Don’t let up on virus, Biden urges leaders

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Monday implored leaders of state and local governments to continue requiring facial coverings in public in an effort to curb coronavirus infections that are again on the rise across the country.

“This is deadly serious,” he said.

The president made his plea during remarks Monday as more states, counties and cities are lifting their mask mandates and relaxing other restrictions.

“Please, this is not politics,” Biden said. “Reinstate the mandate if you let it down, and businesses should require masks as well. The failure to take this virus seriously is precisely what got us into this mess in the first place.”

Biden’s remarks came after Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, warned of rising caseloads in the U.S., describing a feeling of “impending doom” while reflecting on her experience treating covid-19 patients who were alone at the end of their lives.

“We have so much to look forward to, so much promise and potential of where we are and so much reason for hope,” she said during a White House news briefing, her voice breaking at times. “But right now, I’m scared.”

Cases of the virus are up about 10% over the past week, to about 60,000 cases

per day, with both hospitalizations and deaths ticking up as well, Walensky said. She said that without immediate action, the U.S. could follow European countries into another spike in cases and suffer needless deaths.

“I have to share the truth, and I have to hope and trust you will listen,” she said.

States ending mandates include Iowa, Mississippi and Texas, where a legal battle over local control of public health orders is playing out.

Biden also laid out new steps to expand vaccinations, with all adults to become eligible over the next five weeks. And he urged seniors who have not yet been vaccinated to get shots, announcing a new effort by the Department of Health and Human Services that will make “millions of dollars” available to provide assistance, including transportation, to the elderly and people with disabilities.

He said the administration is aware that there are people among those populations who want to be vaccinated but can’t get a ride to a site, noting what has emerged as a significant obstacle to inoculating communities of color.

“We cannot let transportation be a barrier to any senior getting a vaccination,” he said.

Biden said the funding would probably go to community groups already working to help people get their shots.

“Neighbors helping neighbors,” he said. “What a truly American effort.”

Biden responded with a simple “yes” when asked whether he thinks some states should pause their reopening efforts.

STATES REOPENING

Hot spots have started to emerge in the United States, with some states seeing numbers creep up after weeks of declining counts. Some states are racing to reopen and lifting mask mandates in the process, including Mississippi and Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott boasted about opening “100%.”

Biden said he would reiterate his call for every “governor, mayor and local leader to maintain and reinstate the mask mandate.”

He said that until the nation is vaccinated, “each of us has to do our part. We have an obligation, patriotic obligation. Wash your hands, stay socially distanced, wear a mask as recommended by the CDC, and get vaccinated. Get your friends and family vaccinated when you can help.”

He added: “Now’s not the time to let down; now’s not the time to celebrate.”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Monday that the only way to end the pandemic is for everyone to get vaccinated, and he issued a special plea to reluctant men in his party.

“I can say as a Republican man, as soon as it was my turn, I took the vaccine. I would encourage all Republican men to do that,” McConnell told reporters after a visit to the Appalachian Regional Healthcare Hazard Clinic in Hazard, Ky.

McConnell, a polio survivor, said it was a “modern medical miracle” that three vaccines — from Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson — were produced in less than a year, and he highlighted their efficacy. He urged everyone to get a shot.

“The only way this ends is with the vaccine,” McConnell said.

He was pressed about the resistance of some Americans to getting vaccinated, with surveys showing that members of the GOP are particularly wary. McConnell said there was “no good argument” against vaccination.

EVICTION MORATORIUM

The Biden administration is extending a federal moratorium on evictions of tenants who have fallen behind on rent during the pandemic.

The CDC on Monday moved to continue the pandemic-related protection, which had been scheduled to expire Wednesday. The moratorium is now extended through the end of June.

The ban provides protection for renters out of concern that having families lose their homes and move into shelters or share crowded conditions with relatives or friends would further spread the virus, which has killed nearly 550,000 people in the United States.

To be eligible for the housing protection, renters must annually earn $198,000 or less for couples filing jointly, or $99,000 for single filers; demonstrate that they’ve sought government help to pay the rent; declare that they can’t pay because of covid-19 hardships; and affirm they are likely to become homeless if evicted.

In February, Biden extended a ban on housing foreclosures to June 30 to help struggling homeowners.

Housing advocates generally expected the extension of the tenant eviction moratorium and had been lobbying the administration, saying it was too early in the country’s economic recovery to let the ban lapse.

