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The groups are a “stark reminder” that New Yorkers should be vigilant, Governor Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday.
“Wear a mask, socially at a distance, follow public health guidelines, because this is not over,” Cuomo said in a statement.
“We are still knee deep in the first wave of this,” Fauci said in a live feed on Facebook and Twitter.
In Kentucky, Gov. Andy Beshear on Wednesday urged the state to halt a recent “spike” in cases after reporting more than 1,000 new infections for the second day in a row.
“Today’s daily report is too high,” said the governor. “I need your help. It’s up to us and we have to do this.”
In Wisconsin, cases and hospitalizations are increasing. The state reported its highest number of Covid-19 hospitalizations on Wednesday, more than double the numbers seen in late August, when they were in the 200s, data from the Covid Tracking Project shows.
Wisconsin’s seven-day average of daily official new cases peaked Wednesday at 2,334, well above the averages of 600 and 700 seen in late August.
And in Illinois, the governor is tightening restrictions in one part of the state after an increase in positivity rates.
As of early Thursday morning, at least 27 states were reporting seven-day averages of new daily cases higher than a week ago, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Nationwide, more than 7.2 million people have been infected and more than 206,000 have died.
When a vaccine might be available to the U.S. population
On Wednesday, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said that if its Covid-19 vaccine is shown to be safe and effective, it could be available to the general population in late March or early April.
“I think a late first quarter and early second quarter approval is a reasonable timeframe, based on what we know about our vaccine,” Bancel told a conference organized by the Financial Times.
But there are several steps that will have to come before that.
If the safety and efficacy data is verified, Bancel says it hopes Moderna will be able to file an Application for Biologics License (BLA) with the US Food and Drug Administration. That application asks the FDA to consider granting a full license to a drug, while an emergency use authorization (EUA) expedites a drug candidate for use in an emergency.
Moderna could apply for an EUA starting November 25 for people who are considered high priority, including healthcare workers and the elderly, Bancel said at a conference organized by the Financial Times.
“I think if we can vaccinate 75 to 80% of the population, I think it would be a really good achievement,” Fauci said last week.
Mississippi lifts the mask mandate
Despite officials continuing to advocate for wearing masks, Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves announced Wednesday that he will not extend the state’s mask mandate, saying the state’s figures for the average number of new Covid- 19 have decreased.
“It has been a wonderful few weeks for the Covid-19 numbers,” the governor said. “We have cut our average number of new cases in half, we have reduced hospitalizations by two-thirds of what they were before.”
Mississippi has reported more than 98,000 infections since the start of the pandemic. According to data from Johns Hopkins, Mississippi is one of 14 states that have had a relatively stable track in their number of new cases compared to the previous week.
Wyoming, which last week set a single-day record for new Covid-19 cases, also relaxed the rules around restaurants. Nevada relaxed restrictions on public gatherings, while in California, several counties received the green light to move to less restrictive levels of the state’s reopening plan.
Despite removing the masks mandate in Mississippi, the governor urged residents to continue to cover their faces, saying it is “the smartest, most prudent and wisest thing to do.”
CNN’s Kristina Sgueglia, Jason Hanna, Betsy Klein, Lauren Mascarenhas, Claudia Dominguez, and Kay Jones contributed to this report.
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