Military set to begin delivering vaccine shots in Philly; city to announce rollback of some COVID-19 restrictions; CDC traces outbreaks in gyms

Philadelphia students and teachers will not return to school buildings Monday, but a decision is close on when some of them might do so.

Hours after saying he remained “optimistic” that a partial reopening could begin next week as had been planned, Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. told the school board Thursday evening that the district, the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers and city officials are still finalizing negotiations with a third-party mediator on when and how to reopen.

Hite said they will announce on Monday when prekindergarten through second grade students are eligible to come back to buildings. For now, all 120,000 city students “will remain virtual until further details are announced,” Hite told the board.

Monday was to be the day about 9,000 prekindergarten through second grade students — kids whose families opted for them to return to school buildings two days a week — had been scheduled to return. It would have been the first time in nearly a year that Philadelphia public school students got in-school instruction.

The district and teachers’ union have been in negotiations with Peter Orris, a Chicago-based doctor, for two weeks. The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers had previously refused to send its members into buildings it deemed unsafe.

» READ MORE: Philly students won’t return to schools Monday after all but a reopening decision is days away

— Kristen A. Graham

Delaware County on Thursday opened a new vaccination site in Chester and was set to open a Radnor location on Friday, officials said.

When both new sites are operational, the county will have a total of four locations administering vaccinations. The two existing sites are in Yeadon and Aston.

Officials said the county has received 1,000 Moderna vaccines for this week and 2,900 for next week. The county received 1,170 first doses of the Pfizer vaccine and those will be administered at Penn Medicine Radnor because the facility has the training and cold storage needed for the vaccine, officials said.

The county so far has requested 21,370 total vaccine doses and received 10,470, officials said.

— Robert Moran

Despite a massive Moderna second-dose shortage Pennsylvania has said could delay more than 100,000 coronavirus vaccine appointments statewide, the Chester County Health Department says it has not experienced mass delays and is still aiming to administer second doses of the vaccine about 28 days after first doses, as is recommended by the CDC.

“We would only reschedule second doses if there’s another interruption,” such as a winter storm that again impacts distribution, said county health director Jeanne Franklin. She noted the department has managed its doses in such a way that first-dose appointments have also been able to continue as scheduled.

This week, Franklin said, the department got 2,340 Pfizer first doses — the first time the department has received the Pfizer shots, supply of which was unaffected by the state shortage — as well as 2,500 Moderna first doses and 3,000 Moderna second doses.

In all, Chester County’s vaccine providers have so far administered 37,844 first doses and 24,710 second doses, which include 18,459 first shots and 9,080 second ones given by the county health department, the commissioners said Thursday at a news conference. But many others are waiting for their chance to be vaccinated. More than 182,000 people who live or work in Chester County have used the county’s interest form to pre-register for a shot, the commissioners said. Of those, nearly 98,000 have been able to secure an appointment in phase 1a.

Commissioners said they are scheduling eligible people who pre-registered by Jan. 7, nearly two months ago.

”We know how frustrating and difficult this process has been for so many throughout Chester County,” said Commissioner Josh Maxwell. “There are simply more obstacles than there should be to get a vaccine.”

In an effort to mitigate the myriad issues, the county has expanded staffing and services offered at its call center, he said. Workers there now can not only answer residents’ coronavirus-related questions but also help people register their interest in getting the shot and, depending on eligibility and availability, book appointments in both English and Spanish. The Chester County call center can be reached at 610-344-6225.

— Erin McCarthy

Philadelphia announced 285 new confirmed cases of the coronavirus Thursday.

The city also announced eight additional deaths due to COVID-19. A total of 3,091 residents have died of the virus.

As of Thursday, there were 300 coronavirus patients in Philadelphia hospitals, with 42 on ventilators.

The rate of new cases, deaths, and hospitalizations have all decreased in recent weeks. Philadelphia officials have urged residents to continue wearing masks and social distancing but have also said that some pandemic restrictions could be slowly rolled back in the coming days.

