus treatment before sharing the full data with researchers. As a cautionary example of inflating the potential value of a therapy, some pointed to President Donald Trump’s repeated endorsements of malaria drug hydroxychloroquine as a treatment, with no evidence that it works. (Steenhuysen, 4/30)

The Associated Press: Trump Says He's Not Extending Social Distancing Guidelines
President Donald Trump said the federal government will not be extending its coronavirus social distancing guidelines once they expire Thursday, and his son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner, predicted that by July the country will be “really rocking again.” To underscore his confidence, Trump said Wednesday he plans to resume out-of-state travel after spending more than a month mostly cooped up in the White House, starting with a trip to Arizona next week. (Freking and Colvin, 4/30)

Politico: End Of Trump’s Social Distancing Policy Spurs Fears Of Virus Rebound
The Trump administration’s “Stay at Home” guidelines will quietly expire Thursday with little fanfare — letting states decide what’s next. But as President Donald Trump repeatedly declares that “we’re opening our country again,” the inconsistent patchwork of state, local and business decision-making is exactly what could drive a second wave of the coronavirus — or potentially prolong the current outbreak. (Kenen, 4/29)

NPR: 'Slow The Spread' Guidelines Will Phase Out, Trump Says
During a White House meeting with Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards on Wednesday, Trump commended governors for taking steps to reopen their economies. The original two-week guidelines that were extended 30 more days called for Americans to work from home, limit travel and avoid large gatherings. Vice President Pence said the existing guidelines were being applied to the new guidance issued by the White House on how states can reopen safely. (Ordonez, 4/29)

CNN: Trump Says Federal Social Distancing Guidelines Will Be 'Fading Out' 
A day before federal guidelines on slowing the spread of coronavirus are set to expire, Trump administration officials signaled that the strong federal social distancing guidelines would be relaxed as states begin to reopen their economies. "Frankly, every state in America has embraced those guidelines at a minimum, or even done more, and now our focus is working with states as governors, like Gov. John Bel Edwards, unveil plans to open up their states again," Vice President Mike Pence said as he and other task force members met with President Donald Trump and Edwards, a Democrat, in the Oval Office Wednesday. (Carvajal, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Trump Says He’s Ready To Hit The Road To Arizona, Coronavirus Or Not
President Trump, like much of the nation, has cabin fever. That’s about to end. Mr. Trump told reporters at an event with business executives on Wednesday that he plans to travel to Arizona next week and Ohio soon after that. “We’re going to start to move around,” he said, adding that he hopes to start holding campaign rallies again. The Arizona event will focus on industry, he said, without offering further details. (Ballhaus, 4/29)

Politico: Trump To Relax Shelter-In–White-House Routine
Trump often mentions that he hasn’t left the White House in months — except for once — as his administration has worked to respond to the pandemic. Last month he sent off a hospital ship, the USNS Comfort, from a Virginia naval base. He has otherwise stayed within the executive complex for six weeks, a long stretch for a president who used to spend most weekends golfing and visiting his own hotels and golf clubs. In recent days, Trump had asked aides to start adding to his schedule official events outside Washington. (Kumar, 4/29)

Politico: As Death Toll Passes 60,000, Trump’s Team Searches For An Exit Strategy
As the White House shifts its focus away from the public health response and toward rebuilding an economy ravaged by the pandemic, there remains little clear sense — even within his own administration — of how close the U.S. is to victory, and what “winning” the war even looks like. Successive benchmarks set by Trump that rested on containing the virus’ early cases, slowing the disease’s spread and establishing a national pandemic defense have fallen by the wayside. And this week, Trump’s predictions that the U.S. may see just 60,000 coronavirus deaths were belied by the brutal reality of the data. (Cancryn, 4/29)

NBC News: A Tale Of Two Summers: White House Diverges From Health Experts Over What's To Come
In the version of summer predicted by President Donald Trump and his top officials, life is back to normal and the coronavirus pandemic is mostly in the rearview mirror. People will be gathering on the National Mall for July 4, the economy will be rebounding and the U.S. will be conducting millions of tests a day, according to comments they have made in recent days. By Memorial Day, "we will largely have this coronavirus epidemic behind us," Vice President Mike Pence said last week. (Pettypiece, 4/29)

The Hill: Trump Says Coronavirus Will Be 'Eradicated' 
President Trump said Wednesday that the novel coronavirus would eventually be “eradicated” with or without a vaccine so that Americans and businesses could return to normal life and operations. “If you don’t have a vaccine, if the virus is gone, we are like we were before,” Trump told reporters Wednesday at the White House. “Having a vaccine would be a great thing, and I think we are going to get there in this case.” (Chalfant, 4/29)

The Hill: White House Risks Backlash With Coronavirus Optimism 
White House officials are taking an optimistic view of the country’s progress in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, a risky bet that could backfire if cases flare up again as more states begin lifting social distancing measures. Top administration officials in recent days have started laying out specific timetables for when they believe the pandemic will be in the rearview mirror. The sunny declarations come as the White House pushes to revive the economy that has been central to President Trump’s reelection bid. (Samuels and Chalfant, 4/29)

The New York Times: Trump And Kushner On The Coronavirus: Wishful Thinking And Revisionist History
The total number of coronavirus cases in the United States exceeded one million. The American death toll surpassed that of the Vietnam War. And the economy was reported to have shrunk by nearly 5 percent. But the White House on Wednesday declared its response to the crisis “a great success story.” As states begin to lift quarantines, President Trump is trying to recast the story of the pandemic from that of an administration slow to see and address the threat to one that responded with decisive action that saved lives. Recognizing that the crisis jeopardizes his chances of re-election, he and his allies want to convince his supporters that the cascade of criticism is unwarranted. (Baker, 4/29)

CNN: Kushner Calls US Coronavirus Response A 'Success Story' As Cases Hit 1 Million 
President Donald Trump's senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, praised the administration's response to the coronavirus pandemic as a "great success story" on Wednesday -- less than a day after the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States topped 1 million. Kushner painted a rosy picture for "Fox and Friends" Wednesday morning, saying that "the federal government rose to the challenge and this is a great success story and I think that that's really what needs to be told." (Vazquez and Klein, 4/29)

The New York Times: Trump’s Disinfectant Talk Trips Up Sites’ Vows Against Misinformation
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, said in March that promoting bleach as a cure for the coronavirus was “misinformation that has imminent risk of danger” and that such messages would immediately be removed from the social network. President Trump has now put Mr. Zuckerberg’s comments to the test. At a White House briefing last week, Mr. Trump suggested that disinfectants and ultraviolet light were possible treatments for the virus. His remarks immediately found their way onto Facebook, Instagram and other social media sites, and people rushed to defend the president’s statements as well as mock them. (Frenkel and Alba, 4/30)

The New York Times: Trump Officials Said To Press Spies To Hunt For Unproven Links Between Virus And Wuhan Labs
Senior Trump administration officials have pushed American spy agencies to hunt for evidence to support an unsubstantiated theory that a government laboratory in Wuhan, China, was the origin of the coronavirus outbreak, according to current and former American officials. The effort comes as President Trump escalates a public campaign to blame China for the pandemic. Some intelligence analysts are concerned that the pressure from administration officials will distort assessments about the virus and that they could be used as a political weapon in an intensifying battle with China over a disease that has infected more than three million people across the globe. (Mazzetti, Barnes, Wong and Goldman, 4/30)

The New York Times: Trump Seeks Push To Speed Coronavirus Vaccine, Despite Safety Concerns
President Trump is pressing his health officials to pursue a crash development program for a coronavirus vaccine that could be widely distributed by the beginning of next year, despite widespread skepticism that such an effort could succeed and considerable concern about the implications for safety. The White House has made no public announcement of the new effort, called Operation Warp Speed, and some officials are apparently trying to talk the president down, telling him that it would be more harmful to set an unreasonably short deadline that might result in a faulty vaccine than to wait for one that is proved safe and effective. (Sanger, 4/29)

Bloomberg: Trump Coronavirus Vaccine: 'Operation Warp Speed' Project News
Called “Operation Warp Speed,” the program will pull together private pharmaceutical companies, government agencies and the military to try to cut the development time for a vaccine by as much as eight months, according to two people familiar with the matter. As part of the arrangement, taxpayers will shoulder much of the financial risk that vaccine candidates may fail, instead of drug companies. The project’s goal is to have 300 million doses of vaccine available by January, according to one administration official. There is no precedent for such rapid development of a vaccine. (Jacobs and Armstrong, 4/29)

The Hill: Fauci: Hundreds Of Millions Of Coronavirus Vaccine Doses May Be Ready By January
Anthony Fauci said Thursday that it is possible that hundreds of millions of doses of a coronavirus vaccine could be ready by January, as the Trump administration seeks to speed vaccine development. Asked by NBC’s Savannah Guthrie whether it is “in the realm of possibility” for hundreds of millions of vaccine doses to be ready by January, as the administration’s new “Operation Warp Speed” program envisions, Fauci said, “I do.” (Sullivan, 4/30)

In other vaccine news —

Roll Call: US, China Absent From International Vaccine Effort
In laboratories around the world, hundreds of scientists are racing to develop a vaccine for the coronavirus and end the pandemic that has brought global commerce, travel and much of everyday life to a screeching halt. But while the eyes of private business, civil society and the news media are fixated on which vaccine candidates look the most promising and how soon a cure could be available for widespread use, comparatively less attention is being paid to the toxic chain of events that could unfold internationally once a vaccine is ready and national governments compete over access to it. (Oswald, 4/29)

The Hill: Pfizer Says Coronavirus Vaccine Could Be Ready For Emergency Use By Fall 
Pfizer and German pharmaceutical company BioNTech have developed a coronavirus vaccine that could be ready for emergency use as early as September, Pfizer’s CEO told The Wall Street Journal Tuesday. The two pharmaceutical firms said Wednesday they began human trials of the potential vaccine, BNT162, on April 23 in Germany. Twelve participants were given the vaccine and data on the trial is expected as early as June, according to Business Insider. (Guzman, 4/29)

The New York Times: Coronavirus Has Trump Health Secretary In Trouble
Two of President Trump’s top health officials were stewing last month in a drab room at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta as Mr. Trump and his health secretary, Alex M. Azar II, were concluding a laboratory tour, one that they had been left off of. One of the officials, Dr. Jerome M. Adams, the surgeon general, was then invited to join the president and the secretary to shake hands. The other, Seema Verma, who leads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, was not. Instead, a staff member told the powerful Medicare chief to head to the receiving line with the rank and file. Furious, she left for the airport to catch a commercial flight home to Washington. (Weiland, Haberman and Shear, 4/29)

