On Sunday, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported a record number of new confirmed coronavirus infections across the globe.
BBC writes that the global health organization reported 307,930 new cases worldwide over a 24-hour timespan. Notably, the largest increases were seen in the United States and Brazil two countries leading the world in the volume of COVID-19 cases, reportingmore than 6.5 million and 4.3 million cases, respectively.
Our country is in a historic fight against the Coronavirus. Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.
In between the U.S. and Brazil is India, the second country with the most COVID-19 infections. The country reportedly sawmore than 2 million cases occur in August, the highest monthly infection count reported since the pandemic began.
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Along with the U.S. and Brazil, India reported some of the highest recently confirmed cases on Sunday.
Worldwide, Johns Hopkins data indicates there are roughly 29millionconfirmed cases of the coronavirus.
Prior to Sundays spike in global COVID-19 infections, the previous record for a single-day increase in the coronavirus occurred on Sept. 6, when the WHO saw 306,857 positive infections.
The latest data to emerge from theWHO showcases a steady incline in newly confirmed cases worldwide, with the United States's new case count still trending upward, albeit at slower rates than seen over the summer months.
Deaths in the U.S. have largely plateaued, with the current record high having occurred on April 17, wheremore than 6,000 Americans died due to the virus.
In total,more than 194,000 Americans have lost their lives during the pandemic.
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WARSAW, N.Y. (WIVB) Wyoming County has discovered two new cases of COVID-19.
These new cases bring the countys total since the pandemic started to 123. 115 people have recovered, while five others died.
So far, more than 14,000 tests in the county have turned out negative.
More information on COVID-19 in Wyoming County can be found here.
Evan Anstey is a digital content producer who has been part of the News 4 team since 2015. See more of his work here.
Humanoid robot "Prepper"in Germany in April, 2020. Agence France-Presse/Getty Image
The recent pullback for stocks, or as Goldman Sachs refers to it, that warp speed correction on the road to 3,600, (their S&P 500 target), looks to be on pause for Monday, as deal news and vaccine optimism fires up markets.
While we are nowhere near out of the woods with COVID-19, there is growing chatter on Wall Street about life after the virus and how to invest. Christopher Smart, chief global strategist and head of the Barings Investment Institute, tells his clients they need to answer three questions before proceeding:
Is COVID-19 over? (Yes). Will next year be normal (Yes), and Whats the best way to play the next cycle? Navigate secular trends that the pandemic has speeded up technology that will reshape business, rising concern for climate change, and new patterns of living, says Smart.
Echoing those sentiments, our call of the day from AB Bernstein lays out where investors should position themselves over the next three to five years.
We think that long-run equity sector positioning has to be assessed across several dimensions, some of which are linked to the macro policy outlook and some to how demands of investors will change post COVID, says a team of strategists led by Inigo Fraser Jenkins.
Bernstein says sector performance will be shaped by the following: real rates staying low or negative for a long time; strategic policy shifts on tax, buybacks and labor bargaining power; valuation spreads that are extreme levels and changing demands of investors as they face post-pandemic challenges; and growing interest in ESG investing (Environmental, Social and Governance).
As for where to invest, here are the teams top ideas:
The markets
Wall Street stocks COMP, +1.87% SPX, +1.27% DJIA, +1.18% are higher NQ00, +1.99% European equities SXXP, +0.14% are mixed, while Asian stocks finished in the green.
The buzz
Amazon.com AMZN, -0.42% plans to hire 100,000 U.S. and Canadian workers, with starting wages at $15 an hour and $1,000 sign-on bonuses in some cities.
Microsoft MSFT, +0.67% said on Sunday that its bid for TikTok had been turned down, with no explanation why. And after reports that Oracle ORCL, +4.31% would become a trusted tech partner for TikTok parent ByteDance, a Chinese state-affiliated news source said that sale wont be happening. Microsoft shares are down 0.5% and Oracle shares are up 8%.
Nvidia NVDA, +5.81% shares are climbing after Japan technology conglomerate SoftBank 9984, +8.95% announced a $40 billion cash-and-stock deal to sell microprocessor designer Arm Holdings to the chip maker.
