OFFICIALS RELEASE EDITED VIRUS REOPENING GUIDANCE

U.S. health officials on Thursday released some of their long-delayed guidance that schools, businesses and other organizations can use as states reopen from coronavirus shutdowns.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted six one-page “decision tool” documents that use traffic signs and other graphics to tell organizations what they should consider before reopening.

The tools are for schools, workplaces, camps, child care centers, mass transit systems, and bars and restaurants. The CDC originally also wrote a document for churches and other religious facilities, but that wasn’t posted Thursday. The agency declined to say why.

Calgary Zoo returning pandas to China because of bamboo shortage. The Calgary Zoo will be returning two giant pandas on loan from China because a scarcity of flights due to COVID-19 has caused problems with getting enough fresh and tasty bamboo to feed them.

Er Shun and Da Mao arrived in Calgary in 2018 after spending five years at the Toronto Zoo and were to remain in the Alberta city until 2023.

The zoo’s president, Clement Lanthier, said Thursday the facility spent months trying to overcome transportation barriers in acquiring fresh bamboo and decided it’s best for the animals to be in China, where their main food source is abundant. Bamboo is rare in Canada, and they prefer only certain kinds.

“They are picky,” Lanthier said. “There’s a reason why they are endangered. They need their bamboo. That’s all they do. They eat bamboo and they sleep.”

Strong typhoon slams into pandemic-hit Philippines. A strong typhoon slammed into the eastern Philippines on Thursday, knocking out power and threatening food crops in a new emergency for a country overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Typhoon Vongfong blew into Eastern Samar province at noon with fierce rain and wind as tens of thousands of people were being evacuated to safety in provinces along its northwestward path through the country’s most populous region.

There were no immediate reports of casualties or major damage.

After landfall, the storm maintained its maximum sustained winds of about 96 miles per hour, but its gusts intensified to 158 mph, weather agency administrator Vicente Malano said.

Virus whistle-blower tells lawmakers U.S. lacks vaccine plan.

Whistle-blower Rick Bright warned a congressional committee Thursday that the U.S. lacks a plan to produce and fairly distribute a coronavirus vaccine when it becomes available.

Bright alleges he was ousted from a high-level scientific post after warning the Trump administration to prepare for the pandemic.

Bright said, “We don’t have (a vaccine plan) yet, and it is a significant concern.” Asked if lawmakers should be worried, he responded, “absolutely.”

Bright, a vaccine expert who led a biodefense agency in the Department of Health and Human Services, said the country needs a plan to establish a supply chain for producing tens of millions of doses of a vaccine and allocating and distributing them fairly.

He said experience so far with an antiviral drug that has been found to benefit COVID-19 patients has not given him much confidence about distribution. Hospital pharmacies have reported problems getting limited supplies.

President Donald Trump on Thursday dismissed Bright in a tweet as “a disgruntled employee, not liked or respected by people I spoke to and who, with his attitude, should no longer be working for our government!”

It’s a sentiment some of the president’s allies have expressed about Dr. Anthony Fauci as well.