In other news from the administration —

NBC News: 'Dangerous And Disrespectful': Doctors Tear Into Pence's Mask-Less Hospital Visit
Vice President Mike Pence's refusal to wear a mask during his visit to the prestigious Mayo Clinic this week was potentially dangerous and sent the wrong message about the federal guidelines he regularly touts, doctors and health care officials said. Wearing a mask reduces disease transmission and protects both the wearer and the people around them, said Dr. Vin Gupta, a pulmonologist and global health policy expert who is an NBC News and MSNBC contributor. (Timm and Gregorian, 4/29)

The New York Times: New Coronavirus Test Offers Advantages: Just Spit And Wait
A new test for the coronavirus is so simple and straightforward, almost anyone could do it: Spit a glob of saliva into a cup, close the lid and hand it over. While not as fast to process as the speediest swab tests, saliva tests could transform the diagnosis of Covid-19. If manufactured in enough numbers and processed by enough labs across the country, they could alleviate the diagnostic shortages that have hampered containment of the pandemic and offer a less onerous way for companies to see if workers are infected. (Mandavilli, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: LabCorp Has Excess COVID-19 Test Capacity After Weeks Of Backlogs
After weeks of backlogged COVID-19 tests, the CEO of LabCorp said on an earnings call Wednesday that the company now has additional testing capacity. "We're not using all of our capacity at the 60,000 per day right now," CEO Adam Schechter said on the call. "I think that's just short term. I think as states become up and running and back to business, I think we'll be at full capacity in the very near future." (Bannow, 4/29)

NPR: Antigen Tests For The Coronavirus Might Be Easier, But How Reliable? 
States clamoring for coronavirus tests in recent weeks have been talking about two different types. First, there's a PCR test that detects the virus' genetic material, so can confirm an active infection. And then there's an antibody test, which looks at the body's reaction to that infection, so is useful in identifying people who have been infected with the virus in the past. Now, there's a third kind of test under development to help fight COVID-19 that homes in on proteins that stud the virus's outer surface; it, too, detects an active infection. (Stein, 4/30)

The Associated Press: Mayor: LA 1st Major US City Offering All Residents Tests
The city of Los Angeles will offer free coronavirus testing to all residents regardless of whether they have symptoms, Mayor Eric Garcetti announced Wednesday. Testing centers have been set up across the city but until now they were reserved for those with symptoms and frontline employees like health care and grocery store workers. Los Angeles will be the first major U.S. city to offer “large, widescale testing to all its residents, with or without symptoms,” Garcetti said at his daily briefing. (4/30)

The Washington Post: Richmond Coronavirus Testing Targets Poor African Americans
Tiffany Smith tilted her head way back, sending her long ponytail almost to her waist and allowing a nurse to stick a cotton swab up one nostril, then another. “Oh, damn!” she said, wiping her nose after undergoing a free coronavirus test in an east Richmond parking lot. “Whoo!” Though she hated how it felt, Smith, 47, had been seeking the nasal swab since she and her husband, Charles, started having fevers, coughs, sweats and headaches about a week ago. (Vozzella and Schneider, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Why Maryland Has Not Distributed Hogan's Coronavirus Tests From South Korea 
When Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) announced the purchase of 500,000 coronavirus tests from South Korea last week, he called it “an exponential, game-changing step forward” in the state’s effort to get more people tested. The dramatic story drew notice from Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and a dismissive swipe from fellow Republican President Trump. (Cox and Thompson, 4/29)

PBS NewsHour: Why Antibody Tests, A Crucial Step Toward Overcoming COVID-19, Are Still Unreliable
Testing, both for active cases of COVID-19 and for antibodies indicating prior exposure to the disease, will be critical to resuming economic activity. In addition, scientists are racing to develop therapies for people who do get infected -- especially those who become seriously ill. (O’Brien, 4/29)

The New York Times: Powerful Meat Industry Holds More Sway After Trump’s Order
Ever since slaughterhouses became coronavirus hot spots, the meat industry has been asking the Trump administration for help. Hundreds of employees have been getting sick or not showing up for work for fear of contracting the virus. Labor unions, which had been largely quiet in their dealings with many of the large meat companies before the pandemic, started to hold regular news conferences to highlight the growing number of deaths among their workers. And in some states, health departments were shutting down meatpacking plants, even as the companies warned that the nation’s meat supply was in peril. (Corkery, Yaffe-Bellany and Swanson, 4/29)

The New York Times: The Trump Administration’s Legal Moves To Prevent A Meat Shortage, Explained
The Trump administration moved this week to try to mitigate the effects from the shutdowns of beef, pork and poultry processing facilities amid the Covid-19 pandemic that have potentially endangered an important part of the nation’s food supply chain. But the policy moves have generated confusion. “We are, in many regards, in uncharted territory,” said James E. Baker, a former legal adviser to the National Security Council and a professor of national security law at Syracuse University. (Savage, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Food-Plant Workers Clash With Employers Over Coronavirus Safety
Tensions are escalating at food plants between essential workers who feel pressure to stay on the job through the coronavirus pandemic and their employers, who are striving to maintain the country’s food supply chain without interruption. Union officials and worker advocates are fighting for unpaid leave and other accommodations for workers who fear contracting the virus or spreading it to family. Companies are pushing back, in some instances threatening to fire workers who don’t come in or battling unions to make sure factories can stay open. (Maher, Bunge and Berzon, 4/29)

Des Moines Register: Trump's Order To Keep Meatpacking Plants Open Creates Anxiety, Relief
Local Iowa officials worry that President Donald Trump's executive order requiring meatpacking plants to remain open could threaten the health of 2,800 workers at the Tyson plant that closed last week because of a COVID-19 outbreak. But pork producers say the president's action provides "hope and relief" for farmers who face destroying thousands of pigs backed up on farms as the novel coronavirus has both slowed and closed meat processing plants across the country. (Eller and Rodriguez, 4/29)

WBUR: Workers Scared As Trump Orders Meat Plants To Open During Coronavirus Crisis 
President Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to keep meatpacking plants in the U.S. open during the coronavirus pandemic. Tuesday's move comes after more than a dozen beef, pork and poultry plants across the country shut down either temporarily or indefinitely in the past few weeks. The president's executive order to keep the plants open notes that some of the plant closures "may be inconsistent with" worker safety guidance issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, and that "unnecessary" plant closures can have a big impact on the meat supply chain. (Runyon and Whitney, 4/29)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: COVID-19: Hundreds Of Georgia Poultry Workers Have Tested Positive
Nearly 400 workers in Georgia’s prized poultry industry have tested positive for the disease caused by the coronavirus, and one has died from his illness, according to Georgia Department of Public Health statistics obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The 388 workers who have been sickened by COVID-19 represent about 2% of the estimated 16,500 people employed at 14 chicken processing plants across the state. (Redmon, 4/29)

In other supply chain news —

The Wall Street Journal: Two Months That Tore Apart The Food Chain
The coronavirus pandemic has scrambled the U.S. food system, crushing the restaurant industry while pushing up grocery sales at record rates. The crisis is remaking every link in the supply chain, from farms to manufacturers to shippers to stores. Officials are warning of labor shortages and waning meat supplies. Ultimately, it could bring permanent changes to the way food is processed and transported. For consumers, it could mean fewer choices, higher prices and an adjustment in the way we shop and stock our pantries. (Gasparro, Kang and Stamm, 4/29)

CNN: Don't Expect To See Disinfectant Wipes Or Sprays In Stores Anytime Soon, Experts Say
If you want to buy disinfectant wipes, good luck finding them on the store shelves. Products that help prevent the spread of the coronavirus, including disinfectant wipes, cleaning sprays and other items, flew off the shelves weeks or months ago as consumers prepared for the pandemic. It could be several more months until high demand items like sanitizer wipes and sprays are easily available in stores again. (Diaz and Zaslav, 4/29)

The Associated Press: Over 70% Of Tested Inmates In Federal Prisons Have COVID-19
Michael Fleming never got to say goodbye to his father. He didn’t know his dad was fading away on a ventilator, diagnosed with coronavirus at the federal prison where he was serving time for a drug charge. His father, also named Michael, was held at FCI Terminal Island in Los Angeles and died April 19. At least half the population there has tested positive, the largest known hot spot in the federal prison system. (Balsamo, 4/30)

ProPublica/WBEZ: Inside The Jail With One Of The Country’s Largest Coronavirus Outbreaks
The Cook County Jail in Chicago is one of the largest in the country. Sprawling across 96 acres on the Southwest Side, the facility houses more than 4,000 people, most awaiting trial. Its cramped living conditions made it a perfect petri dish for COVID-19. Today, the jail is home to one of the largest known outbreaks in the country and has been a flashpoint in the national debate over how to contain the virus in correctional facilities. (Heffernan, 4/30)

The New York Times: Prisoner With Coronavirus Dies After Giving Birth While On Ventilator
The first female federal prisoner to die after contracting the coronavirus was a 30-year-old mother who had just weeks earlier given birth while on a ventilator. The woman, Andrea Circle Bear, of Eagle Butte, S.D., was sentenced in January to serve 26 months in prison for using a residence on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation to sell drugs in 2018. She admitted that she had sold $850 worth of methamphetamine to a buyer who was later revealed to be a confidential informant, according to court documents. (Bogel-Burroughs and Swales, 4/29)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Board Doesn’t Recommend Depopulating Nevada Prisons 
The Nevada Sentencing Commission on Wednesday twice rejected recommending that Gov. Steve Sisolak move to depopulate the state’s prisons in an effort to stave off the coronavirus’ spread. The board, however, unanimously agreed to ask the governor to consider speeding up the enactment of a “geriatric” parole statute, which is set to take effect July 1. Such a move would mean that about six people older than 65 in Nevada Department of Corrections, which houses roughly 13,000 inmates, could have a chance at early release, prison officials said during the meeting. (Ferrara, 4/29)

Detroit Free Press: Class Action Lawsuit Filed Over COVID-19 Response In Michigan Prisons
The Michigan Department of Corrections is facing a class action lawsuit over its handling of the coronavirus outbreak inside its facilities, where more than 1,400 prisoners are confirmed to have the virus and 41 inmates have died as of late Wednesday. A complaint filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan accuses the department of violating prisoners’ Eighth Amendment rights by exposing them to risk of illness and death from COVID-19. (Jackson, 4/30)

