(CHAPEL HILL, N.C.) — A week after its first day of classes, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill announced it will be shifting all undergraduate classes remotely amid several outbreaks of COVID-19 on campus.
Starting Wednesday, all undergraduate in-person instruction will go digital for the rest of the fall semester, Chancellor Kevin M. Guskiewicz and Executive Vice Chancellor Robert A. Blouin said in a letter to the school on Monday.
The school leaders said the “current data presents an untenable situation.”
In the past week, from Aug. 10-16, the campus’ positivity rate increased nearly fivefold, from 2.8% to 13.6%, officials said. During that period, there were 130 new confirmed cases in students and five in employees, according to the school’s COVID-19 dashboard.
As of Monday morning, 177 students were in isolation and 349 in quarantine both on and off the campus. Most students who have tested positive have had mild symptoms, officials said.
Residential halls, which began move-in on Aug. 3, have been hotbeds of virus activity. On Sunday, the school announced its fourth cluster of COVID-19 cases in three days. Three clusters — which refers to five or more cases in close proximity — were found in residence halls, while the fourth was discovered at a fraternity. The school has not released the exact number of cases in each cluster, citing privacy laws.
Cases in Orange County, in which the university sits, have been on the rise since Aug. 11 as well, following a gradual decline since early July. There are 1,475 confirmed cases as of Monday, according to the county.
The school leaders said they made the decision “in consultation with state and local health officials, Carolina’s infectious disease experts and the UNC System.”
“We know that these trends aren’t just affecting our campus: they have escalated the concerns of our neighbors, co-workers and friends in and around the Chapel Hill and Carrboro communities,” Guskiewicz and Blouin said. “The health and well-being of the good people of our greater Carolina community are just as important to us as that of our students, faculty and staff.”
The school, which has more than 19,000 undergraduate students, had already started the fall with reduced numbers on campus. Residence halls were at under 60% capacity and under 30% of total classroom seats were taught in-person, officials said.
As of Monday, about 21,000 students were participating in in-person learning, of which 13,262 were undergraduate students, a school spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.
To further help de-densify the campus, undergraduate students currently living in campus housing can change their residential plans with no penalty.
UNC’s graduate, professional and health affairs schools are unaffected at this time, school officials said.
The move comes following calls for the campus to go remote.
In a July 29 letter to the school officials, Orange County Health Director Quintana Stewart recommended they consider virtual classes for at least the first five weeks of the fall semester, ABC station WTVD in Durham reported.
Ahead of Monday’s announcement, Barbara Rimer, dean of UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health, also recommended the school make the transition in the wake of the discovered clusters.
“After only one week of campus operations, with growing numbers of clusters and insufficient control over the off-campus behavior of students (and others), it is time for an off-ramp,” she said in a post. “We have tried to make this work, but it is not working.”
As for the spring semester, the school will make a decision “in the future, in consultation with our public health experts and local health officials,” a spokesperson told ABC News.
UNC President Peter Hans said Monday there currently weren’t plans to make similar changes at any of the system’s 16 other institutions.
“Each campus is different, and I expect situations to evolve differently,” he said in a statement. “In any circumstance, we will be grounded by reliable public health data and prevailing local health conditions.”
(NEW YORK) — Karl Jordan and Ronald Washington have been charged with murdering Run DMC’s Jam Master Jay in 2002 while engaged in cocaine trafficking, according to an indictment unsealed in the Eastern District of New York that also charged the two with drug offenses.
The pioneering DJ Jason Mizell was shot in the head at point-blank range with a .40-caliber handgun as he sat on a sofa in a Hollis, Queens, recording studio on Oct. 30, 2002.
Washington is currently imprisoned on a prior robbery case. The judge ordered Jordan detained pending his bail application. He is due back Sept. 17.
Jordan is eligible for the death penalty since the murder was carried out as part of a drug deal. Police had never released a motive for Jam Master Jay’s killing but federal prosecutors said today that the motive for the killing resulted from Jay’s previous acquisition of approximately 10 kilograms of cocaine from a narcotics supplier in the Midwest.
The cocaine was allegedly intended to be distributed in Maryland by Washington, Jordan and other co-conspirators, according to prosecutors.
Mizell had recently informed Washington that the defendant would not be involved in distributing the narcotics in Maryland, which precipitated the murder conspiracy, prosecutors said.
