chicagotribune--2020-12-16--COVID-19 Q&A: How long before the new vaccine is effective? What will distribution look like? What a

COVID-19 Q&A: How long before the new vaccine is effective? What will distribution look like? What are long-term safety concerns? Coronavirus questions answered.

When someone gets a vaccine , how long will it take to become effective ?
What happens when groups of people are approved to be vaccinated ?
Are experts concerned about long-term safety ?
These are some of the many questions readers sent us that we ’ ve put to health and science experts .
This resource will be updated as more questions arrive , so check back often .
Have your own pandemic question ?
Send it to the Tribune here .
Get the latest Chicago COVID-19 information and updates from Chicago Tribune reporters and editors on our COVID-19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ work right away within the body , said University of Chicago Medicine infectious diseases expert Dr. Emily Landon .
In a Chicago Tribune Facebook Live , Landon explained how it signals our immune system : “ We create molecules that have our body make the proteins that basically act like a wanted poster for your immune system .
They say , ‘ This is what you ’ re looking for .
When you find this , kill it.
’ ” Although the vaccine starts to work right away , how long it takes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to fight off the disease is hard to say .
Landon said with the Pfizer vaccine , about half of the time , data showed people had antibodies a few weeks after getting the vaccine .
Researchers are still learning about how long this might protect people .
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention , it typically takes a few weeks for the body to provide protection , so it is possible that a person could be infected and become sick with COVID-19 just before or just after vaccination .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ get vaccines all at the same time .
And this is important to understand because there might not be enough vaccines for everyone in those groups on the first day a group is able to be vaccinated .
So there might be some waiting , but , Landon added , “ It doesn ’ t matter too much in the grand scheme of things if you get vaccinated this Wednesday or next Wednesday.
” She added that you don ’ t have to go when your group is called .
You can wait @ @ @ @ @ @ @ still have some concerns about some aspects of the vaccine .
For example , some people who are pregnant are assessing whether to get a vaccine .
Landon won ’ t wait .
“ I am raring to go .
I am signing up right away for my first time.
” Given the speed with which these vaccines were developed and tested , what long-term safety concerns , if any , do you have ?
Landon emphasized that there aren ’ t long-term consequences of other vaccines we already know more about .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ cause , “ They start upfront .
They don ’ t start 10 years later.
” So with the data we already have , we should have a good sense of what to expect .
“ The short-term problems are all mild , ” she said .
“ They may not feel awesome to you , because you have a pretty bad headache and you may feel really tired afterwards .
But that is way better than having COVID.
” First , don ’ t panic , says Dr. William Schaffner , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Medical Center and former board member at the Infectious Diseases Society of America .
The recent news of possible allergic reactions is “ a bit of a surprise , ” he said , as this did not occur during Pfizer ’ s clinical trials .
But varying things can happen after a person is vaccinated — we are , after all , giving them to many different people .
The system is working as it should , he said .
Experts have detected this issue , and British officials are going to investigate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said in the meantime , all you folks who have had allergies to other things , stand aside for the moment , and we ’ ll call you when we ’ re comfortable with this , ” Schaffner said .
Yes , Schaffner said .
In fact , experts hope the vaccine will offer even more robust protection than whatever protection someone gets from the infection itself .
“ If you ’ ve had COVID before , that ’ s OK , ” he said .
“ You ’ re not going to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccine or anything like that.
” It ’ s hard to say , Schaffner said , and he knows this might be an unsatisfactory response .
He , too , is eager to find out .
“ Just as soon as we start vaccinating a large number of people that will be assessed , and we ’ ll just have to stay tuned for further information down the road , ” he said .
He would not offer any estimate , saying this is a new vaccine and a distinctive virus , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are commonly excluded from research , and have not been included so far in clinical trials for the coronavirus vaccine , despite groups like the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists calling for their inclusion .
This is an issue , said Dr. Kathleen Neuzil , co-director of the National Institutes of Health ’ s COVID-19 Prevention Network , as many in the health care field are women .
Dr. Emily Miller , assistant professor in the Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine at Northwestern Medicine ’ s Feinberg School of Medicine , said unknowns @ @ @ @ @ @ @ risk of not getting the vaccine , which is the risk of acquisition of ( COVID-19 ) , which has concrete and well-documented risks .
...
Through that lens , if we can remember that there is no zero-risk option , then the balance at this point favors receiving the vaccine.
” Women considering becoming pregnant will similarly have no available information on pregnancy after getting the vaccine .
Miller said she will be watching closely to see if the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ’ s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices @ @ @ @ @ @ @ patients to discuss their options with their health care provider .
The full impact of COVID-19 on alcohol use is not yet known , but rates of alcohol usage have been rising during the pandemic .
According to the World Health Organization , alcohol compromises the body ’ s immune system and increases the risk of adverse health outcomes .
The organization suggests people minimize their alcohol consumption — particularly during the pandemic .
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism ( NIAAA ) has issued communications warning people to avoid excessive @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pattern of alcohol consumption can have an impact on health , ” he said .
“ The current 2015-2020 guidelines suggest limiting drinks to up to one drink per day for women or two drinks per day for men .
Having one drink per day is not the same as having seven drinks all at once in a single day .
It ’ s best to spread them out as recommended in the guidelines.
” Need to get tested for COVID-19 during the post-Thanksgiving rush ?
Here ’ s how to find the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with your primary care doctor ; many doctors offer in-office testing .
If you don ’ t have a doctor who does testing , then rapid testing , in-home testing or drive-thru testing are options .
If an option is not affordable enough or closed to you due to restrictions , try crowdsourcing information to get up-to-date information about local testing sites , appointment availability , cost and wait times .
Looking for a rapid test with same-day results ?
Those tests are best for people who actually have COVID-19 symptoms , said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ president of operations for Northwestern Medicine Immediate Care .
If you don ’ t have symptoms , the PCR test , which can detect very small amounts of the coronavirus , is a better choice , she said .
For those who care more about convenience than cost , private clinics offer shorter waits .
Many require upfront payments of $ 175 to $ 300 .
If you want to submit a claim to your insurance company , check the rules for coverage .
Your insurer may require that you are referred for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ OK to travel if you don ’ t have any co-morbidities , and is it possible to do so safely ?
The short answer is no , according to Dr. Gregory Poland , professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the Mayo Clinic .
“ The other side of the coin is the more times you bring more people together , the greater the risk for super spreader and transmissibility , ” he continued .
“ So that healthy 22-year-old may have an upper respiratory mild symptom , or no symptoms at all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the people he walks by , or sits next to , or in that airplane with him .
So it actually does add risk.
” Poland predicts that there ’ s going to be a “ continued exponential increase ” in COVID-19 cases , followed by increases in hospitalizations and deaths , he said .
“ So it makes absolutely no sense to be traveling right now — unless you have no possible alternative.
” “ Here ’ s what ’ s driving a lot of this current surge : It is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ small group gatherings , ” Poland said .
“ So when your relatives drive a day or two to come and see you , now both of you are trading whomever you ’ ve been in contact with at school , work , church ( or ) whatever it might be , and so you ’ re just giving more and more opportunity.
” “ You would drive , you would quarantine — as you say — the two weeks before , ” he said .
“ You might even get a test @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ re asymptomatic , that you ’ re not infected .
You would then drive without staying in a hotel or going to restaurants .
You ’ d have a procedure for how you ’ d get gas and go to the bathroom.
” Once you arrived , you ’ d ideally not stay in the same house as other family members , or at least sleep on different floors , he said .
When sharing common areas , everyone would wear masks and maintain their distance .
Meals would have be to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do you really want to do all that ?
” Poland asked .
“ Or do you want to say , like our family is saying , ‘ We ’ re really thankful that everybody ’ s in good health , and we want everybody to stay healthy ’ ?
” If people test positive , they should isolate themselves immediately , said Robert Citronberg , Advocate Aurora Health ’ s executive medical director of infectious disease and prevention .
Isolate for 10 days from the onset of symptoms .
If someone tested @ @ @ @ @ @ @ should isolate 10 days from the date of the positive test .
Here ’ s the good news : those who test positive can still go outside .
“ Truthfully , if you ’ re cooped up inside your house for 10 days you may go a little stir crazy , ” Citronberg said .
They should wear a mask and avoid being close to people , but it ’ s OK to get some fresh air .
What can college students do to best protect themselves and their families when they come @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what students do , it won ’ t be without risk , Citronberg said .
If any family members at home are high risk , students should be especially cautious .
He recommends two layers of testing — one test before leaving campus and another three days after returning home .
Here ’ s what he acknowledged will be the tough part : Until you have passed the 14-day incubation period , everyone should remain masked inside the home except while eating .
Families should try to eat separately .
He recommends remaining @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last had other social contact .
It might be mandated for people at high risk , but likely not for the general population , said Tina Tan , pediatric infectious disease physician at the Feinberg School of Medicine .
She noted there is not enough information about how these vaccines might impact children or pregnant women , for example , who have not been included in trials .
Pfizer says its COVID-19 vaccine may be 90 % effective .
The vaccine uses genetic code that trains the immune system to recognize the spiked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
How does it work ?
Pfizer , which is developing the vaccine with its German partner BioNTech , is among four candidates already in huge studies in the U.S. , with still more being tested in other countries .
Another U.S. company , Moderna Inc. , also hopes to file an application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration this month .
Neither company ’ s shot is made with the coronavirus itself .
Instead , the vaccine contains a piece of genetic code that trains the immune system to recognize the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ virus .
It ’ s called a messenger RNA vaccine .
( A refresher on basic biology : DNA is transcribed , or copied , into RNA , which then makes proteins that carry out the actual work of living cells .
Molecules called messenger RNA are couriers that carry instructions from DNA to proteins . )
Chemist and biochemist Chuan He , the John T. Wilson Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Chicago , says what Pfizer has done @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about messenger RNA generated in the last several decades .
“ mRNA therapy in the vaccine field supplies proteins that mimic viral proteins to induce an immune response , ” he said .
“ mRNA comes in , will express the encoded protein for a period of time to elicit an immune response , then the immune cells will keep this memory .
The RNA is gone and your body goes back to its normal state , but your immune cells have been trained by the presence of this foreign protein produced from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ news , however , doesn ’ t mean a vaccine will be here soon .
Pfizer ’ s study is continuing , and the company cautioned that the protection rate might change as more COVID-19 cases are added to the calculations .
Scientists have warned for months that any COVID-19 shot may be only as good as flu vaccines , which are about 50 % effective and require yearly immunizations .
Earlier this year , Fauci said he would be happy with a COVID-19 vaccine that was 60 % effective .
Chicago ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from a list of states under travel quarantine orders to a color-coded list comparing the rate of infection here with other states .
Under the original version of the emergency travel order , states were added to the list when they had an infection rate higher than 15 cases per 100,000 residents and were removed once the daily case average remained below that rate for two consecutive weeks .
The city ’ s new color-coded list will be updated every two weeks .
There are exceptions based on how long travelers spend in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ across the Indiana or Wisconsin state line to or from Chicago to work or go to school will be exempt from the quarantine rule .
But workers in Chicago from Indiana will be expected to avoid restaurants , bars and other public spaces in the city .
Read on for the rolling list of states on Chicago ’ s orange and red lists .
The Illinois Department of Public Health encourages people to get tested before and after any gatherings and to curb activities outside their homes before getting together .
The Centers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lowest risk Thanksgiving plans include celebrating only with those who already live in your home , or a virtual dinner with friends and family .
Dr. Robert Murphy , executive director of the Institute for Global Health at Northwestern University ’ s Feinberg School of Medicine , recommends people who choose to get tested do so as close to the event as possible — keeping in mind that some tests return results in 15 minutes and others take days .
People who want to get tested for COVID-19 before the holidays are looking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ One is an antigen test , which looks for specific proteins on the surface of the virus and often returns results within 15 minutes .
However , it is not considered as accurate as the other type of test , a molecular test , such as a PCR test .
Molecular tests detect the virus ’ s genetic material .
It can take a day to a week for results , depending on the testing facility .
“ At this time the CDC estimates that on average immunity to COVID-19 lasts about 3 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unlikely , ” wrote Pho .
“ Chances go up the more someone is exposed to the virus.
” Is there any way to safely have an indoor holiday gathering with a small group of family , around six people ?
Should we quarantine for two weeks prior or get tested before the gathering ?
But , if you do choose to congregate with loved ones for the holiday season , he suggests keeping groups small and spending most of the time outside .
Masks should be worn , said Singer , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The risk isn ’ t gone , but these precautions can “ reduce the risk of spreading COVID-19.
” Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said Nov. 5 that even though we all desire to spend the holidays with friends and family , it ’ s best to sit it out .
If not , she said previously , it could result in a funeral down the line .
“ Perhaps this holiday — as we have already done for most of 2020 — we are going to have to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ virtual , ” she said .
“ We ’ ll have to stay at home and forego the large gatherings so that we will have future events that we can be with our friends and family.
” “ Travel will increase your chances of contracting and spreading COVID-19 , as will going to a crowded event , as will having multiple people in your home for Thanksgiving , ” she said .
“ So in terms of travel , we do recommend avoiding travel to areas of higher risk , but as you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” What is the risk of eating or meeting outside , and not socially distancing from people sitting at the table , especially when we ’ re all from different households and all have been following different levels of precautions ?
While spending time outdoors has been said to lessen the risk of spreading COVID-19 to some degree , Singer reiterates that there is no “ risk-free gathering.
” In May , when the state was beginning to reopen and loosen restrictions after the quarantine period , the general rule of thumb for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is better than inside , and masks are better than no masks , said Dr. Emily Landon , executive medical director of Infection Prevention and Control at the UChicago Medicine .
What is the most recent breakdown of age groups that have died of COVID-19 ?
There have been 10,030 reported deaths in Illinois from COVID-19 as of Nov. 5 since the start of the pandemic .
A breakdown on those deaths by age , race and gender can be found here .
Data on available hospital beds and ventilators can also be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it safe to visit your doctors if you ’ re at higher risk now ?
What about colonoscopies and other scoping procedures ?
How serious is the potential for ocular transmission of COVID ?
Should I wear goggles when in proximity to others , like on an airplane or in a grocery store ?
“ There are receptors for the virus present in the structures of the eye , but this route ( of transmission ) is less common , ” explained Pho .
“ In situations where masking and social distancing can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in crowded places , or more enclosed areas like airplanes , I do recommend wearing eye protection .
I also strongly recommend them for people who are knowingly in close proximity to someone who is infected , such as caregivers for household members with COVID-19.
” Could we make a big difference in hospitalization rates and death tolls by changing our diet and health habits ?
How does your personal health increase or decrease your chances of COVID-19 complications or death ?
Which health conditions are mostly linked to higher death tolls ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ eating habits and regular exercise can be beneficial , Pho says prevention methods are the best way to evade COVID-19 and the complications that can come with it .
“ Avoiding exposure to the virus through masking , social distancing and hand sanitizing are essential , ” she wrote .
“ There is a theory that even if masks aren ’ t 100 % effective at preventing all infections , they reduce the amount of virus ... that is inhaled , leading to an overall milder illness .
”