Meanwhile, in other news on people being held in custody —

Detroit Free Press: Ex-Wayne Co. Juvenile Detention Employee Files Whistleblower Lawsuit
A former employee of the Wayne County Juvenile Detention Facility is suing the county after she said she was told to resign because she refused to work without a face mask to protect herself and others from COVID-19. The whistleblower lawsuit filed last week in Wayne County Circuit Court alleges that Azanean Petty of Detroit was forced to choose between her safety and her job. (Jackson, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Inside The Largest Coronavirus Outbreak In Immigration Detention
As coronavirus infections surge in the nation’s immigration jails, the number is highest at a low-slung lockup surrounded by barbed wire sitting just a few miles from the Mexican border in California. As of Wednesday, 94 detainees and eight Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees at the Otay Mesa Detention Center had tested positive for Covid-19, the federal agency said. Additionally, CoreCivic, the private company that runs Otay Mesa, said 15 of its employees had tested positive. It is the biggest outbreak among all 221 U.S immigration lockup facilities, including local jail space rented by ICE. (Lazo and Elinson, 4/30)

Stat: Reopening Some States Heightens The Risk Of Coronavirus Surges In Others
For all that’s still being discovered about the novel coronavirus, one thing was clear from the beginning: It moves. In just a few months, it sprinted around the world and left in its wake a trail of death, social paralysis, and economic ruin. Now, as some U.S. states start to lift pandemic-related restrictions on businesses and public spaces, there is a fear that infections will resurge in those places — and that if that happens, the virus won’t stay put. (Joseph, 4/30)

The Washington Post: Southern Governors Who Initially Downplayed Coronavirus Threat Ease Into Reopening Of Their States
Last month, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was criticized for not quickly closing his state down — and allowing spring breakers to party on beaches — as the novel coronavirus spread. Neighboring Alabama insisted that it did not face the same threat from the virus as other places did, as did Mississippi, whose governor insisted his state was "never going to be China." All three governors eventually issued stay-at-home orders as the number of coronavirus cases skyrocketed. And they are moving to reopen — much more slowly and methodically than other nearby states but in ways that take cues directly from President Trump. (Wootson and Craig, 4/29)

The New York Times: As Georgia Reopens, Virus Study Shows Black Residents May Bear Brunt
As Georgia reopens many businesses over objections from President Trump and others, a new study illustrates the high rates of coronavirus infection among black people in the state. The report, released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said that more than four-fifths of hospitalized coronavirus patients in the study were black. They were not more likely than other groups to die from the disease or to require a ventilator. Still, of the 297 patients in the study whose race and ethnicity were known, 83.2 percent were black. (Waldstein, 4/30)

Reuters: Florida Moves To Ease Coronavirus Lockdown As Promising Treatment Emerges
The governor of Florida, among the last to lock down his state against the U.S. coronavirus outbreak, announced on Wednesday he would permit a limited economic reopening next week while leaving restraints intact for the dense greater-Miami area. (Fagenson and Resnick-Ault, 4/29)

NPR: Virus Outbreak Poses Political Challenge For Republican In Key Senate Race
In what could be one of the closest Senate races this fall, the coronavirus pandemic has scrambled some of the usual political lines. North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis, who's facing re-election to a second term, has found himself on the same side as the state's Democratic governor, Roy Cooper (who's also facing re-election) in backing the state's stay-at-home order. (Harrison, 4/30)

The Associated Press: Surf's Down In California: Governor Will Close Beaches
Gov. Gavin Newsom will order all beaches and state parks closed starting Friday after people thronged the seashore during a sweltering weekend despite his social distancing order that aims to slow the spread of the coronavirus, according to a memo sent to police chiefs around the state. Eric Nuñez, president of the California Police Chiefs Association, said it was sent to the group’s members Wednesday evening so they have time to plan ahead of Newsom’s expected announcement Thursday. (Beam and Dazio, 4/30)

Politico: California Teachers Resist Newsom’s ‘Unrealistic’ Call For July Start
California teachers unions are fighting Gov. Gavin Newsom’s suggestion that schools open this summer and making clear that they will have a say at the bargaining table. The unions say teachers were stunned by Newsom’s suggestion Tuesday that schools could reopen in July in an attempt to help reduce learning gaps caused by the coronavirus and allow parents to return to work in a greater capacity. (Mays, 4/29)

KQED: Bay Area Shelter-In-Place Orders Extended Through May 31
Regional shelter-in-place orders to curb the spread of the coronavirus have been extended through May 31, according to a joint press release from seven public health officials. This order applies to the six Bay Area counties of Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara, as well as the City of Berkeley, an independent public health jurisdiction. (Wiley, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Va. Gov. Ralph Northam To Allow Non-Emergency Doctor, Dentist Visits
Virginians will be able to resume non-emergency visits to the doctor, dentist or veterinarian later this week after Gov. Ralph Northam announced the state’s first rollback of restrictions since the coronavirus crisis began escalating in March. The news came Wednesday as the region’s leaders expanded efforts to fight the pandemic’s damage, with D.C. officials saying that restrictions and closures might need to be extended another three months under the “most stringent” scenario and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan announcing that all nursing home residents and employees will be tested for the novel coronavirus. (Schneider, Portnoy, Vozzella and Nirappil, 4/29)

Houston Chronicle: Gov. Abbott Pushes Friday Reopening Even As Texas Misses Benchmarks Set By His Advisers 
As he moves to reopen the state Friday amid the coronavirus pandemic, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has cited data and science as his guiding lights. But Texas has yet to meet most of the benchmarks for easing restrictions set by Abbott's most prominent outside medical adviser. (Blackman, 4/29)

Des Moines Register: Coronavirus In Iowa: Reynolds Defends Reopening Process Despite Risk
Gov. Kim Reynolds on Wednesday defended her decision to loosen some restrictions on businesses and religious gatherings in Iowa despite a warning from researchers at the University of Iowa that doing so could lead to a second wave of cases. On Tuesday, the governor's office released a report it received last week from University of Iowa experts who warned against easing restrictions early. "Prevention measures should remain in place," the report said. "Without such measures being continued, a second wave of infections is likely." (Pfannenstiel and Gruber-Miller, 4/29)

The Hill: Majority Of Americans Support Another Two Weeks Of Lockdown: Poll
About three-quarters of Americans favor continuing shutdowns for another two weeks to stem the spread of the coronavirus, compared to only about 10 percent who oppose doing so, according to a poll by Business Insider and SurveyMonkey. The poll, conducted April 28-29 among 1,099 respondents, found 50 percent strongly support at least another two weeks of social distancing measures, with another 25 percent saying they supported them. Six percent said they opposed continuing the measures, compared to 4 percent who were strongly opposed. A larger portion—14 percent—said they had no opinion. (Budryk, 4/29)

The Associated Press: Debate Flares Over Legal Protections As Businesses Open Up
The effort to reopen the economy in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic has set off a conflict at the state and federal level that is escalating by the day over how much legal protection companies should get if their returning workers get sick. The White House, governors, members of congress and state lawmakers are all getting pressured by business leaders who want to be shielded from potential lawsuits brought by sick workers. (McCombs, 4/30)

CNN: Debate Emerges Over Whether Businesses Should Be Protected From Covid-19 Lawsuits 
Major business groups are spearheading the push for political action to limit Covid-19 liability claims. Thomas Donohue, CEO of the US Chamber of Commerce, told CNN his group planned to work "very aggressively" with Congress to create a stopgap for pandemic-related class actions lawsuits. The National Association of Manufacturers is asking Congress to limit state and federal lawsuits against essential manufacturers. In a set of policy recommendations, the association proposed limiting claims to instances where the manufatcurer had "actual knowledge" an employee would be exposed to the virus and "acted with reckless indifference or conscious disregard as to whether they would contract it." (Boykoff, 4/29)

Boston Globe: Employers Face A ‘Minefield’ Of Legal Issues As They Prepare To Reopen
As business leaders contemplate the thawing of this economic deep-freeze, they might want to brace for a flood of litigation that could follow. The trickle has already started: A lawsuit is filed against Walmart over a worker’s death in Illinois. The owner of a lifestyle center in Rhode Island takes tenants to court over missed lease payments. Amazon faces potential class-action litigation accusing it of price gouging. (Chesto, 4/29)

In other news on workers' safety —

Roll Call: Amazon Workers Tally Virus Cases, Voice Alarms About Risks
With each new case of COVID-19 reported at an Amazon warehouse, workers receive a text or voicemail alert assuring them that the best safety procedures recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are being put in place. “We continue to follow CDC guidance,” messages from the company say. But some workers say that isn't true. And some say they are pressured by managers to report that social distancing is maintained when that’s not the case. (Kopp, 4/29)

The Washington Post: City And State Layoffs Threaten Education, Sanitation, Health And Safety
In Michigan, some unstaffed highway rest stops are shuttered. In Santa Barbara, Calif., local librarians are out of a job. Dayton, Ohio, has ordered furloughs at nearly every agency, and in Arlington, Tex., police officers and firefighters may soon see painful cuts. Facing an urgent financial crisis, these and other cities and states nationwide are eyeing dramatic reductions to their workforces, threatening critical public-sector employees and first responders at a time when many Americans may need their local governments’ help the most. (Romm, 4/29)

NBC News: TSA Says 500 Of Its Employees Have Tested Positive For COVID-19
Five hundred people who work for the Transportation Security Administration have tested positive for COVID-19, including four people who died from the disease, the agency said Wednesday. Of the 500 who tested positive, 208 recovered from the illness caused by the coronavirus, the agency said in a statement. (Edelman, 4/29)

KQED: Pandemic's Economic Toll Leaves Plan To Insure California's Undocumented Seniors In Doubt 
As California continues to grapple with the coronavirus pandemic, public health experts and immigrant advocates are pushing for Gov. Gavin Newsom to expand Medi-Cal benefits to tens of thousands of undocumented seniors. The elderly are among those most at risk for complications from COVID-19. (Romero, 4/29)

Kaiser Health News: Free Clinics Try To Fill Gaps As COVID Sweeps Away Job-Based Insurance
Joe Delbert hadn’t needed the Tree of Life Free Clinic in three years. The 55-year-old man, who moved to Tupelo from Georgia to take care of his dying father nearly four years ago, found manufacturing work that came with health insurance. But last month, he joined 26 million other Americans who have lost their jobs because of COVID-19 in the past five weeks. (Morris, 4/30)

Kaiser Health News: ‘An Arm And A Leg’: If Insurer Bills You For COVID Testing, Talk — And Maybe Tweet — It Out
Anna Davis Abel’s insurance company pledged to cover COVID-19 testing without cost sharing, but then left her to pay a big bill. Davis Abel got help thanks to a viral tweet — and from a reporter who reached out to and prodded her insurance company. But her story exposes gaps in the protections Congress put in place to make coronavirus testing more affordable for consumers with health coverage. (Weissmann, 4/30)

