State-by-State Virus Management Under Watch as Reopenings Continue
U.S. coronavirus cases surge in southwestern states
Twenty-one U.S. states reported weekly increases in new cases of COVID-19, with Arizona, Utah and New Mexico all posting rises of 40% or higher for the week ended June 7 compared with the prior seven days, according to a Reuters analysis.
The three southwestern states joined hot spots in the South to help push the national number of new infections in the first week of June up 3%, the first increase after five weeks of declines, according to the analysis of data from The COVID Tracking Project, a volunteer-run effort to track the outbreak.
Hawley Writes to Barr over State Discrimination against Religious Groups
In a letter sent this morning, Senator Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) called on U.S. attorney general Bill Barr to investigate the disparities between how states are treating ongoing protests and the regulations they have placed on religious services during the COVID-19 outbreak.
“State officials have violated the free speech and free exercise rights of religious Americans by treating religious gatherings and speech differently than the speech and mass gatherings of protests,” Hawley alleges in the letter, a copy of which was provided exclusively to National Review.
More than half of states may be undercounting coronavirus cases by not following CDC guidelines
At least 28 states are not following US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines on reporting new Covid-19 cases -- half of which saw the trend of new cases increasing in the last week.
Those states are not reporting probable cases, according to the daily case count listed on the CDC's website. Probable cases include those that show evidence of an infection without the confirmation of a lab test and cases where coronavirus was listed as a cause or contributing cause of death but are not confirmed with a lab test.