From parking to concessions, here are the safety protocols you’ll see in Washington area airports

Before the pandemic, most travelers paid little attention to the business operations of an airport. Your gate number and its proximity to the wine bar probably mattered more than who wipes down the security checkpoint bins or disinfects the parking lot shuttle buses. However, the coronavirus has created a heightened awareness of protective protocols, with travelers wondering who is responsible for implementing measures that will stymie the spread. In anticipation of our return to the skies, we reached out to the three Washington-area airports to better understand how the different agencies and entities are keeping the traveling public safe. For updates, check the websites of the airports and airlines. Parking Reagan National [Iceland plans to welcome back tourists by June 15] Main terminal and baggage claim The MWAA oversees these areas at Dulles and National and is adhering to the guidelines issued by several federal and state agencies including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Virginia Department of Health. The airports are paying extra attention to such high-touch areas as handrails, escalators, elevator buttons and restroom doors. Signage in public spaces, such as the baggage claim area, shares hygienic tips advocated by the CDC. The terminals are open only to ticketed passengers, airport employees and visitors meeting arriving passengers. BWI has also restricted access to its terminal to ticketed passengers and airport staff. Since the outbreak, the cleaning crew has doubled down on handrails, elevator buttons and other oft-handled surfaces. Top Dog Services, a contractor based in Montgomery County, is using electrostatic cleaning in the terminal. Concessions MarketPlace Development, which runs the food and retail shops at the Virginia airports, has closed many of its businesses during the pandemic. Passengers can choose among 11 dining and convenience stores at National and 18 establishments at Dulles. (The numbers can change by day or per demand.) No full-service dining options are currently available, only grab-and-go at the news stands and takeout at the restaurants. Sidney Woods, senior director of marketing at MarketPlace, said the concessions are following CDC guidelines. For instance, all employees wear masks. The company has also installed signs and markers to encourage social distancing and switched to contact-less payment methods, such as self-checkout. At BWI, the individual food and retail vendors are responsible for cleaning their areas. Many have temporarily closed or reduced their hours and altered their dining experience to takeout (Silver Diner) or limited


Old homes and old friends in a historic Anne Arundel County neighborhood

from St. John Lutheran Church,” Glendenning said. The fair, hosted by the Woman’s Club of Linthicum Heights, occurs the last Saturday in September and features food, games, rides and music. The Woman’s Club of Linthicum Heights, a local volunteer organization, also hosts a free summer concert-in-the-park series for residents. When her mother lived with her, Kacey Wetzel would walk to the park with her to hear the concerts, a memory she treasures. Before Baltimore-Washington International Marshall Airport and Interstates 295 and 695 were built, farms and forests surrounded Linthicum Heights. “Back where the airport parking is was all just land and woods, we used to ride our horses all through there,” said Lynn Nichols, a real estate agent with Fathom Realty, who grew up in the area and has been selling homes there since 2007. The airport, which began operating in 1950, is just south of the neighborhood. Despite the closeness of the airport, most residents say noise from the planes isn’t a problem, and many have adjusted to it. “The noise is not bad at all,” David Coleman said. “I think that they changed the flight paths so they don’t actually fly directly over the homes.” Karmen Grey, left, and Candace Alexander, right, walk on the BWI trail in Linthicum Heights. (Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/For The Washington Post) Major transportation routes through the area have increased, leading some older residents to worry about the potential for more. A proposal for a high-speed superconducting magnetic levitation train between Washington and Baltimore has met with opposition from the Linthicum-Shipley Improvement Association. Some residents also have expressed concern about what they see as a link between crime and transit service. Although the coronavirus is keeping most would-be home buyers inside, real estate has been thriving in Linthicum Heights. “Sales have been up, pricing has increased, and inventory is very low, with only 1.1 months of inventory,” Nichols said. “It is clearly a seller’s market.” Living there: Santo and Diana Difrancesca walk around their neighborhood in Linthicum Heights. (Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/For The Washington Post) According to Nichols, 157 homes have sold in Linthicum Heights in the past year. The lowest-priced was a two-bedroom, one-bathroom house for $138,175. The highest-priced was a four-bedroom, three-bathroom house for $524,570. The average sales price was around $315,000. There are 17 properties for sale, ranging from a five-bedroom, two-bathroom home for $265,000 to a four-bedroom, two-bathroom home for $599,900. Schools: Transit:


Hot spots erupt, researchers warn of 2nd wave in South

20 leading pandemic models, developed by biostatistician Nicholas Reich of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, shows a gradual decline in projected covid-19 deaths over the next four weeks, from about 9,000 this week to 4,000 in the second week of June. His model shows that by mid-June, the U.S. should expect to reach 113,000 deaths. But Reich said Wednesday that this is a particularly difficult phase of the pandemic to capture in models because of uncertainty about how people will behave as restrictions are lifted. “There’s so much complexity and so much that could change,” Reich said. Some communities seem to be abiding better by social distancing, Rubin said. They include Denver, Colorado Springs, Columbus, Ohio, and the Research Triangle of North Carolina, all of which look good in the new forecast. But South Florida, which has the bulk of that state’s cases, looks worrisome in the four-week projection, Rubin said. “That Southeast coast, they’re just starting to open up and relax. It’s a densely crowded area. There’s a lot of tinder down there,” he said. Alabama will probably see a steep increase in cases in nearly every county over the next month, according to the PolicyLab model. State Health Officer Scott Harris said this week that Alabama’s numbers were “not as good as we could hope for.” The state began easing its stay-at-home order and other restrictions this month. Gov. Kay Ivey (R), who has allowed restaurants, bars, retail businesses, churches, gyms and salons to reopen, is expected to outline further steps this week. In a news conference Wednesday, Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed said the city is facing a shortage of intensive care beds and being forced to divert patients to Birmingham. “They’re at a capacity that is not sustainable,” he said. “Our health-care system is maxed out.” In upstate Monroe County, N.Y., home to the city of Rochester, hospitalizations of covid-19 patients have risen by about 70 percent over the past 10 days and 18 percent since reopening began on Friday. PolicyLab projects that cases in Monroe County will rise through the end of May before falling precipitously through mid-June. Michael D. Mendoza, Monroe County’s public health commissioner, told reporters Tuesday that he believed hospitalizations have risen in large part because the county dramatically increased testing in May and is doing more testing in nursing homes and in hospitals. The number of covid-19 patients in intensive care


The Technology 202: Elon Musk's re-opening win could have long-term consequences for the company's reputation

in Menlo Park, Calif. (Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images) Staff will also be required to wear masks, Mark Gurman and Kurt Wagner at Bloomberg News report. The company does not plan on offering covid-19 testing and is encouraging employees who are able to work from home to do so through 2021. More coronavirus news: Utah Spent $2.75 Million On A Contact Tracing App That Only 40,000 People Have Used Healthy Together was supposed to help the state reopen. But very few people are using it. BuzzFeed News Your face mask selfies could be training the next facial recognition tool Researchers are crawling the internet for photos of people wearing face masks to improve facial recognition algorithms. CNET Trending Go read this Twitter thread classifying every animated Disney movie song Prepare for Disney songs to be stuck in your head. The Verge Everyone's comparing their plans for 2020 to reality in this sad meme It's not looking great. Mashable How Covid-19 Is Changing the Language in Emails Work emails during the coronavirus pandemic must walk a fine line between being sensitive and oversharing. Wall Street Journal Rant and rave Bloomberg Beta's Roy Bahat expressed doubt that the denizens of Twitter still kept their morning routines. I no longer believe any of you who claim you have morning routinesCome @ me — Roy E. Bahat (@roybahat) May 19, 2020 “Billions” co-creator Brian Koppelman, who has started a trend of users tweeting their morning coffee to encourage food bank donations, disagreed: No really, man. I really do. I’ll walk you through it after this podcast I’m recording. — Brian Koppelman (@briankoppelman) May 19, 2020 What are your thoughts? Send us your morning routine tips on Twitter! Daybook Data and Society Institute will host a digital discussion on the future of labor organizing today at 6 p.m. The House Homeland Security Committee will host a panel on extremism during the pandemic today at 1 p.m. Before you log off Broadway legend Mandy Patinkin is every parent explaining Internet culture: Pop culture quiz pt 2 (Pizza Rat, TikTok) pic.twitter.com/S0adWvTNqd — Mandy Patinkin (@PatinkinMandy) May 19, 2020 h5{font:bold 24px/125% 'FranklinPro', sans-serif !important;text-transform: initial;margin-bottom:10px !important;}p + h5 {margin-top:32px !important;}blockquote p{font-style:italic !important; border-left:solid 5px #ccc !important;padding: 0 0 0 15px !important;margin-bottom:35px !important;}.signup-box-rr p{font:bold 22px/115% 'PostoniWide', serif !important;}#newsletter-signUp-button{width: auto !important;padding: 11px 14px !important;}.signup-box-rr .nl-wrapper{padding: 20px 0px !important;border-bottom: 1px solid #ccc !important;border-top: 1px solid #ccc !important;}@media only screen and (max-width: 61.9375em){ h5{margin-left:6%;margin-right:5%;}}


Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states reimpose strict measures after coronavirus spikes during Ramadan

tracking app to monitor those who come into contact with people who test positive for the virus. Noncompliance can be punished with three years in jail and a fine of up to $55,000. The three other Gulf Arab countries — the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Bahrain — had also eased restrictions at the onset of Ramadan, an especially social month when pious and impious alike make social calls and hold dinner parties. All those countries have now seen the number of infections surge. Public health officials believe many of the new cases are in the large communities of foreign workers, who represent a major part of the labor force in these six countries. After Saudi Arabia recorded its first coronavirus case on March 2, the public health response was swift. The deeply religious kingdom barred Muslims from conducting daily prayers inside mosques, and pilgrimages to the holy sites of Mecca and Medina were halted. International flights were suspended, most major cities were placed under 24-hour lockdowns, most public places were closed and curfews were put in place. Muslims pray during the Laylat al-Qadr, or Night of Power, the holiest night for Muslims, while practicing social distancing, following the outbreak of the coronavirus, during Ramadan, at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. (Saudi Press Agency/Reuters) In the third week of April, the kingdom was recording an average of around 1,200 cases a day. That same week, King Salman issued a royal order shifting to “a partial curfew,” easing restrictions during Ramadan, which began April 24. Maintaining restrictions looked to be difficult during the month, when practicing Muslims abstain from eating and drinking from sunrise till sunset. People tend to crowd restaurants from dusk until daybreak. Some provinces reopened. Construction companies and factories kicked back into gear, and shopping malls, the main hangout for Saudi residents, flung open their doors. The order urged people, however, to avoid gatherings of more than five people and imposed penalties on those who break the rule. The number of reported infections immediately began to increase and have averaged 2,400 cases a day over the past seven days. Last week, the Saudi health ministry announced that four families were infected with the virus after they held a group iftar, the evening fast-breaking meal. A field hospital set up by Qatari authorities in Doha to treat people infected with the coronavirus. (Karim Jaafar/AFP/Getty Images) In the


Montmartre, the Capitol Hill bistro patronized by senators and justices, closes after almost 20 years

For now, Lezla is tending his garden in Arlington (“It’s never looked so good!”) and Raynard is enjoying bike rides with his 4-year-old son. Raynal, who lived in the neighborhood for years before moving last year to Alexandria, wonders who will take over the space. To make enough to cover rising rent, he figures it might have to be a corporate-backed chain. Neighbors who love the area’s quirks and the mom-and-pops worry, too; a Sephora and a Trader Joe’s have popped up across the street. A location of Le Pain Quotidien occupies a prime corner space. I should mention that I am one of those neighbors. Since moving to Capitol Hill 15 years ago, my husband and I have often sipped cold white wine on Montmartre’s patio and devoured country pâté in its cozy dining room. We brought our parents, celebrated birthdays and consoled ourselves after long workweeks. As Montmartre’s employees lose their livelihoods and Lezla and Raynal their very identities, it feels selfish to mourn my own loss in its closure. I’ll miss the braised rabbit, one of our very favorite dishes in the city, a rich dish of silky brown meat accented with mushrooms and olives, decadently served alongside a tangle of pasta in a truffled cream sauce. The dining room in 2013. (Scott Suchman/For The Washington Post) In our house, both the dish and the restaurant are known simply as “the Bunny.” “Where do you want to eat on Friday?” my husband might ask. If I raised my hands up to my head, forming rabbit ears, the plan was set. We aren’t alone in loving it. In a 2001 review of the new bistro in town, Post food critic Tom Sietsema called the dish “a meal that seduces the senses” and noted that just seeing it served to other tables was enough to prompt envy among diners. Lezla says chefs from other restaurants around town would often come with their wives on Sunday nights, when many of their own places were closed, just to eat it. Just last week, Raynal said he was leaving the restaurant when a regular spotted him outside. When he learned it was closing for good, he waxed eloquent about his favorite dish, prompting the once-and-future restaurateur to offer one final bit of hospitality. “I told him to wait a minute,” he says. Raynal went to the kitchen’s freezer and fetched four packages


I know how much it hurts to miss your sport

vitality of their youthful athlete selves. Even through the thickest of our isolation periods, we have been able to stay in shape. After all, a small space with no equipment whatsoever is all one needs to do some jumping jacks and hold plank for a few minutes. But gymnasts can’t substitute time on their balance beams by doing hundreds of sit-ups. Swimmers can’t replicate the form needed to power across the surface with a dry-land simulation of the freestyle stroke. Team players can’t hone timing and unspoken synergy by doing solo footwork drills in the backyard. We athletes of course realize our sacrifices don’t deserve mention at the same time people are suffering, people are dying, health-care workers are taking chances on compromising their own well-being on our behalf. Many individuals have not been allowed time at the side of loved ones who perished, not allowed to host a proper burial. Unspeakable loss has come during these extraordinary times. We also respect the perspective that we’re no more special than college students missing their graduations or marginalized students without computers missing the entire end of their school year. But we athletes have come to live out loud a set of values. We hold high the discipline and the unrelenting focus it takes to chase long-term goals. We believe in the self-esteem and the life lessons of winning and losing that come through playing sports. Today, at 70, I am perhaps an exceedingly enthusiastic novice tennis player. It would be absurd to compare this new passion to my swimming career. But the essentials aren’t really any different. The drive to learn everything I can, the refusal to skip one moment of practice, the obvious priority this noble sport has taken in my current life — the commitment mimics all the values I brought to my swimming life. [ The Opinions section is looking for stories of how the coronavirus has affected people of all walks of life. Write to us. ] I am clear about my good fortune in thriving through this covid-19 era, compared to so many others. Yet I would say losing tennis, even temporarily, has hit me the hardest. For those of you who count on your mountain hikes but have been grounded with trails closed, for you who compete in your local bowling league, for you who play sports for the sheer pleasure they bring you —


The so-called ‘murder hornet’ is creating a buzz, but you can relax

of the Washington State Department of Agriculture, sets out a trap to catch an Asian giant hornet as part of a concerted effort to prevent the insect’s establishment in the Pacific Northwest (Karla Salp/AP) Take a deep breath, everyone. [The garden has lessons for us in this quarantine] If you put the hysteria aside, the two questions to ask are: Can we prevent the Asian giant hornet from establishing itself in the United States, and, if not, what are the consequences? One predictable response is that people, panicked but unable to tell a yellowjacket from a bumblebee, will start showering the world with pesticides, or hire a company to do so, and kill beneficial insects in the process. Samantha Simon, a senior official with the Agriculture Department, welcomes the fact that “people are now more aware of invasive pests,” but said news reports “may have misrepresented the threat the hornet poses to people.” Beekeepers in giant hornet lands such as China, the world’s leading producer of honey, have figured out how to live with the marauder. One way is to place excluders at the hive entrance. The worry in the United States is that if the hornet becomes established, it may do enough damage to honeybee colonies that it will diminish their ability to pollinate fruit orchards and other crops on the West Coast, said Simon, executive director of emergency and domestic programs for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. The hornet is up to two inches long and is the largest hornet species on Earth. It dwarfs the American bald-faced hornet. (Elaine Thompson/AFP/Getty Images) The service is working with other federal agencies and the Washington State Department of Agriculture to lure and trap giant hornets. Field technicians can then use captured hornets to trace their nests for destruction. “I am confident, if the pest is here, we’ll be able to find it and eradicate it,” Simon said. The murder hornet frenzy recalls the mass anxiety about “killer bees” spreading from Mexico a few decades ago. The 1978 movie “The Swarm” starred Michael Caine in a war against killer bees, and it exploited contemporary fears about the northward invasion of Africanized honeybees. Africanized bees are more aggressive and sting in greater numbers than regular honeybees, and they are a management problem for beekeepers in warmer states. But the streets of Texas and Southern California are not littered with their


Trump’s assault on American exceptionalism

of January, trade adviser Peter Navarro had seen enough to warn of a coming pandemic that could kill 500,000 Americans, but Trump was dismissing the disease as “one person coming in from China.” How could two people see the same warnings and come up with such dramatically different conclusions? Another month would pass after Navarro’s grim warning, and Trump would still be assuring Americans that the pandemic would magically go away. As late as March, Trump declared that he was not worried about the pandemic and his defenders on some cable news hosts were telling their viewers that the threat from covid-19 was nothing more than the latest “hoax” to bring down their hero. [ The Opinions section is looking for stories of how the coronavirus has affected people of all walks of life. Write to us. ] By April, the president of the same country that is home to MIT, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Caltech, the University of Chicago and Yale, along with so many others, publicly asked White House doctors to look into whether injecting disinfectants into the bodies of sick patients could cure them from the virus. The most damning element of Trump’s deadly response may well be his stubborn refusal to marshal the resources of the U.S. government, in the face of a once-in-a-century challenge, to create a Manhattan Project for our time. Instead, the befuddled former reality TV host chooses to spend his time spinning wild conspiracy theories and continuing his sad obsession with former president Barack Obama. The U.S. death toll is now rising toward 100,000 lost souls, but the only thing exceptional about this American president’s management of this crisis has been his gross negligence that has allowed so many people to die in a country that remains home to the best and brightest innovators the world has ever known. Read more from Joe Scarborough’s archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. Read more: Vinay Prasad and Ezekiel J. Emanuel: Trump’s medical judgment is wrong. The example he’s setting is worse. Paul Waldman: How Trump will hijack the coming vaccine wars William Haseltine: The rush to share good news on covid-19 drugs is undermining science Max Boot: The WHO has been more effective at fighting the coronavirus than Trump has been. No wonder he hates it. Michael Greenstone: The U.S. should pay people to get tested for covid-19


Why I’m Nervous About the End of Lockdown

have seen devastating, society-straining outbreaks. Others in superficially similar circumstances, like Campania, Florida and Germany, have been spared the worst. Despite more than 23,000 scientific papers written on Covid-19, the breadth of what we don’t know is astonishing. It’s still unclear how much the virus is able to spread through the air; which types of surfaces it can best survive on, and for how long; what role children play in transmitting the disease; how long those who’ve been infected retain immunity; and even how many have been infected. Knowledge isn’t a prophylactic on its own. Robert Koch revolutionized our understanding of infection when he identified the causative agent of tuberculosis in 1882, but his attempts to develop a vaccine were an ignominious failure. The bacterium still kills more than a million people a year. That means Australia may be no better placed to handle a resurgence of infections than the northern hemisphere countries that failed to learn lessons from China. We’ve long been aware that pandemics spread in waves, with the subsequent outbreaks often far worse than the initial surge of infections. About 108 million people are under renewed lockdowns in China’s three northeastern provinces, while initial success in containing the disease has given way to fresh outbreaks in Singapore and South Korea. The impossibility of maintaining a heightened state of vigilance in the long term may be one of the greatest risks ahead of us, as my colleague Clara Ferreira Marques has written. The role of heat and humidity — a subject of particularly passionate debate — is probably what worries me most, living in one of the southern hemisphere’s few temperate countries. Of the 17 nations with more than 50,000 confirmed cases, only Brazil and India have been outside the temperate, arid and high-altitude zones that a climate-based model would suggest are most likely to encourage infection. For much of the world, where spring is gradually turning to summer, seasonal variation in Covid-19’s reproduction rate would offer the prospect of a welcome slowdown in the coming months. Here in Australia, though, a mild fall is now giving way to the first bite of winter. As I step into the cool afternoon air onto a main street that’s as busy as I’ve seen it in months, that’s not a comforting thought. This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.