Meanwhile, in other insurance news —

Modern Healthcare: Chicago Hospital Sues Illinois Over Medicaid Program
St. Anthony Hospital is suing the state, alleging that problems with Illinois' Medicaid program threaten the hospital's ability to care for patients in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. In a lawsuit filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, the Chicago hospital alleges that the state's $12.5 billion Medicaid managed-care program doesn't comply with federal law and subsequently hurts safety nets that treat large numbers of low-income patients. (Goldberg, 4/29)

The Associated Press: Police Called After NYC Funeral Home Puts Bodies In Trucks
Police were called to a Brooklyn neighborhood Wednesday after a funeral home overwhelmed by the coronavirus resorted to storing dozens of bodies on ice in rented trucks, and a passerby complained about the smell, officials said. Investigators who responded to a 911 call found that the home had rented four trucks to hold about 50 corpses, according to a law enforcement official. No criminal charges were brought and the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the investigation, spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. (sisak and Hajela, 4/30)

Reuters: Bodies Found In Unrefrigerated Trucks In New York During COVID-19 Pandemic
New York City has been at the epicenter of the global coronavirus pandemic and the city’s funeral homes have been overwhelmed. As of Wednesday afternoon, more than 18,000 people have died of COVID-19 in America’s biggest city, according to a Reuters tally. Funeral homes say they are facing weeks-long backlogs to bury or cremate the dead. (Jackson, 4/29)

The New York Times: Dozens Of Decomposing Bodies Found In Trucks At Brooklyn Funeral Home
Still, the notion that dead New Yorkers could be left to decay in broad daylight in rental trucks on a crowded street in Brooklyn underscored the challenges facing the city as it tries to absorb a disaster that has already killed nearly five times as many as died in the Sept. 11 terror attacks. One official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about the matter, said that the funeral home had been storing bodies in the trucks after its freezer stopped operating properly. Funeral directors are required to store bodies awaiting burial or cremation in appropriate conditions that prevent infection. (Feuer, Southall and Gold, 4/29)

The Washington Post: A New York City Funeral Home Stored Coronavirus Victims’ Bodies In U-Haul Trucks, Police Say
City officials proposed temporarily freezing the bodies of coronavirus victims and deployed “mobile morgues,” refrigerated trailers that can hold bodies, to support overwhelmed funeral homes, morgues and crematories. The move was intended to give families more time to claim the bodies of family members, after the number of unclaimed bodies buried at Hart Island increased by fivefold in early April. Hart Island is a public cemetery and mass grave in the Bronx where the city buries people whose bodies go unclaimed and those whose families cannot afford another option. (Sheperd, 4/30)

ProPublica: Grieving Families Need Help Paying For COVID-19 Burials, But Trump Hasn’t Released The Money
As the U.S. death toll from the coronavirus mounts, President Donald Trump has yet to free up a pool of disaster relief funding specifically intended to help families cover burial costs. Approximately 30 states and territories have requested the funding as the pandemic spreads across the country and struggling families ask for help burying their dead. The funding is part of the wide array of “individual assistance” programs handled by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to help disaster victims. (Song and Torbati, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Number Of Nursing Homes With Publicly Reported Cases Of The Coronavirus Soars
The number of nursing homes publicly reporting cases of covid-19 has doubled in the past week, with more than 1 in 6 facilities nationwide now acknowledging infections among residents or staff, a Washington Post analysis of state and federal data found. The rise is driven in part by newly released information about previous novel coronavirus infections from states including Michigan, Maryland, Kentucky and South Carolina. Some states have not yet publicly released the names of affected nursing homes. (Jacobs, Mulcahy, King and Cenziper, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Maryland Nursing Home Coronavirus Outbreaks Prompt Hogan To Order Universal Testing
Maryland announced Wednesday that it will test all nursing home residents and staffers for the novel coronavirus, which has spread through 194 facilities, infecting 4,822 staff members and residents and killing 516. Officials said the state may be the first in the country to mandate universal testing. Data released Wednesday evening showed that half of Maryland’s confirmed covid-19-related deaths and more than a fifth of its cases were linked to skilled-nursing facilities. (Tan and Harden, 4/29)

WBUR: Senior Living Facilities Are Coronavirus Hotspots. Now, Families Wonder If They Should Bring Loved Ones Home 
In March, not long after Bill Passman’s parents moved into an assisted living residence in Maryland, his 94-year-old father developed a cough. At first the family didn’t think much of it, even though fears about the coronavirus had recently sent the facility into lockdown. Bill was more concerned about helping his parents figure out how to use Zoom so the family could still talk."We did get [my parents] to click on the Zoom link, joined it — and the audio wasn’t working," he recalled. (Mason, 4/29)

San Francisco Chronicle: Asymptomatic Staff, Untested At Many Nursing Homes, Are Spreading The Coronavirus 
As coronavirus infections increase in nursing homes throughout the state, Santa Clara County made the chilling discovery this month that dozens of staff members with no symptoms of the coronavirus had unknowingly infected the very people they cared for at three facilities experiencing big outbreaks. The revelation raises questions about what Bay Area county public health departments — which oversee testing at nursing homes — are doing to prevent outbreaks. Many do not require workers to be tested before they interact with patients. (Ravani, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City Subway Cars Must Be Cleaned Daily During Pandemic, Cuomo Says
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday that subway cars in New York City should be cleaned every day for essential workers who were still commuting amid the coronavirus pandemic. Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, announced the measure as another 330 New Yorkers died from the coronavirus, bringing the state’s overall toll to 17,968. Nearly 300,000 people in the state have tested positive for Covid-19, state officials said. (Vielkind and De Avila, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: New York City Police To Step Up Coronavirus Enforcement After Funeral Flouts Rules
New York City police will no longer issue warnings to people who violate social-distancing rules designed to fight the coronavirus after a funeral drew a large crowd in Brooklyn Tuesday, officials said. Mayor Bill de Blasio on Wednesday admonished members of the Orthodox Jewish community who gathered the previous evening for the funeral of a prominent rabbi. Mr. de Blasio said the situation was “unacceptable” and “deeply, deeply distressing.” (Chapman and Vielkind, 4/29)

Los Angeles Times: Coronavirus Slows L.A. Money Laundering, Bringing Seizures
Dirty money is piling up in Los Angeles. In the last three weeks, federal agents made three seizures that each netted more than $1 million in suspected drug proceeds. The reason, according to the city’s top drug enforcement official: The coronavirus pandemic has slowed trade-based money laundering systems that drug trafficking groups use to repatriate profits and move Chinese capital into Southern California. (Ormseth, 4/29)

WBUR: Why Some Boston Neighborhoods Have Been Hit Harder By The Pandemic Than Others
Mayor Marty Walsh recently convened a task force to address some of the inequities laid bare by the pandemic. The committee is working to increase testing across the city, improve data collection and support minority-owned businesses. It's an effort that City Councilor Andrea Campbell supports. She represents Dorchester and Mattapan, two of the neighborhoods hit hardest. (Dooling, 4/30)

WBUR: If You're Admitted To A Partners HealthCare Hospital, Expect A Coronavirus Test 
Partners HealthCare is now running a coronavirus diagnostic test on every admitted patient at all of its acute care hospitals. As of Monday, inserting that long swab into your nasal cavity will be part of admissions from the emergency room and for patients transferred to the hospital. If you’re scheduled for surgery at a Partners hospital, you’ll likely be asked to come in for a test the day before. Patients and hospital staff can expect to have the results within one to three hours. (Bebinger, 4/29)

Boston Globe: R.I. Focuses On The Grim Economic And Budgetary Realities Of The Epidemic 
Economists are warning that Rhode Island is plunging into recession, facing a sharp, severe decline and a slow, gradual recovery. Meanwhile, top state and federal officials say that an initial infusion of $1.25 billion in federal funding can’t be used to fill the gaping state budget holes created by the coronavirus epidemic. (Fitzpatrick, 4/29)

Modern Healthcare: COVID-19 Cases On The Rise In California Border Towns
The federal government should "immediately begin medical checks" at the U.S.-Mexico border in Southern California to slow a surge of COVID-19 cases in border communities, two hospitals said Tuesday in a letter to HHS and the Department of Homeland Security. Scripps Health and Sharp HealthCare also asked the Trump administration to give the San Diego region "priority status to receive more personal protective equipment (PPE) and pharmaceutical supplies" because hospitals near the border are running low on critical supplies. The Federal Emergency Management Administration has also redirected supply shipments destined for the San Diego area to other parts of the country, straining local supply chains. (Brady, 4/29)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Emory Hosting Virtual Event About COVID-19-Related Grief
Months after announcing a partnership with Science Gallery International, Emory University is teaming with the university network for “a multi-dimensional exploration of loss, hope and creativity during this crisis,” according to a press release. Emory University faculty and health care providers will collaborate with Science Gallery to host the virtual program “Science of Grief.” (Willis, 4/29)

New Orleans Times-Picayune: Deaths Continue To Climb As Expanded Coronavirus Testing Eyed For Louisiana Nursing Homes 
Coronavirus' deadly toll on Louisiana's nursing homes and adult residential facilities — which has already claimed 26 victims at a veterans home in Reserve, nine more at a New Roads facility, and at least 18 at Lambeth House in New Orleans — grew Wednesday to 637. Of those deaths, the state's nursing homes have been hit the hardest: The deadly respiratory disease has claimed the lives of 590 residents in 156 nursing homes. The state also said there have been at least 2,780 cases of the disease in the nursing homes. (Roberts III, 4/29)

Las Vegas Review-Journal: Las Vegas Hospital To Resume Surgeries In May
Southern Nevada’s major hospitals plan to resume “medically necessary” elective surgeries and procedures Monday, according to a Nevada Hospital Association letter obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The letter, dated Tuesday, was sent this week to medical staff at University Medical Center, North Vista Hospital and The Valley Health System, Dignity Health and HCA Healthcare hospital systems. The companies own and operate more than a dozen local hospitals that have more than 4,000 staffed acute-care beds. (Davidson, 4/29)

Albuquerque Journal: NM Health Agency Has Issued Two Isolation Orders 
The New Mexico Department of Health has, in recent weeks, sought court intervention to require two patients infected with the coronavirus to self-isolate – marking the first time an isolation provision in a 2003 state law has been evoked during the COVID-19 outbreak. An agency spokesman said Wednesday that court records are sealed in both cases because they contain protected information and added the department could not provide further details, including where the two individuals live. (Boyd, 4/29)

