This analysis focuses on Americans views of China on topics including how the country has handled the coronavirus pandemic, the state of bilateral relations and attitudes about the country more broadly. Pew Research Center has been tracking attitudes toward China since 2005. This report also includes demographic analysis comparing groups with different levels of education, age and political leanings.
For this report, we used data from a nationally representative survey of 1,003 U.S. adults conducted by telephone from June 16 to July 14, 2020.
Here are the questions used for the report, along with responses and survey methodology.
Americans views of China have continued to sour, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Today, 73% of U.S. adults say they have an unfavorable view of the country, up 26 percentage points since 2018. Since March alone, negative views of China have increased 7 points, and there is a widespread sense that China mishandled the initial outbreak and subsequent spread of COVID-19.
Around two-thirds of Americans (64%) say China has done a bad job dealing with the coronavirus outbreak. Around three-quarters (78%) place a great deal or fair amount of the blame for the global spread of the coronavirus on the Chinese governments initial handling of the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan.
Faith in President Xi Jinping to do the right thing in world affairs has also deteriorated: 77% have little or no confidence in him, up 6 percentage points since March and 27 points since last year.
More generally, Americans see Sino-U.S. relations in bleak terms. Around seven-in-ten (68%) say current economic ties between the superpowers are in bad shape up 15 percentage points since May 2019, a time in the trade war when tariffs were ramping up. Around one-in-four (26%) also describe China as an enemy of the United States almost double the share who said this when the question was last asked in 2012. Another 57% say China is a competitor of the U.S., while 16% describe it as a partner.
As the U.S. imposes sanctions on Chinese companies and officials over Beijings treatment of Uighurs and other minority groups after originally resisting these actions the American public appears poised to support a tough stance. Around three-quarters (73%) say the U.S. should try to promote human rights in China, even if it harms bilateral economic relations, while 23% say the U.S. should prioritize strengthening economic relations with China at the expense of confronting China on human rights issues.
More Americans also think the U.S. should hold China responsible for the role it played in the outbreak of the coronavirus (50%) than think this should be overlooked in order to maintain strong bilateral economic ties (38%). But, when asked about economic and trade policy toward China, Americans are slightly more likely to prefer pursuing a strong economic relationship (51%) to getting tough on China (46%). Still, more support getting tough on China now than said the same in 2019, when 35% held that view.
While more Americans say the U.S. is the worlds leading economy (52%) than say the same of China (32%), views of U.S. economic superiority declined 7 percentage points over the past four months. And those who see China as economically dominant are less likely to support getting tough on China economically, instead prioritizing building a strong relationship with China on economic issues. They are also less likely to say the U.S. should hold China responsible for its role in the pandemic at the expense of the bilateral economic relationship.
These are among the findings of a new survey by Pew Research Center, conducted June 16 to July 14, 2020, among 1,003 adults in the United States. The survey also finds that while Republicans and Democrats both have negative views of China and are critical of Beijings handling of the coronavirus, this criticism is more prevalent among Republicans. Republicans and Republican-leaning independents are significantly more likely than Democrats and Democratic leaners to have a very unfavorable view of China, to criticize the Chinese governments role in the global pandemic and to want to take a tougher policy approach to the country. (For more on partisan differences in views on China, see Republicans see China more negatively than Democrats, even as criticism rises in both parties.)
Around three-quarters (73%) of Americans have an unfavorable view of China today the most negative reading in the 15 years that Pew Research Center has been measuring these views. This July survey also marks the third survey over the past two years in which unfavorable views of China have reached historic highs. Negative views have increased by 7 percentage points over the last four months alone and have shot up 26 points since 2018.
The percent who say they have a very unfavorable view of China is also at a record high of 42%, having nearly doubled since the spring of 2019, when 23% said the same.
Negative views of China are consistent across education levels. Around seven-in-ten of those who have completed at least a college degree and those who have less schooling voice this opinion. Men and women also differ little in their views of China.
While majorities of every age group now have an unfavorable view of China, Americans ages 50 and older are substantially more negative (81%) than those ages 30 to 49 (71%) or those under 30 (56%). For those ages 50 and older, this represents an increase of 10 percentage points since March.
