COVID-19 update from the USA

This 7 July 2020 video says about itself:

International students studying at colleges in the US will have to leave the country if all of their classes for next term are moved online because of coronavirus restrictions.

For US universities and colleges, international students are a significant source of revenue, bringing tens of billions of dollars into the economy.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren called the new rules “xenophobic“.

Al Jazeera’s Sara Khairat reports.

SUNBELT SICKENS: HOSPITALS NEAR CAPACITY Hospitals rapidly approached capacity across the Sunbelt, and the Miami area closed restaurants and gyms again because of the surging coronavirus as the U.S. emerged from a Fourth of July weekend of picnics, pool parties and beach outings that health officials fear could fuel the rapidly worsening outbreak. The seesaw of restrictions lifted, then reimposed has been seen around the country in recent weeks and is expected again after a holiday that saw crowds of people celebrating, many without masks. [AP]

FLORIDA TO OPEN ALL SCHOOLS DESPITE ROCKETING COVID-19 CASES Florida’s education commissioner ordered schools to reopen for in-person instruction in August, even as coronavirus cases jam hospitals. According to an “emergency order” signed by Commissioner Richard Corcoran, public school districts and charter school boards must open all kindergarten through 12th-grade schools for at least five days a week. Florida shut down its schools on March 17 when there was an average of 69 new COVID-19 cases a day. On Saturday, Florida tallied a record 11,400 new cases in a single 24-hour period. This comes as other states embrace restrictions, after reopening proved disastrous. [HuffPost]

Our minds aren’t equipped for this kind of reopening.

Team Trump is packed with coronavirus truthers.

FAUCI: U.S. STILL ‘KNEE DEEP’ IN FIRST WAVE Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert in the U.S., said the country is in a “serious situation” that needs immediate attention as the coronavirus surges in certain parts of the country. During a live interview streamed on Facebook, Fauci noted that the U.S. is “still knee-deep in the first wave” of the COVID-19 pandemic. “I would say this would not be considered a wave. It was a surge, or resurgence of infections superimposed upon a baseline … that really never got down to where we wanted to go,” Fauci told National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins. [HuffPost]

‘BIG GOVERNMENT’ CRITICS BENEFITED FROM CORONAVIRUS AID Longtime anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist famously said the government should be small enough to drown in a bathtub. But documents released by the Treasury Department disclosed that an ancillary arm of Norquist’s organization Americans for Tax Reform was among the millions of recipients of loans under the Paycheck Protection Program. The massive relief scheme provided loans to small businesses and enterprises that could eventually turn into grants if they keep their workers on payrolls during the coronavirus crisis. [HuffPost]

Why the Ayn Rand Institute getting a federal handout is the Rand-iest thing ever.