Politico: Mitch McConnell's Public Health Gamble
Coronavirus cases are still rising in the District of Columbia, where more than 200 people have died of the disease. The House decided it was too dangerous to return to the Capitol. But Mitch McConnell’s Senate is coming back anyway. The Senate majority leader is gambling that 100 senators can safely meet on the Senate floor and throughout the Capitol complex. Many of them will travel across the country for the Senate’s reopening, risking exposure on airplanes and in airports. And 49 senators are aged 65 or older and at greater risk of the deadly disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Plus, the senators’ return will bring back hundreds of staffers and Capitol employees. (Everett and Levine, 4/30)

The Hill: Feinstein To McConnell: Cancel Plan To Bring Senate Back Amid Coronavirus Pandemic | TheHill
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) is urging Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to cancel his plan to bring the Senate back to Washington, D.C., on Monday, saying the House did the "right thing" by deciding not to return next week... Feinstein — who at 86 is the oldest senator — sent a letter to McConnell and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Wednesday that said the GOP leader should change his plans "in the interest of public health and sending the right message to the nation." (Carney, 4/29)

Politico: Pelosi Taps 7 Lawmakers To Select Coronavirus Committee
Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday appointed seven Democratic members to a newly created House panel meant to police the Trump administration’s coronavirus response efforts. The appointments are expected to ignite a wave of congressional action to spotlight President Donald Trump’s handling of the multitrillion-dollar pandemic relief packages meant to confront the illness’ devastating toll on American life. (Cheney and Ferris, 4/29)

The Hill: Pelosi Fills Out Democratic Roster On Coronavirus Oversight Panel
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Wednesday filled out the Democratic roster on a special committee overseeing coronavirus relief spending, naming six new members to the newly created panel, including some of President Trump's harshest congressional critics. The announcement is a clear signal that Democratic leaders intend to conduct aggressive oversight of the Trump administration's coronavirus spending — a process occurring in the midst of an election year — as trillions of dollars go out the door. (Lillis, 4/29)

And in other news from Capitol Hill —

Politico: Lawmakers Made Hundreds Of Stock Transactions During Pandemic, Watchdog Finds
Republican and Democratic lawmakers have bought and sold stocks hundreds of times throughout the coronavirus pandemic — some of them lucrative moves to invest in industries buoyed by the crisis and divest from sectors like restaurants and hotels that have tanked, according to a new analysis by the Campaign Legal Center. From Feb. 2 to April 8 of this year, the nonpartisan watchdog group found, 12 senators made a combined 127 purchases or sales, while 37 House representatives made at least 1,358 transactions. (Ollstein, 4/29)

The Hill: Black Caucus Moves To Front And Center In COVID Fight 
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) are taking leading positions in the House Democratic response to the coronavirus as data shows African Americans are dying in disproportionate numbers across the country from the pandemic... CBC members have staged numerous media and member conference calls in recent weeks to highlight the glaring racial disparity. And they’ve held tele-town halls to connect their constituents with health and government officials who’ve offered advice on how to navigate the crisis. (Wong, 4/29)

The Associated Press: 30 Million Have Sought US Unemployment Aid Since Virus Hit
More than 3.8 million laid-off workers applied for unemployment benefits last week as the U.S. economy slid further into a crisis that is becoming the most devastating since the 1930s. Roughly 30.3 million people have now filed for jobless aid in the six weeks since the coronavirus outbreak began forcing millions of employers to close their doors and slash their workforces. That is more people than live in the New York and Chicago metropolitan areas combined, and it’s by far the worst string of layoffs on record. It adds up to more than one in six American workers. (Rugaber, 4/30)

CNN: 30 Million Americans Have Filed Initial Unemployment Claims Since Mid-March
After peaking at 6.9 million in the last week of March, claims have fallen each of the last four weeks — an encouraging sign that at least things aren't getting worse. But overall, joblessness remains a dire problem. Friday marks May 1, and for millions of Americans, rents and mortgage payments will be due. Unemployment benefits are one of the key forms of financial aid that are helping families plug the gap. (Tappe, 4/30)

CNBC: US Weekly Jobless Claims Hit 3.84 Million, Topping 30 Million Over The Last 6 Weeks
First-time filings for unemployment insurance hit 3.84 million last week as the wave of economic pain continues, though the worst appears to be in the past, according to Labor Department figures Thursday. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for 3.5 million. (Cox, 4/30)

Bloomberg: Another 3.8 Million Americans File For Jobless Benefits
Continuing claims, or the total number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits, rose by 2.17 million to a record 18 million in the week ended April 18. That sent the insured unemployment rate -- which measures the unemployed receiving benefits as a share of the labor market -- to a record 12.4%, compared with 1.2% before the crisis. Florida had the most claims last week, with an estimated 432,500 on an unadjusted basis, followed by California at 328,000 and Georgia at 264,800. Most states reported declines. (Dmitrieva, 4/30)

MarketWatch: U.S. Jobless Claims Climb 3.8 Million In Late April To Push Coronavirus Total To 30 Million
The unprecedented surge in layoffs has pushed the unemployment rate above 15% to the highest levels since the Great Depression of the 1930s, economists estimate. The official jobless rate will be released next week with the Labor Department’s employment report for April. (Bartash, 4/30)

Reuters: U.S. Weekly Jobless Claims Remain Elevated As Millions More Seek Benefits
The Labor Department’s weekly jobless claims report on Thursday followed news on Wednesday that the economy in the first quarter suffered its sharpest contraction since the Great Recession. This ended the longest expansion in the United States’ history as the economy reels from nationwide lockdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19, the respiratory illness caused by the virus. (Mutikani, 4/30)

The Wall Street Journal: States Struggle With Coronavirus Unemployment Claims Surge
Connecticut was more than halfway through a multiyear modernization of its unemployment insurance system in mid-March when the coronavirus pandemic triggered a surge in claims and the state website that accepts applications froze. Labor department personnel worked all night trying to figure out what had gone wrong and realized the website could only handle up to 8,300 applications in a single day, a fraction of what residents were now trying to submit. After fixing that problem, they tried to figure out what might break next, said Danté Bartolomeo, deputy commissioner of Connecticut’s labor department. (Chaney and King, 4/30)

The New York Times: States Made It Harder To Get Jobless Benefits. Now That’s Hard To Undo.
The state unemployment systems that were supposed to help millions of jobless workers were full of boxes to check and mandates to meet that couldn’t possibly apply in a pandemic. States required workers to document their job searches, weekly; to register with employment services, in person; to take a wait period before their first check, up to 10 days. Such requirements increased in the years following the Great Recession, as many states moved to tighten access to or reduce unemployment benefits. (Badger and Parlapiano, 4/30)

Politico: Unemployed Workers Face Choice Between Safety And Money As States Reopen
Americans may soon face a stark choice as more states begin to reopen their doors: Go back to work and risk catching the coronavirus, or stay home and lose unemployment aid. As governors allow more businesses and retail stores to come back online, employers will begin calling back workers who had been laid off or furloughed and were eligible for unemployment benefits. If they refuse the offer to return to work out of fear for their health amid the pandemic, federal guidelines dictate that they will lose the aid that many have only just started to receive. (Cassella and Ehley, 4/29)

The New York Times: US G.D.P. Declined In First Quarter, With Worse Economy To Come
The coronavirus pandemic officially snapped the United States’ economic growth streak in the first three months of the year. The question now is how deep the damage will get — and how long the country will take to recover. U.S. gross domestic product, the broadest measure of goods and services output, fell at a 4.8 percent annual rate in the first quarter of the year, the Commerce Department said Wednesday. That is the first decline since 2014, and the worst quarterly contraction since 2008, when the country was in a deep recession. (Casselman, 4/29)

Reuters: U.S. Economy Faces Hard Slog Back From Pandemic, Fed Chief Says
The head of the Federal Reserve on Wednesday dashed lingering hopes for a fast rebound from the coronavirus pandemic, saying the U.S. economy could feel the weight of consumer fear and social distancing for a year or more in a prolonged climb from a deepening hole. (Dunsmuir and Saphir, 4/29)

The New York Times: Fed Suggests Tough Road Ahead As It Pledges To Help Insulate Economy 
Jerome H. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, struck a worried tone at his first regularly scheduled news conference since the coronavirus shuttered the United States economy, calling the job losses taking hold “heartbreaking” and predicting a long road ahead. Mr. Powell, who had been presiding over the longest economic expansion on record, has watched as the strongest labor market in generations slipped away. More than 26 million workers have lost jobs as quarantines and lockdowns close businesses, sapping the fuel from a consumer-driven economy. (Smialek, 4/29)

The New York Times: Food Lines A Mile Long In America’s Second-Wealthiest State
Jean Wickham’s two sons are in college. Her husband has worked at the same New Jersey casino for 36 years. She recently felt secure enough to trade her full-time casino job for two part-time gigs that came with an expectation of bigger tips. Then the coronavirus shut down every casino in Atlantic City and instantly put more than 26,000 people out of work — 10 percent of the county’s population. “I’ve worked since I was 14 years old,” said Ms. Wickham, 55, a card dealer. “We’ve never had to rely on anyone else.” (Tully, 4/30)

NPR: Coronavirus Threat Poses Extra Problems For SNAP Recipients
Not long after the shelter-in-place order went into effect in California last month, Melissa Santos and her wife established new rules: they'd eat breakfast, try to get by with snacks, suppress hunger with coffee, and then have dinner. Santos is a student at the University of California, Berkeley. At 32, she's older than most of her undergraduate peers; she spent years taking care of a grandmother with Alzheimer's before considering her own education and career. (Gingold, 4/30)

ABC News: As Coronavirus Continues, So Does Food Insecurity 
More than 20 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits since the coronavirus outbreak began in the U.S. While unemployment has many side effects, one of the most common is food insecurity. Robert Lee, the CEO and co-founder of Rescuing Leftover Cuisine, told ABC's Michelle Franzen on the Perspective podcast that millions of Americans didn't know where their next meal was coming from even before COVID-19 hit the U.S. (Ali, 4/30)

The Wall Street Journal: Miscalculation At Every Level Left U.S. Unequipped To Fight Coronavirus
A new virus had rapidly spread across the globe and Tuomey Healthcare System in South Carolina couldn’t get more protective masks for its hospital workers. A global run on them had created a shortage. That was the 2009 “swine flu.” Tuomey later stockpiled protective gear, but over the years didn’t replenish some expired items. This year, it found that elastic bands on some of its masks were brittle. One snapped when an official tried it on. The swine flu, an outbreak of H1N1 flu, turned out to be a dry run for a major pandemic. But neither hospitals nor manufacturers nor the government made sweeping changes to be ready for one. (Berzon, Evans, Armour and Hufford, 4/29)

Reuters: U.S. Congressional Democrats Push For Coronavirus Medical Supply Czar
Congressional Democrats on Wednesday proposed a bill that would require a U.S. coronavirus supply czar to oversee critical medical supplies, while the top Senate Republican doubled down on demands for business protections. (Morgan, 4/29)

