The FDA has authorized anyone aged 50 years and older to get a second booster shot of the mRNA vaccine at least four months after their initial one. Walgreens and Rite Aid announced this week Americans who qualify for a second COVID-19 booster will now be allowed to receive one at their stores. Walgreens said walk-in appointments will be offered from Wednesday through Friday of this week and appointment scheduling will be available, and preferred, beginning on Friday. Rite Aid said people can make an appointment or walk-in to get their second does if they are eligible.
On Monday, the White House released the President’s $5.8 trillion Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 Budget, featuring nearly $90 billion for pandemic preparedness and response. President Biden called the budget a statement of values, spoke about the progress in combating COVID-19, and acknowledged the work still left to complete. Specifically, the budget calls upon Congress to invest $40 billion in transforming capabilities to produce countermeasures against pandemics, $28 billion in investments in public health infrastructure and early warning systems, $12.1 billion towards research to effectively respond to a pandemic and other biological threats amongst other requests. Congress will consider the President’s budget request but historically works the process separately.
President Biden received his second booster shot for COVID-19 on Wednesday. The booster shot came one day after the Food and Drug Administration’s authorization of the additional vaccine booster for people aged 50 and older. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Rochelle Walensky called the booster safe and emphasized the importance of the booster “for those 65 and older and those 50 and older with underlying medical conditions.”
Capitol Hill
On Thursday morning, The Hill reported that “Senators are swapping offers as they scramble to try to get a deal on coronavirus relief before they leave for a two-week break in a matter of days. […] Senators are haggling over how to pay for $15.6 billion in coronavirus relief after it was stripped out of a government funding bill because of pushback from House Democrats who didn’t want to repurpose state and local government money to help cover the spending. Republicans are insisting that any new coronavirus relief be covered by a coronavirus bill [the American Rescue Plan Act] passed by Democrats last year. ‘His proposal is different than ours, so they’re getting closer, but there’s still a gap between them,’ Romney said, referring to the differences between an offer from Schumer and the GOP offer. The current hang-up is over how to pay for the coronavirus aid, which would cover vaccines, treatments, and testing. Republicans gave Schumer a list of potential ways to pay for the coronavirus relief on Tuesday and said that the Senate majority leader gave them his own list of potential areas the funding could come from on Wednesday. Romney added that he thought they were making ‘good progress’ and that the differences were ‘narrowing.’ Schumer is also already taking steps on the Senate floor to speed up how long it would take to pass a coronavirus relief deal, underscoring both the crowded Senate calendar and the looming recess [beginning April 8]. But Republicans have also signaled that they are willing to walk away if the talks can’t reach an agreement.”
Additionally, it was reported that Sen. John Thune (R-SD), the No. 2 Senate Republican, told The Hill on Wednesday night the size of a potential deal was being scaled back to roughly $10 billion and the group was going to drop roughly $5 billion in global coronavirus funding out of a potential agreement.
On March 17, Reps. Dean Phillips (D-MN) and Mike Quigley (D-IL) led a letter to Congressional leadership calling for “the inclusion of much-needed relief for the country’s hardest-hit small businesses in the upcoming COVID supplemental bill.” The letter, signed by 42 of their colleagues, specifically mentions the restaurant, fitness, hospitality, live events, and travel industries as sectors of the economy disproportionately impacted by the pandemic.
On March 30, the House Oversight Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis held a hearing on “Moving Beyond the Coronavirus Crisis: The Biden Administration’s Progress in Combating the Pandemic and Plan for the Next Phase.” The hearing focused on the progress made over the past two years in combating the coronavirus and examined how the Biden Administration’s National COVID-19 Preparedness Plan—if fully funded by Congress—would continue to protect Americans from the virus while minimizing the need for future pandemic-related disruptions. Witnesses included CDC Director Rochelle Walensky; HHS Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response Dawn O’Connell; and Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.
Administration
The Biden Administration launched COVID.gov, a one-stop website focused on vaccines, tests, treatments, and masks. As part of COVID.gov, a new Test-to-Treat locator will help people access pharmacies and community health centers across the nation where people can get tested for COVID-19 and receive appropriate treatments if they need them. The White House announcement is here.
FDA announce a virtual meeting of its Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee on April 6 to discuss considerations for future COVID-19 vaccine booster doses and the process for selecting specific strains of the SARS-CoV-2 virus for COVID-19 vaccines to address current and emerging variants. Along with the independent experts of the advisory committee, CDC and NIH will participate in the meeting.
HRSA announced more than $413 million in Provider Relief Fund (PRF) payments to more than 3,600 providers. This is the fourth round of PRF Phase 4 payments, totaling nearly $12 billion that has been distributed to more than 82,000 providers
OSHA reopened the rulemaking record partially and scheduled an informal public hearing to seek comments on specific topics that relate to the development of a final standard to protect healthcare and healthcare support service workers from workplace exposure to the COVID-19 virus. The comments deadline is April 22.
The New York Times reports the Biden Administration will lift pandemic-related immigration restrictions. The Times article notes the change could “more than double what is already a historic number of migrants surging into the United States from Mexico.”
A federal jury convicted a California man for submitting fraudulent applications seeking money from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), submitting false statements to a financial institution, and money laundering. Robert Benlevi, 53, of Encino, sought a total of $27 million in forgivable PPP loans. In his fraudulent applications, Benlevi represented that each of his companies had 100 employees and average monthly payroll of $400,000, even though he knew that the companies did not have any employees or payroll expenses.
|
The World Health Organization unveiled a new strategic plan that lays out a path toward ending the global emergency of COVID-19. In its third strategic preparedness and response plan on COVID, the WHO acknowledged the pandemic remains an acute global crisis but charted a path to end the global emergency if key measures are implemented rapidly. The organization outlined two key objectives: reducing coronavirus infections and diagnosing and treating COVID-19 cases effectively to reduce deaths.
More than 20 states filed a lawsuit against the federal mask mandate on transportation, which has been extended until April 18, saying it violated the Constitution and violated the Administrative Procedure Act. The 21 states claim that the CDC had not allowed for public comment for more than a year since the federal transportation mask mandate was first issued. They also claimed that they were negatively impacted by the mask mandate because it required states to “expend resources to enforce the mandate” and harmed states’ “sovereign interests” because many states “have laws or policies prohibiting or discouraging mask requirements in contexts where the mask mandate applies,” according to court filings.
A study found the use of ivermectin to combat COVID-19 did not lead to reduced hospitalization. In Brazil, 3,515 individuals participated in a study where a group received ivermectin, a group received a placebo, and another group received a different form of treatment for COVID-19. The study, posted in the New England Journal of Medicine, says the results concluded ivermectin does not lower the risk of COVID-19 hospitalization.
|
|
Webinars, Events and Resources |
|