Nikola issued a detailed rebuttal over what it terms was a false and misleading report that called the electric-truck maker as a fraud. Shares are down another 3% after plunging last week.
Albert Bourla, the chief executive of Pfizer PFE, +2.60%, said on Sundaythat the drugmaker should know if its COVID-19 vaccine candidate will work by the end of October and if approved, it could be distributed in the U.S. by the end of the year. Pfizeris joining with German drugmaker BioNTech BNTX, +3.60% on that drug.
The University of Oxford said on Saturday it would resume a trial for the coronavirus vaccine candidate it is developing with AstraZeneca AZN, +0.52% AZN, -0.34%. That comes days after the study was halted following a U.K. patient falling ill.
Japan governments longtime top spokesman Yoshihide Suga was tapped for the prime minister post.
The chart
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Need to Know starts early and is updated until the opening bell, butsign up hereto get it delivered once to your email box. The emailed version will be sent out at about 7:30 a.m. Eastern.
Since June 2020, DKI Jakarta has implemented the transitional phases of the implementation of Large-Scale Social RestrictionsPembatasan Sosial Berskala Besar THE PSBB) by easing the restrictions put in place under the PSBB and allowing certain activities to resume in order to maintain the productive socio-economic activities.
However, the Governor of DKI Jakarta decides to discontinue the transitional phases of the PSBB and re-impose the stricter PSBB. This decision is taken in order to reduce the spread of the Corona Virus Disease (Covid-19) as the infection cases in DKI Jakarta continue to surge. Under the Governor Decree No. 959 of 2020 dated September 11, 2020 on the Entry into Force of Large-Scale Social Restrictions in the Management of the Corona Virus Disease (Covid-19) in the DKI Jakarta Province,the stricter PSBB measures are effective as of September 14, 2020 until September 27, 2020 and may be further extended if necessary.
Unlike the transitional PSBB, the Governor of DKI Jakarta sets out the restrictions of the PSBB in DKI Jakarta the Governor Regulation No. 88 of 2020 regarding Amendments of Regulation No. 33 of 2020 on Implementation of Large-Scale Social Restrictions in the Management of the Corona Virus Disease (Covid-19) in the DKI Jakarta Province (the Regulation).
In addition, the implementation of the PSBB under the Regulation refers to Governor of DKI Jakarta Regulation No. 79 of 2020 dated August 19, 2020 on the Implementation of Discipline and law Enforcement of Health Protocols as Endeavor of Prevention and Control of Covid-19 (the Protocols).
We set out below the key provisions of the amendments on the implementation of the PSBB based on the Regulation.
All non-essential businesses are required to temporarily limit their activities at the workplaces. This limitation is conducted by implementing mechanism to work from home for the employees. If the work from home mechanism cannot be conducted, the businesses shall limit the number of people who are at workplaces at any time to be not more than 25% (twenty five percent) of the total number of the people at workplaces.
The Regulation stipulates certain essential businesses which are exempted from the PSBB, as follows:
The exempted businesses above are still subject to the Protocols (which are briefly discussed below).
In general, the non-essential businesses shall implement the following measures in conducting the activities at workplaces:
Both essential and non-essential businesses shall comply with the Protocols, including the following:
WASHINGTON It was the third week of August, the Republican National Convention was days away, and President Trump was impatient.
White House officials were anxious to showcase a step forward in the battle against the coronavirus: an expansion of the use of blood plasma from recovered patients to treat new ones. For nearly two weeks, however, the National Institutes of Health had held up emergency authorization for the treatment, citing lingering concerns over its effectiveness.
So on Wednesday, Aug. 19, Mr. Trump called Dr. Francis S. Collins, the director of the N.I.H., with a blunt message.
Get it done by Friday, he demanded.
It wasnt done by Friday, and on Sunday, regulators at the Food and Drug Administration still had not finished a last-minute data review intended to ease N.I.H. doubts.
