UnCruise Adventures CEO Captain Dan Blanchard. (ABC News)By AMANDA MAILE and MINA KAJI, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — One of the first U.S. cruises to resume sailing amid the novel coronavirus pandemic was cut short after a passenger tested positive for COVID-19.
The 63 passengers and crew aboard the UnCruise Adventures’ ship were just three days into their Alaskan vacation when they were informed Wednesday the guest had tested positive and they would have to return to port.
“This was the guest’s second test following a negative test result,” UnCruise Adventures said in a statement. “The guest is showing no symptoms and no other guests or crew are showing outward symptoms of any kind.”
UnCruise Adventures was able to circumvent the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention no-sail order because its ships carry less than 250 people.
“Social distancing was actually a reality aboard our boat,” UnCruise Adventures CEO Captain Dan Blanchard told ABC News, “as well as all the standard things you would think of masks, no buffets, plated meals, separated tables. So we felt, and still do feel, that the actual vessel itself and the way that our trips run, provide a very low opportunity for transmission.”
The cruise line has now decided to suspend all future 2020 Alaska departures as the entire industry struggles with how to weather the coronavirus crisis.
“It has affected our life immensely,” Blanchard said. “This year we’ll have about 2% of our normal revenue and — and that’s devastating.”
The CDC’s no sail-order expires at the end of September, but major U.S. cruise lines have voluntarily suspended operations until at least the end of October.
“This has been a bit of a come to Jesus moment,” Blanchard said, “about how easily even with proper testing, somebody got on board.”
Blanchard hopes they can start operations again in the winter in Hawaii, but acknowledged the situation is still very fluid.
“We’ve been really lobbying Congress for rapid testing,” Blanchard said. “That would change the game and would allow sailing before an absolute vaccine.”
(STURGIS, S.D.) — Despite concerns about large gatherings during the COVID-19 pandemic, as many as 250,000 motorcycle enthusiasts from around the country are expected to roll into western South Dakota for the 80th annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally beginning Friday and lasting 10 days.
Such a crowd would make it the largest event in the country to take place during the pandemic.
In a survey by the city in May, 60% of Sturgis residents said they preferred to cancel the event. But local business owners who rely on this once-a-year gathering for a huge percentage of their revenues, combined with a realization by city managers that the bikers were going to come to the area no matter what, prompted the city council to sanction the rally.
“The city fathers here wouldn’t cancel this rally if it were the middle of World War 7,” said Brent Bertlson, who has a home in Sturgis and will be attending his 26th rally this year. He said that “the money the city takes in is a number that Ripley wouldn’t believe.”
He’s not wrong. Sales tax revenue from the rally brought Sturgis, a town of 7,000 people, $26 million last year, according to City Manager Daniel Ainslie.
The event generated $655 million in 2019 across South Dakota, because many of the visitors spend time and money throughout the state as they travel to the rally, and often buy big-ticket items like motorcycles and motor homes while there.
“That’s a lot of money for a small state,” said Ainslie.
Rod Woodruff, owner of the Buffalo Chip, a campground and concert venue just outside the city where thousands of bikers will stay, explained how critical the rally can be.
“We spend the whole year getting ready to host the motorcycle rally and music festival,” he said. “And without it, we wouldn’t have a business.”
But even though the rally is going ahead, Ainslie noted the city is concerned about COVID-19. It has taken measures both to shrink the event, which normally draws close to 500,000 people, and to mitigate the potential for the virus to spread. It eliminated advertising and canceled parades, events and contests.
During the 10 days, any Sturgis resident who does not want to venture into the crowd can call upon city volunteers to have them shop for and deliver food and other necessities. In the week after the rally, the city will offer mass testing to any resident who interacted with the visitors.
Woodruff said he and other business owners have also taken precautions prompted by the pandemic.
“We will have hand sanitizer everywhere,” Woodruff said. “All our food will be takeout. We have signs everywhere reminding people to keep 6 feet apart.”
But the Buffalo Chip is not mandating masks. And those familiar with the rally say mask-wearing and social distancing will not be common.
“Those who attend are mavericks,” said Joel Heitkamp, a frequent Sturgis attendee. “This is the rebel crowd and they think they are cool because they don’t do what society tells them to do.”
This attitude might seem fitting in South Dakota, a state that never imposed a lockdown.
“South Dakota is fairly conservative, very independent,” said Christine Paige Diers, the former director of the Sturgis Motorcycle Museum. “The same could be said for the motorcyclists. They’re an independent lot. They don’t want you telling them what you can and can’t do.”