Alison Bowen, Christen A. Johnson, Darcel Rockett


chicagotribune--2020-12-16--United Airlines to begin contact tracing program with CDC this week to help slow spread of COVID-19

Starting this week , passengers traveling to the U.S. on international flights will be asked to voluntarily provide their email @ @ @ @ @ an address where they can be reached , the Chicago-based carrier said Wednesday .
United @ @ @ @ @ and to international destinations to provide the information in the coming weeks .

United Airlines will begin collecting contact information from passengers when they check in as part of an effort by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to better track spread of the coronavirus.
Starting this week, passengers traveling to the U.S. on international flights will be asked to voluntarily provide their email address, phone number and an address where they can be reached, the Chicago-based carrier said Wednesday. United will ask those flying domestically and to international destinations to provide the information in the coming weeks.
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Giving the CDC immediate access to more complete contact information for passengers is expected to help public health officials follow up more quickly with people who have been potentially exposed to COVID-19 while flying.
“Initiatives like testing and contact tracing will play a significant role in slowing the spread of COVID-19 until a vaccine is widely available,” United’s Chief Customer Officer Toby Enqvist said in a news release.
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Delta Air Lines became the first U.S. airline to work with the CDC on contact tracing earlier this month, according to a news release. The airline began collecting contact information from passengers traveling to the U.S. on international flights Tuesday.
Customers can opt into United’s contact tracing program using the airline’s mobile app, by going to the website or when they check in at the airport.
jallison@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-12-16--Two boys, 13 and 15, charged with armed carjacking in Rogers Park

The teens were both arrested around 4:15 p.m. Tuesday in the 4700 block of North Racine Avenue , police said @ @ @ @ @ custody less than 30 minutes after a 65-year-old woman was carjacked after parking in the @ @ @ @ @ Avenue about 2½ miles away .

Two boys, 13 and 15, have been charged with stealing a woman’s car at gunpoint in Rogers Park, according to Chicago police.
The teens were both arrested around 4:15 p.m. Tuesday in the 4700 block of North Racine Avenue, police said. They were taken into custody less than 30 minutes after a 65-year-old woman was carjacked after parking in the 1200 block of West Farwell Avenue about 2½ miles away.
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They were both charged with felony aggravated vehicular hijacking with a firearm and aggravated vehicular hijacking of a person with a handicap, police said.
The teens were expected to appear at a bail hearing Wednesday.
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pfry@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @paigexfry


chicagotribune--2020-12-16--Here’s what you need to know about COVID-19 vaccines in Illinois

Suburban Cook County expects 20,000 doses this week , which will go to workers at 15 hospitals .
Next , @ @ @ @ @ care facilities will be vaccinated by Walgreens and CVS Health workers .
Other health care @ @ @ @ @ workers , will then likely get the vaccine , followed by essential workers , including @ @ @ @ @ , education , transportation , food and agricultural workers , said Dr. Kiran Joshi , @ @ @ @ @ Department of Public Health , during a news conference Monday .

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chicagotribune--2020-12-16--Coronavirus in Illinois updates: Here’s what happened Dec. 15 with COVID-19 in the Chicago area

“ I know these people are helping for some of those later or middle adopters to say ‘ Hey , @ @ @ @ @ just like me , who does the same work do , is from my community @ @ @ @ @ done , that ’ s from my state , ’ `` she said .
“ @ @ @ @ @ there will be a big push toward later , maybe in the spring… And so @ @ @ @ @ surge of people wanting the vaccine a little bit later , but I still think @ @ @ @ @ people now , so this will be a continual process for much of 2021 .
@

