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      Covid could shorten US life expectancy by up to three years, experts say

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      The US could see a decline of two to three years in life expectancy in 2020 due to the coronavirus, the steepest drop since the second world war and with Covid-19 poised to become the third-leading cause of death in America, the Wall Street Journal reported.
      In 2019, life expectancy hit 78.8 years, up 0.1 from 2018, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said. The increase stemmed from decreased death rates in heart disease and cancer, the leading and second-leading causes of death in the US. Drug overdose deaths increased after dropping in 2018 but suicides declined for the first time in 14 years.
      According to data from Johns Hopkins University, 190,519 new cases in the US on Monday saw the Covid-19 caseload pass 18m. By Tuesday morning, there had been 319,466 deaths, 1,696 of them on the day before.
      For comparison, in 2019 around 659,000 people died of heart disease in America, and around 600,000 from cancer. The third-leading cause of death, accidents, killed around 173,000.
      Vaccines are coming on stream, with public figures having shots to encourage widespread take-up, President-elect Joe Biden among them on Monday. Dr Anthony Fauci, the top public health expert, was among those vaccinated on Tuesday.
      Amid concern over the new virus variation detected in the UK, US officials sought to assuage fears, saying it should be monitored but its discovery should not be cause for despair.
      Health secretary Alex Azar, who was also vaccinated, told Fox News both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines should be effective at preventing illness from the recently discovered variant.
      BioNTech chief executive Ugur Sahin told reporters: “Scientifically it is highly likely that the immune response by this vaccine can also deal with this virus variant.”
      Fauci told ABC surveillance was necessary to monitor spread of the British variant, but that officials should not overreact.
      “Travel bans are really rather draconian things to do,” he said.
      In other news on Tuesday, Dr Deborah Birx, a senior Trump adviser who has seen her reputation battered by the White House task force’s failure to combat the pandemic, said she would retire.
      The former US army medic told the Newsy website she wanted to help the incoming Biden administration “in any role that people think I can be helpful in, and then I will retire”.
      Elsewhere, Mike Pence addressed a rightwing conference in Florida at which social distancing and mask-wearing were not in evidence while in Washington, Trump chose to boast about vaccine distribution, which he said was “going very smoothly”.
      Despite reported glitches for which the general in charge of the operation apologised, more than 600,000 Americans, mostly healthcare workers, had received their first vaccine doses by Monday, according to the CDC. Some states began vaccinating long-term care facility residents on Monday.
      Nonetheless, some models predict a death toll of more than 500,000 by the spring, and more than 5,000 deaths a day.
      Robert Anderson, who leads the CDC National Center for Health Statistics mortality-statistics section, told the Journal he used data through August to determine that life expectancy had dropped by approximately 1.5 years.
      “We’ve had a lot of deaths added since August, so I think a drop of two to three years for 2020 isn’t out of the question,” he said.
      Anderson explained that this would be the greatest decrease since 1943, when fatalities in the second world war led to a 2.9 year decline in life expectancy.
      Twenty-five years before that, the Spanish flu resulted in an 11.8-year decline in life expectancy, Anderson said. That sweeping figure stemmed from the fact that virus was especially deadly for children, whose deaths led to a disproportionate decline in life expectancy.
      One demographer, Kenneth M Johnson of the University of New Hampshire, reportedly said the pandemic will cause deaths to outpace births in more than 50% of US counties this year – the first time in US history. Such a reversal would come after the US saw its lowest recorded general fertility rate in 2019.
      “We’ve got people dying and hospital rooms jammed,” Johnson said. “Who’s going to want to have a baby?” More

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      'Congress is not going to be the Grinch': Covid relief bill set to pass on Sunday