Politico: New Jersey Ships Ventilators Out Of State As Coronavirus Hospitalizations Fall
With reports of new coronavirus cases flattening and the number of hospitalizations falling, New Jersey is now shipping ventilators it received from the federal stockpile to hospitals in other states, Gov. Phil Murphy said during his daily briefing on Wednesday. New Jersey will send 50 ventilators to Massachusetts, which has started to see a spike in cases. Another 100 ventilators that were sent from California earlier this month have been cleaned and returned. (Sutton, 4/29)

ABC News: Some Hospitals Outside Of Hot Spots Prepared For Coronavirus War, Face Financial Wounds Instead 
When the first cases of coronavirus were announced in New Mexico on March 11, administrators at Santa Fe’s Christus St. Vincent Hospital felt prepared. As hot spots emerged from coast to coast, the 200-bed hospital -- the only full-service comprehensive care facility in the northern-central part of the state – readied staff, surged its intensive care unit, and canceled elective surgeries. The president of the hospital's clinician group, Dr. Lance Wilson, likened the process to preparing for a “mini-war.” (Rubin, Wagnon and Bruggeman, 4/30)

NBC News: Health Care Experts Say Coronavirus Exposes Major Flaws In Medical System
As the coronavirus pandemic continues its rampage across the United States, with more than a million confirmed cases and no end in sight, medical professionals and experts say the strain on the health care system has exposed major flaws and taught hard lessons. They said the pandemic has shown that we need to shift the way we think about health care as overwhelmed hospitals struggle to treat the surge in patients and lack enough personal protective equipment to keep workers safe. (Silva, 4/29)

Boston Globe: Police, Fire Departments Are The Latest To Voice Concern About State-Provided Masks 
When the Brockton Police Department received hundreds of protective respirator masks from the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency earlier this month, they came as a welcome gift to officers increasingly worried about exposure in the line of duty. The masks were soon distributed to each of the department’s 200 sworn personnel. More were packed into kits and placed inside cruisers. But on Friday, the department received notice from the agency that new tests showed the masks to be severely deficient, filtering just 28 percent of airborne particles — far below what is considered safe for front-line workers. The department immediately recalled the masks. (Arnett and McGrane, 4/29)

Kaiser Health News: Trump Says N95 Masks Can Be Sterilized For Reuse. Only In A Pinch, Experts Warn.
As COVID-19 cases continue to climb, front-line health care workers are decrying unsafe working conditions — in particular, describing inadequate access to personal protective equipment, or PPE. Many hospitals and state lawmakers blame Washington, saying the Trump administration has not done enough to make this critical protective gear available. But at a recent press conference, President Donald Trump suggested those claims are overblown, asserting instead that hospitals have the tools they need to sanitize and reuse protective facewear. (Luthra, 4/29)

The New York Times: How Coronavirus Mutates And Spreads
The coronavirus is an oily membrane packed with genetic instructions to make millions of copies of itself. The instructions are encoded in 30,000 “letters” of RNA — a, c, g and u — which the infected cell reads and translates into many kinds of virus proteins. (Corum and Zimmer, 4/30)

The Washington Post: Studies Leave Question Of ‘Airborne’ Coronavirus Transmission Unanswered
A growing number of studies, including one published this week in the journal Nature, have found evidence that the coronavirus can remain suspended in the air in aerosol particles. That raises anew the question of whether and to what extent the virus can be transmitted as an aerosol — although the evidence is far from conclusive and no such infections have been documented. (Achenbach and Johnson, 4/29)

CIDRAP: Studies Find Men More Prone To COVID-19 Death
Men are more than twice as likely to die of COVID-19 than women, regardless of age, according to a study today in Frontiers in Public Health. Also, older men with underlying diseases are more vulnerable than their female counterparts to COVID-19 infection and poor outcomes, a small retrospective study published yesterday in PLOS Pathogens has found. (Van Beusekom, 4/29)

ABC News: Some Children With COVID-19 Are Experiencing Symptoms Similar To Kawasaki Disease 
In less than 24 hours, Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C., has admitted several children with COVID-19 who are also experiencing a constellation of symptoms that resemble "Kawasaki disease," a rare inflammatory syndrome typically affecting children under the age of 5. A representative from Children's National Hospital said the children exhibited “Kawasaki-like characteristics," joining a growing number of hospitals in the U.S. and U.K. that have reported similar cases. (Kagan and Taghipour, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Doctors Investigate Link Between Rare Childhood Disease And Covid-19
Doctors in Italy and the U.K. have raised the alarm over a small but growing number of children displaying symptoms of a rare blood-vessel disease that may be linked to Covid-19. In both countries, doctors have alerted their colleagues to look out for symptoms associated with Kawasaki disease, an inflammatory condition that typically affects young children. Symptoms include stomach pain, skin rashes and a high fever. The disease is rarely life-threatening, but can cause lasting heart problems if untreated. (Stancati and Douglas, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Dogs Are Being Trained To Sniff Out Coronavirus Cases
As some states move to reopen after weeks of shutdowns, infectious disease experts say the prevention of future coronavirus outbreaks will require scaling up testing and identifying asymptomatic carriers. Eight Labrador retrievers — and their powerful noses — have been enlisted to help. The dogs are the first trainees in a University of Pennsylvania research project to determine whether canines can detect an odor associated with the virus that causes the disease covid-19. (Brulliard, 4/29)

WBUR: Doctors Link COVID-19 To Potentially Deadly Blood Clots And Strokes
Mocco and his colleagues thought it was time to sound the alarm. So they published a letter Tuesday in The New England Journal of Medicine describing five patients in their 30s and 40s who did not have the typical risk factors, but did have the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The letter was the latest evidence of a phenomenon doctors have been reporting since the early days of the pandemic in China. COVID-19 seems to produce blood clots — a lot of them. And this has been especially well documented in intensive care units. (Hamilton, 4/29)

Politico: Democrats Call For Masks To Be Required Aboard Planes
Democrats in Congress are increasingly pushing the Trump administration to require everyone on board an airplane to wear face masks, brushing aside the Federal Aviation Administration's assertion that it doesn't regulate public health. Flight attendant unions have been asking for such a requirement for weeks; airlines have been inching toward mask requirements in recent days, though mostly for flight crews. JetBlue became the first airline to say it would voluntarily require its passengers to cover their faces earlier this week. (Mintz, 4/29)

The Washington Post: Science Behind Sanitizing Airplane Cabin Air Has Advanced But Was Too Late For Coronavirus
On March 14, 1977, a woman with the flu climbed aboard a 737 and headed for Kodiak, Alaska, with 53 other passengers and crew. After an engine failed, most of them sat on the runway with the cabin doors shut, and the ventilation system off, for two hours. Within three days, 38 more people were sick. More than four decades after state and federal epidemiologists showed how easily viruses spread from person to person on airplanes, the novel coronavirus has decimated global aviation. Daily passenger screenings are down 95 percent, according to the Transportation Security Administration. (Laris, 4/29)

Politico: States Weigh Workers' Comp For Frontline Workers Against The Cost
State policymakers praising the heroic efforts of frontline workers are quietly making grim calculations about which professions should gain access to lost wages, hospital bills or even burial costs — changes estimated to top $11 billion in California alone. At least five smaller states have made it easier for high-risk workers such as doctors, nurses and firefighters to claim workers' compensation benefits. But broad proposals have run into fierce headwinds in populous, high-cost states like Illinois, California and New York, where businesses and public employers alike warn such changes could thrust them into bankruptcy or force them to slash public services when they're already teetering financially. (Murphy and Landergan, 4/29)

The New York Times: Inside A NYC Hospital Coronavirus Unit During The Pandemic
There is little respite for the nurses working with coronavirus patients at N.Y.U. Langone Health. Inside the recently opened Kimmel Pavilion in Manhattan, hundreds of patients rest in rooms designed to minimize infection. When the nurses do take a break, a soundtrack of wailing sirens reminds them what lies ahead on their return. On March 10, N.Y.U.’s medical center had just two coronavirus patients. (Gonzalez and Nasseri, 4/29)

Reuters: RVs Become Temporary Homes For Doctors Caring For COVID-19 Patients
Doctors caring for COVID-19 patients at hospitals across the United States have taken up temporary residence in donated recreational vehicles, parked outside their homes, as a way to keep them near to their families yet isolated. (4/29)

Modern Healthcare: Would 'COVID-19 Immunity Cards' Cause Greater Harm Or Benefit?
As the World Health Organization recently warned, there is still no empirical evidence that once a person contracts COVID-19, he or she is then actually immune and can walk around without fear of getting the virus again. However, all other respiratory viruses, including other coronaviruses, produce at least short-term immunity, making it likely that SARS-CoV-2 (which causes COVID-19) works the same way. This immunity mechanism is also how vaccines for all other viruses work. As such, no evidence of immunity is not the same as there being evidence of no immunity. But COVID-19 may be different. (Ira Bedzow and Daniel Grove, 4/29)

Boston Globe: In Chelsea, The Deadly Consequences Of Dirty Air
It’s home to massive fuel tanks and mountains of road salt; to airport parking lots, industrial facilities, and a busy produce center that sends heavy traffic hurtling along its streets; planes fly low on their way in and out of Logan, and ships slide by on the Chelsea Creek; the city is cut in half by the car-choked Tobin Bridge; it has too much contaminated land and too little green space. All of that piles upon the socioeconomic factors that compromise the health of residents in places like Chelsea, predisposing them to higher rates of cardio-vascular disease and respiratory ailments. (Abraham, 4/29)

Stateline: Rural, Intercity Bus Companies Hit Hard By Pandemic 
Intercity bus company services are considered essential — part of the infrastructure that moves people across the country. Often, they operate in areas where there may be no alternative transportation. But Pantuso said the industry has been forgotten by Congress, which did little to help when it passed its $2 trillion CARES Act, the coronavirus relief bill that President Donald Trump signed into law in late March. (Bergal, 4/30)

ABC News: States' Missing COVID-19 Racial And Ethnic Data Creates Incomplete View Of Virus' Impact 
A hard look at COVID-19 racial data by the nation’s top public health experts and epidemiologists revealed a harrowing truth: the virus was devastating African-American communities. More than a month into the battle against the novel coronavirus, some states have yet to release racial and ethnic demographic data critical to understanding how COVID-19 is impacting communities of color as the Trump administration races to speed up testing in minority communities. (Vann and Kim, 4/30)