“Today we begin to answer the question of who killed Jason Mizell,” acting US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Seth DuCharme said in announcing the charges.
“Primarily this is a case about a murder that for nearly two decades had gone unanswered,” DuCharme said, noting how the office has been working the case for 18 years. “We don’t give up on these cases.
“It was important to us then and remains important to us now to bring justice for the victim.”
NYPD Chief of Detectives Rodney Harrison, a Queens native and self-described Run-DMC fan, said “this arrest was very important to me.”
“There are certain crimes for which the passage of time affords no safe harbor and murder is one of them,” DuCharme said.
Defense attorney Michael Hueston entered a not guilty plea to the 10-count indictment on Jordan’s behalf.
Myriam Borzee/iStockBy MORGAN WINSOR and EMILY SHAPIRO, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now killed more than 776,000 people worldwide.
Over 21.7 million people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new respiratory virus, according to data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. The actual numbers are believed to be much higher due to testing shortages, many unreported cases and suspicions that some national governments are hiding or downplaying the scope of their outbreaks.
Since the first cases were detected in China in December, the United States has become the worst-affected country, with more than 5.4 million diagnosed cases and at least 170,136 deaths.
Here’s how the news is developing today. All times Eastern.
4:25 p.m.: UNC Chapel Hill cancels in-person classes after coronavirus cases rise
After coronavirus positivity rates rose from 2.8% to 13.6% at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, school officials have decided to move all undergraduate in-person classes to remote learning, they announced Monday.
When students started moving into dorms two weeks ago, officials kept buildings at less than 60% capacity and classrooms at less than 30% capacity, the school said. However, 177 students are now in isolation and another 349 are quarantining, officials said.
The undergraduate shift from in-person to remote will go into effect Wednesday. Classes for the graduate, professional and health affairs schools will continue as they were, officials said. 4 p.m.: US Open’s top-seeded female player drops out due to COVID-19
Simona Halep, the top-seeded female tennis player at this year’s U.S. Open, has dropped out of the tournament due to COVID-19 concerns.
Halep tweeted Monday, “After weighing up all the factors involved and with the exceptional circumstances in which we are living, I have decided that I will not travel to New York to play the @usopen. I always said I would put my health at the heart of my decision.”
Halep, who is currently ranked No. 2 in the world, is the 12th singles player to drop out of this year’s grand slam tournament. Most of those 12 players cited COVID-19 as a reason.
Ashleigh Barty, who was ranked No. 1, had also previously dropped out due to COVID-19.
The U.S. Tennis Association released its Health and Safety Plan for the U.S. Open earlier on Monday. Players and members of the highest tiered bubble will be tested twice; after two negative results, they will be tested every four days. Members of the tightest bubble will receive access to the National Tennis Center following the first negative test.
The U.S. Open will begin Aug. 31.
2:10 p.m.: Nearly half of adults risk more severe COVID-19 disease due to underlying medical conditions
Nearly half of U.S. adults — 45.4% — have a greater risk of more severe coronavirus disease because they are living with one or more underlying medical conditions, according to a CDC study published in the August edition of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) journal, Emerging Infectious Diseases.
Researchers focused on heart disease, diabetes, lung disease (COPD and asthma), hypertension and cancer because those six conditions were associated with a higher death rate, according to early data from China.
People with one or more of these medical conditions are more likely to experience more serious health problems if infected with COVID-19, according to the study.
The older the person is, the greater the risk is, according to the study.
The study was based on self-reported information from telephone surveys. It does not include information from nursing homes and long-term care facilities so this is likely an underestimate of underlying health conditions.
1:30 p.m.: Virus that causes COVID-19 confirmed in mink in Utah
SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19 in humans, was found among mink at two farms in Utah, according to the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Veterinary Services Laboratories.
Some people who had contact with the mink were found to have COVID-19, the USDA said.
The number of infected animals was not released.
“After unusually large numbers of mink died at the farms, the Utah Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory completed necropsies on several of the affected animals,” the department said in a statement Monday. “Samples were forwarded and tested presumptive positive for SARS-CoV-2 at the Washington Animal Disease Diagnostic Laboratory. Both laboratories are members of the National Animal Health Laboratory Network. The presumptive positive samples were then sent to NVSL for confirmatory testing.”
