Deaths from the coronavirus in the U.S. are nearing 190,000 fueled by a spike in infections in Midwest states. About half a million children in the U.S. have now tested positive for Covid-19—this after numerous officials in the Trump Administration repeatedly claimed that children were not susceptible to the disease. In the state of Florida infections among school-aged children have jumped by a third—a predictable outcome of the Republican Governor Ron DeSantis’ directive to reopen in-person instruction. But in a very unusual and disturbing move, state officials are forcing some counties to keep the data secret which means parents may not know if their children are likely to become infected. A new report by the Rockefeller Foundation and Duke University has concluded that the U.S. needs to be conducting 200 million Covid-19 tests per month in order to bring the virus under control. Currently it is only conducting about 25 million or fewer tests every month. Journalist Bob Woodward’s new book about Trump called Rage reveals that Trump knew the virus was far deadlier than he was saying in public. In a February 7th phone call with the journalist Trump apparently said, “You just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed…It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu. This is deadly stuff.” Meanwhile in public forums he promised the virus would just “disappear”—which it clearly has not.  

Trump has invested most of his virus-related strategy into the release of a vaccine before the November 3rd election but now one of the companies working on a vaccine has just halted its development after a worrying adverse reaction was noted during trials. AstraZeneca announced a, “potentially unexplained illness in one of the trials,” and has stopped to investigate. White House adviser and one of the few trusted science experts left in government, Dr. Anthony Fauci explained that the incident was evidence that proper scientific vetting of vaccines can catch potential problems and stuck with his original projection that a new vaccine would not be available until 2021. Fauci also said he was deeply concerned about the lack of social distancing and mask wearing at recent Trump rallies such as the one in North Carolina on Tuesday. The state government ordered Trump to wear a mask at his rally in Winston-Salem but the President refused and instead mocked virus precautions. Meanwhile on Wednesday, top government health officials faced questioning from U.S. Senators on the pandemic. Dr. Francis Collins,