This is the Coronavirus Briefing, an informed guide to the global outbreak. Sign up here to get the briefing by email.
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India reported 941 coronavirus deaths on Monday, taking the country’s death toll past 50,000.
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Get the latest updates here, as well as maps and trackers for U.S. metro areas and vaccines in development.
School’s in session, mostly from home
It’s back-to-school week for large portions of the United States, and local school districts are finally putting their pandemic education plans into action.
Among the most ambitious is a sweeping plan from the Los Angeles school district, which announced that it would test nearly 700,000 students and 75,000 employees over the next few months.
Even with the herculean effort, Los Angeles, along with most major public school districts in the country other than New York City, will be starting the school year remotely.
For the four million children in the U.S. without internet access, many of whom are Black, Latino or Indigenous, school this semester will be fantasy. Other locations facing the same connectivity issues are turning to a vintage technology to reach students: television.
In Mexico, Peru, Tanzania and Indonesia, governments are hiring local celebrities, news hosts and teachers to create engaging and educational material for students from preschool to high school. For more effective lessons, they’re using tools of professional broadcasts — high-quality sets, script writers and 3-D animations — and many say they are following the cardinal rule of the YouTube era: the shorter and snazzier, the better.
While television lessons are not as valuable as online interactions with teachers and other students, experts say, educational broadcasts can help children’s academic progress, their success in the job market and even their social development.
In other education developments
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The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill became the first big university to cancel in-person learning after classes had begun. One week into the semester, officials said 177 students had been isolated after coronavirus testing, with hundreds more in quarantine.
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Schools in Belgium will open full time in September after officials said the benefits of in-person education outweighed the risks posed by the pandemic.
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For many college students this fall, their dorms will be their childhood bedrooms. Here’s how parents can help make the experience easier for everyone.
Encouraging news on herd immunity
Scientists are changing the way they think about herd immunity. That could be good news for cities that have already been through severe outbreaks.
Early in the pandemic, researchers estimated that perhaps 70 percent of a population would need to be protected from the virus — either by vaccine or already having been infected — to prevent large outbreaks. But that number has recently come down, our colleague Apoorva Mandavilli reports.
“Over the past few weeks, more than a dozen scientists told me they now felt comfortable saying that herd immunity probably lies from 45 percent to 50 percent,” Apoorva wrote in today’s edition of The Morning. “If they’re right, then we may be a lot closer to turning back this virus than we initially thought.”
What changed? Since March, researchers have created more sophisticated immunity models that factor in demographics and social patterns — taking into account, for example, how older people tend to socialize in smaller groups than young people.
“It may also mean that pockets of New York City, London, Mumbai and other cities may already have reached the threshold, and may be spared a devastating second wave,” Apoorva wrote.
The Coronavirus Outbreak ›
Frequently Asked Questions
Updated August 17, 2020
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Why does standing six feet away from others help?
- The coronavirus spreads primarily through droplets from your mouth and nose, especially when you cough or sneeze. The C.D.C., one of the organizations using that measure, bases its recommendation of six feet on the idea that most large droplets that people expel when they cough or sneeze will fall to the ground within six feet. But six feet has never been a magic number that guarantees complete protection. Sneezes, for instance, can launch droplets a lot farther than six feet, according to a recent study. It's a rule of thumb: You should be safest standing six feet apart outside, especially when it's windy. But keep a mask on at all times, even when you think you’re far enough apart.
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I have antibodies. Am I now immune?
- As of right now, that seems likely, for at least several months. There have been frightening accounts of people suffering what seems to be a second bout of Covid-19. But experts say these patients may have a drawn-out course of infection, with the virus taking a slow toll weeks to months after initial exposure. People infected with the coronavirus typically produce immune molecules called antibodies, which are protective proteins made in response to an infection. These antibodies may last in the body only two to three months, which may seem worrisome, but that’s perfectly normal after an acute infection subsides, said Dr. Michael Mina, an immunologist at Harvard University. It may be possible to get the coronavirus again, but it’s highly unlikely that it would be possible in a short window of time from initial infection or make people sicker the second time.
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I’m a small-business owner. Can I get relief?
- The stimulus bills enacted in March offer help for the millions of American small businesses. Those eligible for aid are businesses and nonprofit organizations with fewer than 500 workers, including sole proprietorships, independent contractors and freelancers. Some larger companies in some industries are also eligible. The help being offered, which is being managed by the Small Business Administration, includes the Paycheck Protection Program and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program. But lots of folks have not yet seen payouts. Even those who have received help are confused: The rules are draconian, and some are stuck sitting on money they don’t know how to use. Many small-business owners are getting less than they expected or not hearing anything at all.
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What are my rights if I am worried about going back to work?
- Employers have to provide a safe workplace with policies that protect everyone equally. And if one of your co-workers tests positive for the coronavirus, the C.D.C. has said that employers should tell their employees -- without giving you the sick employee’s name -- that they may have been exposed to the virus.
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What is school going to look like in September?
- It is unlikely that many schools will return to a normal schedule this fall, requiring the grind of online learning, makeshift child care and stunted workdays to continue. California’s two largest public school districts — Los Angeles and San Diego — said on July 13, that instruction will be remote-only in the fall, citing concerns that surging coronavirus infections in their areas pose too dire a risk for students and teachers. Together, the two districts enroll some 825,000 students. They are the largest in the country so far to abandon plans for even a partial physical return to classrooms when they reopen in August. For other districts, the solution won’t be an all-or-nothing approach. Many systems, including the nation’s largest, New York City, are devising hybrid plans that involve spending some days in classrooms and other days online. There’s no national policy on this yet, so check with your municipal school system regularly to see what is happening in your community.
A closer look: New York’s leaders are consumed by the likelihood that, any day now, their numbers will begin rising.
Resurgences
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New Zealand said that it would postpone its national election by four weeks because of a cluster of new virus cases in Auckland, its largest city.
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Australia had its deadliest day of the pandemic, reporting 25 deaths in 24 hours, all in the state of Victoria.
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In South Korea, a pastor whose church is at the center of a new outbreak in Seoul has tested positive.
Here’s a roundup of restrictions in all 50 states.
What else we’re following
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According to a New York Times survey, nearly six in 10 Americans who are out of work because of the pandemic say they do not expect to return to their old job.
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Covid-19 is now the No. 3 cause of death in the U.S., after heart disease and cancer, CNN reports.
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Doctors are battling the coronavirus and misinformation, saying they regularly treat people more inclined to believe what they read on Facebook than what a medical professional tells them.
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A small study prompted fears that neck gaiters could spread more virus droplets than they stop. But new research shows that those face coverings can protect just as well as other cloth masks.
What you’re doing
My wife and I have weekly date nights. Our travel bug has got us taking virtual trips each week. One of us chooses a country to “travel” to and the other arranges a dish and beverage from that country and chooses a movie or documentary to watch that takes place in that part of the world.
— Andy Otto, Decatur, Ga.
Let us know how you’re dealing with the outbreak. Send us a response here, and we may feature it in an upcoming newsletter.
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