These are the first confirmed cases of the virus among mink in the U.S. Mink were previously found to have the virus in the Netherlands, Spain and Denmark, the USDA said. 1:10 p.m.: Canadian Football League cancels season
The Canadian Football League announced Monday that it’s canceling the fall season instead of moving ahead with the planned shortened season.
“The league lost its number one source of venue — fans in the stands — when the COVID-19 pandemic prevented large gatherings,” the league said in a statement. “Unlike US-based leagues that can count on television or streaming to provide the lion’s share of their revenue, the CFL depends heavily on its live gate.”
“Despite months of discussions, the government ultimately declined the CFL’s appeal for financial support,” the league said.
“Even with additional support, our owners and community-held teams would have had to endure significant financial losses to play in 2020,” Commissioner Randy Ambrosie said in the statement. “This outcome after months of discussions with government officials is disappointing. But we’re focused now on the long-term future and we will continue to work with the federal and provincial governments in that context.”
12:45 p.m.: Expert stresses importance of universal flu vaccine during pandemic
Emory University’s infectious disease expert Dr. Rafi Ahmed said in a video briefing Monday that it’s critical that the U.S. not forget about the flu as the pandemic moves forward.
In the last decade, flu infections in the U.S. have ranged from 9 million to 45 million per year and deaths have ranged from 10,000 to 60,000 per year, he said.
The vaccine used for influenza changes annually because every year different strains of the virus emerge, which require the development of new vaccines adapted to fight against them, explained Ahmed. Occasionally a more dangerous strain emerges that can lead to a pandemic, like the swine flu in 2009, he said.
Although the current influenza vaccines are effective, there is still room for improvement, he said.
In particular, Ahmed said “we would like to get away from immunizing people every year” and develop a long-term influenza vaccine that might last “five years, ten years, or maybe even longer.”
11:50 a.m.: NY gyms can soon reopen at limited capacity
In New York, gyms can open on Aug. 24 at 33% capacity, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Monday.
Masks will be mandatory at all times, he said, and health guidelines will be enforced including ventilation requirements.
Localities must inspect the facilities before or within two weeks of reopening, Cuomo said, and localities will also make decisions on indoor fitness classes.
New York, once the U.S. epicenter of the pandemic, now has one of the lowest coronavirus rates in the country, Cuomo said.
Of those tested in New York state on Sunday, .71% tested positive for the coronavirus — the lowest daily number so far, Cuomo said.
11:10 a.m.: LA launches testing, tracing program at schools
The Los Angeles Unified School District — the nation’s second largest school district — is launching a coronavirus testing and contact tracing program at schools, said Superintendent Austin Beutner.
The district is reopening with virtual learning starting Tuesday.
Staff, students and their families will get regular testing which will be used “to study the impact and effects of reopening,” the district said.
“While this testing and contact tracing effort is unprecedented, it is necessary and appropriate,” Beutner said in a statement. “This will provide a public health benefit to the school community, as well as the greater Los Angeles area.”
It also benefits students’ education “by getting them back to school sooner and safer and keeping them there,” he said.
“We hope this effort also will provide learnings which can benefit other school systems,” he added.
California has more than 625,000 coronavirus cases, higher than any other state in the U.S.
8:15 a.m.: Bolivia’s case count tops 100,000 amid protests
More than 100,000 people in Bolivia have now been diagnosed with COVID-19.
The Bolivian Ministry of Health announced the grim milestone on Sunday night, noting that 60% of the diagnosed cases remain active, including 1,198 new infections. There were also 55 additional coronavirus-related fatalities in the past 24 hours, bringing the death toll to 4,058 nationwide.
The South American nation descended into chaos and civil unrest last month after the government decided to postpone the first round of the presidential election again, due to the coronavirus pandemic. The vote, which was initially supposed to be held in May, will now take place on Oct. 18.
Thousands of people have continued to protest in the streets.
7:23 a.m.: Tulsa sees surge in teachers seeking to file wills
A rising number of teachers in Tulsa, Oklahoma, are seeking to file wills amid the coronavirus pandemic and fears of returning to the classroom, according to a report from local ABC affiliate KTUL-TV.
The Tulsa Classroom Teachers Association told KTUL that the requests from teachers to file wills have increased by 200% since May.
Tulsa Public Schools is set to resume classes virtually on Aug. 31.
