After several days of lower COVID-19 infections during the holiday weekend, Illinois saw a significant jump Tuesday as health officials announced 12,542 newly confirmed and probable cases.
They also reported 125 additional deaths. That brings the state’s total since the pandemic began to 738,846 new and probable cases and 12,403 fatalities.
Later on Tuesday, Dr. Allison Arwady said the city of Chicago expects to begin rolling out vaccines for health care workers later this month and could provide them to lower-risk residents in spring and children by summer.
The first distribution of vaccines will go toward Chicago hospitals and health care workers, possibly by the third week of December, Arwady said. The city’s also working with long-term care facilities in the city on vaccines, she said.
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Here’s what’s happening Tuesday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:
7 p.m.: What you need to know about when and how Chicago schools will welcome students back
In the new year, Chicago Public Schools plans to start reopening schools, beginning with students in prekindergarten and special education clusters and phasing in upper elementary grades. The district released a reopening guide just before the Thanksgiving holiday.
Here’s how it addresses some common questions. —Hannah Leone
5:55 p.m.: CDC to shorten guidance for quarantining after COVID-19 exposure to 10 days, 7 with a negative test
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is set to shorten the recommended length of quarantine after exposure to someone who is positive for COVID-19, as the virus rages across the nation.
According to a senior administration official, the new guidelines, which are set to be released as soon as Tuesday evening, will allow people who have come in contact to someone infected with the virus to resume normal activity after 10 days, or 7 days if they receive a negative test result. That’s down from the 14-day period recommended since the onset of the pandemic.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the announcement, said the policy change has been discussed for some time, as scientists have studied the incubation period for the virus. It was discussed Tuesday at a White House coronavirus task force meeting.
Read more here. —Associated Press
5:10 p.m.: US panel says 1st COVID-19 vaccine shots go to health care workers, nursing homes
Health care workers and nursing home residents should be at the front of the line when the first coronavirus vaccine shots become available, an influential government advisory panel said Tuesday.
The panel voted 13-1 to recommend priority be given to those groups in the first days of any coming vaccination program, when doses are expected to be very limited. The two groups encompass about 24 million Americans out of a U.S. population of about 330 million.
Read more here. —Associated Press
5 p.m. (updated): McConnell now says he’s sticking with scaled-back COVID relief bill
Top Senate Republican Mitch McConnell said Tuesday he’s largely sticking with a partisan, scaled-back COVID-19 relief bill that has already failed twice this fall, even as Democratic leaders and a bipartisan group of moderates offered concessions in hopes of passing pandemic aid before Congress adjourns for the year.
The Kentucky Republican made the announcement after President-elect Joe Biden called upon lawmakers to pass a downpayment relief bill now with more to come next year. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi resumed talks with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin about a year-end spending package that could include COVID relief provisions. Key Senate moderates rallied behind a scaled-back framework.
It’s not clear whether the flurry of activity will lead to actual progress. Time is running out on Congress’ lame-duck session and Donald Trump’s presidency, many Republicans won’t even acknowledge that Trump has lost the election and good faith between the two parties remains in short supply.
McConnell said his bill, which only modestly tweaks an earlier plan blocked by Democrats, would be signed by Trump and that additional legislation could pass next year. But his initiative fell flat with Democrats and a key GOP moderate.
“If it’s identical to what (McConnell) brought forth this summer then it’s going to be a partisan bill that is not going to become law,” said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who joined moderates in unveiling a $908 billion bipartisan package only hours earlier. “And I want a bill that will become law.”
Democrats declined to release details of their concessions to McConnell.
Read more here. —Associated Press
4:45 p.m.: How to get a fast, affordable COVID-19 test in Chicago area
As many as one in five Americans traveled for the Thanksgiving holiday, and all of them should be tested for COVID-19, according to top U.S. health officials.
That has some Chicago-area testing centers expecting larger crowds this week.
“We’re watching closely and believe that today will be busy,” Heather Keirnan, a nurse and vice president of operations for Northwestern Medicine Immediate Care, said Tuesday.
So how can you navigate an already stressed system — and get the most convenient, affordable and reliable COVID test possible?
If you have a primary care doctor, start there, Keirnan said.