through the air; which types of surfaces it can best survive on, and for how long; what role children play in transmitting the disease; how long those who’ve been infected retain immunity; and even how many have been infected. Knowledge isn’t a prophylactic on its own. Robert Koch revolutionized our understanding of infection when he identified the causative agent of tuberculosis in 1882, but his attempts to develop a vaccine were an ignominious failure. The bacterium still kills more than a million people a year. That means Australia may be no better placed to handle a resurgence of infections than the northern hemisphere countries that failed to learn lessons from China. We’ve long been aware that pandemics spread in waves, with the subsequent outbreaks often far worse than the initial surge of infections. About 108 million people are under renewed lockdowns in China’s three northeastern provinces, while initial success in containing the disease has given way to fresh outbreaks in Singapore and South Korea. The impossibility of maintaining a heightened state of vigilance in the long term may be one of the greatest risks ahead of us, as my colleague Clara Ferreira Marques has written. The role of heat and humidity — a subject of particularly passionate debate — is probably what worries me most, living in one of the southern hemisphere’s few temperate countries. Of the 17 nations with more than 50,000 confirmed cases, only Brazil and India have been outside the temperate, arid and high-altitude zones that a climate-based model would suggest are most likely to encourage infection. For much of the world, where spring is gradually turning to summer, seasonal variation in Covid-19’s reproduction rate would offer the prospect of a welcome slowdown in the coming months. Here in Australia, though, a mild fall is now giving way to the first bite of winter. As I step into the cool afternoon air onto a main street that’s as busy as I’ve seen it in months, that’s not a comforting thought. This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners. David Fickling is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering commodities, as well as industrial and consumer companies. He has been a reporter for Bloomberg News, Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and the Guardian. For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion ©2020 Bloomberg L.P.


Montgomery officials say county may reopen within a week

Council President Sidney Katz, and at right is Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich (D). (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post) But County Executive Marc Elrich (D) said he’s concerned about whether county hospitals can handle potential surges of covid-19 patients in need of intensive care. During the past week, the intensive care units at all six hospitals in Montgomery have been at capacity, county officials said. “I look at this data every single day … [but] we’ve got to get this right,” Elrich (D) said. “We’re going to move, hopefully, as soon as possible.” The greater Washington region recorded another 82 deaths Wednesday, more than half of them in Maryland. Virginia recorded 33 new fatalities, nearly a third of which were in Fairfax County, bringing the total number of covid-19 deaths to 302 in that state’s most populous jurisdiction. The District added seven fatalities. D.C. health officials also reported that three children have developed the same inflammatory syndrome associated with covid-19 that has been linked to the Saturday death of a 15-year-old girl from Baltimore County. [Known coronavirus cases in D.C., Maryland and Virginia] The illness, known as Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C), is a recently discovered complication of the virus. The first U.S. cases were identified in New York in early May. Across the region, government officials continues to expand testing options as part of their fight against the virus. Loudoun County offered free, drive-up, no-appointment testing in Leesburg, and served more than 300 people in about two hours. Volunteers collect information from those queued up at Philip A. Bolen Memorial Park for the free coronavirus tests. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post) D.C. officials said they have scheduled new mobile testing drives for hard-hit neighborhoods, after the first deployment of no-appointment walk-up testing resulted in 281 tests in the 16th Street Heights neighborhood over the weekend. Officials have scheduled Friday testing in Columbia Heights, which has 454 known infections, the most of any D.C. neighborhood. The 16th Street Heights neighborhood had the second most infections, at 408. Hogan (R) announced universal testing inside Maryland state prisons and juvenile detention facilities, a major hub of covid-19 infections. The move followed an outbreak detected Friday inside the 60-bed Silver Oak Academy juvenile detention facility in Caroll County, where about 40 staff members and children have tested positive for coronavirus. The virus has also spread throughout the prison system, infecting more than 100


A $150 Billion Pile of Frozen Loans Starts to Worry U.S. Banks

banks to share their data with outside apps. Some banks are considering letting customers continue skipping payments but reinstating interest on loans, a move that could make forbearance less enticing for those who don’t absolutely need it. Others might require customers to show additional proof they’ve been impacted by the virus. “The banks want to genuinely help,” said Scott Barton, managing partner at 2nd Order Solutions, which advises lenders on collections and forbearance processes. But they “would like to start to differentiate and not give away money to people that don’t really need it right now.” Forbearance deadlines vary by bank and customer. Citigroup Inc. was one of the first banks to offer forbearance, initially granting a 30-day reprieve that it since extended twice until May 31. Generally, the nation’s largest banks -- also including JPMorgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co. -- have said they will at least check in with borrowers in coming weeks as they assess how to continue programs and whether to encourage people to use other options. Those can include modifying loans or restarting some payments for credit cards or car loans. So far, the programs seem to be easing financial strains during the pandemic. Fewer households were late on their cards, car loans, personal loans and mortgages in April than in March, according to TransUnion data released Wednesday. That upended expectations that consumers would fall behind on their debts as a result of widespread joblessness and the forced shutdown of the U.S. economy. Matt Komos, TransUnion’s vice president of research and consulting, said households may be postponing payments to keep an extra cash cushion just in case the economy worsens. Indeed, many consumers who deferred loans sent payments anyway, sometimes far more than the monthly minimums to reduce their overall debt loads, TransUnion data show. At Bank of America, about a third of people who asked to delay credit-card bills ended up paying, CEO Brian Moynihan said Tuesday on Bloomberg Television. “A lot of the banks are in the dark a little bit in terms of how to treat customers,” said Alan McIntyre, senior managing director for Accenture Plc’s banking practice. “The measures they focus on to manage credit quality -- those dials aren’t moving. And those dials aren’t going to move until the fall.” For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com ©2020 Bloomberg L.P.


The Daily 202: Temporary emissions decline during coronavirus slowdown spotlights challenge of hitting U.N. targets

senator John Glenn was 100. (Matt Schudel) Judy Wilson-Griffin advocated for patients who had higher rates of infant and maternal mortality. She was finalizing a maternal triage acuity index for pregnant women when she contracted the virus and died at 63 in St. Louis. (Lateshia Beachum) James “Charlie” Mahoney, a New York doctor who was planning to retire, died from the virus after taking on shifts in two different hospitals. His family, his boss and other doctors insisted he follow through on retirement, but the 62-year-old “gave his life for that hospital,” his brother said. (Meagan Flynn) Daryana Dyson, a 15-year-old girl from Baltimore, may be Maryland’s youngest coronavirus victim. Though an autopsy is pending, her family said she died from the virus one month shy of her 16th birthday. She had no preexisting conditions, an aunt said. (CBS Baltimore) Bob Carlos, who played a pirate at Disney World for a decade after falling in love with the park during a family trip, died of the disease at 75 — just weeks after his wife also passed from it. (NPR) As of today, all 50 states have begun loosening some lockdown restrictions. “Amid these concerns about the risk of increased activity, every governor in the country has issued new guidelines removing bans on businesses and public gatherings to various degrees. One governor in particular, Alaska’s Mike Dunleavy, said he would reopen his state entirely before Memorial Day weekend,” Teo Armus reports. “Just four other states — North Dakota, South Dakota, Missouri and Wyoming — appear to have similarly lenient orders in place, according to an analysis by The Post, though all will remain in their reopening process through Memorial Day.” A Michigan coronavirus patient was stopped at the airport while trying to board a plane. Health authorities said the individual had tested positive but instead of staying in the state, they insisted on flying home to a different state. Officials issued a cease-and-desist order and warned Lansing’s airport to be on the lookout. (Antonia Farzan) Lake Geneva, a tranquil Wisconsin tourist town, has a new draw: Its restaurants are open. So people are driving in from Illinois. (Holly Bailey) Fifty-four percent of U.S. counties still do not have a single testing site, according to a report by health software company Castlight. (Axios) The Justice Department warned Californians that Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) pandemic measures and his plans to unwind them


Hawaii isn’t messing around when it comes to enforcing tourist quarantines

images of himself at the beach, a garden and other locations on Oahu, as well as blogging from a bus. In a statement, State Attorney General Clare Connors warned that most Hawaii residents would not tolerate anyone violating emergency rules. “If you are out and about in violation of a self-quarantine order, it is likely you will be reported and arrested,” she said. “We again implore visitors to delay their trips until this pandemic passes and we ask that anyone who arrives here comply with the 14-day self-quarantine rule. Being arrested, and potentially paying thousands of dollars in fines or spending a night in jail, is not the way to begin or end a vacation.” Dan Dennison, a spokesman for the state’s Covid-19 Joint Information Center, said this week that 10 visitors had so far been arrested by the Department of the Attorney General, and county police departments were making other arrests. “We continue to understand that enforcement is very important for both residents and travelers and we continue to work with the counties to improve both the screening process as well as the enforcement process,” Ige said in a news conference Monday. “Because we know that the quarantine can only be successful if the general public believes that there is enforcement and that anyone breaking quarantine would be subject to a fine or arrest.” Amir Eylon, chief executive of tourism-focused consultancy Longwoods International, said in an email that governments in destinations that depend on tourists such as Hawaii, New Zealand and Puerto Rico have been forced to make difficult decisions curbing visitors to protect their residents. “While these acts by island destinations like Hawaii may seem to be anti-tourism, if they can avoid becoming a ‘hot zone’ for the pandemic and keep the incidence level low or even eliminate it, this may actually help their image as a safe destination for when the majority of states and other feeder markets ease restrictions on nonessential travel,” Eylon said. “Once folks begin traveling for leisure again, and start looking at long-haul destinations again, those that were successful in containing the coronavirus may very well be sought after more initially than those that struggled with the illness.” Read more: 10 questions about visiting the beach during the pandemic, answered More people are flying again. Here’s what to expect at airports and on planes. These 6 countries are cautiously reopening for summer travel


