But, as city officials celebrated the news of imminent vaccination approvals, Mayor Lori Lightfoot warned residents to follow public health guidelines and not be cheerful as widespread community vaccinations are still several months away.
Here’s what’s happening Thursday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:
12:08 pm: 11,101 new confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases and 196 additional deaths reported
Illinois health officials on Thursday announced 11,101 new confirmed and probable cases of Kovid-19 and 196 additional deaths, bringing the number of known infections in Illinois to 823,531 and statewide deaths 13,861 since the onset of the epidemic. Officials have also recorded 114,503 new tests in the last 24 hours.
The seven-day statewide rolling positivity rate for the case was 9.5% as part of the total tests for the period ending Tuesday.
12:07 p.m .: The Chicago Bears will begin practice on Thursday afternoon after closing Halas Hall on Saturday morning due to a positive COVID-19 test.
The Chicago Bears – the team’s fourth positive test this week – suspended all personal activities and closed Halas Hall on Thursday morning after a personal test for Covid-19 – the team’s fourth positive test this week – but were set to return to practice in the afternoon.
The Bears held meetings in the morning and rescheduled their 1:10 practice at 2:30 p.m.
The players started entering Halas Hall early on Thursday morning when the Bears got a positive result. The person who tested positive was notified and isolated, and the team sent the players and staff home “with caution,” said coach Matt Nagy. He then convened a virtual team meeting to inform them of the circumstances.
11:39 p.m .: Kill Lid-19 epidemic relief is about to end in Illinois as Congress negotiates an aid package. To find out what’s here.
While Congress is negotiating a new round of coronavirus relief, the clock is ticking on a variety of federal aid, but aid is still available in Illinois.
Several federal programs linked to the March package are due to expire later this month, while other types of epidemic relief have been expanded in Illinois.
Here is the help that is still available.
Read more here. –Robert Chennik, Alexia Alejald-Ruiz, Abdel Jimenez, Ryan Ori, Lauren Zumbach
11:15 a.m .: COVID-19 How Chart 5 is a domestic financial disaster in the Chicago area and in Illinois
Coronavirus epidemics have forced employers of all sizes to shrink their operations or temporarily or for good. Lead-off workers, in turn, have less money to spend on other businesses. The health crisis has plunged the country’s economy into recession, and despite promising news about the vaccine, much remains uncertain.
Since mid-April, U.S. The Census Bureau regularly surveys adults to find out how the home epidemic has affected them, both economically and socially.
A recent survey of household finances has raised concerns about job security and shows who is the result of a downturn locally.
11:01 am: Six Flags Great America, will add a drive-thru holiday to the park
Six Flags Great America has created a new way to experience its third annual holiday at Park Lights.
Starting Wednesday and January. On select days from the 18th, Great America will allow patrons, “there is a very rare opportunity to drive inside the park,” said Hank Salemi, the park’s president.
It’s called Holiday in the Park Drive-Through, and it won’t be filled with the Holiday Inn Park Lights and Walk-Through experience, which opened on November 27th and runs from December 30th on select days.
Vehicles are allowed to drive in the park up to 3 miles per hour following the designated route.
10:55 a.m .: Second excitement check updates: Trump’s chief COVID-19 relief negotiator sees ‘much progress’ on 900 900 billion plus plan
President Donald Trump’s top negotiator on the Covid-1119 relief said Thursday that the 900 900 billion plus plan was the way forward and he drew parallels between the administration’s new offer fur and the emerging move of a bipartisan group of senators.
“I have a set of conversations. I spoke to senators from both parties last night, “said Treasury Secretary Steven Munuchin. “Yesterday we had a very productive call with a lot of people. So I think we’re making a lot of progress. “
But a week-long extension of a possible government shutdown seems to have cut some urgency from the talks. This week is just the short-term government-wide funding bill that passed the House on Wednesday and needs to be cleared by the Senate before midnight on Friday to avoid a possible partial shutdown.
10:25 a.m .: ‘Incredible landmark’: Advocate Aurora Doctors excited by Kovid-19 vaccine approval are closer to reality.
On Thursday morning, doctors at Advocate Aurora Health Systems expressed excitement over the possibility of the FDA authorizing the immediate use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine by the FDA and awaiting vaccination plans for the system’s 26 hospitals.
The FDA advisory committee met Thursday to discuss vaccine trial data before recommending the agency, which may approve it soon after the meeting.
Advocate ur Rora Health’s Executive Medical Director for Infectious Diseases and Prevention, Dr. “This is an incredible milestone,” said Robert Citronberg. “That’s out of the ticket.”
The health system has hospitals in Illinois and Wisconsin, and the two states are working together to obtain doses after the FDA approves emergency use. Preliminary data from the Pfizer vaccine, released on Tuesday, looked promising.