Teachers told KTUL they are thankful that the school district is starting with distance learning for the first nine weeks and they hope it will be extended if the city’s COVID-19 numbers don’t go down. They said they’re afraid of bringing the virus home to their families.
6:18 a.m.: Arizona school district cancels classes due to staff absences
A school district in Arizona was forced to cancel Monday classes after more than 100 staff members called out.
The J. O. Combs Unified School District in Arizona’s Pinal County was set to resume in-person classes but notified parents in a letter dated Friday that “we have received a high volume of staff absences for Monday citing health and safety concerns.”
“Due to these insufficient staffing levels, schools will not be able to re-open on Monday as planned,” the school district said. “This means that all classes, including virtual learning, will be canceled. At this time, we do not know the duration of these staff absences, and cannot yet confirm when in-person instruction may resume.”
The school district added that they “will continue to monitor the situation and will share an update no later than 5:00 p.m. on Monday.”
A spokesperson for the school district told Phoenix ABC affiliate KNXV-TV that at least 109 people, including teachers and office staff, have requested not to work.
Last week, the head of the Arizona Health Services Department and the state’s superintendent of public instruction laid out a series of guidelines that public schools were urged to use when deciding whether COVID-19 infection rates are low enough to safely reopen for full in-person learning.
5:37 a.m.: India’s coronavirus death toll crosses 50,000
India’s health ministry recorded 941 additional coronavirus-related deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the nationwide death toll to 50,921.
The country of 1.3 billion people has the world’s fourth-highest death toll from COVID-19, behind the United States, Brazil and Mexico, according to a real-time tally kept by Johns Hopkins University.
More than 2.6 million people in India have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began — the third-highest count in the world.
4:29 a.m.: Another school closes its doors in Georgia amid rising cases
A third school in Georgia’s Cherokee County is shuttering due to a growing cluster of coronavirus cases among its students and staff.
The Cherokee County School District announced Sunday that it was temporarily closing Creekview High School in Canton, Georgia, with the hope of resuming in-person classes there on Aug. 31.
“Over this weekend, the number of positive cases at Creekview High School has increased to a total of 25, with 500 of its 1,800 in-person students now under precautionary quarantine, and additional tests pending that would significantly increase the quarantine total,” the Cherokee County School District said in a statement. “We understand these closings create hardships and are disappointing to students who want to learn in-person as well as their families, but these are necessary measures to avoid potential spread within our schools.”
The school district has also temporarily closed in-person learning at Woodstock High School and Etowah High School, where reopening is also tentatively scheduled for Aug. 31. Remote learning will be in effect for all students at the three schools in the meantime.
Cherokee County reopened its schools on Aug. 3, welcoming back 30,000 students for in-person learning. Since then, at least 1,876 students and 45 staff members from more than a dozen schools have been placed under mandated two-week quarantines, according to data published on the school district’s website.
3:45 a.m.: US reports under 1,000 new deaths for first time in seven days
There were 42,048 new cases of COVID-19 identified in the United States on Sunday, according to a count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
Sunday’s case count is well below the record set on July 16, when more than 77,000 new cases were identified in a 24-hour reporting period.
An additional 572 coronavirus-related deaths were also recorded Sunday. It’s the first time in seven days that the nation has reported under 1,000 new deaths.
A total of 5,403,361 people in the U.S. have been diagnosed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began, and at least 170,052 of them have died, according to Johns Hopkins. The cases include people from all 50 U.S. states, Washington, D.C. and other U.S. territories as well as repatriated citizens.
By May 20, all U.S. states had begun lifting stay-at-home orders and other restrictions put in place to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. The day-to-day increase in the country’s cases then hovered around 20,000 for a couple of weeks before shooting back up and crossing 70,000 for the first time in mid-July.
An internal memo from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, obtained by ABC News on Sunday night, shows that the nationwide number of new cases over the last week has continued to decrease in week-over-week comparisons, while the number of new deaths has reversed and gone up.
(NEW YORK) — New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday announced that gyms could reopen in the state at limited capacities as early as Aug. 24.
Fitness centers will have a 33% capacity limit, but masks must be worn at all times. Facilities will also have to undergo inspection to stay open.
City authorities will be tasked with inspecting fitness centers at least two weeks ahead of scheduled reopenings. Localities will also have to determine if gyms in their area are permitted to host classes, Cuomo said.