These 6 countries are cautiously reopening for summer travel

After months of lockdowns, European leaders are preparing to lift some coronavirus-related travel restrictions and allow tourism to resume — cautiously. “Our message is we will have a tourist season this summer,” European Union economic affairs commissioner Paolo Gentiloni told the BBC last week, “even if it’s with security measures and limitations.” Those E.U. measures include updating health protocols for hotels and public transit and expanding contact-tracing between member states. The goal, according to a news release from the European Commission, is “to help the EU tourism sector recover from the pandemic, by supporting businesses and ensuring that Europe continues to be the number one destination for visitors.” There are some overarching regulations, chief among them that non-European tourists will have to wait until at least June 15 to begin their visits. But much of the loosening of restrictions will be left up to individual nations — the United Kingdom, France and Ireland, for example, have agreed to allow travel among them without requiring a 14-day quarantine in the final destination. Here’s what other countries on the continent, along with a few top non-European travel destinations, are planning. Spain In the Spanish beach town of Canet d’en Berenguer, outside of Valencia, officials are accounting for social distancing with a system allowing beachgoers to book appointments on the sand via mobile app. The beach will be divided into a grid of socially distanced sites, with staggered arrival times and the option to choose either a morning or afternoon slot (but not both). In all, the restrictions will allow for a maximum of 5,000 people per day, about half of the beach’s normal capacity. “This summer will be very different,” Canet d’en Berenguer Mayor Pere Joan Antoni Chordá told CNN. “There’ll be more space between your neighbor. Like a ‘business-class’ beach.” Iceland When Iceland reopens its borders June 15, it will require all visitors to either take a covid-19 test, agree to a two-week quarantine or present official documentation of a recent negative test. Regardless of which option they choose, tourists will have to download a contact-tracing app. Iceland has tested more than 13 percent of its population, higher than any other country in the world. “Iceland’s strategy of large-scale testing, tracing and isolating have proven effective so far,” tourism minister Thordis Kolbrun Reykfjord Gylfadottir said in a statement. Indeed it has: Iceland has reported just 10 coronavirus-related deaths since the pandemic


this summer may be slightly different from what you’ve had in previous years,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told CNN. “Maybe no bars may be open, or no tight crowds, but you can still get a fantastic experience in Greece — provided that the global epidemic is on a downward path.” Every international traveler to Greece will have to enter through Athens and submit to a health screening, which includes a rapid covid-19 test. Mexico Beaches across Mexico will open to tourists starting in June, with multiple phases of reopening continuing through July and August. Los Cabos, the tip of the Baja California peninsula that includes popular spring break destination Cabo San Lucas, will allow for limited travel beginning June 1, as health screenings and enhanced sanitation measures ramp up to accommodate more tourists late into the summer. The Los Cabos tourism board said it will look to open many of the area’s hotels and, eventually, the international terminal at its airport, provided the new safety protocols are effective in preventing the spread of the virus. Cancun and Riviera Maya will also reopen in phases in anticipation of interest from Americans, despite the U.S. State Department’s ongoing “Level 4: Do Not Travel” advisory. “For those looking further to international destinations, the overarching theme [in online searches] seems to be relaxation and beach time, with Mexico and the Caribbean dominating the list,” an Expedia spokeswoman told Travel + Leisure. Australia and New Zealand On the other side of the world, Australia and New Zealand are experimenting with the idea of a “travel bubble” that would allow tourists to travel freely between the countries, which have both had relatively few deaths. The bubble, however, would apply only to residents of the two countries, “Our number one focus at the moment is making sure that both our countries are in the position where we’re domestically managing covid-19 to a point where we can with confidence open borders,” New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said at a recent news conference. For now, international tourists will have to wait. But if you want to buy your plane tickets to Sydney way ahead of time, you may never find a better rate. Read more: Your quarantine experience, reviewed like a hotel Airlines have instructed flight crews to not let masks lead to in-flight disruptions Meet the people who can’t wait to get back on a cruise ship


Three veteran D.C. Superior Court judges vie for chief judge spot

panels, will resume. The commission set up a website where people can comment on the candidates or complete a survey. Comments must be received by June 19. The commission could make its selection by midsummer. The job comes with only a $500-a-year increase to a judge’s salary. But the chief judge influences the direction of the court as well as the careers of its judges. The chief judge is tasked with assigning judges to various divisions, ultimately deciding which judges hear high-profile criminal cases, landlord and tenant issues or child custody battles. It is the second time Josey-Herring, 59, has vied for the job, having lost to former Chief Judge Lee F. Satterfield in 2008. A former D.C. public defender, Josey-Herring is the most senior of the candidates, having been named to the bench in 1997 by President Bill Clinton. The Georgetown University Law School graduate oversees felony criminal cases and has also handled cases in civil and family courts and then as presiding judge in the family court. In 2014, Josey-Herring presided over a case involving former D.C. mayor Vincent C. Gray’s onetime campaign chauffeur, who pleaded guilty to conspiring to conceal under-the-table campaign payments and other illegal schemes during the 2010 mayoral race. In 2017, she was among the judges highlighted in a Washington Post investigation about the District’s Youth Rehabilitation Act, which allows defendants under the age of 22 to receive shorter sentences and, upon completing those sentences without rearrest, have their case removed from public record. The Post found numerous defendants who were convicted of violent crimes after previously being sentenced under the law. One of those defendants was Tavon Pinkney who Josey-Herring placed on probation in 2014 after he pleaded guilty to robbery. Five months into his probation, Pinkney fatally shot a man during a daytime PCP deal. He later pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. [Second-chance law for young criminals puts violent offenders back on D.C. streets] Leibovitz, 61, was also the subject of extensive news coverage. In 2010, she presided over the trial of three men charged in connection with the death of their friend, attorney Robert Wone, who was an overnight guest in their Northwest Washington home. Wone, 32, was stabbed and sexually assaulted. No one was charged with the murder or assault. But federal prosecutors charged the roommates — Joseph R. Price, Victor J. Zaborsky and Dylan M. Ward — with obstruction


Reopened areas of Md., Va. see influx

the Delmarva region is probably higher because it was concentrated over a weekend and occurred in a densely populated area, Zhang said. Most of the weekend trips did not entail commuting, he said. Public health experts said the University of Maryland findings, derived from location data on smartphone apps, don’t reveal how much people are social distancing, wearing masks or taking other precautions as they travel. Even so, they say, traveling generally increases personal interactions, making it easier to transmit the virus. It also makes contact tracing more difficult, they say, because people who later discover they’re infected are less likely to know with whom they interacted. Meagan Fitzpatrick, an assistant professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine who reviewed the findings, said she wasn’t surprised, based on Georgia’s experience. Even so, she said, the significant increase in travel shows that counties need to go beyond considering infections among residents when assessing their readiness to reopen. “It shows the more accurate risk assessments take into account infections from areas your county will draw from,” Fitzpatrick said. “What are they bringing with them?” [When Georgia reopened, out-of-state travelers followed] Fitzpatrick said researchers won’t know for two to three weeks whether the increase in travel leads to more infections. That’s because it can take a while to see trends rather than daily blips due to when and how test results, hospitalizations and deaths are reported. In Georgia, for example, an analysis of state data by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that it’s too early to know the health impacts of the state’s April 24 reopening. Cases of the novel coronavirus have held steady or dropped slightly in the past two weeks, the paper said. However, its analysis found that recent data is too preliminary to show clear trends since the reopening. Zhang, director of the Maryland Transportation Institute, said stepped-up travel in the Delmarva region matches national trends. Nationwide, about 47 million people crossed state lines Friday. That was more than twice as many as in mid-April and climbing back toward the pre-pandemic daily average of 55 million, even as government officials in many parts of the country continue to ask residents to stay home as much as possible to slow the virus’s spread. “How quickly these out-of-state trips are coming back is really shocking,” he said. [Wondering what’s safe as states reopen? Here’s what some experts say.] Maryland and Virginia’s