But on Sunday night, the eve of the convention, the president announced, with the F.D.A.s approval, that plasma therapy would be available for wider use, and he declared that it could reduce deaths by 35 percent, vastly overstating what the data had shown about the benefits.
Mr. Trumps call to Dr. Collins was a flash point in a pressure campaign by the White House to bend the nations public health agencies to his desire to show progress in the fight against a pandemic that has killed more than 192,000 people in the United States. And it was just one in a series of moments that have left scientists and regulators across the public health bureaucracy increasingly worried that the White House could exert greater pressure to approve a vaccine before Election Day, even in the absence of agreement on its effectiveness and safety.
On the night of the plasma announcement, Dr. Collins was told to show up at the White House, where he was given a coronavirus test and then shunted to the Roosevelt Room as Mr. Trump and others spoke to journalists in the briefing room.
There, Dr. Collins and Dr. Peter Marks, one of the top regulators at the Food and Drug Administration and the person most directly responsible for maintaining the independence and scientific rigor of the vaccine approval process, watched helplessly as the president and other top administration officials oversold plasmas effectiveness, creating a public relations debacle that reverberated for days.
Dr. Collins left the White House after the announcement. But Dr. Marks, who had pushed for the plasma approval, was escorted to the Oval Office to spend a few minutes with Mr. Trump and his top aides, who were celebrating with cupcakes with white icing. In an interview on Friday, Dr. Marks said he was a little bit in a state of shock to find himself there being thanked by the president for his work on the plasma approval.
Although he described it as a brief interaction that really didnt have any substance, health officials who had heard about the encounter said they feared it could create the impression that the guardrails between politics and science were being further eroded at a time when the public is already concerned about political pressure in assessing the safety of vaccines and treatments.
Some of those present were taken aback when Mr. Trump, who a day earlier had tweeted about a deep state at the Food and Drug Administration blocking quick approvals of treatments and vaccines to hurt him politically, jokingly asked whether Dr. Stephen M. Hahn, the F.D.A. commissioner, was doing a good job.
With Election Day just over seven weeks away, Washington is witnessing the collision of two worlds: a community of largely anonymous government scientists and doctors who operate in a culture guided by research, data sets and peer review, and a president famously disdainful of science, politically wounded by his failures to contain the coronavirus and now determined to cast himself as moving as fast as possible to provide Americans with vaccines and treatments.
Government scientists and pharmaceutical companies have begun taking extraordinary steps to counter any impression that they could sacrifice public safety to political expediency, pledging publicly that they are committed to impartial scientific decisions about fighting the coronavirus.
Dr. Hahn has publicly committed to vetting any vaccine approval through an advisory committee of outside experts. In an attempt to add more rigor to the agencys decision-making process, he said this week that the Food and Drug Administration intended to issue new guidance on the standards used to justify emergency use of a vaccine.
We will not jeopardize the publics trust in our science-based, independent review of these or any vaccines, Dr. Hahn said on Twitter on Friday. Theres too much at stake.
The administration has come under withering criticism for not acting aggressively enough to confront the virus and failing, for example, to push through bureaucratic red tape in the pandemics early stages to develop diagnostic tests that would work. White House officials say the president is now doing exactly what his opponents have assailed him for not doing: exerting pressure to develop safe and effective drugs and vaccines as quickly as possible because people are sick and dying, not because of the timing of the election.
The rushed plasma approval rollout is far from the only aspect of the government response to the virus that was shaped by pressure from the White House. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have repeatedly waffled on how much testing is recommended and for whom, and according to emails first reported on Friday by Politico, political appointees at the Department of Health and Human Services have tried to revise or delay C.D.C. reports on the coronavirus they believed were unflattering to the president. The Food and Drug Administration first gave emergency authorization for use of hydroxychloroquine to treat Covid-19 after Mr. Trump promoted it, only to be forced to reverse itself.
But the battle over approval of convalescent plasma is particularly telling because it involves many of the players who would figure in a far more momentous decision over whether to authorize an emergency approval for a vaccine.
Over the summer, the debate over plasma evolved from a purely scientific discussion about its merits to a kind of political loyalty test, laid bare in presidential remarks in the days before the announcement.