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Laquitta Boyd, holds her 6-year-old daughter Venisha while receiving her first COVID-19 vaccination at a back-to-school health fair hosted by RUSH University Medical Center at the Salvation Army Freedom Center on July 30, 2022, in Chicago. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune)
Illinois medical workers started receiving their initial doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine that federal regulators approved for emergency use late last week, a day after the state received its first shipments of the vaccine and a day after many states began their immunizations.
Inoculations were given Tuesday morning at Loretto Hospital in the Austin community, where the death rate dwarfs the citywide average.
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Vaccinations also began at a hospital in Peoria, with the governor in attendance. Vaccinations planned Tuesday for Edward Hospital in Naperville and Elmhurst Hospital were postponed at least until Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration said in documents posted online that its initial review confirmed the effectiveness and safety of a second vaccine developed by Moderna and the National Institutes of Health, bringing the shot to the cusp of authorization.
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Outside experts will offer their recommendation on that vaccine Thursday, with a final FDA decision expected soon thereafter.
Also on Tuesday, state officials announced 7,359 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 117 additional fatalities, bringing the total number of known infections in Illinois to 863,477 and the statewide death toll to 14,509 since the start of the pandemic.
Here’s what’s happening Tuesday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:
7:37 p.m.: Illinois starts administering COVID-19 vaccine amid optimism and thoughts of the disease’s victims
As the first COVID-19 vaccine administered in Illinois was plunged into Dr. Marina Del Rios’ left arm Tuesday, she thought about all the people who didn’t live to see the historic day.
Her former patients. The health care workers who treated the virus and lost their lives because of it. The friend who died in the early days of the pandemic.
“I can’t give you a total number of the people I know who have died or lost loved ones. I’ve stopped counting,” said Del Rios, the social emergency medicine director at the University of Illinois Hospital. “You never want any lives to be lost, but so many at the same time weighs even heavier on you.”
Del Rios and four other health care workers received Chicago’s first COVID vaccinations Tuesday at Loretto Hospital, the first step in a national effort to blunt a pandemic that has killed 1.6 million people and sickened nearly 73 million worldwide. Five health care workers in Peoria were also given shots at an event attended by the governor. Read more here. — Jamie Munks, Stacy St. Clair, Dan Petrella, Lisa Schencker and Gregory Pratt
4:37 p.m.: Chicago travel order now only requires 10-day quarantine for ‘red’ tier states, which will no longer include Iowa
The city of Chicago moved more than a dozen states to its most severe travel order designation, but people returning from those areas only need to quarantine for 10 days now, officials announced Tuesday.
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Based on the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance that those exposed to COVID-19 should quarantine for 10 days, not 14, travelers from “red” level states are mandated to follow the shorter requirement, according to a city press release.”
Regardless of category, people are urged to avoid non-essential travel and to follow standard COVID-19 mitigation practices such as wearing a mask, washing hands frequently, and social distancing,” the press release said.
As of Friday, Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and West Virginia will be bumped up to the red tier.
But Iowa is moving down to the “orange designation” that allows travelers to avoid the quarantine if they receive a negative test result before coming into the city.
That makes the total 31 red states and 17 orange states plus Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. New to the orange list will be Maine and Vermont. Only one state, Hawaii, remains “yellow,” meaning there are no additional testing or quarantine requirements.
Up until last month, any state averaging an infection rate higher than 15 daily cases per 100,000 residents over a seven-day period was added to the city’s list. Then the city revamped its travel order introduced during the Fourth of July weekend to require a quarantine only from people coming from red-tier states, or those with higher COVID-19 case rates than Chicago. The city is now at 60 cases per 100,000 residents.
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Those coming from orange states, which have numbers between 15 cases-per-100,000 and Chicago’s rate of 60-per-100,000 should get a negative COVID-19 test result no more than 72 hours before arriving or quarantine for 10 days. Those coming from the one yellow state must only observe regular social distancing and mask rules.
The travel order is updated every two weeks and goes into effect the following Friday. Read more here. — Alice Yin
4:25 p.m.: Chicago Public Schools’ reopening plan uncertain as hearing on teachers union injunction request looms
Major decisions could be made about Chicago Public Schools this week related to its coronavirus response and plans to resume in-person learning.
The Chicago Board of Education is set to vote on extending its emergency COVID-19 spending authorization until March, allowing the district to take on costs tied to the pandemic without the usual approval process. So far, CPS reports it has spent about $132 million on coronavirus measures, including $68 million of the $75 million earmarked for emergencies. If approved by the board, the extension would give CPS three additional months to spend the remaining $7 million. Read more here. — Hannah Leone
(Updated) 4:04 p.m.: Second stimulus check updates: Talks escalate on long-delayed COVID-19 aid package, top lawmakers to meet
Talks on a long-delayed COVID-19 aid package intensified Tuesday as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi summoned other top congressional leaders for a potentially critical meeting.
Pelosi, D-Calif., spoke with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for more than an hour, her office tweeted, and Mnuchin will join the make-or-break meeting of Capitol Hill’s “big four” leaders by phone.
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The uptick in activity could be a sign that an agreement is near, though COVID-19 relief talks have been notoriously difficult. Read more here. — Associated Press
3:12 p.m.: Evanston and Skokie health departments wait for call on COVID-19 vaccines: ‘It’s like the bat phone. If it rings, then you go and get it.’
Public health officials in Evanston and Skokie are waiting for the call that doses of the much anticipated COVID-19 vaccine are ready for pick up.
For now, local officials are preparing for that call to come and expect that it could be sometime this week. Other details, like where they will be sent to retrieve it, are also up in the air, said Greg Olsen, public health manager for the city of Evanston. Read more here. — Genevieve Bookwalter, Pioneer Press
1:35p.m.: Pritzker calls vaccinations in Peoria ‘a beginning for the state of Illinois’
Gov. J.B. Pritzker called Tuesday’s vaccinations in Peoria “a beginning for the state of Illinois.”
He also discussed security precautions for the state’s vaccine supply. The Illinois State Police and local law enforcement are working “to make sure that at every step of the way these vaccines are protected once they arrive in the state” and are distributed to the places where they will be administered, Pritzker said.
“I met with the state troopers that were at the (Strategic National Stockpile) yesterday and they escort these vaccines as they move from the SNS to these regional hospitals that also have ultracold storage,” Pritzker said. “And then local law enforcement typically are accompanying the local health departments as they pick up the vaccines.”
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Pritzker said the OSF St. Francis Medical Center in Peoria was chosen to receive the first vaccines for the state’s event in part because the state’s strategic national stockpile is “nearby, and so this made it more convenient.” The state has not disclosed the exact location, citing security reasons.
It wasn’t clear how many vaccinations would be administered across the state on Tuesday, but the state and the city of Chicago received vaccine shipments, and additional shipments are expected to arrive at four county health departments this week.
The state’s top public health official, Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said 96 hospitals in Illinois will be administering vaccines this week. The hospitals are associated with the 50 counties in the state with the highest per capita death rates, the metric Pritzker’s administration chose for distributing the state’s initial shipment to frontline health care workers.
Some rural counties without hospitals are on the list, while the counties where designated vaccine downstate distribution hubs are located in Peoria, Springfield and Champaign initially were not. But the state updated its plan to include hospitals where people from those rural counties would be most likely to go.
“That’s just for this week, and of course there will be subsequent pushes every single week,” Ezike said Tuesday. “By next week all hospitals will be engaged in the effort. This is just the beginning. Patience will be the name of the game but we will get this out to all of our workers in the health care setting.”
Ezike said the state is likely to spend most of next year on its vaccination efforts, and acknowledged not everyone will be initially eager to get a shot.
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“I do imagine that as with any kind of activity that you’re trying to take on, there will be early adopters, there will be never adopters, there will be late adopters and there will be people in the middle,” she said.
“I know these people are helping for some of those later or middle adopters to say ‘Hey, I see someone who looks just like me, who does the same work do, is from my community that’s getting this done, that’s from my state,’ " she said. “And so I imagine that there will be a big push toward later, maybe in the spring… And so there might be a big surge of people wanting the vaccine a little bit later, but I still think there are adequate numbers of people now, so this will be a continual process for much of 2021.”
The Pfizer vaccine requires two shots, the initial one and a booster about three weeks later. Ezike said those who received their first doses will not be “appropriately covered, or immune from the single shot.”
“We don’t have actual data to say what happens if you don’t get that second because the plan is to have that booster after 21 days,” Ezike said. “It’s an important step but there’s still absolutely another step as well as the continued mitigations that have to continue. I hope that all the people who are watching this have confidence that this is a vaccine that they should take as well.”
—Jamie Munks
12:20 p.m.: Fourth person to receive vaccine in Peoria said she felt ‘awesome’ afterwards
Evelyn Tatum, the fourth person to receive the vaccine in Peoria, said she felt “awesome” afterwards, but that she will continue to operate as she has been to this point in the pandemic.
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“I’ll be wearing my mask until I’m told I can take it off,” Tatum said. “And I will just be so happy. I will be so happy.”
“It’s been something. It really has been something, working with all this,” she said. “I’ve been here since the beginning, I’ve been through it all, never took any time off. I just wear what I have to wear, my PPE, and just went on with my life and my job. It really didn’t change much of anything, I just did what I had to do. I’m a healthy woman, and as long as I follow the rules, anybody follows the rules, you’ll be OK. I’m a big believer in that.”