John Pollock, coordinator of the National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel, said the moratorium “is vital for ensuring there is enough time for Congress’s emergency rental assistance to reach the millions of renters in need who would otherwise be evicted.”

Pollock said current surveys show that 18.4% of all tenants owe back rent. That number also revealed significant racial disparity: The percentage of Black tenants behind on their rent was 32.9%.

But Pollock and other housing advocates were disappointed that Biden merely extended the ban without addressing several issues that put many tenants at risk of eviction.

“In Massachusetts, judges have green-lighted over 1,700 evictions under the federal eviction moratorium. While it is protecting some families, it’s clearly not protecting all,” said Denise Matthews-Turner, interim executive director of City Life/Vida Urbana, a grassroots housing justice organization in Boston.

“The extension is a good thing,” she said, “but it’s disappointing that the moratorium wasn’t also strengthened to keep families from falling through the cracks, such as families with nofault evictions or whose landlords won’t accept rent relief.”

Diane Yentel, president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, said she and others had pushed to make the ban’s protections automatic and universal. Currently, tenants have to actively take steps to invoke the ban’s protections, which can lead to exploitation of those who don’t know their rights or don’t understand the process.

Also, some jurisdictions have allowed landlords to initiate the eviction process in court, a tactic that scared many families into leaving rather than having the eviction proceedings, even unfinished ones, on their records.

PREVENTING INFECTIONS

Meanwhile, government researchers said the covid-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna effectively prevented coronavirus infections, not just illness, with substantial protection evident two weeks after the first dose.

Two doses of the vaccines provide as much as 90% protection against infection, according to data from the CDC study published Monday. Earlier clinical trials had established that the shots also prevent illness, hospitalizations and deaths.

The study adds to evidence that new vaccines made with messenger RNA technology actually reduce the spread of the virus in real-world conditions. An earlier study in Israel found that a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine reduced infections by as much as 85%.

The CDC studied a group of about 4,000 frontline workers — including health care personnel, first responders, teachers and service workers — from mid-December to mid-March as vaccines rolled out widely.

Participants were tested for covid-19 weekly and surveyed for reports of symptoms. The researchers compared the frequency of covid-19 infections before and after vaccinations to estimate how effective the shots were at preventing the disease’s spread, regardless of whether people felt sick.

Both the vaccines require two doses spaced weeks apart. Two weeks after the first dose, the shots appeared to prevent 80% of infections; that rose to 90% two weeks after the second dose, when people were considered fully immunized.

CANADA’S CONCERNS

Canada has suspended use of another vaccine, from Oxford University and AstraZeneca, for people younger than 55 over concern it might be linked to rare blood clots.

The National Advisory Committee on Immunization had recommended the pause for safety reasons, and the Canadian provinces, which administer health care in the country, announced the suspension Monday.

“There is substantial uncertainty about the benefit of providing AstraZeneca covid-19 vaccines to adults under 55 given the potential risks,” said Dr. Shelley Deeks, vice chair of the National Advisory Committee on Immunization.

Deeks said the updated recommendations come after new data from Europe suggested the risk of blood clots is now potentially as high as one in 100,000, much higher than the one in 1 million risk believed before.

She said most of the patients in Europe who developed clots after receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine were women younger than 55, and the fatality rate among those who develop clots is as high as 40%.

Dr. Joss Reimer of Manitoba’s Vaccine Implementation Task Force said the rare type of blood clot typically happens between four and 20 days after getting the shot, and the symptoms can mirror a stroke or heart attack.

“While we still believe the benefits for all ages outweigh the risks, I’m not comfortable with probably. I want to see more data coming out of Europe so I know exactly what this risk-benefit analysis is,” Reimer said.

The AstraZeneca shot, which has been authorized in more than 70 countries, is a pillar of the U.N.-backed project known as COVAX that aims to get vaccines to poorer countries. It has also become a key tool in European countries’ efforts to boost their sluggish vaccine rollouts.

Canada’s top health agency said it has not received any reports of blood clots stemming from the vaccine, and the department’s chief medical adviser, Dr. Supriya Sharma, said she still believes the vaccine’s benefits outweigh the risks.

Information for this article was contributed by Paulina Firozi, Reis Thebault and Donna Cassata of The Washington Post; by Zeke Miller, Jonathan Lemire, Ashraf Khalil, Michael Casey and Rob Gillies of The Associated Press; and by John Tozzi of Bloomberg News (WPNS).