Coronavirus Watch: Trump rally in Des Moines could be 'another super-spreader event'
White House experts recommend limiting social gatherings in central Iowa to 25 people.
But nearly 10,000 people are gearing up to attend President Donald Trump's rally at the Des Moines International Airport on Wednesday, 12 days after Trump revealed that he had come down with COVID-19.
"If anyone in attendance is infectious, we are potentially looking at another super-spreader event," Lina Tucker Reinders, executive director of the Iowa Public Health Association, said in an email.
It's Wednesday, and this is the Coronavirus Watch from the Paste BN Network. Here's the most significant news of the day, as of 12 p.m. ET:
- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the Senate will vote on more COVID-19 relief when it returns to Washington on Monday.
- Travelers planning a trip to Hawaii will no longer have to quarantine for 14 days if they tested negative for the coronavirus at least 72 hours before their departure from the mainland, starting Thursday.
- Elsewhere, travelers from 38 states and territories will now have to isolate upon entering New York, New Jersey and Connecticut after the three neighboring states expanded their quarantine list again.
- The drug company Eli Lilly announced Tuesday that it was pausing a trial of an experimental drug similar to one President Donald Trump recently claimed cured him of COVID-19. Experts say the pause is reassuring, not frightening.
- Facebook said Tuesday that it would begin a campaign to encourage flu shots and ban anti-vaccination advertisements. But the social network may not be going far enough, some say, because nonpaid anti-vaccination posts are still allowed.
Paste BN is investigating how racist policies of the past and present have fueled high COVID-19 deaths in communities of color. Check out the six-part series here.
12 states set records for new cases in a week, 5 had deaths: New case records were set in Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming, and record numbers of deaths were reported in Kansas, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin, a Paste BN analysis of Johns Hopkins data through late Tuesday shows.
Today's numbers: The U.S. has reported more than 7.8 million cases and 215,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data. Globally, there have been more than 38.2 million cases and 1 million fatalities. See the numbers in your area here, and check out where cases are rising here.
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– Grace Hauck, Paste BN breaking news reporter, @grace_hauck