As has been the case for much of the last 15 years, Republicans continue to hold more unfavorable views of China than Democrats, 83% vs. 68%, respectively. Republicans are also much more likely to say they have a very unfavorable view of China (54%) than Democrats (35%).
In the past four months, negative views toward China among Republicans have increased 11 percentage points. Over the same period of time, unfavorable views among Democrats have increased 6 points, resulting in a 15 point gap between the parties.
Americans are highly critical of the way China has handled the coronavirus outbreak. Around two-thirds (64%) say China has done a bad job, including 43% who say it has done a very bad job. (When a slightly different question was administered online in April and May, 63% of Americans said China was doing only a fair or a poor job dealing with the coronavirus outbreak, including 37% who said it was doing a poor job.)
Republicans and Republican-leaning independents are significantly more likely than Democrats and Democratic leaners to say China has done a bad job dealing with the coronavirus: 82% vs. 54%, respectively. And they are about twice as likely to think China has done a very bad job (61% vs. 30%). Older people, too, are more critical, with 73% of those ages 50 and older finding fault in Chinas pandemic response, compared with 59% of those 30 to 49 and 54% of those under 30. But education has little relationship to how people think China has handled the novel coronavirus: Around two-thirds of those with and without a college degree say China has not done well in its response.
Around three-quarters of Americans say the Chinese governments initial handling of the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan contributed either a great deal (51%) or a fair amount (27%) to the global spread of the virus. Republicans are particularly critical: 73% believe Chinas early handling of the pandemic contributed a great deal to its spread, compared with 38% of Democrats who say the same. Older people, too, are especially likely to lay the blame on China.
Half of Americans think the U.S. should hold China responsible for the role it played in the outbreak of the coronavirus, even if it means worsening economic relations, while 38% think the U.S. should prioritize strong U.S.-China relations, even if it means overlooking any role China played in the outbreak. (The 8% of adults who say the Chinese governments initial handling of the virus is not at all to blame for the global spread of the virus were not asked this foll0w-up question, while 5% expressed no opinion, either to the first or second question.) Republicans and those who lean toward the GOP are about twice as likely (71%) as Democrats and Democratic leaners (37%) to say the U.S. should hold China responsible even at the expense of worse economic relations.
Those who think China has done a poor job handling the outbreak or who fault its role in the viruss global spread are significantly more likely to have negative views of the country. For example, 85% of those who say China had done a poor job handling the COVID-19 pandemic have an unfavorable view of the country, compared with 53% among those who think its doing a good job dealing with the outbreak.
When it comes to the bilateral economic relationship, Americans, by a more than two-to-one margin, say economic ties are bad (68%) rather than good (30%). And a quarter say economic relations are very bad.
While more than half thought economic ties were bad in the spring of 2019, when the question was last posed, this sense has increased by 15 percentage points over the past year. These shifts are visible across the political spectrum. Among Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, who were split nearly evenly last year, a majority (63%) now believe bilateral economic ties are bad, a 15-point increase. Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents have also become more negative roughly three-quarters (73%) say ties are bad, up 12 points from a year prior.
And Americans have mixed preferences on how to best shape economic and trade policies with China. Around half say it is more important to build a stronger relationship with China, while 46% place more value on getting tougher with China. In the past year, the share endorsing a tougher stance with China on economic and trade policy has grown by 11 percentage points.
Republicans and Democrats have both shifted their views over the past year in favor of getting tougher on China on economics and trade. Today, roughly two-thirds of Republicans support this position, 12 points higher than in 2019. Democrats, for their part, are 14 points more likely this year to favor getting tough on China, though only a third pick this option over building relations.
In recent months the Chinese government has come under fire on several human rights fronts, including a new national security law in Hong Kong, mass surveillance and detention of ethnic Muslim Uighurs, drastic responses to the coronavirus and mistreatment of Africans in the country.
When asked whether the U.S. should prioritize economic relations with China or promote human rights in China, nearly three-quarters of Americans choose human rights, even if it harms economic relations with China.
Democrats are more likely than Republicans to emphasize human rights over economic gain, though at least seven-in-ten of both groups hold this opinion. Younger and older Americans alike prefer more emphasis on human rights than economic relations when it comes to China. Less than a quarter of all age groups say the U.S. should prioritize economic relations with China, even if it means not addressing human rights issues.