In a news briefing on Aug. 19, Mr. Trump complained that people over there an apparent reference to the Food and Drug Administration wanted to limit plasma treatment until after the election. In a Twitter post three days later, he accused deep state officials at the agency of slow-walking approvals of Covid-19 vaccines and treatments to harm him politically.
Like other approaches to dealing with the virus, convalescent plasma was a subject of scientific debate and disagreement. The pale yellow liquid that remains after blood is stripped of its red and white cells, it has been used since the 1890s to treat infectious diseases, including the flu, SARS and Ebola.
Regulators at the Food and Drug Administration, which approves new treatments, were willing to evaluate convalescent plasma for emergency approval on the basis of tens of thousands of case studies from a federally supported Mayo Clinic program. Dr. Collins and other officials at the N.I.H. wanted its benefits tested with randomized trials, for which scientists across the country had struggled to recruit patients. Although N.I.H. did not have regulatory authority, the administration wanted agreement among all the health agencies on moving ahead with expanded use of plasma.
In June, Dr. Marks alerted Dr. Deborah L. Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, that early data from the Mayo Clinic program looked promising. Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, quickly began agitating for emergency approval, senior administration officials said.
Throughout the summer, the White House has kept a close eye on the Food and Drug Administrations progress with therapies and possible vaccines. The president himself calls Dr. Hahn on his cellphone about once a week, according to a senior administration official.
Mr. Meadows is also in regular contact with Dr. Hahn, who sometimes makes unscheduled visits to Mr. Meadowss corner suite in the West Wing.
Dr. John C. Fleming, a top adviser to Mr. Meadows, holds a weekly meeting with Dr. Hahn, Dr. Marks, Dr. Janet Woodcock, a top F.D.A. drug official, and Eric D. Hargan, the deputy health secretary. Jared Kushner, the presidents senior adviser and son-in-law, was also closely involved in tracking progress on vaccines and treatments.
For weeks, F.D.A. regulators, backed by Dr. Hahn, insisted the data from the plasma research was not strong enough to justify approving wider use. By Aug. 12, though, they were ready to move ahead, deciding plasma met the comparatively low bar for emergency authorization in which the potential benefits outweighed the risks.
N.I.H. officials were still arguing for a clinical trial, but the scientists arrived at a compromise: The Food and Drug Administration would analyze the data again with fresh results from the Mayo Clinic program.
Frustrated by the delay, Mr. Trump pressed his case with Alex M. Azar II, his health secretary.
Two allies of Mr. Kushners got involved: Brad Smith, a deputy assistant to the president, and Adam Boehler, the chief executive of the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation and a former Trump administration health official.
They talked to Dr. Hahn and Mr. Azar about data that they said showed that plasma from the Mayo Clinic program was available to only three-fourths of the hospitals treating Covid-19 patients, leaving 900 hospitals without access to the therapy. While emergency approval was held up, they noted, Americans were dying.
Matters came to a head on Aug. 19 after The New York Times published an article saying the plasma approval was on hold because of the N.I.H. objections. F.D.A. and White House officials were furious that N.I.H. officials had publicly aired their objections despite negotiations to resolve the conflict over data. Mr. Trump called Dr. Collins demanding that plasma be approved within two days.
Dr. Birx and other top health officials also lashed out at Dr. Collins, asking him to publicly clarify his position, according to senior administration officials with knowledge of one tense meeting that week.
At the Food and Drug Administration, officials were expecting to finish the new analysis for the N.I.H. and to announce emergency approval of plasma as early as Monday, Aug. 24.
But on the preceding Thursday, they were told that was too late: The decision had to be announced on Sunday, the day before the start of the Republican National Convention, ostensibly because making the announcement during the gathering would appear to be politically driven.
Another obstacle emerged that weekend: New Mayo Clinic data was missing key entries and could not be used, foiling the reanalysis.
White House officials said they were told by Mr. Azar and Dr. Hahn that they were ready to make the announcement on Sunday. The presidents communications team quickly put together an event in the White House briefing room, with Mr. Trump flanked by Dr. Hahn and Mr. Azar. The F.D.A. called the approval another achievement in the administrations battle against the pandemic.