—Jamie Munks
12:15 p.m.: 7,359 new confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases and 117 additional deaths reported
Illinois health officials on Tuesday announced 7,359 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 117 additional fatalities, bringing the total number of known infections in Illinois to 863,477 and the statewide death toll to 14,509 since the start of the pandemic.
Officials also reported 92,922 new tests in the last 24 hours. The seven-day statewide rolling positivity rate for cases as a share of total tests was 8.6% for the period ending Monday.
—Chicago Tribune staff
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11:57 a.m.: Certified nursing assistant first to receive a shot in Peoria
Chemica Jones, 41, a certified nursing assistant at OSF HealthCare St. Francis Medical Center was the first to receive a shot in Peoria.
Jones works with COVID patients “on a day to day basis,” she said in an interview after receiving the first dose of the state’s vaccine supply.
“At first I was a little nervous but once I got here, and realized ‘OK Chemica you’re here to do your part, this is what you were put here for,’” Jones said. “I just want to do my part for my community, for my family, just make sure I keep everyone safe. I know people are optimistic about the vaccine but it’s OK to be nervous. It’s okay to be scared, but once you get it you’ll realize It made a difference. I’m stopping the spread of the virus.’”
Also vaccinated in Peoria were Juan Fernandez, a transporter, Doug Meyer, a respiratory therapist, Evelyn Tatum, who works in Environmental Services at the medical center and Victor Chan, chief of Emergency Services at OSF HealthCare St. Francis Medical Center.
—Jamie Munks
11:42 a.m.: Peoria health workers first to get vaccines from Illinois’ supply
Five health care workers in Peoria were the first to receive the state of Illinois’ share of the coronavirus vaccine shortly after 11 a.m. Tuesday, with Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike looking on at OSF St. Francis, Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center in Peoria.
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“I think everyone has reason to be excited that we are at the beginning of the end,” Ezike said after the shots had been administered.
COVID 19 vaccines are being administered to health care workers in Peoria this morning, with @GovPritzker and Dr. Ezike looking on. pic.twitter.com/Y75fQkAxAJ — Jamie Munks (@by_jamiemunks) December 15, 2020
—Jamie Munks
11:05 a.m.: Chicago administers first doses of coronavirus vaccines
Five frontline medical workers received the vaccine against COVID-19 in Chicago, marking an important milestone in the fight against coronavirus.
“What we just witnessed is history in the making,” Mayor Lori Lightfoot said during a ceremony at Loretto Hospital in the city’s hard-hit Austin neighborhood.
The first person to receive the vaccine was Dr. Marina Del Rios, from the University of Illinois health system.
Chicago public health commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady led a small ceremony for five recipients where she emphasized the vaccine’s safety and discussed the process used to store it. Officials gave five doses to start, because that’s how many are in a vial, she said.
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After the first vaccination, the room applauded.
Mark Hooks, an emergency department nurse at Loretto, was the third person — and first Illinois man — to receive the vaccination. In April, he told the Tribune about the grueling decision to isolate himself from his two school-age daughters was the hardest part of his job.
Though Hooks joined them for socially distant activities such as bike riding and street hockey, there were no meals shared, no watching movies together on the couch.
“There is a lot of Zoom and a lot of Houseparty, but it’s just not the same,” he said. “Even harder than being scared about coming to work every day is not being able to be with them.”
Read more here. — Gregory Pratt, Stacy St. Clair
11:01 a.m.: Busting COVID-19 vaccine myths
If you want an idea of the conspiracy theories that hang over COVID-19 vaccines, there’s no better summation than a 40-second TikTok video posted in October by a performer named Taylor Rousseau.
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As a melodramatic song plays, Rousseau, young, blonde and elaborately mascaraed, silently portrays a woman beaten to death for refusing to take a vaccine that contains a microchip carrying the mark of the beast. At the end, she enters a heavenly skyscape emblazoned with the words: “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
The video has been seen more than 680,000 times, garnered 47,000 likes and, despite thousands of mocking comments (“Ma’am, this is a CVS”), earned plenty of positive reviews.
“This is so incredibly powerful,” one viewer wrote.
Therein lies a challenge for public health officials trying to convince a wary portion of the public that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective. Phony assertions have circulated for months on social media, joining a current of anti-vaccine sentiment that has grown stronger over the last 20 years.
A poll released last week showed that only 47% of Americans plan to get the vaccine. Those who didn’t want it mostly said they were concerned about side effects and the development and approval process, though the poll didn’t ask about many widely circulating myths. As the rollout begins, there are common myths about the COVID-19 vaccine and what experts have to say about them.
You can read about them here. —John Keilman
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9:25 a.m.: COVID-19 vaccine administration delayed at Naperville’s Edward Hospital
Naperville’s Edward Hospital has delayed administration of COVID-19 vaccines because delivery of the doses to the hospital was pushed back, a hospital spokesman said.
The hospital is now anticipating receiving the vaccines Wednesday.
The Edward-Elmhurst Health System, which also includes Elmhurst Hospital, had planned to begin administering the vaccines to employees Tuesday. This morning, spokesman Keith Hartenberger said administration had been delayed at both hospitals.
When it does receive the vaccines, the system expects to receive 3,900 doses, which it will split evenly between employees at Edward and Elmhurst hospitals. Frontline workers caring for patients with COVID-19 and emergency department employees will receive priority for the vaccine, though it will be available to all employees, Hartenberger has said.
The first shipment will cover employees’ first doses. A required second dose will be provided from later shipments.
Read more here. —Sarah Freishtat, Naperville Sun
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7:15 a.m.: First COVID-19 vaccines administered in Chicago to be given at Loretto Hospital in Austin neighborhood, vaccinations also slated for other state hotspots
Mayor Lori Lightfoot and city health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady will join hospital officials at the Loretto Hospital in the Austin neighborhood Tuesday morning to witness the ceremonial first COVID-19 vaccination in Chicago.
The event, coming a day after many states began administering the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, will be livestreamed on local news sites and the mayor’s Facebook page. It wasn’t clear how many people will receive the first vaccines at Loretto. Chicago had been scheduled to receive 23,000 doses of the vaccine this week, reserved for medical workers and at-risk residents of longterm care facilities.
The Austin neighborhood’s COVID-19 death and case rate far outstrip the city’s average. Vaccinations also were slated to begin Tuesday at hospitals in Naperville, Elmhurst and Peoria.— Chicago Tribune staff
5 a.m.: Illinois schools have tallied more than 160 outbreaks of COVID-19. But what happens when they occur, and who decides if a school should close?
After a string of COVID-19 cases were reported at The School of Saints Faith, Hope and Charity in Winnetka last month, school officials dutifully notified the Cook County Department of Public Health and were soon delivered some troubling news.
The Roman Catholic elementary school had met the criteria for an outbreak, thrusting a thorny health and safety decision into the hands of the principal and the Archdiocese of Chicago about whether to halt in-person instruction.
“We decided to immediately pivot to e-learning for a temporary period, because first and foremost is the safety of our students and staff, and we just didn’t want to take the risk,” said Justin Lombardo, the leader of the archdiocese’s COVID-19 task force, who said students have been back in the classroom at the North Shore school since Nov. 30.
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Since the beginning of the pandemic, 163 such school-based outbreaks have been reviewed in the state, including nine reported Friday by the Illinois Department of Public Health. But while the state is now posting such numbers online — and health departments are assisting schools with surveillance of cases, contact tracing and guidance — it still falls to school officials to make the biggest decision: Does the school need to shut down again?
Read more here. — Karen Ann Cullotta
5 a.m.: Hope at a historic moment: First COVID-19 vaccinations scheduled to be given in Illinois on Tuesday
The first COVID-19 vaccinations in Illinois are scheduled to be administered Tuesday, bringing a sense of hope along with the most significant action yet to blunt a pandemic that has killed more than 14,000 people statewide.
Amid a massive distribution effort that will take several days to reach medical centers in more than four dozen counties, Chicago selected a hospital in one of its hardest-hit neighborhoods to administer the city’s first shot. The vaccination will be given Tuesday morning at Loretto Hospital in the Austin community, where the death rate dwarfs the citywide average.
“The Loretto Hospital and our colleagues at safety net hospitals across the city have been in the trenches of Chicago’s battle against COVID since day one,” Loretto President and CEO George Miller said. “We are honored to play a part in this historic moment, on behalf of all the front-line health care providers, our heroes, and our brothers and sisters so disproportionately impacted by this pandemic. We look forward to turning this corner, together.”
The vaccinations also were slated to begin Tuesday at hospitals in Naperville, Elmhurst and Peoria.
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Read the full story here. — Dan Petrella, Sarah Freishtat, Stacy St. Clair, Lisa Schencker, Lisa Donovan, Gregory Pratt And Jamie Munks
5 a.m.: Cook County officials investigating south suburban youth wrestling tournament featuring out-of-state teams
A wrestling tournament featuring several Midwestern teams in Lynwood over the weekend, is being investigated by Cook County officials and got the attention of Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
Cook County spokesman Don Bolger said the village of Lynwood has cited the Ho-Chunk Nation Southland Center for hosting the King of the Ring Christmas Bash Saturday and Sunday, which brought hundreds of grapplers from Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and other states. Bolger said that the village did not specify which violations were cited and Lynwood Mayor Eugene Williams did not return calls seeking comment.
Pritzker, who spent a good chunk of his news conference Monday giving details about the COVID-19 vaccine, commented about the tournament.
”I would just say putting parents, teachers and coaches and the kids in danger is a terrible idea,” Pritzker said. “Especially when we are experiencing a number of deaths per day in the United States that is equivalent to a 9/11 every day.”
Read more here. — Daily Southtown
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chicagotribune--2020-12-17--Daywatch: Pritzker clashes with feds over next vaccine shipments, Lightfoot apologizes for wrongful

