Over the past few months, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) was criticized for playing it too cautiously with its Covid-19 guidance. The agency had recommended people wear masks outdoors, even kids in the outdoor heat of summer camp. It has overestimated the risk of outdoor spread and surface transmission. It was too […]
The future of America’s Covid-19 epidemic can now be distilled into this: long-term confidence and hope, but short-term uncertainty and, perhaps, even despair. Vaccines are rolling out quickly, setting up the country to crush the outbreaks that have warped our lives for the past year. But in the short term, perhaps the next month, the […]
In the coming months, America could reach a point when it has more Covid-19 vaccines than people want. Between efforts from the federal government and drug companies to step up manufacturing and distribution, the US’s vaccine supply is truly increasing: At least 150 million doses are expected through March — a rate of more than […]
This winter is brutal. The cold weather has made it hard to socialize outdoors, coronavirus variants are spreading, and the US is about to surpass half a million Covid-19 deaths. Many of us are feeling anxious about how we’re going to make it through the lonely, bleak weeks ahead. I see a lot of people […]
We’ve reached half a million deaths from the coronavirus in the US. But most of these deaths — and the grueling medical ordeals leading up to them — have remained largely hidden from view. The majority of terminally ill Covid-19 patients typically spend their last days or weeks isolated in ICUs to keep the virus […]
The power was still out in my Dallas housing complex early last Tuesday, so I grabbed the survival hatchet from my emergency bag to chop up a couple of fallen trees, which were covered with six inches of down-soft snow dropped by Winter Storm Uri. The trees broke easily, and after 30 minutes of hacking, […]
A panel of expert advisers to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) voted unanimously on Friday afternoon to recommend the one-dose Covid-19 vaccine developed by Johnson & Johnson for an emergency use authorization. The next step is for the FDA to accept the recommendation, which could happen as soon as this weekend, clearing the way […]
The Senate on Wednesday took an important step forward on limiting emissions — and meeting its commitments to curb global warming — by voting to limit the unbridled release of methane molecules, often a byproduct of natural gas production, into the atmosphere. The 52-42 vote reinstates the Oil and Natural Gas New Source Performance Standards, […]
The Covid-19 pandemic now appears to be the worst it has ever been, with daily new cases worldwide topping 800,000 several times over the past week. More new cases have been reported in the past two weeks than in the first six months of the crisis. More than one in three of these new cases […]
The Biden administration has announced that it will work with the World Trade Organization (WTO) to negotiate a deal to suspend intellectual property rights associated with the Covid-19 vaccines — a surprise move for the administration, which had initially resisted taking such a step. The reversal came as Covid-19 deaths are mounting in India and […]