The rush contributed to serious mistakes. Dr. Hahn misinterpreted agency data and claimed that plasma reduced the mortality rate of Covid-19 patients by 35 percent a substantial exaggeration of what the research actually showed.
Immediately after the announcement, however, the mood in the Oval Office was celebratory. Cupcakes were served. Photographs were taken.
Before him on the Resolute Desk, the president had multiple copies of that days Wall Street Journal. He noted with pleasure a prominent article stating that he had forever changed the Republican Party.
Katie Thomas contributed reporting from Chicago, and Mark Mazzetti from Washington.
GAITHERSBURG, Md. (WJZ) Novavax is one of nine pharmaceutical companies pledging to make the safety of vaccinated people the top priority in the development of the first COVID-19 vaccines.
The Gaithersburg-based company claims to follow science, and not a political push, for a timeline of when its safe to release a vaccine.
CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE:
To read more, visit cbsnews.com.
For the latest information on coronavirus go to theMaryland Health Departments websiteor call 211. You can find all of WJZs coverage oncoronavirus in Maryland here.
News Release
Monday, September 14, 2020
A National Institutes of Health-funded study found that people with substance use disorders (SUDs) are more susceptible to COVID-19 and its complications. The research, published today in Molecular Psychiatry, was co-authored by Nora D. Volkow, M.D., director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). The findings suggest that health care providers should closely monitor patients with SUDs and develop action plans to help shield them from infection and severe outcomes.
By analyzing the non-identifiable electronic health records (EHR) of millions of patients in the United States, the team of investigators revealed that while individuals with an SUD constituted 10.3% of the total study population, they represented 15.6% of the COVID-19 cases. The analysis revealed that those with a recent SUD diagnosis on record were more likely than those without to develop COVID-19, an effect that was strongest for opioid use disorder, followed by tobacco use disorder. Individuals with an SUD diagnosis were also more likely to experience worse COVID-19 outcomes (hospitalization, death), than people without an SUD.
The lungs and cardiovascular system are often compromised in people with SUD, which may partially explain their heightened susceptibility to COVID-19, said Dr. Volkow. Another contributing factor is the marginalization of people with addiction, which makes it harder for them to access health care services. It is incumbent upon clinicians to meet the unique challenges of caring for this vulnerable population, just as they would any other high-risk group.
NIDAs Dr. Volkow and Rong Xu, Ph.D., of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, analyzed EHR data collected until June 15, 2020, from 360 hospitals nationwide. The EHRs were de-identified to ensure privacy.
The study population consisted of over 73 million patients, of which over 7.5 million had been diagnosed with an SUD at some point in their lives. Slightly more than 12,000 were diagnosed with COVID-19, and about 1,880 had both an SUD and a COVID-19 diagnosis on record. The types of SUDs investigated in the study were tobacco, alcohol, opioid, cannabis, and cocaine.
The complicating effects of SUD were visible in increased adverse consequences of COVID-19. Hospitalizations and death rates of COVID-19 patients were all elevated in people with recorded SUDs compared to those without (41.0% versus 30.1% and 9.6% versus 6.6%, respectively).
Additionally, African Americans with a recent opioid use disorder diagnosis were over four times more likely to develop COVID-19, compared to whites. Results showed that hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and renal diseases, which are risk factors for COVID-19, were more prevalent among African Americans than whites with opioid use disorder.
According to the authors, the study findings underscore the need to screen for, and treat, SUDs as part of the strategy for controlling the pandemic. Additional research needs to be done to better understand how best to treat those with SUDs who are at risk for COVID-19 and counsel on how to avoid the risk of infection.
*This research was funded by NIDA, the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute on Aging, all parts of NIH, as well as the American Cancer Society and The Clinical and Translational Science Collaborative of Cleveland.