The age of the motorcyclists is a factor that is both concerning and possibly reassuring. Most of those in attendance are an older demographic — and more at risk for serious complications from the virus.
“It’s not a young person’s sport anymore,” said Heitkamp. Only half-joking, this rally veteran added, “I’m 58 and if I went this year, I’d be among the youngest people there.”
But while an older crowd may be more vulnerable to the disease, Woodruff believes their better judgment will balance those risks.
“This is not a college kid crowd. These are mature people, accustomed to having made their own decisions about how to live their lives,” he said. “They know what is necessary to calculate and minimize the risks of catching a COVID virus.”
Another factor that may minimize the potential spread of the disease is the spread of the land around Sturgis. The hundreds of thousands that come to the rally will not all be in one place. Bertlson pointed out that “the vast majority of people coming here are camping, staying in tents, campers or motor homes. They are all spread out over the Black Hills. And a vast majority of events happen outside.”
But in the town itself, Paige Diers painted a troubling picture: “Main Street will be packed with people. Crowds walking up and down the sidewalk, checking out the vendors, looking at the motorcycles. So social distancing would be extremely difficult.”
Sturgis itself has not been hit hard by the virus. The city is in Meade County, which has had only one death so far. But this huge gathering comes in a state that had severe outbreaks in meatpacking plants early in the pandemic and that even now is renewing concerns among health officials. According to an internal Federal Emergency Management Agency memo obtained by ABC News, cases are on the rise in the Sioux Falls area with 298 new cases reported in the week ending Aug. 2, a 22.2% increase from the week before.
“You’re just adding fuel to a fire,” said Dr. John Brownstein, an epidemiologist and ABC News Medical Contributor. “South Dakota is already experiencing increases in transmission. COVID is not under control in South Dakota; it’s just not.”
He is worried that gatherings like this, with visitors from different locations, have brought infections back to other communities during the pandemic and Sturgis being located in a rural part of the state should be of no comfort. The rally, said Brownstein, could put a huge strain on an area that “does not have the capacity to handle a surge in cases, hospitalizations and deaths.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement to ABC News about the rally, “Large gatherings make it difficult to maintain CDC’s recommended social distancing guidelines, which may put attendees at risk of exposure to SARS-CoV-2. Any identification of cases following a large gathering would not likely be confirmed until 2-3 weeks after the event.”
For Bertlson, such concerns are overblown.
“I think people will be cautious,” he said. “But rational people informed of the facts are not that scared of this COVID.”
He called Sturgis “a freedom rally,” adding, “Bikers are big believers in freedom. I’ve heard from people tired of being locked down and being told what they can and can’t do. A lot of these people are saying, ‘I’m going to Sturgis.'”
Phototreat/iStockBy QUINN OWEN and KIARA BRANTLEY-JONES, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — The number of unauthorized crossing attempts by migrants at the southern border increased in July when President Donald Trump’s administration used a controversial public health order to rapidly send them back, citing COVID-19 concerns, according to data released by Customs and Border Protection Thursday.
Last month, border agents conducted more than 35,000 rapid returns or “expulsions” of unauthorized migrants under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s direction.
Since the CDC order was first issued in March, immigration agents have used it more than 105,000 times.
“We’re trying to remove them as fast as we can to not put them in our congregate settings, to not put them into our system, to not have them remain in the United States for a long period of time, therefore increasing the exposure risk of everybody they come in contact with to include the work force of all those different entities that would be impacted,” Mark Morgan, the acting CBP commissioner, told reporters Thursday.
Morgan said more than 90% of people subjected to the order were removed within two hours of their arrest by CBP. Others that qualified under the Convention Against Torture guidelines were referred to agents in citizenship and immigration services for humanitarian review.
Asked about plans to eventually end or scale back the order, Morgan deferred to the CDC.
“They will be the ones that make the decision ultimately from a public health perspective,” Morgan said.
This week, government lawyers defended ICE’s use of private hotels to hold minors before they’re sent back under the order, after ICE was accused of violating a decades-old court agreement that sets requirements for immigrant minors in custody.
“DHS’s use of hotels to house minors pending their expulsion pursuant to the Title 42 process comports with CDC’s general guidance to detention facilities, which state that the ideal quarantine conditions are individual rooms with solid walls and a closed door,” the government said in a Tuesday court filing, citing Title 42, the United States Code dealing with public health, social welfare and civil rights which CBP says grants them the authority to quickly send migrants back across the border without a hearing in immigration court.