When asked if they see China as a competitor, enemy or partner, a majority of Americans say they see the country as a competitor (57%). This is a significant decline from last time the question was asked in 2012, when 66% said the same. The share of Americans who consider China an enemy has increased by 11 percentage points over the same period, from 15% to 26%. The proportion of Americans who see China as a partner has remained steady at 16%.
The share of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who see China as an enemy has increased 21 percentage points since the question was last asked in 2012. In comparison, there has been an 8 percentage point increase among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, widening the gap between the two parties.
Perceptions of Chinas relationship with the U.S. differ by age. While roughly a quarter of those ages 18 to 29 see China as a partner, only 6% of those 50 and older say the same. Conversely, older Americans are nearly three times as likely as their younger counterparts to see China as an enemy (36% vs. 13%). Americans of all age groups are equally likely to see China as a competitor.
Americans who see Chinas initial handling of the coronavirus outbreak as at least somewhat responsible for the global pandemic are more likely to see China as an enemy.
Since the coronavirus outbreak was declared a pandemic in March, the U.S. unemployment rate has skyrocketed, and the International Monetary Fund predicts the U.S. gross domestic product will shrink in 2020, while the Chinese economy will achieve positive growth. The American publics economic confidence has also declined. While 52% of Americans still see their country as the worlds leading economic power, this is down from 59% in March, an unprecedented high in Pew Research Centers surveys on this question.
The share of Americans who see China as the worlds top economy continues to hold steady at about a third (32%). No more than one-in-ten name either Japan or the European Union as the worlds leading economy (5% and 6%, respectively).
American men are significantly more likely than women to see the U.S. as the worlds top economy. But there are few differences in opinion across different age groups or education levels.
While Republicans views on this question have mostly held steady over the past four months, Democrats have become significantly less likely to see the U.S. as the leading global economy: 54% of Democrats held this opinion in March, compared with 44% today.
When asked how much confidence they have in Chinese President Xi Jinping to do the right thing regarding world affairs, about three-quarters of Americans say they have not too much confidence or no confidence at all (77%). And, for the first time since the question was first asked in 2014, a majority (55%) now say they have no confidence at all in the Chinese president. This is a 10-point increase from March and more than double the share who said so last year.
The low confidence in President Xi is tied to concerns over how China has handled the coronavirus pandemic. Americans who say the Chinese government has done a bad job dealing with the coronavirus outbreak are significantly more likely to have no confidence in Xi (64%) than those who say it has done a good job (39%). The same is also true for those who blame China for the global spread of the virus.
As Xi and Trump discuss execution of the Phase 1 trade agreement, signed in January, Americans views of the bilateral economic relationship also are associated with their opinion of Xi. Those who think Sino-U.S. economic relations are bad are significantly more likely to have no confidence in him (61%) than those who think relations are good (44%).
Americans ages 50 and older are about 20 percentage points more likely than their younger counterparts to have no confidence at all in Xi (62% vs. 40%). And a partisan divide in evaluations of Xi has reemerged. Republicans and Republican-leaning independents are now 10 points more likely than their Democratic counterparts to have no confidence at all in Xi. In comparison, partisans were equally likely to lack confidence in the Chinese leader in March, as well as in 2019 and 2018.
Confirmed cases of COVID-19 have risen to more than 17.3 million around the world, according to Johns Hopkins University of Medicine. The number of confirmed deaths now stands at more than 673,000.
Preliminary data shows the French economy contracted by 13.8% in the second quarter. Household consumption, company investment and trade were all hit by the nationwide lockdown.
Social distancing has pushed flu infection rates to record lows, according to early figures. The data suggests measures to tackle coronavirus are having an impact on other communicable diseases.
The UK has tightened lockdowns in some Northern areas, including Greater Manchester. The move is targeted at areas where transmission rates are increasing.
Florida and Arizona have both reported record increases in COVID-19 deaths. The US epicentre is also showing signs of shifting to the Midwest.
Global cases have gone past 17 million.
Image: Our World in Data
The crisis threatens to "destroy the livelihoods" of the region's 218 million informal workers, said a policy brief released yesterday. This puts decades of poverty reduction at risk.
Remittances from Southeast Asians working abroad are set to fall by 13% - or $10 billion - while the regional economy is expected to contract by 0.4% this year.