Read more here. —Nara Schoenberg
4:38 p.m.: Known for never closing, Omega Restaurant in Niles shuts down temporarily due to COVID-19 pandemic
The ongoing pandemic has shut down — temporarily — a popular Niles restaurant known for never closing.
Omega Restaurant, which offered 24-hour service seven days a week at 9100 W. Golf Road, locked its doors Nov. 29 and will remain closed until February, owner Tom Konstantopoulos said.
“The reason we closed was so we can be here next year, so we can minimize the losses,” he explained. “We’re not closing for good, we’re not going anywhere. We had our best year last year in 2019 and we were doing great, but then the pandemic came and kept chopping away at us.”
Unable to provide indoor dining due to the state’s current restrictions, Konstantopoulos said staying open for carryout and delivery “doesn’t make sense” financially. A message shared with customers on the restaurant’s Facebook page stated, “the reality is that we cannot maintain operations, compensate our employees what they deserve and survive without indoor seating.”
Government assistance helped the restaurant survive the first indoor dining shut-down in the spring, Konstantopoulos said, but this fall, there has not been a second COVID-19 relief package approved by the federal government.
Read more here. —Jennifer Johnson
2:25 p.m.: 8 states including Ohio added to ‘red’ category in Chicago’s travel quarantine order
More of the country will be under Chicago’s most severe category for its travel quarantine order, city officials announced Tuesday while bracing for a post-Thanksgiving surge.
The same 46 states and Puerto Rico remain under Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s travel quarantine order for those returning to Chicago, but as of Friday, eight of them will be bumped up to the “red” classification that mandates a two-week quarantine. Only travelers from Maine, Vermont and Hawaii have no additional safety requirements.
Those added to the red category on Friday will be Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma and Rhode Island. They will join Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming to make a total of 19 red states.
Twenty-seven states plus Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico are in the next level, orange, while the lowest stage, yellow, has three states.
Chicagoans should still avoid travel to any of the red or orange states, public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady reiterated in a Tuesday press conference. She had urged residents to avoid Thanksgiving travel and other traditional plans during her last travel order update two weeks ago, around when the city was seeing as many as one in 15 people with active COVID-19 infections.
Read more here. —Alice Yin
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1:50 p.m.: Chicago could get vaccines in December, give to lower-risk residents and children by next spring and summer
The city of Chicago expects to begin rolling out vaccines for health care workers later this month and could provide them to lower-risk residents in spring and children by summer, public health commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said Tuesday.
The first distribution of vaccines will go toward Chicago hospitals and health care workers, possibly by the third week of December, Arwady said. The city’s also working with long-term care facilities in the city on vaccines, she said.
Two companies have produced vaccines that look to be more than 90% protective, Arwady noted, and federal officials will consider approving them later this month.
The city anticipates initially getting between 20,000 to 25,000 doses of vaccine and continuing to get regular allotments from the government, she said.
“We are ready to accept whatever amount of vaccine we receive,” Arwady said.
Pharmacies will be doing “strike teams” to help deliver vaccines to long-term care facilities, she said.
Arwady also said it’ll likely be “later in the spring” when the city will be able to more broadly spread vaccines to people who are at lower-risk, and the summer for children, but that is up in the air depending on vaccine production and how well trials do.
But she noted, at the start, there won’t be enough for all health care workers to get immediate vaccinations.
Read more here. —Alice Yin and Gregory Pratt
1:15 p.m. (updated): Illinois coronavirus daily case tally jumps back above 12,000, with 125 more deaths also reported
Illinois public health officials on Tuesday announced 12,542 newly confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday, a significant jump after several days of lower numbers.
Officials have voiced cautious optimism over the past week about a flattening of statewide coronavirus numbers after weeks of steady growth, and the higher number of cases reported on Tuesday is likely due, at least in part, to a testing lag over the holiday weekend.
The daily case count was last above 10,000 on Thanksgiving Day and has been below 8,000 since Friday.
The state also reported 125 deaths of people with COVID-19 on Tuesday, raising the statewide death toll to 12,403. The state has reported 738,846 known and probable cases throughout the course of the pandemic.
The cases reported Tuesday came out of a batch of 116,081 tests conducted over a 24-hour period. The seven-day statewide positivity rate for cases as a share of total tests was 10.4% for the period ending Monday.
