Editor’s note: This is a live account of COVID-19 updates from Friday, June 11, as the day unfolded. It is no longer being updated. Click here to see all the most recent news about the pandemic, and click here to find additional resources.
As many states implement vaccine incentive programs to encourage those who haven’t yet received shots, Washington state confirmed its first round of lottery winners — including a man who walked away with $250,000.
Meanwhile, world leaders from the Group of Seven industrialized nations are meeting at their summit and are planning to share at least 1 billion coronavirus shots with struggling countries around the world.
A giddy crowd welcomes the reopening of Jazz Alley
The mood was positively giddy Thursday night at Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley as the crowd, starved for live music by the pandemic for 15 months, anticipated diva Lisa Fischer’s dramatic ascent to the stage.
Fischer sang backup vocals for years behind everyone from Roberta Flack to the Rolling Stones, but became world famous in her own right after the 2013 Oscar and Grammy-winning film “20 Steps From Stardom.”
“The energy is just amazing,” said one of the club managers, Ari Dimitriou, whose father, John, owns the club. “I’m so excited. I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to have your life back.”
And how refreshing to see the faces of those humans, too, though most of the 200 or so music-lovers there — about half a house, per COVID regulations — wore masks as they strolled between tables, as did the always-focused, fast-moving servers.
Dimitriou’s is not the first Seattle venue that features jazz to reopen — the Owl N’ Thistle Irish Pub Tuesday night jam sessions started back up several weeks ago and The Triple Door turns on the lights June 18 — but as the city’s major, go-to jazz club, Jazz Alley’s revival is big news.
Read the full story here.
California governor signs orders to roll back virus rules
SACRAMENTO, Calif. —.
Hotel industry emerges from pandemic with new business model, possibly fewer workers
As Americans travel more, they are encountering a hotel industry that has undergone dramatic transformations and might never return to its pre-pandemic business model.
Some properties, particularly in leisure-centric areas like Florida, are scrambling to find enough workers to staff bustling properties. Many others, meanwhile, have still not brought back all their workers amid a continued travel slump.
But one thing that hotels across the board are considering is whether many of their customers are willing to accept fewer services than before, such as daily room cleanings and sizable breakfast spreads, analysts say, and that might mean a smaller hotel workforce in the years following the pandemic.
The leadership of hotel brands like Hilton, Park and Host have increasingly touted savings and increased efficiency from reducing labor costs on services like cleaning in calls and presentations to investors since the economy began to recover last year.
As vaccines turn pandemic’s tide, U.S. and Europe diverge on way forward.
Thai lawmakers approve $16B in borrowing to fight COVID-19
Thailand’s House of Representatives on Thursday approved a bill that would allow the government to borrow up to $16 billion to deal with the economic fallout and medical costs of the coronavirus.
About $9.6 billion would be used for direct assistance to individuals and businesses, $5.5 billion to create jobs and stimulate the economy, and $962 million for medical equipment, research and medicine.
The government said the funding cushioned the economic blow from the pandemic, reducing the tourism-dependent economy’s contraction to about 6% from projections that had been as high as 8%.
State health officials confirm 677 new coronavirus cases
The state Department of Health (DOH) reported 677 new coronavirus cases and 12 new deaths on Friday.
The update brings the state's totals to 443,454 cases and 5,815 deaths, meaning that 1.3% of people diagnosed in Washington have died, according to the DOH. The data is as of 11:59 p.m. Thursday.
In addition, 24,762 people have been hospitalized in the state due to the virus — 32 new hospitalizations. In King County, the state's most populous, state health officials have confirmed a total of 110,911 COVID-19 diagnoses and 1,614 deaths.
Since vaccinations began in mid-December, the state and health care providers have administered 7,375,424 doses and 45.47% of Washingtonians have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to vaccination data, which the state updates on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Providers are currently giving an average of about 26,891.
CDC says masks not required outdoors at airports, train stations for fully vaccinated people.
China’s children may be next in line for COVID-19 vaccines
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Experts note that if countries are going to achieve herd immunity through their vaccination campaigns, inoculating children should be part of the plan. Doing so, however, may be easier said than done for reasons ranging from vaccine hesitancy to vaccine availability.
