(NEW YORK) — Here are today’s In Crisis headlines:
House scheduled to vote on COVID-19 relief bill today
The House of Representatives is scheduled today to vote on President Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill that the Senate passed over the weekend. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s office announced Wednesday morning that the vote will come between 11:45 a.m. and 12:15 p.m. ET today. Despite polls showing the legislation is popular among a majority of Americans, the bill is still not expected to get any Republican support, mirroring the absence of GOP votes to pass the Senate version. The 600+ page bill, dubbed the American Rescue Plan, includes an extension of supplemental unemployment benefits through September 6, and a new round of relief payments for Americans struggling with the pandemic’s ongoing economic impact. President Biden is eager to sign the bill into law this week before current federal unemployment benefits expire on March 14. The White House says Americans can expect to see their $1,400 checks by the end of the month.
COVID-19 numbers
Here’s the latest data on COVID-19 coronavirus infections, deaths and vaccinations.
Latest reported COVID-19 numbers globally per Johns Hopkins University
Global diagnosed cases: 117,660,021
Global deaths: 2,612,360. The United States has the most deaths of any single country, with 527,705.
Number of countries/regions: at least 192
Total patients recovered globally: 66,692,308
Latest reported COVID-19 numbers in the United States per Johns Hopkins University
There are at least 29,096,450 reported cases in 50 states + the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam. This is more than in any other country.
U.S. deaths: at least 527,705. California has the greatest number of reported deaths in the U.S., with 54,628.
U.S. total people tested: 367,015,805
The greatest number of reported COVID-19 cases in the U.S. is in California, with 3,607,891 confirmed cases out of a total state population of 39.51 million. This ranks second in the world after England, which has 3,703,136 cases. Texas is third, with 2,704,790 confirmed cases out of a total state population of 29 million.
Latest reported COVID-19 vaccination numbers in the United States
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports a total of 123,232,775 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been distributed in the U.S. Of those, 93,692,598 doses have been administered, with 61,088,527 people receiving at least one dose and 32,102,061 people fully vaccinated, representing 18.4% and 9.7% of the total U.S. population, respectively. The Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines each require two doses to be effective. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine requires a single dose to be effective.
COVID-19 cases, deaths declining in the US
The U.S. has seen a significant decline in its COVID-19 metrics over the past two months, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services. There has been an overall 77% drop over the last eight weeks, with approximately 400,000 new coronavirus cases and just under 12,000 deaths reported in the last seven days. Two months ago at this time, the country had reported over 20,000 COVID-19 deaths and 1.7 million cases in a single week. With a current average of 57,600 new cases a day, the seven-day average of daily cases continues to drop nationwide, declining by 13.6% since last week.
White House to announce new push for additional COVID-19 vaccines
President Biden will announce later this afternoon a push to procure 100 million additional doses of the single-dose Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, to be delivered later this year. Biden will announce that he’s directing the Department of Health and Human Services to procure the doses at a meeting today with executives from Johnson & Johnson and Merck, meant to highlight the landmark partnership, brokered by the White House, between the rival companies that’s accelerating vaccine manufacturing. That partnership enabled Biden to declare enough vaccine will be available for every American adult to be immunized by the end of May — around 260 million people. The additional 100 million doses being announced today will not be delivered before that deadline, and a White House official declined to provide a specific timeline. However, The New York Times reports the doses will be delivered sometime in the second half of this year.
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