Governments should boost social welfare payments and prioritize higher health spending, said Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana, head of the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.
The first global pandemic in more than 100 years, COVID-19 has spread throughout the world at an unprecedented speed. At the time of writing, 4.5 million cases have been confirmed and more than 300,000 people have died due to the virus.
As countries seek to recover, some of the more long-term economic, business, environmental, societal and technological challenges and opportunities are just beginning to become visible.
To help all stakeholders communities, governments, businesses and individuals understand the emerging risks and follow-on effects generated by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the World Economic Forum, in collaboration with Marsh and McLennan and Zurich Insurance Group, has launched its COVID-19 Risks Outlook: A Preliminary Mapping and its Implications - a companion for decision-makers, building on the Forums annual Global Risks Report.
The report reveals that the economic impact of COVID-19 is dominating companies risks perceptions.
Companies are invited to join the Forums work to help manage the identified emerging risks of COVID-19 across industries to shape a better future. Read the full COVID-19 Risks Outlook: A Preliminary Mapping and its Implications report here, and our impact story with further information.
A Reuters poll of over 500 economists suggests the outlook for the global economy has grown more pessimistic.
The still-rising number of infections and the risk of fresh lockdowns is putting any potential rebound at risk.
We expect the economic reality of the virus to start catching up with businesses across the globe soon, said Jan Lambregts, global head financial markets research at Rabobank.
What we need is a vaccine or significant breakthroughs in medicines to decisively reopen our economies and restore business and consumer confidence but there is no magic wand for the time being.
The poll expects the global economy to shrink by 4% this year - down from the 3.7% forecast in June.
The scale of the coronavirus pandemic and the economic shutdowns it caused set in motion a series of debates and questions about what the world may look like once its stranglehold on society loosens: Will we travel less? Will we work at home more? Will norms in schools and at large-scale public events be changed for years?
Less noticed, but just as important, is the potential that the coronavirus could be a catalyst to overhaul the global economic order. A debate on the failures of the global economy had already started before the pandemic, born of a sense that capitalism and corporations had become parasites on the planet.
In the aftermath of the pandemic, the worlds rich countries should do more than just wait for corporations to change. They have to overhaul their monetary policies, the forms of private investment they incentivize and the attitudes of their antitrust enforcement.
Until now, monetary policy has rewarded holders of financial assets over those who have stock in real assets like land, factories and labor. Thats because the worlds most powerful central banks have prioritized controlling inflation over expanding industrial capacity and employment in whats called the real economy.
This status quo in central banking, which has been dominant for four decades, has encouraged corporations, especially the largest publicly traded companies, to focus on short-term financial gains and share prices at the expense of pursuing longer-term investments that would reap more broadly shared rewards. Compounding the gains of those who already own plenty of capital has resulted in the entrenched income inequality and stagnant wages that citizens in dozens of countries bemoan.
In the United States, the Federal Reserve is expected to operate under its dual mandate to promote maximum employment and stabilize prices (by limiting inflation). However, while central banks like the Fed have explicit inflation targets typically aiming to keep the rate at 2 percent they do not have explicit unemployment targets.
The Fed, could instead put new policies in place that make a very low unemployment rate or more aggressively, underemployment rate the new trigger for whether it decides to stimulate or hit the financial breaks on the economy. This shift would avert the risk of depressing wages and be helpful to groups in the work force who are discriminated against and often first fired, last hired. And crucially, it would reward companies for longer-term investments that promote real economic growth.
How else can the financial markets be encouraged to prioritize real, productive investment? Governments can begin to issue higher taxes on dividend payments to large shareholders of big, publicly traded companies and pair that with tax reductions on long-term investments.
Its not surprising that investors who for years looked at a landscape of sluggish-to-moderate global growth have been looking for quick financial returns rather than productive, but sometimes risky, long-term investments. Guided by shareholder demands, for the past decade businesses have focused on delivering returns quickly and predictably to investors instead of investing in longer-horizon infrastructures like research, plants and machinery that would ultimately lead to innovation and drive economic growth.
According to a 2019 report, American Investment in the 21st Century, led by Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, net private domestic investment in fixed assets like equipment, machinery and property has shrunk in half since the mid-1980s.