— Laura McCrystal

On Thursday, Philadelphia opened its second standing COVID-19 vaccine clinic inside the gymnasium at the Community Academy of Philadelphia Charter School.

The city opened its first standing vaccine clinic on Tuesday at North Philadelphia’s Martin Luther King Jr. Older Adult Center. Health Commissioner Thomas Farley said a third would open on Saturday at the University of the Sciences in West Philadelphia.

The clinics will vaccinate Philadelphians who have been given appointments after preregistering online.

— David Maialetti

Over 24 hours last weekend, the Black Doctors COVID-19 Consortium vaccinated nearly 4,000 people, on their own surpassing the city’s daily vaccination average this month of 3,500 first doses per day.

Three out of four Philadelphians vaccinated at the city’s first round-the-clock walk-up site were people of color — a particularly notable number in a city where 55% of people who have received the vaccine are white, even though they make up just 40% of residents.

“The end goal was for everybody in line to get vaccinated, and they did,” said Ala Stanford, the group’s founder. “From that perspective, I would call it a success, but room for improvement.”

The consortium started the day with about 3,000 doses, but the city ended up delivering about 1,000 more as the group began running low early Saturday. These doses were transferred from other clinics, which the Department of Public Health would not specify, but a spokesperson said “no other clinic’s ability to function or open was impacted by these requests.”

» READ MORE: Philly Black doctors clinic outpaced the city in vaccinating Black residents, but group says there’s ‘room for improvement’

— Ellie Rushing, Oona Goodin-Smith, and Anna Orso

February is usually the peak of flu season, with doctors’ offices and hospitals packed with suffering patients. But not this year.

Flu has virtually disappeared from the U.S., with reports coming in at far lower levels than anything seen in decades.

Experts say that measures put in place to fend off the coronavirus — mask wearing, social distancing and virtual schooling — were a big factor in preventing a “twindemic” of flu and COVID-19. A push to get more people vaccinated against flu probably helped, too, as did fewer people traveling, they say.

Another possible explanation: The coronavirus has essentially muscled aside flu and other bugs that are more common in the fall and winter. Scientists don’t fully understand the mechanism behind that, but it would be consistent with patterns seen when certain flu strains predominate over others, said Dr. Arnold Monto, a flu expert at the University of Michigan.

The numbers are astonishing considering flu has long been the nation’s biggest infectious disease threat. In recent years, it has been blamed for 600,000 to 800,000 annual hospitalizations and 50,000 to 60,000 deaths.

» READ MORE: The flu has nearly disappeared in the U.S. during the pandemic

— Associated Press

Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, praised Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot COVID-19 vaccine Thursday morning, saying it will complement existing vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna.

“When you have a company like Johnson & Johnson that has a very good track record with pharmaceuticals, to have them be in the mix with the other two is nothing but good news,” Fauci said during an interview on NBC’s Today show.

Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine, which could receive FDA authorization as soon as Friday, is slightly less effective at preventing severe disease than the two-shot vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna. But the drug was found to be 100% effective in preventing COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths after 28 days, and was 85% effective against severe illness.

Fauci said all three of the vaccines are safe an effective, based on data reviewed by the FDA, and urged Americans to take the vaccine as soon as one becomes available to them.

“This is a race between the virus and getting vaccines into people. The longer someone waits to get vaccinated, the better chance the virus has to get a variant or a mutation,” Fauci said. “So the sooner we get vaccine into the arms of individuals, whatever that vaccine is, once it gets by the FDA, if it’s available to you, get it.”

— Rob Tornoe

The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell sharply last week but remained high by historical standards.

Applications for benefits declined 111,000 from the previous week to a seasonally adjusted 730,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. It is the lowest figure since late November. Still, before the virus erupted in the United States last March, weekly applications for unemployment benefits had never topped 700,000, even during the Great Recession of 2008-2009.