Asked why the minors can’t be housed at the Office of Refugee Resettlement while following social distancing measures — the federal agency that typically houses unaccompanied minors and connects them with family or sponsors — Morgan said the risk to public health is too great.
“If we introduce these individuals to ORR, we’re defeating the entire purpose of Title 42,” Morgan said. “We’re still introducing these individuals into our system throughout and creating a greater exposure risk to the American people.”
More than 180 immigrant advocacy organizations and human rights groups — including Americans for Immigrant Justice, Center for Justice and International Law, Columbia Law School Immigrants’ Rights Clinic and Freedom Network USA — wrote to Chad Wolf, the acting secretary of Homeland Security, in April, urging him to end the practice.
“The Trump Administration has proposed to expand the national security bar for asylum to include certain infectious diseases as a national security threat. During this time of pandemic, it would bar asylum seekers from countries where COVID-19 is prevalent,” Immigrant Legal Center tweeted Thursday.
The Uncage Reunite Families Coalition held a press conference Thursday morning to call on Arizona’s congressional delegation to investigate the detention of unaccompanied minors at a Hampton Inn hotel in Phoenix.
Rep. Raquel Teran, D-Ariz., spoke at the presser and strongly criticized the Trump administration for its ill treatment of undocumented immigrant children. Teran cited major issues including the pandemic, systemic racism and the detainment of undocumented children, saying it all shows that the current administration is “[willing] to sacrifice children to further a heartless political agenda.”
Eddie Chavez Calderon, the campaign organizer for Arizona Jews for Justice, spoke at the presser and called for advocacy groups to help migrant children, saying that action can be taken without government assistance. He also demanded that no children be deported by themselves.
“There is no moral high ground on this to counter,” said Calderon. “This is simply an ugly smudge on who we are right now… this is about revolution both morally and communal.”
Members of the URFC called the detainment a violation of basic human rights and the law, alleging that taxpayer dollars are being used to keep the children detained in hotels without taxpayers knowing the full extent of how their money is being spent.
The presser ended with a message asking citizens to call the House of Representatives to demand answers about the whereabouts of undocumented migrant children that have been deported and full reports about the conditions of the hotels where the children stayed.
(NEW YORK) — Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves has ordered some residents to wear masks, bowing to political pressure as COVID-19 infection rates continue to shatter records in the state which saw 1,775 new cases in a single day.
Reeves made the announcement on Tuesday as the coronavirus infection rate shot up to 23.3%, pushing the state one step closer to becoming the nation’s next COVID-19 hot spot.
Doctors administered about 1.7 tests per 1,000 people over the past week, the highest in the country, according to hospital trade publication Becker’s Hospital Review.
Reeves had previously resisted the idea of making mask use a requirement in the state, but he partly changed his mind Tuesday, when he issued an order requiring masks at public gatherings statewide for two weeks, in a push to allow schools to safely reopen. The state now ranks second in new cases per million people, behind Florida.
At least 33 states, along with Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, have orders in place that require people to wear face coverings in public. Health officials say it helps curb the spread of the deadly virus, but many states, including Mississippi and neighboring Tennessee, have refused to do so.
Mississippi residents still aren’t mandated to wear masks while in public, but the governor said “wearing a mask is critical” if the state wants to move forward with its plan to reopen schools.
“We have got to be prepared to change — this is what we are doing for the initial reopening of our schools,” Reeves said Tuesday. “We have to balance the very real risk of the virus and the lifelong damage from school closures.”
State crisis by the numbers
The Mississippi State Department of Health reported 956 new cases and 21 new deaths Wednesday. The state reported as many as 1,775 new infections in a day last week.
As of Wednesday, the state had at least 64,400 cases, more than double what it had last month (30,900).
State officials are also investigating a large ongoing outbreak within the state’s legislative body.
Last month, about 870 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Mississippi, compared to nearly 1,120 on Tuesday. Even worse, the state reported 52 new deaths on July 31, a record high and nearly three times as much as the number of new daily deaths reported a month ago, according to state data.
With many school districts returning to school this week, the governor noted that older students might be more likely to get infected and spread the virus. Because of that, he ordered eight “hot spots” to delay reopening schools for grades seven to 12. Experts say that while research is ongoing about children and COVID-19, limited scientific studies indicate that older children are more likely to transmit the virus than younger children.