WBUR: Don't Skip Your Child's Well Check: Delays In Vaccines Could Add Up To Big Problems 
Pediatricians across the U.S. are seeing a steep drop in the number of children coming in for appointments right now — only about 20% to 30% of the volume they would normally see this time of year, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. Though telemedicine can make up part of the difference, doctors say the size of the drop-off in some routine well checks is a big problem — for those children and for the nation — though parents are understandably concerned about exposing their kids to the coronavirus. (Pao, 4/29)

ABC News: The Impact Of COVID-19 On Infant And Child Health Care, Beyond Missed Vaccinations 
Families are keeping children safe at home by heeding warnings to stay inside during the COVID-19 pandemic. But in spite of parents' best intentions, strict adherence to home quarantine has created a new problem that puts kids at risk: missed doctor's visits. (Nunneley, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Coronavirus Tracking Apps Raise Questions About Bluetooth Security
Governments and companies are planning to introduce mobile applications that use Bluetooth to track coronavirus infections. Researchers say the technology keeps users’ identifying data private, but the complexity of working with Bluetooth raises cybersecurity concerns. Bluetooth, a widely used technology for connecting devices, has emerged as the technology of choice for tracking the spread of the coronavirus, as the U.S. and European countries decide how to safely reopen businesses in the coming weeks and months. (Stupp, 4/30)

Modern Healthcare: OIG: VA's March EHR Go-Live Was 'Likely Unrealistic'
After a review of the aging physical and information-technology infrastructure at Mann-Grandstaff VA Medical Center, the OIG determined that the "VA committed to an aggressive, but likely unrealistic, deployment date of March 2020 without having the necessary information on the state of the medical center's infrastructure," according to the report. That's on top of challenges posed by anticipated EHR capabilities—such as online prescription refill— not being ready by the March go-live date, according to a separate report the OIG released this week. (Cohen, 4/29)

Kaiser Health News: As Coronavirus Strikes, Crucial Data In Electronic Health Records Hard To Harvest
When President Donald Trump started touting hydroxychloroquine as “one of the biggest game changers” for treating COVID-19, researchers hoped electronic health records could quickly tell them if he was on the right track. Yet pooling data from the digital records systems in thousands of hospitals has proved a technical nightmare thus far. That’s largely because software built by rival technology firms often cannot retrieve and share information to help doctors judge which coronavirus treatments are helping patients recover. (Schulte, 4/30)

Modern Healthcare: Teladoc's Quarterly Revenue Climbs 41% On The Back Of 2 Million Telehealth Visits
Teladoc Health reported $180.8 million in revenue for this year's first quarter, up 41% from $128.6 million posted in the year-ago quarter. That meant Teladoc beat its own revenue guidance for the quarter by multiple millions of dollars, as telemedicine use has soared in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak. In February, the Purchase, N.Y.-based telemedicine provider had said it expected its revenue for the quarter to be in the range of $169 million to $172 million. (Cohen, 4/29)

The Associated Press: As Economies Stagger, Pressures Grow To Ease Virus Lockdowns
The world’s economic pain was on full display Thursday as Europe and the United States were releasing more evidence of the devastation wrought on jobs and economies by coronavirus lockdown measures. In Europe, where over 132,000 people with the virus have died so far, fears about new infection spikes were tempering hopes that economies now on government-funded life support will regain their vigor as workers return to factories, shops and offices. (Leicester and McHugh, 4/30)

The Associated Press: As Virus Cases Surge, Brazil Starts To Worry Its Neighbors
Brazil’s virtually uncontrolled surge of COVID-19 cases is spawning fear that construction workers, truck drivers and tourists from Latin America’s biggest nation will spread the disease to neighboring countries that are doing a better job of controlling the coronavirus. Brazil, a continent-sized country that shares borders with nearly every other nation in South America, has reported more than 70,000 cases and more than 5,000 deaths, according to government figures and a tally by Johns Hopkins University — far more than any of its neighbors. The true number of deaths and infections is believed to be much higher because of limited testing. (Calatrava and Weissenstein, 4/30)

The Washington Post: Many Lebanese Surprised By Coronavirus Outbreak In Secluded And Stunningly Beautiful Town 
When Lebanon reported its first coronavirus infection in February, the case was a woman who had come from the Muslim holy city of Qom in Iran, which was rapidly becoming the epicenter of the epidemic in the Middle East. Iran has long been a factor in Lebanon’s highly sectarian politics, and many Lebanese were quick to cast blame on Iran and local Shiite Muslims for Lebanon’s widening outbreak. Avoid Shiite villages and areas, some urged. (Dadouch, 4/27)

CIDRAP: WHO Reconvenes COVID-19 Panel; Africa's Outbreaks Intensify
The World Health Organization (WHO) director-general said today that the COVID-19 emergency committee will meet tomorrow to review pandemic developments, as cases surge in some African nations and as many past-peak countries take tentative steps to relax their distancing measures. The global total today rose to 3,179,494 cases reported form 185 countries, and at least 226,173 people have died from their infections, according to the Johns Hopkins online dashboard. (Schnirring, 4/29)

The Washington Post: China Set To Hold Big Congress Meetings In Sign Of Victory Over Coronavirus
China signaled its confidence that its novel coronavirus epidemic has finally been brought under control, scheduling for next month its highest-profile annual legislative meetings, which had been postponed at the height of the outbreak. Known as the “Two Sessions,” the meetings are always a piece of important political theater for China’s ruling Communist Party, a venue for the leaders to trumpet their achievements of the past year and lay out their plans and targets for the year ahead. (Fifield, 4/29)

Politico: Conservative Americans See Coronavirus Hope In Progressive Sweden
Conservatives have developed a fascination with Sweden’s hands-off approach to the coronavirus — an unexpected twist for a country that once served as a Republican punchline for Bernie Sanders jokes. On the surface, Sweden’s approach to containing the coronavirus pandemic is a libertarian dream: Restaurants remain open, as long as they adhere to social-distancing rules. Schools are in session. Salons are in business. And by some metrics, Sweden has fared roughly as well as many of its European neighbors, all of which have instituted much stricter lockdown measures. (Nguyen, 4/30)

Politico: Swedish Leader Defends Coronavirus Approach, Shrugs Off Far-Right Embrace
Sweden’s foreign minister says there’s been a “misunderstanding” in the United States about her country’s Covid-19 policies — which have been distinctly more liberal than the strict lockdowns instituted across much of the rest of Europe and North America. Ann Linde told POLITICO that Sweden is not a libertarian nirvana: the government has moved to limit online gambling in recent days, is closing restaurants that break social distancing rules, and has forbidden family visits to nursing homes. (Heath, 4/29)

Meanwhile —

The Wall Street Journal: U.S. Borders To Remain Shut To Foreign Travelers As States Reopen
The Trump administration has no immediate plans to reopen the country’s borders after imposing a ban on foreign travelers from the European Union and the U.K. last month to slow the spread of the coronavirus, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said. Mr. Pompeo told reporters Wednesday that the State Department was working with countries on plans to resume international travel, but declined to say whether borders would reopen before the summer. (Donati, 4/29)

ABC News: Upward Mobility May Be Good For Your Mental Health, But Bad For Your Heart Health 
Decades of research have informed us that higher socioeconomic status (SES) often equates to better overall health. But what about people who were not born with high socioeconomic status, but earn it later in life? According to a new study, even people who eventually land at the top of the socioeconomic ladder may not reap the same health benefits as those who were born there. (Anoruo, 4/28)

The Washington Post: Aspirin May Reduce Risk Of Certain Cancers
Besides relieving headaches, fever, pain and swelling, aspirin also may help ward off various cancers of the digestive tract, lowering your risk by 22 to 38 percent, according to new research published in Annals of Oncology. (Searing, 4/27)

CIDRAP: H7N3 Avian Flu In US Turkey Outbreaks Related To Wild Bird Strains
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) last week shared new details about its investigation into H7N3 avian flu outbreaks at turkey farms in North Carolina and South Carolina, one of them involving a highly pathogenic version of the virus. The outbreaks initially involved low-pathogenic H7N3, occurring earlier this spring at a few commercial turkey farms in both of the states. One of the later events at a South Carolina farm, however, involved highly pathogenic H7N3. (4/27)

The New York Times: Behind The Wheel, Women Are Safer Drivers Than Men
Women tend to be better drivers than men — much better, judging by the number of deaths they cause on the road. British researchers used a government database of 14,425 road fatalities from 2005 to 2015 that involved more than one vehicle. Without assigning blame for the accidents, they calculated the number of other people’s deaths associated with drivers of cars, vans, trucks, motorcycles, buses and bicycles. (Bakalar, 4/27)

The Star Tribune: Pence Should Have Worn A Mask During Visit, And Mayo Should Have Insisted 
Mayo Clinic is one of the world’s most-respected medical institutions, and generations of its leaders have fiercely protected and furthered that reputation. That’s why it’s so hard to understand how a self-inflicted public relations blunder occurred Tuesday with the apparent consent of its current president and CEO, Dr. Gianrico Farrugia. Vice President Mike Pence’s visit to the Rochester, Minn., medical center to laud its COVID-19 response garnered national coverage. What should have been a slam-dunk to polish Mayo’s trusted name instead raised unnecessary questions about its institutional values. (4/29)

The Washington Post: Mike Pence Didn’t Wear A Mask … To Keep His Eyes Uncovered? 
“And since I don’t have the coronavirus, I thought it’d be a good opportunity for me to be here, to be able to speak to these researchers, these incredible health-care personnel, and look them in the eye and say, ‘Thank you.’” — Vice President Pence, explaining his decision not to wear a mask at the Mayo Clinic, in defiance of its policy that all visitors wear masks. Well, it is worse than I thought. Mike Pence, who is heading up our coronavirus task force, does not know where the eyes are located on the face. (Alexandra Petri, 4/29)

USA Today: Coronavirus Leadership Test: Mike Pence Skips Mask, Fails As Role Model
Here’s the thing, Mr. Vice President: Real men wear masks. Not just those unmartial milksops like French Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron, who believes in diplomacy, plays classical piano and can recite an alarming quantity of Molière from memory. Or like Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, who after all lives in California, which is kind of the France of the United States. No, amid this coronavirus pandemic, some of the world’s most dedicated and dictatorial thugs have been seen in protective gear, including even the famously bare-chested Vladimir Putin. (Melinda Henneberger, 4/29)

CNN: Pence Unmasked Shows His Obedience To Trump 
Who was that unmasked man hovering dangerously close to everyone at the Mayo Clinic? It was Vice President Mike Pence, doing his best imitation of President Donald Trump's super-troll leadership style. More importantly, he was publicly demonstrating that whatever personal strength he possessed when he agreed in 2016 to be Trump's understudy has now pathetically withered. (Michael D'Antonio, 4/29)