About the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA): The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is a component of the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIDA supports most of the worlds research on the health aspects of drug use and addiction. The Institute carries out a large variety of programs to inform policy, improve practice, and advance addiction science. Fact sheets on the health effects of drugs and information on NIDA research and other activities can be found at www.drugabuse.gov, which is compatible with your smartphone, iPad, or tablet. To order publications in English or Spanish, call NIDAs DrugPubs research dissemination center at 1-877-NIDA-NIH or 240-645-0228 (TDD) or email requests to drugpubs@nida.nih.gov. Online ordering is available at drugpubs.drugabuse.gov. NIDAs media guide can be found atwww.drugabuse.gov/publications/media-guide/dear-journalist, and its easy-to-read website can be found at www.easyread.drugabuse.gov. You can follow NIDA on Twitter and Facebook.
About the National Institutes of Health (NIH):NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.
NIHTurning Discovery Into Health
###
TheWest Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR) reports as of 10:00 a.m., September 13,2020, there have been 483,468 total confirmatorylaboratory results received for COVID-19, with 12,699 totalcases and 266 deaths.
DHHR hasconfirmed the death of an 81-year old female fromLogan County. We offer our deepest sympathy as our state grievesanother loss, said Bill J. Crouch, DHHR Cabinet Secretary.
CASESPER COUNTY: Barbour(36), Berkeley (872), Boone (176), Braxton (9), Brooke (104), Cabell (654),Calhoun (22), Clay (30), Doddridge (17), Fayette (470), Gilmer (19), Grant(147), Greenbrier (117), Hampshire (95), Hancock (137), Hardy (75), Harrison(320), Jackson (228), Jefferson (403), Kanawha (1,985), Lewis (37), Lincoln (139),Logan (544), Marion (243), Marshall (139), Mason (124), McDowell (80), Mercer(379), Mineral (149), Mingo (301), Monongalia (1,691), Monroe (144), Morgan(44), Nicholas (66), Ohio (328), Pendleton (46), Pleasants (15), Pocahontas(56), Preston (142), Putnam (399), Raleigh (415), Randolph (230), Ritchie (9),Roane (41), Summers (28), Taylor (113), Tucker (16), Tyler (15), Upshur (58),Wayne (317), Webster (7), Wetzel (46), Wirt (9), Wood (333), Wyoming (80).
Pleasenote that delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from thelocal health department to DHHR. As case surveillance continues at the localhealth department level, it may reveal that those tested in a certain countymay not be a resident of that county, or even the state as an individual inquestion may have crossed the state border to be tested.
Pleasevisit the dashboard located at www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more information.
"Glassafe," the above concept where seats are fitted with protective shields, has been proposed by Aviointeriors.
(CNN) Plexiglass dividers between passengers, new staggered row layouts, zig-zag seating, space-age transparent bubbles around travelers' heads -- just as new divider screens popped up in shops and restaurants around the world in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, so came a wide variety of new concepts for airline seating.
In the months since, while mask mandates, hand gel and disinfectant wipes have become airline must-haves, a fundamental change to what we see when we sit down inside an aircraft cabin hasn't followed.
At the same time, the scientific and medical understanding of how the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus is transmitted has proceeded apace. Infection is now known to be largely via the droplet and aerosol (rather than fomite, or touch) routes, which affects the kind of protective barriers that are most effective.
Indeed, the most effective barrier is closest to the mouth of an exhaling passenger: the humble face mask. That's why airlines are, by and large, mandating them -- and banning passengers who endanger others by not wearing them.
Despite close quarters, the aircraft environment does not seem to be much higher risk than other inside spaces. Flights have continued in many parts of the world, and very few have turned out to be infection clusters themselves.
It seems that the widespread requirement to wear face masks onboard aircraft, high-efficiency particulate air, or HEPA, filtration on many aircraft and some unique aspects of the inflight environment, are likely to have contributed here.
"The reasons for the apparently low rate of in-flight transmission are not known," noted the International Air Transport Association (IATA), an airline trade body, "but could encompass a combination of the lack of face-to-face contact, and the physical barriers provided by seat backs, along with the characteristics of cabin air flow. Further study is anticipated."