Montgomery officials say county may begin to reopen within the next week

been at capacity, county officials said. “I look at this data every single day . . . [but] we’ve got to get this right,” Elrich (D) said. “We’re going to move, hopefully, as soon as possible.” Officials in neighboring Prince George’s County, Md., have not made statements about being close to easing restrictions. D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) on Thursday is set to receive a report from a task force on how to manage the city’s reopening. The decision on when to reopen will be shaped by the city health department, Bowser says. Officials said Wednesday that the community spread of the coronavirus has declined for 10 days, four days short of meeting the metrics the mayor has set for reopening. The greater Washington region recorded 82 more deaths Wednesday, bringing the total number of covid-19 fatalities in the District, Maryland and Virginia to 3,604. Virginia recorded 33 new fatalities, nearly a third of them in Fairfax County, bringing the total number of covid-19 deaths to 302 in that state’s most populous jurisdiction. The District added seven fatalities. [Known coronavirus cases in D.C., Maryland and Virginia] D.C. health officials also reported that three children have developed the same inflammatory syndrome associated with covid-19 that has been linked to the Saturday death of a 15-year-old girl from Baltimore County. Three cases of the syndrome have been reported to Maryland’s health department and one to Virginia’s so far, spokespeople for Hogan and Northam said Wednesday night. Beth Riggs, a spokeswoman for Children’s National, said the hospital was treating 23 young patients for the syndrome. The discrepancy in numbers from the hospital and jurisdictions was not immediately clear. The illness, known as multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), is a recently discovered complication of the coronavirus. Across the region, government officials continue to expand testing options as part of their fight against the virus. Virginia’s Loudoun County offered free, drive-up, no-appointment testing in Leesburg, and had enough people lined up in their cars by 3 p.m. to account for all its 1,700 available tests, even though the site was supposed to operate through 6 p.m. Volunteers collect information from those queued up at Philip A. Bolen Memorial Park in Leesburg for the free coronavirus tests. (Katherine Frey/The Washington Post) Cars lined up at Philip A. Bolen Memorial Park hours ahead of the 10 a.m. start time, and some people had to wait


are about 16,000 nursing home patients in the state and 36,000 nursing home workers, according to Joseph DeMattos Jr., president and chief executive of Health Facilities Association of Maryland. So far, 1,135 residents and staff members of long-term care facilities in the state have died of covid-19. [It's becoming easier to get a coronavirus test. Here are some options.] Still, many jurisdictions around the state have begun to reopen. On Wednesday, State Comptroller Peter Franchot (D) urged the Hogan administration to “move as quickly as possible” to allow restaurants in those areas to offer outdoor dining — an amenity that is part of Virginia’s “phase one” reopening but not Maryland’s. Franchot, who is running for governor in 2022, said he was advocating for outdoor dining to prop up a key part of the economy. He said he believes many social distancing and safety restrictions should stay in place, and reiterated that the pandemic is far from over. “This idea that we can just be cavalier and take our shirts off and walk down the boardwalk, like this virus has been defeated, that’s just wrong,” he said at a meeting of the state Board of Public Works. “I want people to understand that we’re trying to protect their safety, and if they’re not safe, they’re not going to have any economic prosperity.” Even when the region does reopen, many summer activities are unlikely to happen, a round of announcements on Wednesday showed. Officials in Baltimore said all special events are canceled through Aug. 31, including the city’s Fourth of July celebration and three-day Artscape festival that was scheduled to begin July 17. The city’s summer jobs program for youth will be held remotely. The District’s National Independence Day Parade down Constitution Avenue has also been called off. And Arlington County announced Wednesday that summer camp activities have been canceled, joining Fairfax County in that decision. Arlington officials said they considered whether the camps could be safely held with proper social distancing, appropriate cleaning protocols and other safety measures. But they concluded the risk of infection for the camp participants and county staff is still too great. “We recognize how important camps are to our residents, and we are truly saddened to have to cancel for the summer,” Jane Rudolph, director of Arlington’s Department of Parks & Recreation, said in a statement. Residents who have already paid for summer camp will receive


23 children reported to have rare syndrome

Children’s National Hospital is treating 23 children for an inflammatory syndrome associated with covid-19, a hospital spokesperson said Wednesday night. The illness, known as multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children, is a recently discovered complication from the novel coronavirus. At least three cases of the syndrome have been reported in the District, officials said. One case has been reported to state officials in Virginia as of Wednesday night, and three cases have been reported to Maryland’s state health department, officials said. The discrepancy in the numbers reported by the hospital and individual jurisdictions was not immediately clear. NBC Washington first reported the pediatric cases at Children’s National Hospital, and hospital spokeswoman Beth Riggs confirmed that the hospital was treating 23 young patients. Children's National Hospital said it is treating 23 young patients with multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children. (Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images) Symptoms for the syndrome, which can cause problems with a child’s heart and other organs, may include persistent fever and low blood pressure. [Juliet Daly was a healthy 12-year-old in Covington, La., until the coronavirus infected her heart] City officials told the D.C. Council on Wednesday that at least three children in the nation’s capital have developed the syndrome. LaQuandra Nesbitt, director of the D.C. Department of Health, told city lawmakers that medical professionals know very little about the syndrome and the virus’s effect on children. Although the virus disproportionately kills the elderly, the inflammatory syndrome has been linked to the death of a 15-year-old in Baltimore County. The death is one of three cases of the syndrome reported to Maryland’s health department, said Michael Ricci, a spokesman for Gov. Larry Hogan (R). Only one case of the syndrome had been reported to Virginia’s health department as of Wednesday night. That case involved a child in the Fairfax health district who was hospitalized on May 5 and has since been discharged and is recovering at home. The number could change over the next few days given reporting lags, said Alena Yarmosky, spokeswoman for Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D). Laura Vozzella and Ovetta Wiggins contributed to this report. Read more: Local newsletters: Local headlines (8 a.m.) | Afternoon Buzz (4 p.m.) Like PostLocal on Facebook


The Health 202: Some social distancing policies worked better than others to stem covid-19

Street Journal’s Jim Carlton reports. Now politicians — and Americans — seem to have reached their maximum tolerance for staying at home. Governors across the political map are moving full speed ahead on reopening. As of today, all 50 states have started lifting their shutdowns, despite widely varying trends in their number of cases, deaths and tests performed. Connecticut, one of the final states to ease its shutdown, is allowing restaurants to offer outdoor seating, retail stores to let customers inside, and outdoor museums and zoos to resume operations, my colleague Marisa Iati reports. Hair salons and barbershops were also slated to start reopening today until Gov. Ned Lamont (D) pushed back the date to June 1. Even in New York, the hardest-hit state in the nation, upstate areas are starting to resume activity. Yesterday Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said the state’s outbreak has slowed to levels similar to when it began there. On Monday, 105 people died of the virus in the state — a figure comparable to daily deaths at the end of March. “We’re basically back to where we started before this tragedy descended upon us,” Cuomo said at a news conference. Welcome to The Health 202, our must-read newsletter on health policy. Ahh, oof and ouch AHH: A 60-page document of reopening guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was posted on the agency website over the weekend without fanfare. The guidance on reopening schools, childcare facilities, restaurants and mass transit was released after weeks of delay and an internal debate over whether the details were too strict, Laura Meckler and Rachel Weiner report. The White House had initially shelved the guidelines, saying they were “overly specific.” Freedom Preparatory Academy in Provo, Utah. (George Frey/Getty Images) It says schools, for example, must place desks six feet apart, stagger student arrivals and require daily temperature screenings, among other guidelines. “The guidelines arrive amid mixed messages from authorities over how and how quickly to reopen the life of the nation,” Laura and Rachel write. “… Inside the administration, the most contentious element of the CDC document was guidance over houses of worship, and the posted document eliminates that section. An administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter, said additional guidance on religious gatherings may be coming.” OOF: Vaccine experts warn Moderna did not produce the information


our must-read newsletter on health policy. Ahh, oof and ouch AHH: A 60-page document of reopening guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was posted on the agency website over the weekend without fanfare. The guidance on reopening schools, childcare facilities, restaurants and mass transit was released after weeks of delay and an internal debate over whether the details were too strict, Laura Meckler and Rachel Weiner report. The White House had initially shelved the guidelines, saying they were “overly specific.” Freedom Preparatory Academy in Provo, Utah. (George Frey/Getty Images) It says schools, for example, must place desks six feet apart, stagger student arrivals and require daily temperature screenings, among other guidelines. “The guidelines arrive amid mixed messages from authorities over how and how quickly to reopen the life of the nation,” Laura and Rachel write. “… Inside the administration, the most contentious element of the CDC document was guidance over houses of worship, and the posted document eliminates that section. An administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter, said additional guidance on religious gatherings may be coming.” OOF: Vaccine experts warn Moderna did not produce the information necessary to know how impressive or not its vaccine candidate may be. The biotech company announced this week, to much fanfare, that it was seeing promising early results from its first human safety tests. A Moderna building in Cambridge, Mass. (Bill Sikes/AP) “Several vaccine experts asked by STAT concluded that, based on the information made available by the Cambridge, Mass.-based company, there’s really no way to know how impressive — or not — the vaccine may be,” Stat News’s Helen Branswell reports. “While Moderna blitzed the media, it revealed very little information — and most of what it did disclose were words, not data. That’s important: If you ask scientists to read a journal article, they will scour data tables, not corporate statements. With science, numbers speak much louder than words.” “Even the figures the company did release don’t mean much on their own, because critical information — effectively the key to interpreting them — was withheld,” Helen adds. In an “The Moderna announcement described a safety trial of its vaccine based on eight healthy participants. The claim was that in all eight people, the vaccine raised the levels of neutralizing antibodies equivalent to those found in convalescent serum of


necessary to know how impressive or not its vaccine candidate may be. The biotech company announced this week, to much fanfare, that it was seeing promising early results from its first human safety tests. A Moderna building in Cambridge, Mass. (Bill Sikes/AP) “Several vaccine experts asked by STAT concluded that, based on the information made available by the Cambridge, Mass.-based company, there’s really no way to know how impressive — or not — the vaccine may be,” Stat News’s Helen Branswell reports. “While Moderna blitzed the media, it revealed very little information — and most of what it did disclose were words, not data. That’s important: If you ask scientists to read a journal article, they will scour data tables, not corporate statements. With science, numbers speak much louder than words.” “Even the figures the company did release don’t mean much on their own, because critical information — effectively the key to interpreting them — was withheld,” Helen adds. In an “The Moderna announcement described a safety trial of its vaccine based on eight healthy participants. The claim was that in all eight people, the vaccine raised the levels of neutralizing antibodies equivalent to those found in convalescent serum of those who recovered from covid-19,” wrote William Haseltine, founder of Harvard’s cancer and HIV/AIDS research departments. “What to make of that claim? Hard to say, because we have no sense of what those levels were. This is the equivalent of a chief executive of a public company announcing a favorable earnings report without supplying supporting financial data, which the Securities and Exchange Commission would never allow.” OUCH: Most elderly covid-19 patients who were put on ventilators in a pair of New York hospitals did not make it. That’s according to a new sweeping study published yesterday in the Lancet. Its findings are “broadly consistent with clinical findings from China and Europe, and confirmed that advanced age is the greatest risk factor for a severe outcome, particularly if accompanied by chronic underlying diseases, such as hypertension, diabetes, heart disease and obesity,” Joel Achenbach and Ariana Eunjung Cha report. A patient recently transported from a nursing home is attached to a ventilator in the emergency room at St. Joseph's Hospital in Yonkers, N.Y. (John Minchillo/AP) The research looked at 257 critically ill adults admitted at two hospitals in northern Manhattan from March 2 and April 1. It found 39 percent died by


loved ones and those who live in heavily impacted areas. Here are a few of those who have succumbed: Annie Glenn, a leading advocate for people with communication disorders after overcoming a severe stuttering problem of her own, died from the virus in St. Paul, Minn. The widow of astronaut and senator John Glennwas 100. (Matt Schudel) Judy Wilson-Griffin advocated for patients who had higher rates of infant and maternal mortality. She was finalizing a maternal triage acuity index for pregnant women when she contracted the virus and died at 63 in St. Louis. (Lateshia Beachum) James “Charlie” Mahoney, a New York doctor who was planning to retire, died from the virus after taking on shifts in two different hospitals. His family, his boss and other doctors insisted he follow through on retirement, but the 62-year-old “gave his life for that hospital,” his brother said. (Meagan Flynn) Daryana Dyson, a 15-year-old girl from Baltimore, may be Maryland’s youngest coronavirus victim. Though an autopsy is pending, her family said she died from the virus one month shy of her 16th birthday. She had no preexisting conditions, an aunt said. (CBS Baltimore) Bob Carlos, who played a pirate at Disney World for a decade after falling in love with the park during a family trip, died of the disease at 75 — just weeks after his wife also passed from it. (NPR) As of today, all 50 states have begun loosening some lockdown restrictions. “Amid these concerns about the risk of increased activity, every governor in the country has issued new guidelines removing bans on businesses and public gatherings to various degrees. One governor in particular, Alaska’s Mike Dunleavy, said he would reopen his state entirely before Memorial Day weekend,” Teo Armus reports. “Just four other states — North Dakota, South Dakota, Missouri and Wyoming — appear to have similarly lenient orders in place, according to an analysis by The Post, though all will remain in their reopening process through Memorial Day.” A Michigan coronavirus patient was stopped at the airport while trying to board a plane. Health authorities said the individual had tested positive but instead of staying in the state, they insisted on flying home to a different state. Officials issued a cease-and-desist order and warned Lansing’s airport to be on the lookout. (Antonia Farzan) Lake Geneva, a tranquil Wisconsin tourist town, has a new draw: Its restaurants are open.


Cambridge University will hold all lectures online until summer 2021. (Antonia Farzan) The virus could bring down the curtain on Shakespeare’s Globe theater. The theater – one of the world’s best-known venues for staging the Bard’s work – said it won’t survive the year without at least a $7 million injection of cash. (William Booth) Captain Tom Moore, the 100-year-old U.K. World War II veteran who inspired the world by fundraising 33 million pounds for the National Health Service by walking laps in his garden, will be knighted. (BBC) The World Bank said as many as 60 million people could fall into extreme poverty. The virus could erase much of the recent progress made in battling poverty, said World Bank Group President David Malpass. The organization has established emergency response operations in 100 countries, home to 70 percent of the world’s population. Thirty-nine of the countries targeted by the $160 billion program are in sub-Saharan Africa, while nearly one-third of the total countries are in conflict-affected situations, such as Afghanistan, Haiti and Niger. Somalia has seen a massive rise in female genital mutilation during the lockdown, as circumcisers go door-to-door to cut girls stuck at home. (Reuters) Tanzania refuses to impose stricter social distancing measures, citing economic concerns, despite warnings that this could lead to mass casualties. (Teo Armus) Sales soared at Walmart and Home Depot, propped up by panic buying. “Walmart said online sales surged 74 percent, lifting overall sales by nearly 9 percent from February to April. Meanwhile, Home Depot said its revenue rose 7 percent,” Abha Bhattarai reports. “Consumer spending has dropped precipitously in the weeks since the pandemic took hold. U.S. retail sales fell a record 8.3 percent in March, then plunged 16.4 percent in April … Pier 1, which had filed for bankruptcy weeks before the shutdowns, announced Tuesday it would cease operations altogether. … But spending on groceries has continued to climb. Walmart, the country’s largest grocer, said profits rose 4 percent, to $3.99 billion, during the first quarter. Demand has been so brisk that Walmart has hired more than 235,000 workers since mid-March.” Some of the biggest U.S. retailers, including Amazon, Kroger and Rite Aid, are phasing out hazard pay for essential workers as coronavirus-related costs pile up. Workers and unions are fighting back, saying they still face extra risks. Amazon’s chief executive Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post. (WSJ) The contagion is


Crime reports for Anne Arundel and Howard counties and for Annapolis

Anne Arundel County Due to coronavirus and social distancing concerns, •Destruction to a vehicle •Destruction of property/vandalism •Theft from a vehicle •Thefts of vehicle parts and accessories •Tampering with a vehicle •Attempted vehicle theft •Credit or debit card theft •Identify theft •Lost property •Telephone misuse •Trespassing The following were among incidents reported by the Anne Arundel County police. For information, call 410-222-8050. BROOKLYN AREA STABBING Belle Grove Rd., GAMBRILLS AREA THEFT/BREAK-IN Symphony Lane, GLEN BURNIE AREA STABBING Harold Ct., ATTEMPTED HOME INVASION Margate Dr., LAUREL AREA THEFT Corridor Marketplace, LINTHICUM AREA ROBBERY Nursery Rd., ODENTON AREA ASSAULT Route 175 near Sappington Station Rd., PASADENA AREA ASSAULT Levy Ct., Annapolis Due to coronavirus and social distancing concerns, These were among incidents reported by the Annapolis Police Department. For information, call 410-268-9000. ASSAULT Riva Rd., SHOOTING Madison St., SHOTS FIRED Newtowne Dr., ROBBERIES Busch’s Frontage Rd., Church Circle at Main St., Clay St., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Bricin St., Hilltop Lane, Hilltop Lane, BUS THEFT AND RECOVERY City Gate Lane at Larkin St., Howard County Due to coronavirus and social distancing concerns, COLUMBIA AREA WEAPONS VIOLATION Little Patuxent Pkwy., SERIAL PEEPING TOM ARREST College Sq., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Dockside Lane, Roll Right Ct., Tamar Dr., Wild Swan Way, Wingborne Ct., VEHICLE THEFTS Lambskin Lane, Lightning View Rd., Merryrest Rd., ELKRIDGE AREA CARJACKING Whisper Way and Steepridge Dr., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Avalon Dr., Washington Blvd., ELLICOTT CITY AREA THEFTS/BREAK-INS Ridge Rd. N., Trotters Chase, HIGHLAND AREA THEFT/BREAK-IN Hall Shop Rd., JESSUP AREA THEFT/BREAK-IN Assateague Dr., VEHICLE THEFT Gatewood Dr., LAUREL AREA ROBBERY Washington Blvd., THEFTS/BREAK-INS Bluebell Way, Mountain Laurel Way, Tiger Lily Path, Wincopia Farms Way, 2nd St. N., SYKESVILLE AREA THEFT/BREAK-IN River Rd., — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


The Finance 202: Powell, Mnuchin split on next steps for economic recovery

million contract to a Virginia start-up that will produce a variety of generic drugs and their ingredients — including medicines used to treat covid-19 — at advanced manufacturing facilities in the United States,” David J. Lynch, Jeanne Whalen and Laurie McGinley report. “White House officials called it a potential landmark in the efforts to return pharmaceutical manufacturing to the United States from overseas.” New York's outbreak is back where it started, Cuomo says: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said “that the state’s outbreak has slowed to levels not seen since the beginning of the pandemic as the number of fatalities, rate of new infections and the daily number of hospitalizations related to covid-19 continue to fall," CNBC's Jasmine Kim and William Feuer report. Nonessential plant tours are banned in Michigan, but Trump's visit is still on: “Ford says it will require the president to wear a mask, something he has not done on other recent plant tours,” Crain's Detroit Business's Chad Livengood reports. The automaker appeared to backtrack from their requirement later in the day and Trump simply told reporters “we'll see” of the prospect that he would wear a mask. Customers shop Tuesday at a Walmart store in Chicago. (Scott Olson/Getty Images) More from the corporate front: Sales soar at Walmart and Home Depot: The retail giants “reported big boosts in quarterly sales, propped up by panic-buying as Americans hunkered down at home. Walmart said online sales surged 74 percent, lifting overall sales by nearly 9 percent from February to April. Meanwhile, Home Depot said its revenue rose 7 percent,” Abha Bhattarai reports. “On the other side of the spectrum: Kohl’s. The department store chain posted a 41 percent drop revenue for the quarter.” Airlines show signs of life: “Bookings are again outpacing cancellations and June reservations are showing ‘modest improvement,’ Southwest Airlines Co. said,” Bloomberg's Mary Schlangenstein reports. “United Airlines Holdings Inc. is seeing reduced cancellation rates and ‘moderate’ strengthening on U.S. and some international routes. Delta Air Lines Inc. has noticed a slight bounce in leisure bookings, and American Airlines Group Inc. said it’s filling a greater portion of seats on its planes.” Big chains see room to grow as small restaurants get crushed: “Big fast-food brands like Domino’s Pizza, Chipotle and Wendy’s that were doing well before the crisis want to grow – or continue pre-existing expansion plans – after the pandemic subsides,” Reuters's Hilary