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      “Congress is not going to be the Grinch,” a senior Democratic senator said on Sunday, as lawmakers stood poised to vote on a $900bn coronavirus aid package made possible by a late-night compromise on one of the final hurdles, a dispute over Federal Reserve pandemic lending authorities.The package will be tied to a funding bill to avert a government shutdown.Speaking to reporters the day after reaching the compromise with Senate Republicans, Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said: “Barring a major mishap, the Senate and House will be able to vote on final legislation as early as tonight.”Republican senator Mitt Romney told CNN’s State of the Union: “I believe there is going to be a deal. There are always sticking points, but the big one was resolved last night … They’re working out some additional points but I think it’s going to get done. It’ll get done before Christmas.”Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, referred to a popular Dr Seuss character who “stole” Christmas when he told ABC’s This Week: “The great news is, Congress is not going to be the Grinch. We’re going to get this package done.”The coronavirus aid deal includes $600 direct payments to individuals and a $300 per week unemployment compensation supplement. The second-largest economic stimulus in US history, following the $2.3tn Cares Act passed in March, it will be tied to a $1.4tn spending bill that funds government programs through September 2021.The House was due to meet at noon on Sunday in order to take up the bill.“I do have optimism that it’ll pass,” House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy told Fox Business. “I am very hopeful that we get this done today.”Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the chamber’s top Democrat, told reporters she wanted to give members some time to review the package before calling a vote.“I think we’re close, we’re very close,” Pelosi said. “But we want to have members have enough time to review it all.”Donald Trump, whose administration has largely left negotiations to congressional leaders, used Twitter to complain.“Why isn’t Congress giving our people a Stimulus Bill? [The pandemic] wasn’t their fault, it was the fault of China,” Trump wrote. “GET IT DONE, and give them more money in direct payments.”Senator Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, had insisted on language that would guarantee that the Fed could not revive emergency lending programs for small businesses and state and local governments after 31 December, when they expire under Cares Act relief legislation passed in March.Republicans said the programs represented unnecessary government interference and politicized the Fed. They accused Democrats of seeking to extend them as a way to provide unchecked funds for state and local governments controlled by their party. Democrats accused the Republicans of trying to limit President-elect Joe Biden’s options for boosting the economy after he takes office on 20 January.Toomey spokesman Steve Kelly said the senator’s agreement with Schumer “rescinds more than $429bn in unused Cares Act funds; definitively ends the Cares Act lending facilities by 31 December 2020; stops these facilities from being restarted; and forbids them from being duplicated without congressional approval.”A senior Democratic aide said Toomey had agreed to “drop the broad language in his proposal that would have prevented the Fed chair from establishing similar facilities in the future”.The Senate adjourned a rare Saturday session with a call from Republican leader Mitch McConnell to avoid last-minute disagreements.On Sunday, San Francisco Federal Reserve president Mary Daly told CBS’ Face the Nation the package would provide much-needed relief for the economy.“This support is unequivocally beneficial,” Daly said.In the 11 months since the first coronavirus cases were documented in the US, Covid-19 has killed around 316,000, by far the most in the world, and put millions out of work. Economists say growth will likely remain sluggish until vaccines are widely available in mid- or late 2021.On Sunday, Warner told ABC: “I was with Senator Schumer last night in his office until about 11pm. I was glad to see that Senator Toomey accepted Senator Schumer’s offer on a compromise … We did not think tying the hands of a future Fed or treasury made any sense.“…I’m very proud that in many ways this package only came about because a bipartisan group of senators spent a month working hard, showing the American people that we can actually do things when we have such an amazing need.“So folks who are going to run out of unemployment the day after Christmas, or potentially get kicked out of their apartment, or those long lines at the food banks: help is on the way.” More

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      Second federal prisoner scheduled to die in weeks has Covid, lawyers say

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      A second federal prisoner scheduled to be put to death next month, as the Trump administration rushes to execute more people before Joe Biden takes power, has tested positive for Covid-19, his lawyers said on Friday.Cory Johnson’s diagnosis came a day after attorneys for Dustin John Higgs confirmed he had tested positive at a US prison in Terre Haute, Indiana, where both men are on death row.Johnson, Higgs and a third inmate, Lisa Montgomery, are scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection at the federal complex just days before Biden takes office.The Trump administration resumed federal executions after a 17-year pause in July and has carried out 10 death sentences since then, including two last week. It has executed more people in a single year than any other administration in more than 130 years and this year has killed more inmates than all the states put together.Johnson’s lawyers, Donald Salzman and Ronald Tabak, called on federal authorities to strike their client’s current execution date of 14 January – six days before inauguration day. Higgs is scheduled to die a day later.Montgomery’s execution date is 12 January, but because she is the only woman on federal death row she is held at a separate prison in Texas and would need to be brought to Indiana to be executed. She would be the first woman killed by the US government in 67 years.Johnson’s attorneys said his infection would make it difficult to interact with him in the critical days leading up to his scheduled execution, adding: “The widespread outbreak on the federal death row only confirms the reckless disregard for the lives and safety of staff, prisoners, and attorneys alike.”“If the government will not withdraw the execution date, we will ask the courts to intervene,” they said.The US Department of Justice and Bureau of Prisons did not respond to requests for comment.Prosecutors alleged Johnson was a crack cocaine dealer who killed seven people in 1992 in an attempt to expand the territory of a Richmond, Virginia, gang and silence informants. His legal team has argued that he is intellectually disabled, with a far below average IQ, and therefore ineligible for the death penalty.Higgs was convicted of ordering the 1996 murders of three women in Maryland. Montgomery was convicted of using a rope to strangle a pregnant woman in 2004 and then using a kitchen knife to cut the baby girl from the womb, authorities said.The Bureau of Prisons confirmed in a statement on Thursday that inmates on federal death row have tested positive for Covid-19. As of Thursday, there were more than 300 inmates with confirmed cases at FCC Terre Haute. The Bureau of Prisons said “many of these inmates are asymptomatic or exhibiting mild symptoms”.Nationwide, one in every five state and federal prisoners has tested positive for the coronavirus, a rate more than four times as high as the general population, according to data collected by the Associated Press and the Marshall Project. More

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      Mike Pence receives Covid-19 vaccine on live TV: 'I didn't feel a thing'