"Janus," by Italian firm Aviointeriors, proposes seats made up of a row of three, with the seat in the middle facing the opposite direction.
Courtesy Aviointeriors
The challenges of modifying airplane seating
During the first half of 2020, a wide variety of cabin additions were proposed to combat the spread of Covid-19 and to reassure passengers. Transparent barriers clipping into the seatback pocket, foam inserts for the top of the seat, sculpted headrest shrouding add-ons and more.
Cabin interiors supplier companies around the world scrambled to see what they could do in the event that airlines wanted to make these big changes to their cabins.
Some companies even proposed new ways of arranging the seats, such as the Janus seat from Aviointeriors, where passengers face in alternating directions.
The Janus proposal features seats fitted with a three-sided shield.
Aviointeriors
The proposed barriers attached in a variety of ways to the seat, and that led to very specific challenges in bringing them on board. Many of these challenges intersect, of course.
To start with, any addition to the aircraft cabin needs to be certified as safe in a variety of ways.
It must be fire-resistant and not give off fumes that might be toxic to passengers. It needs to resist incredible forces without shattering, creating sharp edges or blocking passengers' emergency egress from their rows.
That's true whether it's attached to the seat or provided by the airline --as in, for example, a foam insert to create barriers from the row behind. These barriers would, in essence, create a "sneeze guard" between rows.
Perhaps most complicatedly, anything attached to the seat in particular needs to undergo crash testing, which has become more arduous in recent years as regulators insist on ever-safer travel.
For seats and anything attached to them, this includes loading them with crash dummies and the attachments and firing them down a sled to crash with 16 times the force of gravity, without the dummy taking simulated major injuries.
"Certification has been the main challenge," explained Mark Hiller, chief executive officer at Recaro Aircraft Seating. "When you add a feature to the seat that increases weight, the entire seat must be recertified. It's not an easy process, but creating a long lasting, durable solution is what we are focused on."
Recaro has proposed a number of barrier-style additions, as well as antimicrobial technology to be embedded in seat materials during the manufacturing process.
All in all, it's much more complicated than your supermarket putting a plexiglass partition between you and the cashier.
Recaro has proposed a number of side-on barrier options.
Courtesy Recaro
Cost and timing are major factors
Airlines would also have to keep all of these cabin additions maintained, replacing them due either to basic wear and tear or to misuse by passengers unfamiliar with them.
Over the years, aircraft cabins have been designed and refined to be incredibly sturdy -- one seatmaker openly advertises the robustness of its tray tables by having prospective customers stand on them -- but the speed at which these new products have been developed may well mean that they would need to be refined after installation.
And that after-installation period is crucial. Any additions, whether temporary or permanent, need to be cleaned and serviced regularly. Adding time to the already constrained schedules of airline cleaners creates complexity and cost, while airlines would also need to keep stocks of spares across their operations.
Cost overall is certainly a factor, as airlines worldwide enter their deepest financial crisis of modern times.
"We are aware of the fact that airlines are cash strapped at the moment," Recaro's Mark Hiller noted, "so we must be able to prove that these solutions will provide peace-of-mind for passengers and deliver return on investment."
So far, Recaro has no takers on its proposals for Covid-era modifications to airline seats.
Timing, too, is a point against the implementation of many of these measures-- both the expected timing of widespread vaccine availability in early to mid 2021, and the time needed to design, certify, manufacture, and install new seats or barrier additions.
In essence, there's little benefit in completing an expensive program just a couple of months ahead of the vaccine.
Some changes are more likely than seat barriers
For now, the best ways to combat Covid-19 seem to be around minimizing contact between passengers --and between passengers and crew.
Service standards have been changed to reduce the amount that crew circulate within the cabin, and meals have been rethought to reduce the amount of time they stay open to the air while being prepared and eaten, although food is not thought to be a transmission route.
So what is changing? Well, some of the most intense work is on baking in antimicrobial --including antiviral-- properties into the materials used for seats and the cabin.
Adjustments to meal service to minimize contact are already in place.