Higher taxes on large dividend payments and federal subsidies for long-term investments could help America reverse course.
We also need to address concentration of corporate power. To overhaul the prevailing global economic architecture, the globes leading governments will need to address the fact that many sectors airlines, banking, technology have become oligopolies dominated by just a few multinational corporations. These Gilded Age style markets reduce competition and concentrate the pricing power of large, well-connected corporations.
There have been calls to break up technology companies or to limit their scale and monopolistic tendencies. However, dozens of national regulators are pitted against global corporations that can use their multiple bases to evade rules inconvenient to them. So international regulatory cooperation will be needed to rein in the increasingly unfettered power of these multinational behemoths.
At a time when many governments seem steered by nationalism, effective cross-border cooperation is hard to imagine. However, feats of global cooperation from the past like the post-World War II establishment of the Bretton Woods systems new world order offer examples of leaders eventually meeting the moment even amid formidable challenges.
The pandemic is not just giving us a chance to rethink how to best live and work. It is also providing an opportunity to reconsider the way that the very structures of our world economy operate.
Dr. Moyo is an economist and the author of How the West Was Lost: Fifty Years of Economic Folly and the Stark Choices that Lie Ahead.
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TheWest Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR) reports as of 5:00 p.m., on July 30,2020, there have been 277,343 totalconfirmatory laboratory results received for COVID-19, with 6,422 totalcases and 115 deaths.
DHHR has confirmed the deaths of a49-year old female from Ohio County, a59-year old male from Logan County, and an 85-year old female from Logan County.Thepassing of these West Virginians is reported with a heavy heart and we extendour sympathies to their loved ones, said Bill J. Crouch, DHHR CabinetSecretary.
In alignment with updated definitions fromthe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the dashboard includes probablecases which are individuals that have symptoms and either serologic (antibody)or epidemiologic (e.g., a link to a confirmed case) evidence of disease, but noconfirmatory test.
CASESPER COUNTY (Case confirmed by lab test/Probable case):Barbour (29/0), Berkeley (615/22), Boone (71/0), Braxton (8/0), Brooke(53/1), Cabell (300/9), Calhoun (6/0), Clay (17/0), Doddridge (4/0), Fayette(124/0), Gilmer (16/0), Grant (65/1), Greenbrier (84/0), Hampshire (70/0),Hancock (89/3), Hardy (53/1), Harrison (175/1), Jackson (157/0), Jefferson(281/5), Kanawha (743/13), Lewis (25/1), Lincoln (55/1), Logan (112/0), Marion(166/4), Marshall (119/2), Mason (45/0), McDowell (20/1), Mercer (128/0),Mineral (102/2), Mingo (111/2), Monongalia (853/16), Monroe (18/1), Morgan(24/1), Nicholas (29/1), Ohio (244/0), Pendleton (36/1), Pleasants (6/1),Pocahontas (40/1), Preston (98/22), Putnam (151/1), Raleigh (151/5), Randolph(203/3), Ritchie (3/0), Roane (14/0), Summers (5/0), Taylor (45/1), Tucker(9/0), Tyler (12/0), Upshur (36/2), Wayne (176/2), Webster (3/0), Wetzel(40/0), Wirt (6/0), Wood (220/11), Wyoming (19/0).
As case surveillance continues at thelocal health department level, it may reveal that those tested in a certaincounty may not be a resident of that county, or even the state as an individualin question may have crossed the state border to be tested.
Pleasenote that delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from thelocal health department to DHHR.
Please visit thedashboard at www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more detailed information.
Facebook has prided itself on thorough moderation and removal of COVID-19 misinformation posted to its social network since March, but the company is now under fire for having failed to take action for several hours against a fast-moving viral Breitbart News video promoting dangerous coronavirus conspiracy theories and treatments over the weekend.
The company now says removal of the video took longer than expected, in a statement given to The Verge, and the company is going to investigate why. Before Facebook took action, the video featuring non-experts refusing to wear masks while touting unverified virus cures had been widely shared tens of millions of times, including by President Donald Trump and his son on Twitter. After it began gaining traction, Facebook and other social networks, including Twitter and YouTube, removed it and began trying to contain its spread through reposts.