The latest figures come as the job market has made scant progress in the past three months. Hiring averaged just 29,000 a month from November through January. Though the unemployment rate was 6.3% in January, a broader measure that includes people who have given up on their job searches is closer to 10%.

» READ MORE: U.S. unemployment claims dropped last week to 730,000, lowest total since November

— Associated Press

Philadelphia will announce a rollback of some COVID-19 restrictions on Friday that could allow fans back into stadiums and arenas across the city, Health Commissioner Thomas Farley said Thursday.

“Probably not as many as people would like to have,” Farley cautioned in an interview on CBS3.

Farley warned that for Philadelphia to roll back its restrictions on event crowds, Pennsylvania will also have to ease its limits on gatherings, which are currently capped at 2,500 people outdoors and 500 people indoors, including players and staff. A spokesperson for Gov. Tom Wolf did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“I’m optimistic there would be some fans in the stands on Opening Day for the Phillies, but how many is something we have to see,” Farley said.

On Tuesday, Farley said the city is unlikely to change rules governing indoor catered events or restaurants. Virus case counts have dropped 80% in Philadelphia since late December, and the city has responded with a trickle of changes, including expanding dining capacity inside restaurants that install ventilation systems.

» READ MORE: Phillies fans may return to Citizens Bank Park as city relaxes some COVID-19 restrictions

— Rob Tornoe

The U.S. military on Wednesday began delivering shots at coronavirus vaccination centers in Texas and New York and announced that service members will start staffing four centers in Florida and one in Philadelphia next week.

The military is sending a 222-member team to the Pennsylvania Convention Center, which officials have said could administer about 6,000 vaccine doses a day.

“Every city in the country, including Philadelphia, is currently struggling with not having enough COVID vaccine to meet the demand of their residents, so this center will make a huge difference,” Mayor Jim Kenney said last week.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has so far approved the deployment of 25 military vaccination teams, which come in two sizes, 222 members and 139 members, and total about 4,700 service members. So far, 11 have either started or will begin next week.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has asked for 100 such teams, which would put the Defense Department on pace to deploy as many as 19,000 troops if all are needed. The troop number is almost double what federal authorities initially thought would be needed.

» READ MORE: Military begins delivering vaccines in Texas, New York, with Philadelphia up next

— Rob Tornoe and the Associated Press

A real-world test of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine in more than half a million people confirms that it’s very effective at preventing serious illness or death, even after one dose.

Wednesday’s published results, from a mass vaccination campaign in Israel, give strong reassurance that the benefits seen in smaller, limited testing persisted when the vaccine was used much more widely in a general population with various ages and health conditions.

The vaccine was 92% effective at preventing severe disease after two shots and 62% after one. Its estimated effectiveness for preventing death was 72% two to three weeks after the first shot, a rate that may improve as immunity builds over time.

It seemed as effective in folks over 70 as in younger people.

“This is immensely reassuring … better than I would have guessed,” said the Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Gregory Poland.

— Associated Press

The spread of the coronavirus across the region showed more signs of slowing Wednesday, while data indicated more than 1.2 million people had been fully vaccinated in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, with even more having received one shot and in line for the second.

More than 677,000 Pennsylvanians and 566,000 New Jerseyans have already received the two-shot doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines. As of Wednesday, the two states also both had their lowest average rate of new infections since early November. Pennsylvania was averaging 2,569 new coronavirus cases a day over the past week and New Jersey 3,029.

Thanks to the improving trends, Murphy said he may soon allow New Jersey restaurants to operate at 50% of seating capacity instead of the current 35%. He said the state was being cautious due to the variant strains of COVID-19, which health officials are monitoring.

Still, the governor urged hope: “It feels like the ground is beginning to shift into a better place.”

» READ MORE: Pa and N.J. averaging lowest new case numbers since November

— Justine McDaniel, Allison Steele, and Rob Tornoe

— John Duchneskie