Daywatch: Pritzker clashes with feds over next vaccine shipments, Lightfoot apologizes for wrongful raid and Three Floyds closes brewpub permanently

“ I want to tell Ms. Young ( that ) I am deeply sorry and troubled that her home was @ @ @ @ @ had to face the humiliation and trauma that she suffered .
That is just not @ @ @ @ @ in an emotional news conference .
“ It simply should not have happened .
And @ @ @ @ @ there is full accountability for what took place .
”

Good morning, Chicago. On Wednesday, state officials announced 7,123 new cases of COVID-19 and 146 additional fatalities. The new numbers came as Illinois Veterans’ Affairs officials acknowledged that employees who tested positive for COVID-19 continued to work at the state’s home in LaSalle where 33 veterans died.
Meanwhile, U.S. officials said they’re actively negotiating for additional purchases of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine after passing up a chance to lock in a contract this summer. The FDA also said that some Pfizer vaccine vials may contain extra doses.
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Here’s more coronavirus news and other top stories you need to know to start your day.
For your smart speaker | Holiday gift guide | Join our COVID-19 Facebook group | More newsletters | Puzzles & Games
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Dr. Marina Del Rios, from the University of Illinois health system, reacts as she receives Chicago's first COVID-19 vaccination from Dr. Nikhila Juvvadi on Dec. 15, 2020. (Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune)
Gov. J.B. Pritzker and federal health officials clashed Wednesday over whether the state’s next two shipments of Pfizer’s vaccine were being cut back, putting on display the logistical complications of a massive vaccination distribution effort that’s slowly getting off the ground in Illinois.
Pritzker said anticipated shipments nationwide in the next two weeks both have been cut in half, which “will likely cut our state’s projected Pfizer shipments this month roughly by half.” But a HHS spokesperson said there have been no changes to the three official allocations that have been made to the states.
Roseland Hospital employees Linda Seaverson, lead environmental services worker, from left, emergency room Dr. Tunji Ladipo and medical lab scientist Tony Nevarez will receive the COVID-19 vaccine. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
The 975 coveted doses of the COVID-19 vaccine expected to arrive by police escort as soon as Thursday morning will create a new challenge for Roseland Community Hospital in a year that has been overrun by them.
Like other medical centers across the country in recent days, Roseland has been tasked with deciding which of its hundreds of employees — for reasons both practical and symbolic — should be the first to get the injection they’ve all needed since the pandemic began. Meet Roseland’s first five.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot takes questions from the news media after reading a statement concerning a video of Chicago police mistakenly searching the wrong house, during a news conference at City Hall on Dec. 16, 2020. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)
Mayor Lori Lightfoot apologized to social worker Anjanette Young on Wednesday for the Chicago Police Department’s 2019 raid on her home, during which officers handcuffed her while she was naked, and disavowed her Law Department’s extraordinary attempt to block WBBM-Ch. 2 from airing body camera footage of the incident.
“I want to tell Ms. Young (that) I am deeply sorry and troubled that her home was invaded, and that she had to face the humiliation and trauma that she suffered. That is just not right,” Lightfoot said in an emotional news conference. “It simply should not have happened. And I will make sure that there is full accountability for what took place.”
Also on Wednesday, Lightfoot followed through on a pledge to introduce a plan to the City Council that would eliminate loopholes in the Welcoming City Ordinance that allow police to in some cases cooperate with federal immigration agents.
People gather in Macy's Walnut Room restaurant in the Loop on Saturday, Nov. 30, 2019. (Camille Fine / Chicago Tribune)
Monday night should have been 92-year-old Rose Haddad’s annual dinner next to the giant Christmas tree inside the Walnut Room. But this year, COVID-19 forced a beautiful twist on a tradition she’s upheld for more than 80 years. Tribune columnist Heidi Stevens has the story.
Three Floyds Brewing will permanently close its brewpub after initially announcing a temporary closure due to COVID-19 in the spring. (Antonio Perez / Chicago Tribune)
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Three Floyds Brewing said it would close its brewpub and taproom indefinitely due to the virus. Indefinitely has become forever, according to the Times of Northwest Indiana.
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The newspaper reported Wednesday afternoon that the iconic northwest Indiana brewery has informed investors that its brewpub, which operated a full kitchen and poured a broad array of Three Floyds beers, will not reopen after being closed for seven months.


chicagotribune--2020-12-17--Police release picture of Jeep wanted in connection with October slaying

McKinney , who was of the same block where he was shot , was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center @ @ @ @ @ he was pronounced dead less than an hour after the attack , officials said .

Chicago police have released a picture of a black Jeep wanted in connection with the October homicide of a 32-year-old man in the Roseland neighborhood on the city’s Far South Side.
The victim, Deshawn McKinney, was in the passenger seat of a 2016 black Chevrolet Equinox parked in the 11400 block of South Calumet Avenue about 4:25 p.m. on Oct. 24 when the killing happened.
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When a woman who had been behind the wheel of the Chevrolet was getting out of the vehicle, someone inside a passing southbound black Jeep SRT opened fire, hitting McKinney multiple times to his body and damaging the Chevrolet, police said.
McKinney, who was of the same block where he was shot, was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he was pronounced dead less than an hour after the attack, officials said.
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An autopsy the next day determined McKinney died of multiple gunshot wounds, and his death was ruled a homicide, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
In a community alert issued Wednesday night, police said the Jeep involved was last seen missing a front license plate, has blacked-out wheels and tinted windows, police said.
Chicago police released this picture of a black Jeep wanted in connection with the Oct. 24, 2020, homicide of DeShawn McKinney, who was fatally shot in the 11400 block of South Calumet Avenue. (Chicago police)
Anyone with information is urged to call Area 2 detectives at 312-747-8271 or submit an anonymous tip to cpdtip.com


chicagotribune--2020-12-17--Amid its ‘war’ against COVID-19, Roseland Community Hospital makes symbolic choices for first five e

Amid its ‘war’ against COVID-19, Roseland Community Hospital makes symbolic choices for first five employees who will be vaccinated

“ It ’ s a relief to know we have this coming , ” he said .
“ I ’ @ @ @ @ @ lot , and the people who should be getting ‘ hurrahs ’ and ‘ thank @ @ @ @ @ who made this happen .
The Ph.D.s , the researchers , the graduate students who @ @ @ @ @ months doing the same thing over and over again in their labs .
We as @ @ @ @ @ recognize that .
”

The 975 coveted doses of the COVID-19 vaccine expected to arrive by police escort as soon as Thursday morning will create a new challenge for Roseland Community Hospital in a year that has been overrun by them.
Like other medical centers across the country in recent days, Roseland has been tasked with deciding which of its hundreds of employees — for reasons both practical and symbolic — should be the first to get the injection they’ve all needed since the pandemic began.
The Far South Side hospital, which treats patients regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay, has carried a tremendous weight over the past 11 months. As the Roseland neighborhood has suffered a coronavirus death rate 67% greater than the citywide average, the staff opened a 40-bed COVID ward, provided inpatient care to 320 people and conducted more than 25,000 tests in a community that has long suffered from the city’s health care inequities.
It hasn’t always gone smoothly. When a pregnant woman with COVID died after failing to be quickly triaged upon arrival, the state cited the hospital for several issues related to its handling of the virus. The hospital has said it worked address the issues.
The hospital believes it will receive enough doses to vaccinate its 600 employees and contractors, including the estimated 25% who have expressed reluctance about getting the injections. Each vial contains about five shots, so Roseland President and CEO Tim Egan wanted the first five recipients to be a reflection of the many faces who have contributed to the fight.
Two of the picks are, most obviously, a doctor and a nurse who have been treating COVID patients from the start. His other three selections — a housekeeper, an engineer and a medical lab scientist — are employees who have jobs that may not grab headlines, but who have allowed the hospital to wage a public health battle unlike any in the past century.
“It takes an army to win a war and we’ve had this army on the front lines since day one,” Egan said. “It’s not just doctors and nurses who are doing heroic work, it’s all across the board. We are so appreciative of the dedication of all our professionals. We want them all to know that they’re valued, and we want them protected.”
Meet Roseland’s first five:
Gil Jean, chief nursing officer
Gil Jean, chief nursing officer, on Dec. 16, 2020, at Roseland Hospital. Jean will be among the five recipients to share the first vial of COVID-19 vaccine Thursday at Roseland Hospital on Chicago's Far South Side. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
Gil Jean has a secret that she has kept from her nursing staff since the pandemic began.
She was scared of the virus too.
As Roseland’s chief nursing officer, she didn’t want her staff to know just how deeply worried she was about their safety, the alarming pace at which the virus took patients’ lives or even her own health. She kept those feelings buried, she said, until she got home and could cry in private.
“I feel as a leader, I always need to be strong for them and tell them how much I appreciate them. There were some really, really hard days, and they were amazing,” she said as her voice choked with emotion. “And I know they were scared. I know this because I was scared too.”
Her staff’s fears also played a role in her decision to receive one of the hospital’s first vaccinations. Several nurses already have told her they do not want to receive the shots until they first see how other people react, a reluctance that has alarmed hospital leadership and spurred them into action.
Roseland executives, including CEO Egan, have been passing out flyers about the importance of the vaccine in recent days, hoping to sway the skeptics. About 25% have indicated they don’t want the vaccine, Egan said.
Beyond wanting to protect his staff, Egan worries about the message it would send to the neighborhood if hospital employees are too scared to be vaccinated. He understands their fears — fueled by both the country’s history of inhumane experiments on Black Americans and distrust in a system that has allowed deadly health care disparities — but he believes this is the only way to blunt the virus’s spread.
Jean shares Egan’s concerns, so she volunteered to roll up her sleeve and receive the first of two shots Thursday. She tells anyone who asks that she trusts the science and the scientists who approved the vaccine for emergency use.
“I want them to see me,” she said. “I want them to know that I would never ask them to do something that I wouldn’t do myself. This is a time for leadership.”
Linda Seaverson, head environmental services worker
Linda Seaverson, lead environmental services worker, in the linens storeroom on Dec. 15, 2020, at Roseland Hospital. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
As the hospital’s head housekeeper, Linda Seaverson pushes aside concerns for her own safety each morning and heads to work in a community hit hard by the virus. She says she never, not even in the pandemic’s deadliest moments, considered finding a different job.
“I care about people. I always have,” she said. “I wouldn’t want someone to walk away from me when I needed them most, so I would never walk away from anyone else.”
Seaverson, 61, makes a concerted effort to be a cheerful, uplifting presence in the COVID patients’ rooms each day. Draped in full personal protective equipment, she chatters happily as she goes about cleaning, sanitizing and collecting linens. She even speaks to those who are too sick to answer, believing they can hear her and wanting them to know someone cares.
She always leaves with a promise to see the patient later, though she knows it’s a pledge she can’t necessarily keep. Nothing, she says, is harder than later seeing an empty bed in a patient’s room.
“I’m not going to lie,” she said. “It hasn’t been easy.”
In keeping with her desire to help people, Seaverson has agreed to be among the first vaccinated at the hospital. She initially had questions about its safety, but she says she has read enough about the dosage to feel comfortable with her decision.
She hopes people will follow her example and educate themselves about the importance of getting the shot.
“I was scared about getting it,” she said. “But if I do it and get a good reaction, maybe it will help show other people it’s safe. I’m a people person, and all I ever want to do is help.”
Dr. Tunji Ladipo, emergency medical specialist
Dr. Tunji Ladipo in the emergency room on Dec. 15, 2020, at Roseland Hospital. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
An exhausted Tunji Ladipo returned home from work recently, thoroughly beaten by the recent uptick in COVID cases and the overflowing emergency department it produced.
His 16-year-old daughter tried to cheer him by announcing that she, too, planned to become a doctor some day.
“Really?” Ladipo said, brightening. “You want to be a doctor like your dad?”
“No,” she quickly answered. “I want to be a doctor like Dr. (Anthony) Fauci.”
On the eve of becoming part of the largest vaccination effort in American history, Ladipo believes his teenager has it right. After months and months of darkness, scientists are bringing us toward the light.
He says he will be thinking, with gratitude, of those scientists as the vaccine is injected into his arm.
“It’s a relief to know we have this coming,” he said. “I’ve thought about this a lot, and the people who should be getting ‘hurrahs’ and ‘thank yous’ are the scientists who made this happen. The Ph.D.s, the researchers, the graduate students who spent hours and days and months doing the same thing over and over again in their labs. We as a society really need to recognize that.”
Tony Nevarez, medical lab scientist
Tony Nevarez, medical lab scientist, in the lab where COVID-19 tests are run on Dec. 15, 2020, at Roseland Hospital. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
With a pandemic raging, Tony Nevarez decided he wanted to go back to a hospital laboratory.
He had left the field a few years earlier to work in environmental sciences, but he didn’t feel the same satisfaction there as he did in a medical setting. Choosing to return to a hospital job, however, meant he would be handling and testing samples to determine whether they contained the potentially deadly coronavirus.
He didn’t care. He joined a private laboratory and was contracted to work at Roseland Community Hospital, which conducts about 250 tests a day.
“Don’t get me wrong. The risks of working in a hospital were always in the back of my mind,” the 29-year-old said. “But I like helping people, and this job is just more interesting.”
When Roseland started offering testing in mid-March, it was one of the few Illinois sites that allowed patients to be tested without being in a car. In a neighborhood where many residents don’t have their own transportation, it was a crucial service.
The hospital also relaxed its rules on who could receive a test, giving it to anyone regardless of whether they had a doctor’s order, COVID-19 symptoms or an underlying condition that would make the patient vulnerable to the virus’s deadly grasp. By the time Gov. J.B. Pritzker declared testing available to anyone who is symptomatic, Roseland already had been doing its open testing initiative for two weeks.
From the start, Roseland staff have believed the tests offered the community some reassurance and a sense of control amid a virus that hit lower-income Black neighborhoods harder than richer white ones in the city.
Nearly a year into pandemic, accessible testing remains one of the hospital’s core principles. And Nevarez’s selection as one of the first five people vaccinated at Roseland is meant to reinforce that belief.
“It’s good to know I’m doing something positive for society,” Nevarez said. “As a kid, I never could have imagined something like this, but this is really good way to make a living. I feel good about my job. I feel good about myself.”
Dan Moriarty, hospital engineer
Dan Moriarty, engineer, in the basement workshop on Dec. 15, 2020, at Roseland Hospital. (Brian Cassella / Chicago Tribune)
Ask Dan Moriarty how it feels to be on the front lines of a pandemic and he’ll say he hasn’t given it much thought.
Truth be told, he’s been far too busy to contemplate such matters.
In the past year, Moriarty has helped build a 40-bed COVID ward at the hospital, installed more than 60 negative pressure systems in patient rooms and converted Roseland’s lobby into an overflow treatment area. His most important project, however, was completed this week when he transformed a meeting space into a vaccination command post that allows the doses to be stored nearby at their ultracold temperatures and provides employees with privacy as they get their shots.
“We’ve been doing everything we can to keep the place safe,” he said. “There were a lot of overnights and extra hours to make it happen, but everyone pulled together and made sure it got done.”
The job required considerable brainstorming, as the engineering staff regularly conferred on how to best handle their construction projects while adhering to safety protocols. Even a routine job like changing an air filter required full personal protective equipment that made him look like he was responding to a hazmat spill.
Moriarty, who has worked at the hospital since May 2019, said he did everything he could to protect himself from the virus. It wasn’t so much the idea of contracting the illness that drove his vigilance but the fear that he could infect someone else.
“At the end of the day, everyone had a job to do,” he said. “You just do it as safely as possible.”
Moriarty hopes the newly available vaccines hasten the return of things he once took for granted such as going to a restaurant or spending an entire eight-hour shift without a mask on his face. He’d also like to go to bed each night without worrying that he unknowingly infected someone with a potentially deadly virus.
“I just want things to go back to normal,” he said. “It’s what everyone is hoping for, isn’t it?”