Weve removed this video for making false claims about cures and prevention mentions for COVID-19. People who reacted to, commented on, or shared this video, will see messages directing them to authoritative information about the virus, a spokesperson says. It took us several hours to enforce against the video and were doing a review to understand why this took longer than it should have. The company says its removed more than 7 million pieces of misleading or false content related to the coronavirus between April and June.
New York Times journalist Kevin Roose, one of the first reporters to raise the alarm about the videos alarming virality, theorized that the video remained up for so long because it had been posted by Breitbart News, an organization Facebook treats as equitable to mainstream media so as to appease conservatives who often complain about social media bias. Facebook communications employee Andy Stone said that was not true, writing in a reply, This had nothing to do with newsworthiness and is not how our newsworthiness policy works.
Face masks are a simple way to help prevent the spread of the new coronavirus through talking, coughing or sneezing, scientists and public-health specialists say. But they need to be worn properly.
While some types of masks are more effective than others, public-health officials say any face coveringeven a bandannais better than nothing.
Heres how different types of masks stack up, and how they are meant to be used.
Common masks fall into three categories: cloth masks or coverings like gaiters, intended to prevent an infected person from spreading the virus by catching large droplets; surgical masks, with a more sophisticated design also meant to prevent the wearer from spreading diseases; and N95 masks, which protect the wearer as well, and fit tightly to the face.
Cloth
- Typically homemade
- Style and materials vary widely
- Prevents wearer from spreading disease
- Work in herd-immunity: the more wear masks,
the more effective they are
- Wash after use
Surgical
- Loose fit
- Prevents wearer from spreading disease
- Dispose after use
- Made from a material called polypropylene
N95
- Tight fit, must be fit tested
- Protects wearer if fitted properly
- Limited quantity
Cloth
- Typically homemade
- Style and materials vary widely
- Prevents wearer from spreading disease
- Work in herd-immunity: the more wear masks, the more effective they are
- Wash after use
Surgical
- Loose fit
- Prevents wearer from spreading disease
- Dispose after use
- Made from a material called polypropylene
N95
- Tight fit, must be fit tested
- Protects wearer if fitted properly
- Limited quantity
A good cloth mask filters well and is comfortable to breathe through.
A cloth mask should consist of three layers: an inner layer near the mouth that can get moist, a middle filtration layer and an outer layer exposed to the outside environment. Here are the materials for homemade masks that do this best, according to the World Health Organization, using a scale that combines filter quality and breathability. A higher rating is better.
How a mask fits is as important as what it is made of.
1. Check for defects in the face mask, such as tears or
broken loops
2. Place one loop over each ear. Mask will contour to face,
but not as tightly as an N95.
3. Mask should sit on bridge of nose
1. Straps rest at the back of your head. An N95 will contour
tightly to face.
2. Mold metal strip to the shape of your nose
3. Re-adjust straps or nosepiece until a
proper seal is achieved
4. Place both hands over the respirator and breathe.
If theres leakage, there is not a proper seal.
5. If you cant get a proper seal, try a different N95 size
or model.
Surgical Mask
1. Check for defects in the face mask, such as tears
or broken loops
2. Place one loop over each ear. Mask will contour
to face, but not as tightly as an N95.
3. Mask should sit on bridge of nose
N95
1. Straps rest at the back of your head. An N95
will contour tightly to face.
2. Mold metal strip to the shape of your nose
3. Re-adjust straps or nosepiece until a
proper seal is achieved
4. Place both hands over the respirator and breathe.
If theres leakage, there is not a proper seal.
5. If you cant get a proper seal, try a different
N95 size or model.
Removing a mask properly is also important to prevent the spread of the virus.
Do not touch the front of the N95 to remove your mask. This can cause contamination.
Pull the straps from the back of your head. Discard while making sure to avoid touching the respirator.
If you need to re-use an N95 mask, store it in a paper bag for five days. Then you can re-use it.
N95 masks filter out at least 95% of very small particles when worn properly, including droplets carrying viruses. Versions with a plastic valve at the center, which makes the mask easier to exhale through, are intended for industrial workers and offer protection only to the wearer.
True N95s arent easy to wear properly. They must have a tight seal to the face to ensure that all air goes through the filter instead of around the edges. But they offer the best protection against the coronavirus, which is why the WHO recommends these masks be reserved for health-care workers.