British Airways
Tapis, a company that makes fabrics and leathers for aircraft interiors, released in August its 9-series Ultraleather with "antimicrobial, silver ion technology embedded in the surface layers that prevent leaching and efficacy loss," which the company explained "provides a safe shield for aerosol borne micro-organisms within the aircraft to create a low risk, safe environment for passengers."
This type of material essentially disrupts the functioning of microbes, including viruses, and tests have proven promising on the coronavirus that causes Covid-19.
Fundamentally, this is the kind of product that airlines seem to be betting on: no massive changes during the pandemic, but acknowledging that passengers aren't going to become any less interested in onboard hygiene when the eventual Covid-19 vaccine eases the public health crisis.
John Walton is an international transportation and aviation journalist based in France, specializing in airlines, commercial aircraft and the passenger experience.
July was a terrible month for Angelicas family.
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Angelica says she and her husband kept working in factories that ignored safety guidelines set by the state. WBEZ agreed not to use Angelicas last name because shes undocumented and fears deportation.
No one cleaned the factory at my husbands job. All the workers ate lunch together at the same time. Theres like 60 employees there, she said in Spanish. I told him we should report it, but we were too afraid.
By July, her husband became infected with the virus, and she got sick soon after. She remembers that month as one of the most difficult times in her life.
I was so afraid, desperate and sad. We were so poor we often didnt have enough to eat, she said. I was so afraid to ask for help. We didnt want our neighbors to know we were sick.
Angelica and her husband are both undocumented and both work for staffing agencies that send them to warehouses and factories to work earning $10 an hour. No health insurance, no sick time off. She has four children. They all live in a two-bedroom apartment.
I think my children are traumatized, she said. They hear us talking about money, and I see it in their faces. I think they are depressed too.
Angelica is one of the 130 temp workers surveyed in Illinois for a report released today titled: We do not have the luxury of working from home. The report by the Chicago Workers Collaborative, which advocates for temps, surveyed people who work in food processing, manufacturing, warehousing and logistics. They are considered essential workers. In Illinois, the majority of these workers are Black and brown, the report said.
Half of the workers said they felt unsafe or very unsafe working during the pandemic. Half of the workers also reported their workplaces were unable to adhere to the 6 feet of social distance guidelines set by the Illinois Department of Public Health.
Nik Theodore, professor of urban planning and policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago, has studied the temp worker industry for years. Theodore said assembly lines typically have machines that cant be moved to accommodate for social distancing.
If workers are shoulder to shoulder in an assembly line, they cant social distance, he said.
Another problem temp workers reported is that companies did not disclose when others got the virus. Instead, the majority of the temp workers relied on each other for information on which employee might have the virus.
The majority of workers said they received personal protective equipment from their employers but said it was insufficient and inadequate, the report said.
There was an overwhelming response of feeling like the companies dont care about them, said Jannelle White, an organizer with the Chicago Workers Collaborative. The companies dont value them.
Thats how Angelica said she feels.
They just want us to produce, she said. They dont care about us. They just care about the production.
After her husband recovered from COVID-19 and tested negative, he went back to work. But she hasnt been able to because she needs to be clear of the coronavirus. Angelica took two tests that came back positive for COVID-19. Shes waiting on a third test. She still doesnt feel 100% healthy, but her family is behind on rent and they need the money. She said the Chicago Workers Collaborative gave her some money for rent when she was sick but thats gone, so shes willing to return to an environment that she thinks is unsafe. Theres no other alternative.
I need to work, she said. We live paycheck to paycheck.
The report pushes for regulators to enforce Gov. JB Pritzkers COVID-19 guidelines which require social distancing, screening and face masks.
Mike Matulis, spokesman for the Illinois Department of Labor, said temp workers with safety concerns should contact either federal OSHA or the Illinois Attorney Generals Workplace Rights Bureau.
But Theodore said relying on temp workers to report dangerous work conditions is not realistic. He said many would not want to risk being fired in a time of high unemployment during a dangerous pandemic.
Mara Ins Zamudio is a reporter for WBEZs Race, Class and Communities desk. Follow her @mizamudio.