Citroenberg said he did not have the final number of doses each hospital would initially receive, noting that Illinois and Wisconsin have separate frameworks for distribution.
However, the health system is in the process of prioritizing which staff members will be able to vaccinate first, as doses will be limited. It will not be mandatory.
Citroenberg said hospitals are working to identify people who spend the most time working in areas where Covid-1 areas are present, especially in intensive care units and on Covid-19 floors.
“The fact that this vaccine was able to develop in such a short period of time is one of the great scientific achievements of our time.”
9:50 am: Illinois colleges and universities suffer enrollment losses after epidemic disruptions
Total undergraduate enrollment in Illinois colleges and universities is down 7.6% from last year, which is worse than the national decline of 4%, as students returned to school during the coronavirus epidemic, according to state dates released this week. Was.
Graduate enrollment in both public and private institutions increased by 1.5%, while it was not enough to offset the undergraduate loss. Overall post-secondary enrollment in Illinois has declined .4. %% this year, data from the Illinois Board of Higher Education shows.
Community colleges suffered the most with a 13.7% drop in students, and the population of new and transferred students dropped significantly.
But not all the news was bad.
9:54 am: Suburban Blue Nose Brewery closes ‘when beer is on’ due to coronavirus epidemic economic toll.
The small southwestern suburban Blue Nose Brewery is closing due to the economic collapse of the coronavirus epidemic, its co-founder said this week.
Jordan Eisenberg, co-founder of Blue Nose, said in an interview that he made the decision in late October, when the state ordered Cook County bars and restrooms in the suburbs to shut down the indoor business for a second time to stop the spread of COVID-19. He said he largely kept the decision to himself when dealing with the business.
8:10 a.m .: FDA meeting on vaccines is ‘important day for America’, says commissioner
Commissioner Stephen Hahn says Thursday’s meeting of the Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine advisory panel is “an important day for the whole of America.”
The head of the FDA hopes it will lead to the end of the epidemic and “for a more normal and healthy life.”
7 a.m .: The year at Chicago Music was one that, due to the epidemic, was like no other.
The show must continue even if there is no show. It’s the biggest Chicago music lesson in 2020. In a year where we know culture was shutting down largely overnight, Chicago’s music scene survived, even though we’ve come a long way.
Despite the promise of our pre-epidemic world, the state of Chicago music was already a confusing place. Long-term issues plagued the city’s music scene, ranging from the possible completion of independent music venues to the mass migration of young musicians seeking more fame, fortune and opportunity on shore. However, in the same way that the epidemic highlighted the racial and economic hardships of society, it also exposed the fragility of the entertainment community in the city and across the country.
No one can underestimate the social, economic and cultural disruptions of the COVID-19 epidemic on the city music scene. Unlike rest restaurants, rentals and retail stores, which have eased the down-down ban in the summer months, finding places to go back (albeit temporarily), music venues will be closed for the foreseeable future.
5 a.m .: Gun purchases in Illinois in 2020, civil unrest over weapons permits, increase in drive record-breaking
Illinois residents bought more guns and applied for more firearm permits in 2020 than at any other time in history, according to figures released Wednesday by state police.
Due to the increase in demand with events during this unprecedented year, more than 1,000,000 serious inquiries into the purchase of guns have been made to date, the authorities said, showing an increase of 45% over 2001.
The state has also received a record 445,945 applications for firearms owner ID cards as of November 2020, up 167% from 166,649 applications in 2017. Illinois State Police did not release the number for any other years, but said the 2020 programs “blew up the past. “The first fur was made after the concealed carry license, the previous boom in 2013.
“This is a reflection of the great deal of unrest and a reflection of the tensions we have in this state and in this country,” said Brendan Kelly, Illinois State Director of Police. “It’s undeniable.”
5 a.m .: Tenants’ Advocates, Cook County Resident Tenants Proposed for Real Estate Industry, Dispute Over Landlord Ordinance
A great debate between tenant advocates and the real estate industry in Cook County is set to boil over this month as the board of commissioners is expected to vote on a proposal to tighten suburban tenant rights amid an epidemic-filled housing crisis.
The proposal, called Resident Tenant Landlord Ordnance, brought in by county commissioners Scott Britain and Kevin Morrison, will cement major landlord rules in the suburbs, where about 555,000 home tenants are not covered by a code that belongs to the county alone. Chicago, Evanston and Mount Prospect.
It is based on Chicago’s own code city that has guided leases since 1986, for the physicality of some homeowners who say it exceeds the market and puts pressure on the market.
During a virtual news conference on Tuesday, supporters of the proposed Cook County ordinance said it was necessary for suburban tenants to receive such protections when the coronavirus epidemic made the loot claim more stringent.
Here are five things that happened on Wednesday related to COVID-19:
