Month: December 2020

An advisory committee to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is set to vote on priority designation of COVID-19 vaccines Tuesday afternoon, as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) prepares to review two vaccine candidates this month for emergency use authorization. The meeting Tuesday will lay out vaccine administration priorities, which are largely expected to put health care workers and nursing home staff and residents at the top of the list. But some experts also say vaccinating minority communities, which have been disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus, should also be a priority. How distribution will work a the local level and whether there will be enough doses to vaccinate health care workers and the elderly, however, remains to be seen. Dr. Jos...

The coronavirus was in the U.S. as early as mid-December 2019, a period earlier than officially identified in either China or the U.S., according to new research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The study, published Monday, found evidence of the virus in 106 of 7,389 blood donations to the Red Cross in nine states. These donations were collected between Dec. 13, 2019, and Jan. 17, 2020, with the Red Cross later submitting them to the CDC to test for antibodies. Antibodies were detected in 39 samples on the West Coast in Washington, Oregon and California, all of them collected between Dec. 13 and 16. Antibodies were detected in another 67 samples in Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Rhode Island and Wisconsin. Those samples were collected betw...

Twenty more Mainers with COVID-19 have died, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Tuesday. The 20 deaths are a new daily record for the stateThe new deaths bring the total since the beginning of the pandemic to 214.Ten of the new deaths were in Androscoggin County, three were in Penobscot County, two were in York County and Kennebec, Knox, Oxford, Piscataquis and Washington counties each had one new death.The Maine CDC said due to the Thanksgiving holiday, there was a delay in reporting some deaths, which led to the large increase on Tuesday.Below is more information on the reported deaths, including when they died.A man in his 80s from Penobscot County who died on Nov. 30 A man in his 60s from Oxford County who died on Nov. 30 A man in his 70s from An...