Read more here. —Jamie Munks
1:05 p.m.: Indiana’s COVID-19 deaths nearly double during November
The number of COVID-19 deaths in Indiana has nearly doubled for November from a month earlier as health officials continue adding to those reports and the state’s coronavirus-related hospitalizations remain at their highest point during the pandemic.
The Indiana State Department of Health added 142 deaths to the statewide toll with its daily update on Tuesday. Most of those deaths occurred over the past week with a reporting lull from local officials over the Thanksgiving weekend.
Locally, Lake County has reported 475 fatalities including six new deaths in Tuesday’s reporting. While Porter County showed one new fatality Tuesday, the state dashboard shows a total of 91.
Marion County shows the most deaths with 15 new ones for a total of 885, according to the state.
Those boost Indiana’s coronavirus deaths during November to at least 1,416 people — surpassing the previous monthly peak during April by nearly 400 and almost double October’s total of 732 deaths.
Gov. Eric Holcomb on Tuesday also signed an extension of the state’s public health emergency through Dec. 31. Under authority from that emergency, the governor has issued the statewide mask order and limits on crowd sizes based on the county risk level of coronavirus spread.
Read more here. —Associated Press
12:35 p.m. (updated): Bipartisan group of lawmakers pitch $908 billion bill as Biden urges Congress to pass down payment on COVID-19 relief
A bipartisan group of lawmakers is putting pressure on congressional leaders to accept a split-the-difference solution to the protracted impasse over COVID-19 relief in a last-gasp effort to ship overdue help to a hurting nation before Congress adjourns for the holidays.
The group includes Senate centrists such as Joe Manchin, D-W. Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, who hope to exert greater influence in a closely divided Congress during the incoming Biden administration.
In Wilmington, Delaware, President-elect Joe Biden called on lawmakers to approve a down payment on COVID relief, though he cautioned that “any package passed in lame-duck session is — at best — just a start.”
The proposal hit the scales at $908 billion, including $228 billion to extend and upgrade “paycheck protection” subsidies for businesses for a second round of relief to hard-hit businesses like restaurants. It would revive a special jobless benefit, but at a reduced level of $300 per week rather than the $600 benefit enacted in March. State and local governments would receive $160 billion, and there is also money for vaccines. It does not include a second round of stimulus checks, the New York Times reported.
Earlier, larger versions of the proposal — a framework with only limited detail — were rejected by top leaders such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. But pressure is building as lawmakers face the prospect of heading home for Christmas and New Year’s without delivering aid to people in need.
Read more here. —Associated Press
11:53 a.m.: Column: A parting love letter to City Lit, my favorite bookstore in Chicago, on its final day of business
On a chilly Thursday evening in 2017, City Lit bookstore in Logan Square transformed itself into an apothecary.
Sales associates were bibliotherapists, tasked with prescribing literature to heal what ails us — lovesickness, loneliness, a sense of impending doom. Local writers (including me) were invited to read passages from books they found curative. (I chose “The Interestings,” by Meg Wolitzer.) A portion of the sales that night went to 826CHI, a nonprofit that supports creative writing programs for Chicago students.
It was a small and unforgettable evening, the sort of quiet magic that only happens, really, in a bookstore. People talking and laughing and wondering about stories, ideas, history, fate.
A neighborhood bookstore is a gift, and City Lit was an incomparable one — small enough to remain intimate, large enough to hold both standards and surprises; staffed by generous experts; filled with cross-legged kids during weekend storytimes and curious grown-ups during evening author readings. It has been my favorite bookstore in Chicago.
And now it’s closed. Tuesday is the last official day of business, though its doors haven’t been open for browsing or events since March 14.
Read more here. —Heidi Stevens
11:33 a.m.: Giving Tuesday and holiday donations can bring scammers; the pandemic makes it worse.
It’s officially the season to be jolly, and for many people, that involves giving back through monetary donations.
Most people tend to give a bulk of their donations between now and the end of the year, with days like Giving Tuesday being a big one for charities. But these days often bring higher chances of charity fraud, especially while in the midst of a pandemic.
“Charities get about 30% of their revenue from (Giving Tuesday) and end of the year,” said Steve Bernas, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Chicago and Northern Illinois. “Everybody is trying to make their donations before the end of the year for tax purposes — and the scammer knows that. … There’s always an increase of charity fraud this time of year because there’s also an increase in consumers donating to charities.”