plans to increase its original content, and new rivals, including AT&T Inc.’s HBO Max and Comcast Corp.’s Peacock, are coming on the scene. After more than two decades climbing the ranks at Disney, Mayer is leaving his role as head of direct-to-consumer and international operations to become chief executive of short-video app TikTok, owned by Chinese tech giant Bytedance Ltd.” Facebook to launch new shopping feature: “The move to build up e-commerce offerings follows Facebook’s launch last year of limited shopping options on photo-sharing app Instagram and messaging app WhatsApp. Company leaders wager making the platforms more business-friendly will generate fresh ad revenue, even as user growth slows. Facebook Shops will tie at least some of those efforts together, enabling businesses to set up a single online store accessible via both Facebook and Instagram.” Santander settles predatory auto-lending claims for $550 million: The regulators Comptroller of the Currency Joseph M. Otting. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) Otting is stepping down. The banking regulator just finished a controversial overhaul of Community Reinvestment Act rules “Mr. Otting, a former bank CEO, told Senate lawmakers last week that he sought to accelerate completion of the change amid the coronavirus pandemic… The overhaul more precisely defines the types of lending and other investment in low-income communities that banks would be credited for under the law. A bad evaluation can restrict banks from merging or opening new branches." From Gregg Gelzinis, a senior policy analyst at the Center for American Progress: Imagine resigning in the middle of an economic crisis—that could soon turn into a banking crisis—because you successfully completed your one true goal: weakening the Community Reinvestment Act. What a legacy. https://t.co/mACrg8aoVx — Gregg Gelzinis (@FinGregg) May 19, 2020 Daybook Today: The Fed releases minutes from its April 28-29 policy meeting The House Education and Labor Workforce Protections Subcommittee holds a hearing on protecting workers from covid-19 Target, Lowe's, Expedia Group, McKesson and L Brands are among the notable companies reporting their earnings Thursday: The Labor Department releases weekly jobless claims The National Association of Realtors releases existing home sales for April Best Buy, Hormel Foods, Intuit and BJ's Wholesale Club are among the notable companies reporting their earnings Friday: China kicks off its annual legislative session, the National People's Congress Alibaba Group, Deere, Foot Locker and Buckle are among the notable companies reporting their earnings The funnies From The Post's Ann Telnaes: Bull session h5{font:bold


Help for battered restaurants could be on the way as House considers new bills

pandemic as they face a future of limited dining capacity, public fear and rising costs to cover masks, gloves and cleaning products. The Real Economic Support That Acknowledges Unique Restaurant Assistance Needed to Survive Act of 2020, or simply, the Restaurants Act, would create a $120 billion grant program to help an estimated 500,000 independent restaurants survive a potentially long period when they may earn only a fraction of their former revenue. Under the act, money would be administered by the Treasury Department and available only to independent establishments with fewer than 20 locations under the same name, a caveat designed to avoid a repeat of PPP embarrassments in which chains such as Potbelly, Shake Shack and Ruth’s Chris received funds meant for small businesses. (Some of the companies, such as Shake Shack, gave back the money.) The National Restaurant Association has made a similar plea to Congress, but the Restaurants Act would target only small independents, which represent 70 percent of all restaurants. The grants would cover the difference between revenue from 2019 and that projected for 2020, with a cap of $10 million per grant. [Restaurants are suing insurance companies over unpaid claims — and both sides say their survival is at stake] Restaurants are “uniquely vulnerable as we face the covid-19 pandemic,” Blumenauer said in a statement. “Few industries have been as uniformly ravaged as the food service industry, which is why I am working with a coalition of culinary experts and advocates and pushing my colleagues in Congress to provide support. Local, independent restaurants are the beating heart of our communities. They need relief now.” The legislative efforts come after weeks of lobbying from the National Restaurant Association and the recently formed Independent Restaurant Coalition (IRC), as well as a Monday meeting at the White House, where 10 restaurant executives expressed their concerns to President Trump. Last month, the IRC sent a letter to both chambers of Congress, asking for the restaurant stabilization fund. Will Guidara of the Independent Restaurant Coalition speaks at the White House on Monday as Ivanka Trump listens. (Evan Vucci/AP) Will Guidara, a founding member of the IRC and the former owner of the Michelin-starred Eleven Madison Park in New York City, alluded to the grant program in the meeting Monday with the president. [A bipartisan group of lawmakers and José Andrés want to empower FEMA to meet America’s growing hunger crisis]


Prince George’s County Health Department employee dies of covid-19

When Chantee Mack was growing up, she and her older brother loved accompanying their mother to work as a clinical technician at Georgetown University Hospital. Aric Mack, 48, said he knew since those early days that his little sister would work in health care. She loved watching medical documentaries to prepare for the career she knew she wanted, said her younger brother Roland Mack, 38. Shortly after graduating from the University of Maryland at College Park, she went to work at the health department in Prince George’s County, where she had grown up. It was at work that her family believes she contracted covid-19. She died May 11 at Adventist HealthCare White Oak Medical Center. She was 44. Chantee Mack, 44, of Laurel. (Family photo/Family photo) “It was the first and only job she had,” said Aric Mack, who flew with his wife from Texas to see his sister in the hospital. His sister had been admitted April 14 because she was struggling to breathe. “I have no idea why they were still going to work,” Aric Mack said. Chantee Mack, who lived in Laurel, worked in the health department’s sexually transmitted disease clinic, informing people of their test results. Roland Mack said it was work that should have been done remotely once the pandemic started. Prince George’s County Health Officer Ernest L. Carter announced the death of an employee in the health department at a news conference Thursday but did not name Chantee Mack. “She was an excellent employee — she stepped up to the plate,” he said, appearing choked up. Mack was one of more than 100 clinical staff who the county “deemed essential to assist with the county’s unprecedented efforts in March to scale up our response to COVID-19, which included standing up our community screening and testing operations and other critical functions,” Carter later said in a statement. “She was a dedicated public health professional who made a difference in the health and well-being of Prince Georgians,” he said. Chantee Mack’s family remembered her as smart and caring. She was quiet but strong, Aric Mack said. She loved the Washington Redskins, watching tennis and going to the movies with her younger brother. She was passionate about helping others, said her sister-in-law, Renee Mack, who is a nurse. She said Chantee Mack told her a few months ago that she was interested in training to be a


NCAA moves to allow Division I football, basketball teams back on campus for workouts

novel coronavirus pandemic upended sports in the United States. The NCAA’s moratorium on all athletic activities extends through May 31. The Division I Council will address the resumption of other sports at a later date through an electronic vote. Coaches cannot be present at these voluntary workouts unless they are necessary for safety reasons. The activities also must be initiated by the athletes. “We encourage each school to use its discretion to make the best decisions possible for football and basketball student-athletes within the appropriate resocialization framework,” M. Grace Calhoun, the Division I Council chair and the athletic director at the University of Pennsylvania, said in a statement. “Allowing for voluntary athletics activity acknowledges that reopening our campuses will be an individual decision but should be based on advice from medical experts.” The council also extended the waiver that allows teams in those sports eight hours of virtual non-physical activities per week through the end of June, the NCAA’s release said, “recognizing that some student-athletes won’t be able return to campus or will not be comfortable doing so.” Because of varying local and state guidelines, college athletes are not expected to return to campus all at once. Conferences and schools can choose to enforce start dates later than June 1. For instance, the Advocate (La.) reported that SEC presidents plan to vote soon on whether schools will bring players back to campuses June 1 or June 15. Ohio State Athletic Director Gene Smith told reporters Wednesday that the school planned to allow players to use on-campus facilities starting June 8. Yahoo reported that the NCAA will leave testing protocols to the states and individual schools. Allowing athletes to return to campus for workouts this summer is the first step toward preparing for a 2020 football season. Without the revenue generated by football, athletic departments would face significant financial challenges. If players do not have sufficient time on campus this summer for workouts and practices, an on-time start to the football season would be in jeopardy. Most college football teams begin their seasons the first weekend in September. Read more: College basketball recruits can’t wait to break out, but AAU play is still on hold Jerry Brewer: Talk of football on empty campuses lays bare college sports’ craven system Kentucky fires cheerleading coaches after investigation uncovers hazing, alcohol use Fearing cuts, nonrevenue college sports look for ways to ‘weather this storm’


Thousands from coronavirus hot spots flocked to Maryland and Virginia as parts of the states reopened

weekend and occurred in a densely populated area, Zhang said. Most of the weekend trips did not entail commuting, he said. Public health experts said the University of Maryland findings, derived from location data on smartphone apps, don’t reveal how much people are social distancing, wearing masks or taking other precautions as they travel. Even so, they say, traveling generally increases personal interactions, making it easier to transmit the virus. It also makes contact tracing more difficult, they say, because people who later discover they’re infected are less likely to know with whom they interacted. Meagan Fitzpatrick, an assistant professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine who reviewed the findings, said she wasn’t surprised, based on Georgia’s experience. Even so, she said, the significant increase in travel shows that counties need to go beyond considering infections among residents when assessing their readiness to reopen. “It shows the more accurate risk assessments take into account infections from areas your county will draw from,” Fitzpatrick said. “What are they bringing with them?” Fitzpatrick said researchers won’t know for two to three weeks whether the increase in travel leads to more infections. That’s because it can take a while to see trends rather than daily blips due to when and how test results, hospitalizations and deaths are reported. In Georgia, for example, an analysis of state data by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that it’s too early to know the health impacts of the state’s April 24 reopening. Cases of the novel coronavirus have held steady or dropped slightly in the past two weeks, the paper said. However, its analysis found that recent data is too preliminary to show clear trends since the reopening. Zhang, director of the Maryland Transportation Institute, said stepped-up travel in the Delmarva region matches national trends. Nationwide, about 47 million people crossed state lines Friday. That was more than twice as many as in mid-April and climbing back toward the pre-pandemic daily average of 55 million, even as government officials in many parts of the country continue to ask residents to stay home as much as possible to slow the virus’s spread. “How quickly these out-of-state trips are coming back is really shocking,” he said. Maryland and Virginia’s reopenings coincided with a sunny, warm weekend. There were reports of throngs of people on the Ocean City boardwalk, with many not wearing masks or practicing social distancing. Recreational