Why some Orthodox Jewish women won’t get vaccinated do Tewel, 18, who is the youngest of 11 children.
There is no evidence that any vaccines, including coronavirus vaccines, cause fertility problems, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And many prominent mainstream Orthodox leaders have advised their communities to get the coronavirus vaccine.
But in ultra-Orthodox circles in New York, where women marry at a younger age and birthrates dwarf those of the general population, the spread of unsubstantiated rumors about the vaccine’s potential adverse effects on fertility and pregnancy have been particularly effective in dissuading young women from getting the vaccine, interviews with health officials and community members show.
You’ve earned that time off. What to know about using it, post-vaccine
Even before the coronavirus pandemic fundamentally changed how we live and work, Americans have never been very good at taking days off. The pandemic further tipped the scales of our work-life imbalance.
“The concept of being totally removed from work has become really foreign,” says Andrea Bonior, a clinical psychologist who writes an advice column, Ask Dr. Andrea, for The Washington Post. “We’ve been absorbed in this little work-life murky blob that swirled everything together.”
Because of lockdowns and travel restrictions, the potential for days off was limited. Many felt like vacation time would be wasted if it was not spent traveling. But now with the world’s borders reopening for tourism, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention saying that vaccinated people are able to travel with less risk, taking paid time off (PTO) is looking more appealing than ever.
After a year of not going anywhere, travelers may have forgotten best practices for requesting time off — or have new anxieties due to the pandemic.
Here’s what to keep in mind as you begin putting in your vacation requests.
Tokyo Olympics still undecided on allowing fans at Games.
“Thinking in a different way, I think it’s an option to suggest to people to enjoy the games on TV — like teleworking,” said Dr. Nobuhiko Okabe, director general of the Kawasaki City Institute for Public Health. “We could suggest a different way of enjoying the games.”
U.S. vaccine surplus grows by the day as expiration dates loom 800,000 doses on shelves but is administering only 4,500 a day and has 27,000 Pfizer and Moderna doses that are set to expire at the end of the month.
FDA tells Johnson & Johnson to throw out 60 million doses from troubled plant
After weeks of review of a troubled Baltimore factory, federal regulators have decided that about 60 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine produced there must be discarded.
For weeks the FDA has been trying to figure out what to do about at least 170 million doses of vaccine that were left in limbo after the discovery of a major production mishap involving two vaccines manufactured at the site.
More than 100 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and at least 70 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were put on hold after Emergent discovered in March that its workers had contaminated a batch of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine with a key ingredient used to produce AstraZeneca’s.
UK economy edges to pre-pandemic levels as lockdown eased
The easing of lockdown restrictions in April helped the British economy grow at its fastest rate since July 2020 and recoup further ground lost during the coronavirus pandemic, official figures showed Friday..
VP Harris making Southern stops to promote vaccination
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The visits mark the launch of a national tour that’s part of of the White House’s “month of action,” announced by President Joe Biden last week to urge more Americans to get vaccinated before the July 4 holiday.
Who's still dying of COVID in the U.S.?
Deaths from COVID-19 have dropped 90% in the United States since their peak in January, according to provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As the nation reopens and restrictions are lifted, however, the virus continues to kill hundreds of people daily.
After the first vaccines were authorized for emergency use in December, with priority given to senior populations before younger groups, the share of those dying who were 75 or older started dropping immediately.
Now, about half of COVID-19 deaths are people aged 50 to 74, compared with only a third in December.
Catch up on the past 24 hours
How COVID-19 is hitting Washington's youngest residents: The CDC's director is "deeply concerned" by rising hospitalization rates in teens nationwide, so we took a look at how Washington's numbers stack up when it comes to serious COVID-19 cases and vaccinations in youth. Our FAQ also explains when kids under 12 will be able to get vaccines.
Washington's first vaccine lottery winner got lucky twice, he explained as he claimed a $250,000 jackpot yesterday. Time is ticking as the lottery tries to reach the winners of smaller prizes, so check your voicemail.
The Washington State Fair in Puyallup will make a comeback in September after its first cancellation in nearly 80 years, and tickets for concerts with big-name headliners go on sale today. Organizers are providing a few other clues about what to expect.
Two passengers have tested positive for COVID-19 on the first North American cruise since the pandemic started.