chicagotribune--2020-12-17--Column: Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s apology doesn’t undo the trauma Chicago police inflicted on an innoce

Column: Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s apology doesn’t undo the trauma Chicago police inflicted on an innocent woman during botched raid

She also says she didn ’ t know that her Law Department was in federal court Monday seeking to bar @ @ @ @ @ the video .
If that ’ s the case , we must also wonder what @ @ @ @ @ under her nose that she doesn ’ t know about .

Mayor Lori Lightfoot answers questions concerning a video of Chicago police mistakenly searching the wrong house, during a news conference at City Hall on Dec. 16, 2020. (Abel Uribe / Chicago Tribune)
Some Chicagoans are beginning to wonder who Mayor Lori Lightfoot really is. The person they thought they elected a year and a half ago never would have done what she apparently tried to do to Anjanette Young.
Our mayor is more compassionate. She is too smart to fall into the same trap that forced her predecessor out of Chicago politics. She is open, honest and dedicated to undoing the wrongs that have been done to Chicago residents.
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Or so they hoped.
_________
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The Chicago Tribune publishes a variety of columnists. Columns are opinion content that reflect the views of the writers and not necessarily the Chicago Tribune
_________
It is troubling enough to watch the video of Young standing naked and handcuffed in front of a group of male police officers, who burst into her apartment that night and accused her of a crime she knew nothing about.
It is disgraceful that the city’s Law Department made an emergency filing in court to try and stop the video from airing on TV. And it is reprehensible that the mayor initially wanted a judge to sanction Young for publicizing the ordeal.
This was one of the most degrading, traumatic incidents imaginable, yet Young bravely chose to make it public. The mayor, on the other hand, was a coward. She apparently thought it would be best if Young continued to suffer in silence.
Young deserved better from the mayor. Women deserve better from another woman. Black women deserve better from a Black woman. All Chicagoans deserve better than that.
Lightfoot apologized to Young on Wednesday, saying, “What you experienced should never have happened, period.”
But it is not enough. Too much damage has been done by Lightfoot’s early attempt to sidestep the issue by simply saying that the raid didn’t happen on her watch. Too much pain was caused by Lightfoot’s refusal to condemn efforts by lawyers who work on the mayor’s behalf to silence Young.
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Lightfoot declined to comment on Tuesday when reporters asked whether she supported sanctions against Young for violating a prior confidentiality order regarding the raid.
Lightfoot responded, “It’s for that judge to determine whether or not that was appropriate.” We’ll take that as a yes.
Amid the angry public fallout, Lightfoot is seeking to distance herself from the controversy. She insists that she first learned about the video this week. The incident happened in February 2019, three months before Lightfoot took office.
If Lightfoot didn’t know, she should have known that this explosive video was lurking around in her mayoral stratosphere for 19 months. No conscientious public official would allow herself to be caught off guard about such an emotionally volatile event that could end up toppling her administration.
She also says she didn’t know that her Law Department was in federal court Monday seeking to bar WBBM-Ch. 2 from airing the video. If that’s the case, we must also wonder what else is going on right under her nose that she doesn’t know about.
Saying that she was unaware does not make her less culpable. It does not shield her from the anger and disappoint that so many Chicagoans are feeling right now.
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It does not make her any more trustworthy than then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel when he tried to block the video of Laquan McDonald’s murder from being released.
Nor does her apology free her of responsibility for the events following the raid. Her redemption will be determined by what she does next.
It does not matter that she had a “very emotional reaction” to the video. It doesn’t make Chicagoans feel any better that the city is no longer seeking sanctions against Young and has now turned the effort solely toward her attorney.
Women who watched that video of Young standing naked in her living room, telling police 43 times that they were raiding the wrong place, felt as though they were kindred spirits.
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We don’t care that the mayor thinks she “could have easily been Ms. Young.” It doesn’t matter that Lightfoot feels as though she could put herself in Young’s place. Most women could.
The only thing Lightfoot can do to restore our confidence is to take every step to make sure that such a thing never happens again in Chicago. Barring that, she must prove that if it does, the officers will be held accountable.
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She must start with the officers responsible for that botched raid at Young’s apartment. At the very least, someone should be reprimanded, if not fired.
Lightfoot must demand that on her watch, women of all races be treated with the same dignity and respect. She must make sure that police officers are clear on where the city stands — and that she will be the toughest enforcer they could encounter.
Anyone can make a mistake, but the true character and strength of a leader is determined by how far he or she is willing to go to make amends.
dglanton@chicagotribune.com
Twitter @dahleeng


chicagotribune--2020-12-17--Coronavirus in Illinois updates: Pritzker clashes with feds over size of future vaccine shipments as

Coronavirus in Illinois updates: Pritzker clashes with feds over size of future vaccine shipments as 7,123 new COVID-19 cases and 146 additional deaths reported

But a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said there have been no changes to the @ @ @ @ @ been made to the states : the first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine , which @ @ @ @ @ went out this week ; the first shipment of a second vaccine from Moderna , @ @ @ @ @ to ship as soon as next week ; and the second shipment of the Pfizer @ @ @ @ @ Tuesday and also would ship next week .