The pandemic has only exacerbated the likelihood of becoming a victim of charity fraud. In his 33 years at the bureau, Bernas said scams have never been as rampant as they are now.
“With the pandemic, everybody’s trying to help as much as they possibly can; they know people are in need. Unfortunately, with COVID-19, it forces everybody online and the scammer goes toward where the money’s at as well,” said Bernas. “For scammers, this is a field day for them.”
Diligently researching an organization before deciding to donate to it can be integral to wading off charity fraud, said Bernas. Ask for information on where the money goes, and don’t wait until the last minute; be proactive in your giving and find an organization meaningful to you, he said.
Read more here. —Christen A. Johnson
8:44 a.m.: Esports arena for professional video game competitions planned for Chicago’s Near South Side
Professional video game players could compete in front of large crowds on the Near South Side if a local real estate developer’s unique, post-pandemic vision comes to fruition.
Scott Greenberg, best known for Chicago hotels such as the Wit in the Loop and the EMC2 hotel in Streeterville, wants to build a $30 million esports venue called Surge near the Stevenson Expressway.
The 106,000-square-foot venue at 2500 S. Wabash Ave. would serve food and drinks from three large kitchens, and include an arena large enough for 800 spectators to watch top players compete, Greenberg said.
“What we’re doing is not like anything else in the world, as far as esports stadiums,” said Greenberg, president of Lincolnshire-based ECD Co.
ECD’s partner on the project is Chicago-based virtual reality company MassVR, which had a smaller esports venue in Old Orchard shopping mall in Skokie before it closed during the coronavirus pandemic.
During COVID-19, video games mostly have been limited to players’ homes, creating a boom for the industry. But the development of vaccines is bringing hope that large gatherings can safely resume in 2021.
Read more here. —Ryan Ori
6:15 a.m.: Evanston students auction time and talents to save Gyros Planet, a struggling restaurant feeding thousands of hungry families
A group of Evanston Township High School students and alums is rallying around a family business near their school in the sort of gesture that lights the way for all of us.
Gyros Planet and Taqueria, down the block from ETHS, has been a gathering spot for students and neighborhood families since wife-and-husband team Erika Castro and Pablo Sanchez bought the storefront from its previous owners and reopened it in March 2019.
In April, shortly after the restaurant’s one-year anniversary, Castro and Sanchez started handing out a few dozen free meals each day, hoping to fill the hunger gap caused by the coronavirus pandemic. At first, they took turns packing and delivering free food to their customers — customers they’d known and loved for months — who would call and tell them about their needs. (Sick family members. Furloughs. Layoffs. No health insurance.)
Soon they couldn’t keep up with the deliveries, so they set up a table every day from 11 a.m. to noon and filled it with meals for people to come by and pick up. Their goal was to give away 100 free lunches a day — no small task for a restaurant with a dwindling bottom line and no employees besides Castro and Sanchez to help with the cooking and assembly.
Read more here. —Heidi Stevens
6 a.m.: Chicago Park District to approve smaller budget for 2021 amid $100 million loss in revenue during the pandemic
The Chicago Park District will vote Wednesday on its 2021 budget, as it attempts to keep its head above water after a $100 million loss in revenue during the pandemic and an ongoing pension crisis.
The proposed $481.8 million budget is a drop from last year’s $487 million budget, which included a modest tax increase for homeowners and followed a new labor agreement for the district’s workers.
At last month’s Park District meeting, Superintendent Michael Kelly addressed challenges posed by the “daunting circumstances” of the pandemic in a video recorded at Gately Park, the new 139,000-square-foot track and field facility on the South Side.
“In prior years, the annual budget would highlight program expansion, it would detail plans for new and renovated facilities, and the overall growth of opportunities,” Kelly said. “The glaring difference in 2021 over previous years are the extreme mitigation efforts that we will implement to remain on sound financial footing.”
Kelly highlighted the Park District’s quick pivot to online programming as one way the district has met the challenges of the pandemic. He also said the district was able to keep necessary capital projects on track, including shoreline protection work after severe storm damage, and construction projects like the beach house at the South Shore Cultural Center and the Gately facility.
But the district suffered a $100 million loss in revenue in the last year, Kelly said, in part from program fees and special events disappearing.
Read more here. —Morgan Greene
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