A manufacturer business name
or logo should be printed on
the mask
NIOSHname
should appear on
an official N95 respirator
N95 respirators manufactured
after September 2008, must
have a TC-Approval number
The LOT number is an identification
number that may also include the
date the mask was made. Its
recommended, but not required.
1. NIOSHname should appear on an official N95
respirator
Good morning. Donald Trumps serious new approach to the pandemic lasted all of one week. Speaking at his daily White House coronavirus briefing on Tuesday, the president described as very impressive a doctor who claims face masks do not combat the spread of Covid-19 and says DNA from aliens is being used in medical treatments.
Trump had shared an online video featuring the doctor and other supposed experts recommending the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine, and contradicting official government guidelines on the disease. The clip, which was also touted as a must-watch by the presidents son, Donald Trump Jr, has since been removed by Facebook and YouTube for containing false public health information.
Meanwhile, US officials say Russian intelligence services are using English-language websites to spread disinformation to Americans about the pandemic, as part of an ongoing effort to sow confusion before the presidential election in November.
The US attorney general clashed with Democrats on the House judiciary committee on Tuesday, as he denied the interventions of federal agents in Portland and in Washington DCs Lafayette Square were motivated by Trumps re-election efforts. The president wants footage for his campaign ads, and you appear to be serving it up to him as ordered, the committee chairman, Jerry Nadler, told Bill Barr, who insisted the federal forces cracking down on protests in Portland were not out looking for trouble.
Meanwhile in New York, there was outcry after police apparently bundled a protester into an unmarked minivan, in an arrest described by the American Civil Liberties Union as dangerous, abusive, and indefensible.
Trump is damaging Americas reputation abroad not only with his own antics, but also through those of his ambassadors, according to a report by Senate Democrats, entitled Diplomacy in Crisis. A record number of the presidents ambassadorial appointments have been political, and many such senior diplomats had no qualifications besides being big-money Republican donors, writes Julian Borger.
Woody Johnson, the billionaire Trump backer who became the US ambassador to London, has been accused of making sexist and racist remarks (which he has denied). Jeffrey Ross Gunter, the US ambassador to Iceland and a dermatologist by trade reportedly became so paranoid about security that he asked to carry a gun and to travel in an armoured car, despite the absence of security concerns in Reykjavik, the Icelandic capital.
The Five Eyes intelligence alliance could expand by adding Japan to its existing membership: the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Some British Conservative lawmakers say widening the longstanding alliance would pool key strategic resources and help to lessen the wests dependency on China.
As the Guardian continues its climate countdown in the run-up to the presidential election and to Trumps threatened withdrawal of the US from the Paris climate agreement Emily Holden examines the environmental plans of the presumptive Democratic nominee. Joe Biden has pledged to link the climate fight to jobs, by spending $2tn on clean energy as quickly as possible within four years, and transitioning the US entirely to clean electricity by 2035.
The US needs collective action and systemic change to fight the climate battle, argues Prof Michael Mann and the simplest way to start that systemic change is by voting:
Your vote will reverberate for years, as the efforts that have grown in the dark shade of the Trump administration are poised to bloom with a President Joe Biden, a climate-friendly Congress and state and local politicians who favour climate action.
The Esselen tribe of northern California has regained part of its ancestral land after 250 years, buying a 1,200-acre ranch near Big Sur, which tribal leaders say will be used for education and cultural purposes, and to conserve local flora and fauna.
Mark Zuckerberg will tell Congress companies arent bad just because they are big, when he appears with other top tech CEOs at a hearing on Wednesday, part of a major antitrust investigation into the power and size of the big tech firms.
Abortion could be decriminalised in Mexico as the result of a potentially historic supreme court ruling on Wednesday, which is hotly anticipated by activists on both sides of the countrys abortion debate.
Americans have been warned not to plant seeds from packets reportedly sent to residents in several US states from China. The seeds are thought likely to be part of a brushing scam, whereby people receive unsolicited items from a seller who then posts false customer reviews to boost sales.
The photographer snapping New Yorkers private thoughts
Photographer Jeff Mermelstein has spent most of his career emulating the classic, 35mm sidewalk reportage of Diane Arbus or Joel Meyerowitz. But for the past three years he has been pursuing a new project: capturing New Yorkers private messages as they compose them on their phones, as he explains to Alex Rayner.