Montgomery officials say county may start to reopen within a week

Virginia, Northam said, adding that there is no timeline yet for reopening. “They are following the data just as we are.” In Maryland, Gayles said Montgomery has been monitoring the three-day average of new coronavirus infections, deaths and hospitalizations as key metrics for reopening. In nine of the past 14 days, the three-day average for new cases has declined, along with the average number of emergency room visits and hospitalizations tied to covid-19, Gayles said. “I look at this data every single day . . . [but] we’ve got to get this right,” Elrich (D) said. “We’re going to move, hopefully, as soon as possible.” Officials in neighboring Prince George’s County, Md., have not made statements about being close to easing restrictions. D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) on Thursday is set to receive a report from a task force on how to manage the city’s reopening. The decision on when to reopen will be shaped by the city health department, Bowser says. Officials said Wednesday that the community spread of the coronavirus has declined for 10 days, four days short of meeting the metrics the mayor has set for reopening. The greater Washington region recorded 82 more deaths Wednesday, bringing the total number of covid-19 fatalities in the District, Maryland and Virginia to 3,604. Virginia recorded 33 new fatalities, nearly a third of them in Fairfax County, bringing the total number of covid-19 deaths to 302 in that state’s most populous jurisdiction. The District added seven fatalities. D.C. health officials also reported that three children have developed the same inflammatory syndrome associated with covid-19 that has been linked to the Saturday death of a 15-year-old girl from Baltimore County. Three cases of the syndrome have been reported to Maryland’s health department and one to Virginia’s so far, spokespeople for Hogan and Northam said Wednesday night. Beth Riggs, a spokeswoman for Children’s National, said the hospital was treating 23 young patients for the syndrome. The discrepancy in numbers from the hospital and jurisdictions was not immediately clear. The illness, known as multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C), is a recently discovered complication of the coronavirus. Across the region, government officials continue to expand testing options as part of their fight against the virus. Virginia’s Loudoun County offered free, drive-up, no-appointment testing in Leesburg, and had enough people lined up in their cars by 3 p.m. to account for all its


There are about 16,000 nursing home patients in the state and 36,000 nursing home workers, according to Joseph DeMattos Jr., president and chief executive of Health Facilities Association of Maryland. So far, 1,135 residents and staff members of long-term care facilities in the state have died of covid-19. Still, many jurisdictions around the state have begun to reopen. On Wednesday, State Comptroller Peter Franchot (D) urged the Hogan administration to “move as quickly as possible” to allow restaurants in those areas to offer outdoor dining — an amenity that is part of Virginia’s “phase one” reopening but not Maryland’s. Franchot, who is running for governor in 2022, said he was advocating for outdoor dining to prop up a key part of the economy. He said he believes many social distancing and safety restrictions should stay in place, and reiterated that the pandemic is far from over. “This idea that we can just be cavalier and take our shirts off and walk down the boardwalk, like this virus has been defeated, that’s just wrong,” he said at a meeting of the state Board of Public Works. “I want people to understand that we’re trying to protect their safety, and if they’re not safe, they’re not going to have any economic prosperity.” Even when the region does reopen, many summer activities are unlikely to happen, a round of announcements on Wednesday showed. Officials in Baltimore said all special events are canceled through Aug. 31, including the city’s Fourth of July celebration and three-day Artscape festival that was scheduled to begin July 17. The city’s summer jobs program for youth will be held remotely. The District’s National Independence Day Parade down Constitution Avenue has also been called off. And Arlington County announced Wednesday that summer camp activities have been canceled, joining Fairfax County in that decision. Arlington officials said they considered whether the camps could be safely held with proper social distancing, appropriate cleaning protocols and other safety measures. But they concluded the risk of infection for the camp participants and county staff is still too great. “We recognize how important camps are to our residents, and we are truly saddened to have to cancel for the summer,” Jane Rudolph, director of Arlington’s Department of Parks & Recreation, said in a statement. Residents who have already paid for summer camp will receive a credit for future camp activities, county officials said. rebecca.tan@washpost.com erin.cox@washpost.com


NASA names newest space telescope for pioneering female astronomer

Congress and convincing budget offices of the project’s importance. With its 7.9-foot mirror and $4.5 billion sticker price, the Hubble was far bigger and more costly than any space telescope ever launched. Skeptics wondered whether such an instrument was possible — and even if it was, would it be worth the cost? “You simply had to be solid in your vision and persistent, and [Roman] had those qualities,” Hammel said. NASA has struggled to escape the gravity well of a storied history dominated by white males. Dan Goldin, its administrator in the 1990s, famously lamented the culture there as “too stale, male and pale.” The agency that put 12 white males on the moon had historically consigned women and racial minorities to second-tier roles. NASA’s most ambitious effort today is a plan to put astronauts back on the moon by 2024. That program is named Artemis, after the Greek goddess who was the twin sister of Apollo. Last year, a telescope in Chile operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy was renamed after Vera C. Rubin. She also was a trailblazing astronomer, renowned for her research showing that galaxies were certain to contain dark matter that cannot be detected through direct observation. If space scientists have neglected women in the naming of spacecraft, they have at times been downright hostile to women seeking to join their ranks. When NASA was established in 1958, many astronomy programs did not admit women. Observatories had no women’s restrooms. Women were barred from research presentations and scholarly clubs. As recently as 2018, a sweeping report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine found that half of women in science had experienced harassment. The problem is especially bad for women of color; a 2017 survey of female space researchers found that 40 percent of nonwhite respondents had felt unsafe in their workplaces due to racism and sexism. In an essay for the journal Science, Roman wrote of the hurdles she faced during her early career. The physics department chairman at Swarthmore College, where she earned her bachelor’s degree, told her that he usually tried to talk women out of his program but that she “might” make it. “But I am glad I ignored the many people who told me that I could not be an astronomer,” Roman wrote. “I have had a wonderful career in a field that I love.”


Coronavirus hot spots erupt across the country; experts warn of second wave in South

deaths. But Reich said Wednesday that this is a particularly difficult phase of the pandemic to capture in models because of uncertainty about how people will behave as restrictions are lifted. “There’s so much complexity and so much that could change,” Reich said. Some communities seem to be abiding better by social distancing, Rubin said. They include Denver, Colorado Springs, Columbus, Ohio, and the Research Triangle of North Carolina, all of which look good in the new forecast. But South Florida, which has the bulk of that state’s cases, looks worrisome in the four-week projection, Rubin said. “That Southeast coast, they’re just starting to open up and relax. It’s a densely crowded area. There’s a lot of tinder down there,” he said. Alabama will probably experience a steep increase in cases in nearly every county over the next month, according to the PolicyLab model. State Health Officer Scott Harris said this week that Alabama’s numbers were “not as good as we could hope for.” The state began easing its stay-at-home order and other restrictions this month. Gov. Kay Ivey (R), who has allowed restaurants, bars, retail businesses, churches, gyms and salons to reopen, is expected to outline further steps this week. In a news conference Wednesday, Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed said the city is facing a shortage of intensive care beds and being forced to divert patients to Birmingham. “They’re at a capacity that is not sustainable,” he said. “Our health-care system is maxed out.” In upstate Monroe County, N.Y., home to the city of Rochester, hospitalizations of covid-19 patients have risen by about 70 percent over the past 10 days and 18 percent since reopening began on Friday. PolicyLab projects that cases in Monroe County will rise through the end of May before falling precipitously through mid-June. Michael D. Mendoza, Monroe County’s public health commissioner, told reporters Tuesday that he believed hospitalizations have risen in large part because the county dramatically increased testing in May and is doing more testing in nursing homes and in hospitals. The number of covid-19 patients in intensive care and on ventilators has “remained relatively stable,” he said. In Texas, there has been an outbreak of cases in El Paso and in meatpacking plants in the Panhandle. The rate of positives in coronavirus tests has gone down as the number of tests has increased, and hospitalization rates are holding steady. Gov. Greg Abbott (R)


Copyright bots and classical musicians are fighting online. The bots are winning.

impacting our very mission in a time where this now has become mission critical.” These systems aren’t just disrupting the relationships between classical organizations and their audiences; they’re also impacting individual musicians trying to stay musically present — and financially afloat — during the crisis. Michael Sheppard, a Baltimore-based pianist, composer and teacher, was recently giving a Facebook Live performance of a Beethoven sonata (No. 3, Op. 2, in C) when Facebook blocked the stream, citing the detection of “2:28 of music owned by Naxos of America” — specifically a passage recorded by the French pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, whom Sheppard is not. The takedown led Sheppard into what he describes as “a byzantine web of ridiculousness” starting with Facebook’s dispute form: “Beethoven died in 1827,” he responded. “This music is very much in the public domain. Please unblock it.” And this wasn’t Sheppard’s first run-in with Facebook, which has blocked or muted past performances of Fauré, Chopin and Bach for being too digitally reminiscent of other performances of Faure, Chopin and Bach. Frustrated with the intrusive claim of infringement, the imposed busywork of defending himself, and the helplessness he felt trying to get these issues recognized and resolved, Sheppard took to Twitter. “Dear @naxosrecords,” he tweeted May 9, “PLEASE stop muting portions of works whose composers have been dead for hundreds of years. It does 0% of people any good, especially musicians like myself who are trying to make a living in time of crisis. #UnmuteBeethoven.” Two days later, Naxos tweeted back, thanking Sheppard for his request and confirming that his video had been “whitelisted.” “There are people worse off than me whose only income is their performances,” says Sheppard, who accompanies his streams with a “virtual tip jar.” “But if it’s muted, what’s the point? Other people are doing the same thing and getting stymied by this.” The covid-19 crisis has certainly driven more classical musicians online to experiment with streaming, but the struggle between bots and Bach isn’t new. The pianist James Rhodes went viral after Sony claimed ownership of the living room performance of Bach’s First Partita that he posted to Facebook in 2018. The same year, musician and blogger Sebastian Tomczak received multiple copyright claims against a 10-hour stretch of white noise he uploaded to YouTube three years prior. And in January 2019, students of conductor Jonathan Girard at the University of British Columbia presented a