JAMA: Moving Personal Protective Equipment Into The Community: Face Shields And Containment Of COVID-19 
The COVID-19 pandemic arrived swiftly and found many countries unprepared. Even highly prepared countries are now facing second-wave outbreaks that have forced implementation of extreme social distancing measures. To minimize the medical and economic consequences, it is important to rapidly assess and adopt a containment intervention bundle that drives transmissibility to manageable levels. Face shields, which can be quickly and affordably produced and distributed, should be included as part of strategies to safely and significantly reduce transmission in the community setting. Now is the time for adoption of this practical intervention. (Eli N. Perencevich, Daniel J. Diekema, and Michael B. Edmond, 4/29)

WBUR: Applauding Nurses From The Windows, Exploiting Them On The Job 
By botching the federal response and playing the crisis for political advantage, the Trump administration is not just failing to contain the virus — it is failing American care-workers. The administration and profit-driven hospitals are taking advantage of nurses’ ethic of care, rooted in women's historical obligation to meet the needs of the ill and vulnerable. (Nell Lake, 4/30)

Stat: Are Infertility Treatments 'Essential' During The Covid-19 Pandemic?
As the Covid-19 epidemic began to put an unprecedented strain on the U.S. health care system, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services along with many state agencies issued directives that non-essential care be discontinued. The goal was to redeploy resources that were being used for them to fight the spreading coronavirus. (Shailin A. Thomas and Arthur Caplan, 4/30)

Houston Chronicle: Let Patients Continue To See Doctor At Home Using Technology After Pandemic 
Paradoxically, in forcing some patients to stay home, the pandemic is spurring a digital revolution as health care providers rapidly scaleup remote-access options for patients.A trip to the doctor is never just a trip to the doctor. Time off from work can add financial strain, missing school can affect academic performance for children, and the time and cost of commuting limits when and how families can even reach a doctor. The COVID-19 pandemic has made matters worse. (Timothy Singer and Zachary Tabb, 4/30)

Stat: Big Pharma Could Boost Its Reputation With Its Covid-19 Response 
President Trump, a known critic of Big Pharma, summoned 10 executives from various pharmaceutical companies to the White House in early March to discuss the coronavirus pandemic. He wanted the industry’s help in creating a vaccine to prevent the disease and therapies to fight it at a time when neither existed. Trump’s behavior mimics that of most Americans. In times of medical crisis, we turn to those who can design, develop, and manufacture new medicines and ask, “What can Big Pharma discover to help save lives?” (John Lamattina, 4/30)

The New York Times: How Long Will A Vaccine Really Take?
A vaccine would be the ultimate weapon against the coronavirus and the best route back to normal life. Officials like Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the top infectious disease expert on the Trump administration’s coronavirus task force, estimate a vaccine could arrive in at least 12 to 18 months. The grim truth behind this rosy forecast is that a vaccine probably won’t arrive any time soon. Clinical trials almost never succeed. We’ve never released a coronavirus vaccine for humans before. Our record for developing an entirely new vaccine is at least four years — more time than the public or the economy can tolerate social-distancing orders. (Stuart A. Thompson, 4/30)

The Wall Street Journal: That Trump Lysol Moment
The 2020 election may have been decided the moment the makers of Lysol felt obliged to issue a statement disavowing an incumbent president who offhandedly said something about using disinfectant internally to kill coronavirus. That will be one for the history books. Setting aside the political damage, what’s unfortunate is that President Trump throughout has been trying valiantly if often clumsily, as the saying goes, to “do something, anything” in the battle with coronavirus. But of course even amid a nationwide catastrophe we have to endure the repellent, unending war between the media and its Trump white whale. (Daniel Henninger, 4/29)

Los Angeles Times: Seven Ways The AIDS Epidemic Prepared Me For COVID-19 
This thing is not over. COVID-19 hospitalizations, deaths and surges will continue. It will be months to years before a vaccine or herd immunity makes us free to jostle in line at a restaurant or sit shoulder-to-shoulder at a funeral, concert hall, bar, synagogue, sports arena or AA meeting. Given we’re in for the long haul, I found myself remembering how gay people responded to the AIDS crisis of the 1980s and 1990s. I was a reporter in San Francisco then, and lessons I learned apply today. (Katy Butler, 4/30)

Politico: Admit It: You Are Willing To Let People Die To End The Shutdown
CNN’s Jake Tapper was brutally direct in his question to Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, who recently lifted his state’s stay-at-home order, in favor of a gradual reopening of business. Are you worried, Tapper asked, that a premature move could “cost your constituents their lives?” Polis was blandly indirect in his answer. While he might wish to have “next week’s information and next month’s information available to me today,” the Democratic governor said, “that’s not the world we live in.” During a pandemic that likely will continue for months, he’s looking for a path forward in “an ongoing sustainable way,” one that takes into account citizens’ interests “psychologically, economically, and from a health perspective.” (John F. Harris, 4/30)

The Washington Post: Soon All Of Us Will Be In The Same Position As Georgia 
Georgia recently began the slow process of reopening its economy, permitting people to dine in restaurants, get a haircut, go to the gym or, bizarrely, get a tattoo. Other states are set to join them. Texas, for example, is also beginning the slow process of coming out of economic deep freeze on Friday, May 1. Many infectious disease experts are aghast, while a few are supporting the move. Covid-19, a disease unknown a mere six months ago, has taken the lives of almost 60,000 people in the United States and sickened at least a million more. Yet it seems increasingly certain many of us will be in the same position as the residents of Georgia within the next few weeks or months. (Helaine Olen, 4/29)

Los Angeles Times: McConnell Promotes Coronavirus Business Liability Protection
It may not be an official recession yet — technically, the economy has to contract for two consecutive quarters to qualify for that designation. But we’re undoubtedly in the early stages of one, as the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis signaled Wednesday when it estimated that GDP fell sharply in the first quarter of 2020. It was the biggest quarterly decrease since the crippling 2008-09 recession, and yet it pales in comparison with the epic 37% decrease that IHS Markit projects for the quarter we’re now slogging through. Maybe that helps explain why so many states are starting to lift their coronavirus stay-at-home orders even though they don’t have the capacity to test workers for the virus or trace contacts on a mass scale. (John Healey, 4/29)

The Washington Post: The Class War Against Front-Line Workers
We talk incessantly about our appreciation for front-line workers in retail, delivery, food-processing and other sectors who allow the rest of us to live our socially distanced lives. Then we slap them in the face.Item One: President Trump, who has largely declined to use his power under the Defense Production Act for needed medical and protective equipment, used that same power on Tuesday night to force meat processors to remain open. (E.J. Dionne, 4/29)

The Hill: We Don't Know How Best To Reopen The Country, But We Have A Playbook 
The primary strategy to stem the tide of the COVID-19 pandemic across the country has been the implementation of strict social distancing measures to avoid overwhelming hospitals and causing unimaginable mortality. Now, as data is accumulating that social distancing is reducing new cases, attention is turning to reopen the economy while minimizing the chances of reigniting uncontrolled viral spread. (Richard Sherwood and Mandana Arbab, 4/29)

Bloomberg: What Covid-19's Second Wave Could Look Like
The world is beginning to loosen restrictions that have been put in place to limit the spread of Covid-19. Leaders of countries, states and cities are finding they have little choice but to return to economic activity well before an effective vaccine or treatment for the disease is available. This means secondary outbreaks are a near certainty. What’s uncertain is how devastating future surges of infection will be. If they’re sporadic and kept under control, death rates will stay low, and life may inch back toward normalcy. If they’re large, countries and regions may need to dive back into shutdown mode, extending the pandemic’s economic damage. (Max Nisen, 4/29)

The Hill: Until There's A Cure Social Distancing Will Have To Continue
We have done what was necessary. We stayed at home as much as possible. We have kept a distance from people outside of our household. All to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic. (Benjamin Van Rooij, 4/29)

New England Journal of Medicine: Loosening Covid-19 Restrictions
The rapid spread of SARS-CoV-2, a novel coronavirus that emerged in late 2019, and the resulting Covid-19 disease has been labeled a Public Health Emergency of International Concern by the World Health Organization. What physicians need to know about transmission, diagnosis, and treatment is the subject of ongoing updates from infectious disease experts at the Journal. In this audio interview conducted on April 29, 2020, the editors discuss strategies to limit transmission of SARS-CoV-2 as restrictions are loosened and economies restart around the world. (Eric J. Rubin, Lindsey R. Baden and Stephen Morrissey, 4/30)

The Hill: Collecting And Reporting Ethnicity Stats On COVID-19 Matters For The Health Of Everyone 
The Equitable Data Collection and Disclosure on COVID-19 Act, which requires the federal government to include race and ethnicity among demographic data collected and released about COVID-19 is not partisan. It is not biased. And it is not relevant only to the slice of American citizenry with brown and black skin who are dying disproportionately in this country from the virus. It matters to the health and welfare of everyone. (Dr. James E.K. Hildreth, 4/29)

Boston Globe: Impossible Coronavirus Decisions And The Price Tag On Human Life 
We are now beginning to face another urgent question: When does increasing the risk of preventable death become “worth it” to save the economy? Regulatory agencies regularly perform this kind of cost-benefit analysis, such as when deciding acceptable levels of arsenic in the water or safety requirements in our cars. But the COVID-19 pandemic is fraught with uncertainties and far-reaching implications — significantly greater in complexity and potential impact than the typical situations faced by regulatory agencies. (Howard Friedman, 4/29)

The Wall Street Journal: Trump Can’t Postpone The Election 
‘'Mark my words, I think he is going to try to kick back the election somehow,” Joe Biden recently said of President Trump during an online fundraiser. To “try” is one thing. But there are constitutional and legal reasons why a president can’t delay a federal election or extend his term of office, which should dispel any worries. Start with the text of the Constitution. The 20th Amendment is exceedingly clear: “The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January.” There’s no clause that allows presidents to remain in office beyond Jan. 20 or to invoke some emergency power to extend a term of office. (Derek T. Muller, 4/29)

NBC News: Trump Forcing West Point Graduates To Risk Coronavirus For His Ego Disrespects Their Work
President Donald Trump announced two weeks ago that the annual commencement ceremonies at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point would proceed as normal and that he would speak in-person to this year’s 1,000 graduating class — much to the surprise of academy officials, who had been carefully planning how to restructure the milestone for cadets without putting anyone at risk for COVID-19. So now, instead of delaying the iconic ceremony or conducting it virtually, the commander in chief is putting 1,000 cadets, an untold number of military personnel and civilians, and perhaps the cadets’ families at risk in order to give a speech. (Charlotte Clymer, 4/29)