The white women defecting from Trump
Trump won in 2016 with help from a crucial and somewhat unlikely demographic: white women with college degrees. Four years later, finds Adam Gabbatt, some of them bitterly regret their decision and are trying to make amends in 2020.
In a new interview, Ed Sheeran admits he used to binge-eat and vomit at the height of his fame. The revelation is a reminder that its not just women who can have a tortuous relationship with food, writes Arwa Mahdawi.
The late Steve Jobs is another example of how we mythologise rather than pathologize unhealthy eating in important men. According to his official biography, Jobs would sometimes live on only apples and carrots for weeks and would fast for days on end in an attempt to induce euphoria. That is something I did when I was 15 and it was quite rightly labelled anorexia.
Virgin Galactic has unveiled images from the interior of the VSS Unity, the craft in which the commercial space firm plans to take paying tourists to the edge of Earths atmosphere. For most of us, the photographs are the closest well get to a suborbital flight on Sir Richard Bransons passion project: tickets cost $250,000 each.
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Weve been bending over backward to report, he said.
Bruckel said Total Access Urgent Care recently changed lab companies for COVID-19 tests after a national lab, Quest Diagnostics, was sometimes taking more than 14 days to turn around results.
The company changed its primary lab company a few weeks ago and, Bruckel said, patients are now typically getting results within two to three days.
Page said the county is also working to improve its own processes by hiring three new employees to help the county notify patients of results more quickly and has been helping the state with its data entry in their antiquated system, he said.
Missouri has reported 44,823 confirmed cases and 1,213 COVID-19 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
On Tuesday, Missouri ranked 15th in the U.S. for the rate of new cases per 100,000 people in the last seven days, according to an analysis by the New York Times. Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi topped the list, and Illinois, which includes St. Louis suburbs, ranked 32nd with 78 cases per 100,000 people, compared with 143 in Missouri.
The states rate of new cases on Tuesday prompted Chicago to add Missouri to its list of 22 states with travel restrictions. Beginning Friday, Chicago will require people traveling from Missouri to quarantine for two weeks, except for essential workers who must travel over state lines. Those who do not follow the order could face fines, according to Chicago officials.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged Friday that a significant number of COVID-19 patients do not recover quickly, and instead experience ongoing symptoms, such as fatigue and cough.
As many as a third of patients who were never sick enough to be hospitalized are not back to their usual health up to three weeks after their diagnosis, the report found.
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"COVID-19 can result in prolonged illness even among persons with milder outpatient illness, including young adults," the report's authors wrote.
The acknowledgement is welcome news to patients who call themselves "long-haulers" suffering from debilitating symptoms weeks and even months after their initial infection.
"This report is monumental for all of us who have been struggling with fear of the unknown, lack of recognition and many times, a lack of belief and proper care from medical professionals during our prolonged recovery from COVID-19," Kate Porter, who is on day 129 of her recovery, wrote in an email to NBC News.
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Porter, 35, of Beverly, Massachusetts, has had low-grade fevers, fatigue, rapid heart beat, shortness of breath and memory and sleep issues since her diagnosis March 17.
"This gives me hope that we will gain access to more resources throughout our recovery and hopefully, get our lives back to what they once were," Porter wrote.
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The CDC report is based on telephone surveys of 274 COVID-19 patients. Ninety-five of those patients, or 35 percent, said they "had not returned to their usual state of health" when they were surveyed, which was at least two to three weeks after their first test.
Many with long-term symptoms are otherwise young and healthy: Among those surveyed between ages 18 and 34, about 20 percent experienced lasting symptoms.
"This report indicates that even among symptomatic adults tested in outpatient settings, it might take weeks for resolution of symptoms and return to usual health," the CDC authors wrote.
The report also pointed out that in contrast, "over 90 percent of outpatients with influenza recover within approximately two weeks" after a positive flu test.
Among the patients who experienced lasting symptoms in the CDC report, 71 percent reported fatigue, 61 percent had lasting cough, and 61 percent reported ongoing headaches.
The CDC added that preventative measures, such as physical distancing, face masks and frequent hand-washing, continue to be important to slow the spread of COVID-19.
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Erika Edwards is a health and medical news writer and reporter for NBC News and "TODAY."