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Laquitta Boyd, holds her 6-year-old daughter Venisha while receiving her first COVID-19 vaccination at a back-to-school health fair hosted by RUSH University Medical Center at the Salvation Army Freedom Center on July 30, 2022, in Chicago. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune)
For the latest updates, click here for Thursday’s live blog.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and federal officials clashed Wednesday over whether the state’s next two shipments of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine were being cut back, putting on display the logistical complications of a massive vaccination distribution effort that’s slowly getting off the ground.
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Pritzker said anticipated shipments nationwide in the next two weeks both have been cut in half, which “will likely cut our state’s projected Pfizer shipments this month roughly by half.” But a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said there have been no changes to the three official allocations that have been made to the states.
Meanwhile, Illinois Veterans’ Affairs officials acknowledged Wednesday that a complaint has been filed with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration over employees who tested positive for COVID-19 but continued to work at the state’s home in LaSalle where a deadly outbreak sickened more than 200 residents and staff members, and 33 residents have died.
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Also on Wednesday, Illinois health officials announced 7,123 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 146 additional fatalities, bringing the total number of known infections in Illinois to 870,600 and the statewide death toll to 14,655 since the start of the pandemic.
Here’s what’s happening Wednesday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:
7:30 p.m. (updated): More Illinois hospitals begin vaccinating health care workers as state and federal officials clash over size of future shipments
Gov. J.B. Pritzker and federal health officials clashed Wednesday over whether the state’s next two shipments of Pfizer’s new coronavirus vaccine were being cut back, putting on display the logistical complications of a massive vaccination distribution effort that’s slowly getting off the ground in Illinois.
Pritzker began his daily COVID-19 briefing Wednesday by saying anticipated shipments nationwide in the next two weeks both have been cut in half, which “will likely cut our state’s projected Pfizer shipments this month roughly by half.”
“The same is true across the rest of the nation,” the governor said.
But a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said there have been no changes to the three official allocations that have been made to the states: the first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine, which was allocated Nov. 20 and went out this week; the first shipment of a second vaccine from Moderna, allocated Nov. 27 and set to ship as soon as next week; and the second shipment of the Pfizer vaccine, which was allocated Tuesday and also would ship next week.
“Operation Warp Speed remains on track to allocate enough vaccine for about 20 million Americans to receive their first doses before the end of the month,” assuming the Food and Drug Administration authorizes the Moderna vaccine for emergency use later this week, the spokesperson said.
A Pritzker spokeswoman had no immediate explanation for the discrepancy.
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The dispute over the number of available vaccine doses comes as public anticipation and media fervor triggered by the vaccine’s arrival in the state butts up against the painstaking process of receiving, repackaging and distributing the highly delicate doses to regional medical centers.
Those 10 large hospitals will serve as hubs for getting the vaccine to the designated local health departments and hospitals in line to receive the initial doses.
Some Illinois hospitals began giving their employees vaccines Wednesday.
Read more here. —Dan Petrella, Lisa Schencker and Gregory Pratt
6:20 p.m.: State VA official acknowledges employees with coronavirus allowed to work at LaSalle home where 33 veterans died
Illinois Veterans’ Affairs officials acknowledged Wednesday that a complaint has been filed with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration over employees who tested positive for COVID-19 but continued to work at the state’s home in LaSalle where a deadly outbreak sickened more than 200 workers and residents.
Staff members at LaSalle were not required to work after testing positive for the virus, but some chose to do so, Tony Kolbeck, chief of staff for the state VA department, said after being asked by legislators at a state House committee hearing whether employees were pressured to stay on the job.
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“There were occasions in the overnight shift in which an individual was alerted that they were positive, they were in the COVID unit already,” Kolbeck said during the nearly four-hour House Veterans’ Affairs committee meeting. “They were asymptomatic and they chose to stay the rest of the shift. If they had not, there may have been a concern about not the proper staff being there in that overnight shift.”
The outbreak at LaSalle was first identified on Oct. 31, when a routine test on a staff member came back positive and a resident who was sent to the hospital for a separate issue tested positive.
Since then, 33 residents have died, and more than 200 residents and staff members have been infected. Last week, Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s administration fired LaSalle home administrator Angela Mehlbrech and placed the nursing director on administrative leave pending the outcome of an ongoing inspector general’s investigation.
Read more here. —Jamie Munks
4:45 p.m.: Chicago Teachers Union says ‘all options’ are on the table if schools can’t reopen safely
Less than 40% of Chicago Public Schools students eligible to begin in-person instruction next year plan to do so.
That’s according to survey data released during Wednesday’s Board of Education meeting – data that also showed a significant disparity in the rate of white students opting to return to schools versus students of color.
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But at the same meeting, Chicago Teachers Union President Jesse Sharkey indicated the union remains highly skeptical about CPS’s reopening plans and he all options are on the table if the sides can’t reach an agreement on how to minimize the risk of COVID-19 transmissions in schools.
Sharkey said options could include those that “would have very real consequences for this whole city.”
Read more here. —Hannah Leone
3:15 p.m.: Three Floyds reportedly closes brewpub — this time for good — due to pandemic
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Three Floyds Brewing said it would close its brewpub and taproom indefinitely due to the virus. Indefinitely has become forever, according to the Times of Northwest Indiana.
The newspaper reported Wednesday afternoon that the iconic northwest Indiana brewery has informed investors that its brewpub, which operated a full kitchen and poured a broad array of Three Floyds beers, will not reopen after being closed for seven months.
“As many of you know, this pandemic has not been kind to the restaurant industry, and we are no exception,” Three Floyds wrote in a letter to investors, according to the Times. “As of December 1, 2020, we have decided to permanently close 3 Floyds Brewpub. This decision was not easy for us, but at the end of the day, the safety of our customers and staff will always be our top priority.”
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Calls to the brewery and its founder, Nick Floyd, were not returned Wednesday.
Read more here. —Josh Noel
2:24 p.m.: Twin Drs. Brandi Jackson and Brittani James discuss COVID-19 and the Black community on Facebook Live
As part of the largest vaccination effort in American history, Chicago and other parts of Illinois began administering the first doses of the coronavirus vaccine this week.
While the pandemic has impacted all of our lives, it has disproportionately affected Black and brown communities.
Over one-third of Black adults said they know someone firsthand who died after contracting COVID-19. This reflects generations-long disinvestment in communities of color – disinvestment rooted in policy that continues in areas of housing, employment, education, food, transportation, small businesses and access to health care.
This harsh reality has been intensified by the racial tension seen across the nation following accounts of police brutality in the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, among others.
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While some see the vaccine as a silver bullet that will take us back to prepandemic life, others are concerned that the vaccines have been rushed and want to see how the rollout goes before they commit to getting it.
In a recent poll, fewer than half of Black Americans said they would take the vaccine.
Dr. Brandi Jackson, director of Integrative Behavioral Health at Howard Brown Health Center and an adjunct professor of psychiatry at Rush University Medical College, and Dr. Brittani James, a family practitioner with the University of Illinois health system and assistant professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine, discuss the Black community’s response to the vaccine and the disparities and inequities they’ve seen in the past nine months on Facebook Live.
—Darcel Rockett
1:29 p.m.: Shipments of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine significantly reduced over next two weeks
The next two shipments of the new Pfizer coronavirus vaccine to Illinois and other states have been significantly reduced by the federal government, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Wednesday.
”This development will likely cut our state’s project Pfizer shipments this month roughly by half,” Pritzker said at his daily COVID-19 briefing. “The same is true across the rest of the nation.”
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Anticipated deliveries of about 8 million and 9 million doses in the next two weeks both have been cut to 4.3 million, Pritzker said.
Pritzker did not immediately provide a reason for the reduction.
Read more here. —Dan Petrella
12:10 p.m.: 7,123 new confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases and 146 additional deaths reported
Illinois health officials on Wednesday announced 7,123 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 146 additional fatalities, bringing the total number of known infections in Illinois to 870,600 and the statewide death toll to 14,655 since the start of the pandemic.
Officials also reported 93,278 new tests in the last 24 hours. The seven-day statewide rolling positivity rate for cases as a share of total tests was 8.5% for the period ending Tuesday.
—Chicago Tribune staff
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11:13 a.m.: Chicago teachers union discusses ongoing safety concerns over in-person classes, reiterates demands
The Chicago Teachers Union held an online news conference Wednesday to address its ongoing safety concerns and to reiterate its demands ahead of Chicago Public Schools potentially reopening schools on a hybrid basis Feb. 1.
Numerous teachers and union officials, including its president, Jesse Sharkey, were joined on a Zoom call by environmental consultants to outline what they see as unacceptable conditions that should preclude reopening. Sharkey said there is a path to reopening before widespread access to a coronavirus vaccine becomes available, but that it hinges on a variety of factors which are addressed in a list of demands submitted to CPS by the union.
”The whole point behind the CTU setting out a number of demands is we think we should begin in-person learning when we can meet those demands,” Sharkey said. “We shouldn’t say everyone has to be vaccinated (first). Public health officials are telling us that may take a long time … It depends on there being some guardrails, if you will, that help us be assured of safety, equity and trust.”
Linda Perales, a special education teacher at Corkery Elementary, said that Mayor Lori Lightfoot and CPS have already made empty promises, among them that teachers would have access to adequate disinfectant wipes and that 400 additional custodians will be hired to keep schools clean and safe. She said each teacher would only get three containers of disinfectant wipes and only a quarter of those 400 janitorial positions have been filled to date.”
In addition, the CDC has told us that we should not interact with anyone outside of our household. And with the current CPS reopening plan, teachers and students will be interacting on a daily basis with multiple people that do not live in their household, who will not be able to wear a mask all day and who will not be able to social distance. So this plan is just truly unsafe,” Perales said.
She also said the demands on teachers to instruct students on basic safety precautions – how to socially distance, wear masks and wash their hands – on top of teaching under the hybrid remote and in-person model, are unsustainable.
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”This is an impossible task. Not to mention that clinicians and special teachers, like art and music, will be travelling to multiple (buildings) which increases the risk for the transmission of COVID-19,” she said. “What we need is a real plan that is safe … and we need a better plan for remote learning.”
Sterling Laylock, a behavioral economist and environmental consultant working with the teachers union, said he’s repeatedly heard school and city officials say they are “following the science,” but he said that’s not accurate.
He is concerned about classroom conditions and remains unconvinced that a study provided by CPS, which relied on an air quality inspection of about 20% of CPS classrooms, is a fair assessment of what conditions will be like once they’re in use.
”We’ve got a lot of inconsistencies and a lot of missing information. If you just simply take a look at how the schools were inspected, they inspected 20% of the classrooms for indoor air quality with no persons present. People are the source of this COVID-19 pollution, when we breathe, when we cough,” he said.
The other 80% of classrooms were evaluated with a walkthrough and visual assessment. But Laylock said that beyond the dangers of COVID-19 transmission once rooms are in use, many of the most toxic gasses are colorless and odorless. By simply looking at an empty classroom, no one can say whether that room will be safe, Laylock said.
”We keep hearing, ‘we’re following the science, we’re following the science.’ Well, that sounds nice but we have to actually do the science – and that’s not what’s happening. What’s happening is a marketing presentation, straight away,” Laylock said.
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Short of ongoing monitoring, he said there is no way to use the visual inspections to extrapolate and say with any certainty what conditions will be like in all classrooms.
”I’m so passionate about it because how will we know where we are, and how will we know what we’re doing, and how will we be able to make any kind of corrective action, especially coupled with the fact that this report is incomplete and it focuses on buildings, not children and the adults that are staff and teachers, that are going to be expected to implement all this stuff,” he said.
—Katherine Rosenberg-Douglas
8:38 a.m.: Negotiators nearing agreement on long-delayed COVID-19 aid bill — including direct payments
Top congressional leaders appear closer to an agreement on a long-delayed COVID-19 relief package, hoping to seal an agreement as early as Wednesday that would extend aid to individuals and businesses and help ship coronavirus vaccines to millions.
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W. Va., a coauthor of a $908 billion bipartisan package, said leadership negotiators are closing in on an agreement that would extend direct payments of $500-$600 to most Americans but would deny Democratic negotiators long-sought aid to state and local governments. Manchin credited his bipartisan group with facilitating the breakthrough.
“I think they’re basically now putting it all together,” Manchin said on CNN. “We were able to break the gridlock.”
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Read more here. —Associated Press
7:20 a.m.: Chicago handing out more than $11 million in relief to performance venues, restaurants and bars
Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration was slated to announce that more than $11 million in grants is being handed out this week as part of a city COVID-19 relief fund, according to a news release.
The city’s Hospitality Grant Program has handed out grants of $10,000 to 995 restaurants and bars and grants of at least $10,000 to 100 performing arts venues, according to the release.
The grant money is designed to help those most affected “throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, especially following recent state-wide mitigation measures that have closed indoor service and performances,” according to the release.
The City Council was expected Wednesday to pass ordinances to give what Lightfoot’s office calls “regulatory relief” to businesses, including extending license expiration dates to July 21, after capping fees charged by third-party food delivery companies.
—Chicago Tribune staff
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5 a.m.: ‘Project Cheer’ making Christmas a little brighter for Decatur restaurant employees
A group of anonymous donors are serving up a bit of Christmas cheer to local restaurant and bar employees affected by COVID-19 restrictions, and helping other businesses in the process.
“The mitigation measures faced by the restaurant and bar establishments has taken both a human and economic toll. With the holiday season upon us, our support is needed now more than ever,” said a news release from the Decatur Regional Chamber of Commerce announcing the Project Cheer initiative.
Working with the owners of restaurants that are members of the Chamber, employees most in need were identified to be among the beneficiaries of donations totaling more than $22,000.
The gifts, in the form of Metro Money, are being delivered to the recipients this week. Metro Money can be redeemed at over 45 local businesses and are treated just like cash.
“This gift allows those employees the opportunity to purchase food, Christmas gifts, whatever is needed to lighten their load this December while also putting dollars back into our local community,” the release stated.
The effort grew out of inquiries from Chamber members about ways of helping those in the local restaurant industry.
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The Chamber partnered with the United Way of Decatur and Mid-Illinois to accept additional donations.
—Decatur Herald & Review, via Tribune Content Agency
Breaking coronavirus news Stay up to date with the latest information on coronavirus with our breaking news alerts.
In case you missed it
Here are five things that happened Tuesday related to COVID-19:


chicagotribune--2020-12-18--Long-running federal review into Obama center concludes, groundbreaking tentatively set for 2021

The presidential center ’ s location on park land was at the heart of another fight , this time in @ @ @ @ @ over the planned center ’ s campus in Jackson Park was effectively killed in August @ @ @ @ @ panel ruled the plaintiffs did not suffer actual harm and that much of their grievances @ @ @ @ @ ’ s jurisdiction .
But its chief litigant is vowing to appeal up to the @ @ @

An aerial view of the proposed site for the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park in Chicago on May 13, 2020. (Zbigniew Bzdak/Chicago Tribune)
A federal review into the historic effects of former President Barack Obama’s proposed presidential center in Jackson Park officially concluded Thursday afternoon, further dashing hopes of opposition groups troubled by the impact of future construction on the storied South Side park.
Officials finalized a memorandum of agreement that caps off the presidential center’s three-year Section 106 federal review, the longest out of several triggered by the Obama Foundation’s decision to locate the future complex on historic property. Other reviews into mitigating environmental impacts as well as protecting public parkland remain ongoing, although the foundation announced earlier this month that groundbreaking for the center is slated to begin in 2021.
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“The completion of this step of the federal review is the result of years of hard work by Mayor Lightfoot, community leaders, environmentalists and park enthusiasts,” a foundation representative wrote in a statement. “We celebrate this milestone with all those who have taken the time out of their busy schedules to help us reimagine what is possible in Jackson Park with the OPC.”
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The $500 million Obama Presidential Center is expected to be a sprawling campus that will house the Obama Foundation offices and include spaces for large gatherings, an athletic center and a public library branch. In addition, the campus will have outdoor recreation areas including a sledding hill and walking paths.
But a process known as Section 106 was triggered in December 2017 because the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act requires federal agencies to sign off on changes that may affect historic properties such as Jackson Park. The Federal Highway Administration worked with the city to consider roadway changes and potential mitigations in order to allow it to approve upcoming transportation project funding.
When the first draft was rolled out this summer, the finalized MOA was met with condemnation from some local groups in support of preserving Jackson Park as is. But dozens of other parties concurred with the final report.
The nonprofit Jackson Park Watch, a dogged adversary of the presidential center’s proposed site, suggested a number of changes that were ignored, although the group was not required to sign off on it.
“It was really a travesty … that ignored the realities of what the impact on the historic resources of the park, how they would be affected by the current plans for the Obama center,” the group’s co-president Brenda Nelms said.
Under the MOA, the city will be required the rehab the English Stone Comfort Station as well as the Statue of the Republic in the park. The eastern chunk of Midway Plaisance will see a new “play area” designed by the city, which also must work up materials to educate the community about the significance of Jackson Park.
The presidential center’s location on park land was at the heart of another fight, this time in the courts. A lawsuit over the planned center’s campus in Jackson Park was effectively killed in August after a federal appeals court panel ruled the plaintiffs did not suffer actual harm and that much of their grievances were not within the court’s jurisdiction. But its chief litigant is vowing to appeal up to the Supreme Court.
ayin@chicagotribune.com


chicagotribune--2020-12-18--Giant hemp grower to buy marijuana cultivation license in Illinois

Red White and Bloom has been growing relatively nonpsychoactive CBD and hemp flower at its Granville greenhouse for more than @ @ @ @ @ it would need minimal changes to convert to producing cannabis , extracts and infused products @ @ @ @ @ component of marijuana that gets users high .

Red White and Bloom Brands Inc. announced Thursday it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the outstanding shares of Cannabis Capital Partners Inc., and with it rights to purchase a cannabis cultivation center in downstate Shelbyville, the company stated in a news release.
The 24,000-square-foot grow house to be purchased is run by Shelbyville County Community Services, a not-for-profit mental health group that employs people in rehabilitation.
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Red White and Bloom, through its subsidiary Mid-American Growers Inc., operates a 3.6 million-square-foot greenhouse in Granville, just west of Starved Rock State Park.
Processing at the Red White and Bloom hemp growing facility in Granville, Illinois, on July 2, 2020. (E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune)
Company officials hope to get Illinois Department of Agriculture approval to move the small Shelbyville operation to its much larger greenhouse.
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The Department of Agriculture said only that it had not received any request to approve such a move.
However, state law requires that cannabis growing licenses be geographically dispersed, one for each Illinois State Police district. That would seem to suggest that a change in the law would be required to move the license. State and Shelbyville County Community Services officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Red White and Bloom also stated that it would be able to launch its High Times brand cannabis and Platinum Vape brand in the state, while the Shelbyville facility would be better suited for a new, smaller craft cannabis growing license.
Red White and Bloom has been growing relatively nonpsychoactive CBD and hemp flower at its Granville greenhouse for more than a year. It said it would need minimal changes to convert to producing cannabis, extracts and infused products with THC, the primary component of marijuana that gets users high.
The deal to buy CCP is contingent upon certain milestones, including the approval, if sought, of the relocation of the license.
CCP, in turn, has entered into “definitive agreements” to acquire the Shelbyville license, the release stated, for $16.25 million in cash at closing plus $16.25 million in the form of a note.
rmccoppin@chicagotribune.com