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      Mike Pence received the Covid-19 vaccination on live television on Friday morning, saying it was a “medical miracle” and reassuring Americans facing a surging rise of cases around the country “that hope is on the way”.The televised event came amid concerns that the rollout of the vaccine in the US could be hampered by doubts from people over its quick authorization, the anti-vaxxer movement, and skepticism from some in the Black community because of historic distrust of institutions.“Confidence in the vaccine is what brings us here this morning,” the vice-president said. “I didn’t feel a thing. Well done.”His wife, Karen Pence, and the US surgeon general, Jerome Adams, also received shots during the televised White House event. It was also attended by Robert Redfield, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Protection, and Dr Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, who praised Pence and said it was “now up to all of us to step forward and get vaccinated”.In recent days, Fauci has been advocating that Pence, as well as Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, get the vaccination as soon as possible “for security reasons”. Biden officials have said the president-elect will receive the vaccine in public in Delaware on Monday to send a “clear message it is safe”.A few hours after Pence was vaccinated, House speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted photos of her vaccination.Today, with confidence in science & at the direction of the Office of the Attending Physician, I received the COVID-19 vaccine. As the vaccine is being distributed, we must all continue mask wearing, social distancing & other science-based steps to save lives & crush the virus. pic.twitter.com/tijVCSnJd7— Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) December 18, 2020
      Pence is the first member of the White House to be publicly vaccinated. Trump was infected with Covid-19 in October and multiple outbreaks of the virus have occurred among staffers.After initial reports that White House officials would be receiving the first doses of the vaccine, Trump tweeted last week that he halted the Oval Office’s rollout. “I am not scheduled to take the vaccine, but look forward to doing so at the appropriate time,” he said.On Friday, Pence alluded to the imminent approval of a second vaccine developed by drug company Moderna, saying “we have one and perhaps, within hours, two vaccines.”A panel of outside advisers with the Food and Drug Administration, which is in charge of approving vaccinations, held a meeting yesterday to discuss Moderna’s vaccine. Following the meeting, the FDA could make an approval as early as Friday afternoon that would allow the vaccine’s distribution for emergency use.The US federal government has said it has six million doses of the Moderna vaccine ready for distribution upon its approval. Nearly three million doses of a vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech were distributed throughout the country this week after it was approved late last Friday.While the White House has tried to soften the appearance of the virus’ spread in the country, Pence acknowledged that “with cases rising across the country, hospitalizations rising across the country, we have a ways to go”. On Thursday, the US had 233,271 new cases of the virus and 3,270 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.Nearly 310,000 Americans have died from Covid-19 infection.States around the country have seen increases in infections after the Thanksgiving holiday at the end of November. Public health experts have pleaded with American to stay home as Christmas and New Year approaches, and millions of Americans are expected to travel to see family. The American Automobile Association estimates that 85 million people will be traveling, most by car, between 23 December and 3 January.An influential data model from Seattle-based Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) predicted on Friday that the US will see an additional 262,000 deaths by 1 April, reaching a total of 562,000 deaths by that point. IHME had previously predicted a total of 502,000 Americans would have died from Covid-19 by that time. The institute cited rising infection and hospitalizations numbers for the uptick in its prediction. The vaccine’s rollout will save 34,000 lives, according to the institute, though it noted that mandates on masks and indoor gatherings could further curb the spread.“The most important measures to keep the death toll down in the next months will be expanding mask use and re-imposition of some mandates in states with severe stress on hospital systems”, the institute said in a statement. More

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      US surpasses 17m coronavirus cases just a day after setting record death toll – live updates

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      Biden picks Deb Haaland for interior secretary – reportCongress closes in on $900bn Covid aid bill as Friday deadline loomsFDA says extra doses of vaccine contained in Pfizer vials can be usedBiden and Pence will soon receive Covid vaccine Sign up to receive First Thing – our daily briefing by email 9.44pm GMT Joe Biden released a statement today emphasizing the need for the US government to prioritize cybersecurity, as new details about the recent hack of several federal agencies continue to emerge.“I want to be clear: my administration will make cybersecurity a top priority at every level of government — and we will make dealing with this breach a top priority from the moment we take office,” the president-elect said in his statement. 9.24pm GMT Senator Mitt Romney criticized the White House for its “inexcusable silence and inaction” over the recent hack targeting US government agencies, which has been attributed to the Kremlin.pic.twitter.com/iEsWD1V4KI Related: Deep US institutional secrets may have been exposed in hack blamed on Russia Continue reading… More

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      Trump appointee urged ‘herd immunity’ approach to combat Covid – report

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      Top White House appointee in Department of Health and Human Services said in an email in July, ‘we want Americans infected’A top White House appointee in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) urged health officials in July to double down on a “herd immunity” approach to combating the Covid-19 pandemic, writing “we want [Americans] infected”.Paul Alexander, a former aide to HHS assistant press secretary Michael Caputo and a known herd immunity advocate, wrote an email to Caputo on 4 July – right as virus cases were spiking in the Sun Belt – laying out his case for herd immunity. Continue reading… More