There will also be other health and air filtration requirements in place.
“The localities have a role here. They have to inspect the gyms before they open or within two weeks of their opening to make sure they’re meeting all the requirements,” Cuomo said. “The local elected officials will make the decision in a jurisdiction and the local health department’s must inspect before or within two weeks to make sure all the guidelines are in place.”
The long-awaited announcement came days after the governor declined to offer a timeline on fitness center reopenings, saying, “Now is not the time,” citing surging COVID-19 infection rates in states that reopened gyms without proper protocols in place.
Many states, including neighboring New Jersey, have been exploring ways to safely reopen gyms and other recreational facilities in recent weeks with most areas entering the final phases of their respective reopening plans.
Some experts have recommended opening gyms in limited capacities, with strict restrictions on machine usage.
Several reopened states, including Arizona, have moved to re-close gyms.
“We know gyms are highly problematic from the other states. They opened them and they had to close them,” Cuomo told reporters earlier this month. “We’re here, poised delicately on this island of New York state with this sea of spread all around us, so we know we have this storm and we have to be very, very careful.”
The governor’s office recently said that it was monitoring daily test results from across the states in an effort to pinpoint potential hotspots ahead of time.
carlballou/iStockBy IVAN PEREIRA, MEREDITH DELISO and MORGAN WINSOR, ABC News
(AUSTIN, Texas) — A long standoff between police and a gunman holed up with hostages in a suburb of Austin, Texas, ended Monday morning, a day after three police officers were shot inside the home while responding to a 911 call about a domestic disturbance.
Three people related to the suspect were being held hostage inside the house in Cedar Park, following Sunday’s shooting. Two of the hostages were released Monday morning before the suspect and the last hostage exited the home “peacefully,” according to a tweet from the Cedar Park Police Department.
“The scene will continue to be active for quite a while as we investigate,” police added.
The incident began on shortly after 3 p.m. Sunday local time. A man in his mid-20s had kicked down the door of his mother’s home and was “acting very aggressive,” according to Mike Harmon, interim police chief for the Cedar Park Police Department.
The police later identified the man as Joseph DeSean Taylor, 26.
Responding officers were met with gunfire inside the house. They returned gunfire, and it is unknown if the suspect was hit, Harmon said. At least 50 bullets were fired during the incident, according to police.
Following the shooting, the suspect barricaded himself inside the home with three family members, including his mother and a juvenile, Harmon said. The age of the third family member remains unknown.
Residents of the area were urged to stay indoors early Monday morning as the suspect remained barricaded inside the house. Negotiators were in talks with the suspect to “bring this to a peaceful resolution,” the police chief told reporters at a press conference Sunday night.
“We do have a message for the suspect inside, and please take this to heart,” Harmon said. “We want to end this peacefully for everybody involved. For the suspect inside, for the hostages that are inside, for the officers that are on the scene, for everybody.”
“So please, if you’re listening to this, please come out and surrender yourself peacefully so we can resolve this situation tonight,” he added.
The Cedar Park Police Department has responded to the residence in the past, according to Harmon. The suspect has “some mental health issues,” he said, but did not elaborate beyond that.
Taylor has been charged with three counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon on a public servant and three counts of aggravated kidnapping, according to police. He was taken to a local hospital to be examined and was awaiting transport to the Williamson County Jail, the police said.
The three officers who were shot were rushed to an area hospital in stable condition while the suspect remained barricaded inside the house, according to a tweet Sunday evening from the Cedar Park Police Department.
The officers were later identified as Officer Jacqueline Quiles, a four-year veteran of the force, Officer Cris Hester, a 10-year veteran, and Officer Nik Anderson, an eight-year veteran.
The police chief later told reporters that the wounded officers had non-life-threatening injuries and two were released from the hospital Monday. One was still in stable condition as of Monday evening.
The three officers will be placed on administrative leave while the Cedar Park Police Department’s Professional Standards Division conducts an internal investigation, which is part of the department’s policy during shootings, the police said.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott shared his condolences for the injured officers.
“Our hearts are with the police officers who were injured while protecting the Cedar Park community this afternoon,” Abbott said in a statement.
ABC News’ Josh Margolin and Cammeron Parrish contributed to this report.
iStock/smolaw11BY: MEREDITH DELISO