Dr. LouAnn Woodward, vice chancellor of the University of Mississippi Medical Center, confirmed on Wednesday that the hospital is lacking 14 ICU beds because there’s been so many COVID-19 patients in need of intensive care. She said those patients are still being treated as ICU patients, but in other parts of the hospital.
The hospital is on track to lose between $60 million and $100 million for the fiscal year, Woodward said, citing the ongoing pandemic.
Protecting the state’s most vulnerable
Several health experts have sounded the alarm on Mississippi as well as neighboring Alabama, saying particular counties could be on track to become new U.S. hot spots based on their population demographics.
Mississippi has a large Black population with high poverty levels. Poor and underprivileged populations, especially those of color, are particularly vulnerable to suffering from the novel coronavirus due to their lower access to quality care.
Black people made up about 50% of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the state, with Black women being the majority.
As of Monday, Black women accounted for nearly 13,300 of Mississippi’s infections, with white women making up about 8,100, according to state data. Black men, on the other hand, accounted for about 7,860 of overall infections, compared to 6,848 for white men.
Dr. Olubukola Nafiu, director of pediatric anesthesia research at Michigan State University, said people color, especially those living in poverty, are more likely to experience lower quality of care. That makes them more prone to experience complications when battling illnesses like the novel coronavirus, he said.
“In the past, many medical professionals have explained that African Americans tend to be sicker than their white peers, in general, but that’s not always true,” Nafiu told ABC News. “I believe if we targeted preventive measures towards the most vulnerable populations, then we will have a substantial effect on reducing mortality rates, across the board, within the African American population.”
Overall, more than 19 million people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, 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. America has become the worst-affected country, with more than 4.8 million diagnosed cases and at least 160,104 deaths.
COVID-19 legislation
Medical experts have pointed to the number of legislative failures when explaining the trends behind the increase in infections.
The first is when states fail to reimplement social distancing restrictions or statewide mask mandates, according to researchers with Boston University who called the lack of restrictions in states like Mississippi concerning among public health experts.
Reeves has now implemented mask orders for hot spot counties — including Boliver, Coahoma, Forrest, George, Hines, Panola, Sunflower and Washington — and urged residents to avoid large social gatherings. He also warned that he might close down bars statewide if the virus continues to surge.
“There are a handful of counties that certainly reach that threshold of being hot spots,” Reeves said Tuesday. “For this standard, we are mandating a delay [opening schools] in counties with more than an absolute number of 200 cases and 500 per 100,000 residents in the last two weeks. We must pump the brakes in hardest hit areas.”
His administration pushed forward with opening schools this month, but school districts have already reported that students tested positive for the coronavirus upon returning to in-person classes. Medical experts said they expect that will continue to be the case if there is no strict public guidance.
So far, the main guidance has been for residents to avoid large gatherings and only leave home for work, school or other essential activities.
“Don’t go to funerals, don’t go to weddings, don’t have large gatherings at your house with 30 to 40 people to cook out,” Reeves said. “Only do what you have to do — go to work and go to school if your school chooses.”
When asked how he plans to keep students safe while returning to school, the governor said: “In my opinion, the best way to accomplish that is to provide guidelines by local school leaders to tailor them and step in with the authority of state movement if and when and where it is absolutely necessary.”
deepblue4you/iStockBy ERIC NOLL and HALEY YAMADA, ABC News
(NEW YORK) — Man and man’s best friend have been reunited after the Apple Fire in California.
Greg Skeens thought he had seen the last of his Blue Heeler, Buck, when the dog took off running into hills as firefighters arrived to battle the flames surrounding Skeens’ home.
“It was one big, orange flame all the way around the house … and I thought we were gonna die,” Skeens told local reporters.
Buck fled and was “chasing a coyote three times his size … I thought he was gone,” Skeens added.
The Apple Fire burned more than 28,000 acres outside of Los Angeles in just five days. As thousands of firefighters continue to combat the flames to save residents and homes, a few Orange County firefighters spotted a dog, lost and alone.
It turned out to be Buck.
The firefighters, who had spotted the dog farther out into the fire line, carried him to safety and handed him over to local authorities.
Days later, an animal control worker ran into Skeens and listened to his story about losing Buck. The worker put two and two together and was able to reunite the pair.
Just three days after Skeen thought he had lost Buck forever, they were reunited in a heartwarming moment.
Buck is now safe and sound at home, and, the Orange County Fire Department told local reporters, those who rescued him are back out on the front lines.
UnCruise Adventures CEO Captain Dan Blanchard. (ABC News)By AMANDA MAILE and MINA KAJI, ABC News
