Illinois public health officials on Sunday announced 1,382 new confirmed case of COVID-19 and eight additional deaths.
The numbers came after the statewide count surpassed 2,000 in Illinois for two straight days. The state has now reported 194,080 cases overall and 7,636 confirmed deaths.
On Sunday, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot had fencing put up and police officers posted at entrances to Monroe Harbor, a day after she criticized a large beach party there.
Meanwhile, Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Friday announced his administration is filing new emergency rules to require businesses to enforce mask requirements that include the possibility of fines up to $2,500.
Here’s what’s happening this weekend with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:
Sunday
Pritzker urges public to embrace masks
Gov. J.B. Pritzker was joined by several medical experts Sunday afternoon to urge Illinoisans to mask up and help stop the spread of the coronavirus.
At a news conference at Northwestern’s Prentice Hospital, Pritzker called mask requirements and physical distancing during a pandemic “common sense,” noting the majority of Americans support a mask mandate, and that health professionals with whom he has spoken all count masking and distancing among the most effective ways to slow the virus’ spread.
“In the last few months, research has evolved from the early days of the coronavirus, when it was shown that wearing masks protected others you’re with,” Pritzker said. “Now, study after study after study has shown us that if you wear a mask, it protects you, too.”
Pritzker said the new emergency rules issued last week requiring businesses and schools to enforce mandatory face mask rules or face potential fines protects the public and treats businesses fairly. Read more here. — Morgan Greene
No pajama pants? In Springfield schools, students must adhere to dress code for remote learning.
Students in the capital of Illinois are not allowed to wear hats, bandannas, sunglasses, pajama pants or slippers in school buildings. And that dress code now extends to their bedrooms and kitchen tables.
“We don’t need students in pajamas and all those other things while on their Zoom conferences,” Jason Wind, the district’s director of student support, explained during an online board meeting of Springfield Public Schools this past week.
Along with the clothing requirements, the district’s remote learning guidelines mandate that students be “sitting up out of bed, preferably at a desk or table.”
A district spokeswoman, Bree Hankins, said in a statement that the remote learning guidelines were developed collaboratively with teachers, administrators and parents, and that the dress code reflected what the students would be wearing when in school. Read more here. —The New York Times
Montrose Harbor blocked by police, fence after Mayor Lori Lightfoot shuts down large beach party
For months, memes have appeared to show Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot watching for crowds and threatening to close parts of the city if residents don’t abide orders and closures during the coronavirus pandemic.
But on Saturday, Lightfoot herself — not just a Photoshopped picture of her, like those used in such memes — apparently had a hand in breaking up a large gathering at Montrose Harbor, according to social media posts by the mayor and crime blog CWB Chicago.
The mayor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. However, Lightfoot on Saturday posted to Twitter an image of dozens of people engaging in what she called, “reckless behavior on Montrose Beach.”
“It’s called a pandemic, people,” said the mayor’s post, which included a picture of partygoers. “This reckless behavior on Montrose Beach is what will cause us to shut down the parks and lakefront. Don’t make us take steps backwards.”
In a follow-up tweet she confirmed she was there and seemed to suggest she had already ordered new fencing seen Sunday morning: “In case you were wondering, I stopped by to see for myself. It’s being addressed,” she wrote at 7:30 p.m., about 90 minutes after she posted a picture of the party.
Stoking concerns that the mayor had followed through on threats to close the “parks and lakefront,” were additional images circulating on social media of police cars blocking a Montrose Harbor entrance. The Lakefront Trail also was blocked by police officers at Montrose Avenue and Lake Shore Drive Sunday morning. Read more here. —Katherine Rosenberg-Douglas
US hits 5 million confirmed COVID-19 cases, the highest of any country
With confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S. hitting 5 million Sunday, by far the highest of any country, the failure of the most powerful nation in the world to contain the scourge has been met with astonishment and alarm in Europe.
Perhaps nowhere outside the U.S. is America’s bungled virus response viewed with more consternation than in Italy, which was ground zero of Europe’s epidemic. Italians were unprepared when the outbreak exploded in February, and the country still has one of the world’s highest official death tolls at 35,000.
But after a strict nationwide, 10-week lockdown, vigilant tracing of new clusters and general acceptance of mask mandates and social distancing, Italy has become a model of virus containment.
“Don’t they care about their health?” a mask-clad Patrizia Antonini asked about people in the United States as she walked with friends along the banks of Lake Bracciano, north of Rome. “They need to take our precautions. … They need a real lockdown.” Read more here. —Associated Press
Franciscan Health Hammond seeking volunteers for COVID-19 treatment study
Franciscan Health Hammond wants volunteers for a COVID-19 study it hopes could lead to a new treatment.
The hospital is participating in pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly’s study to test if an engineered antibody drug, called LY-CoV555, could neutralize the virus early in patients that only show mild symptoms, before the condition progresses to hospitalization.
Around 15 volunteers or more are needed at Franciscan in Hammond, Dr. Erica Kaufman West, a hospital infectious disease doctor said. Lilly’s study – called BLAZE-1 – is recruiting 400 volunteers in 24 sites nationwide, including another Franciscan hospital in Indianapolis. So far, about one-third total have signed up, she said. Read more here. —Meredeth Colias-Pete
Saturday
Coronavirus aid updates: Trump signs executive orders for $400-a-week unemployment benefit, deferral of payroll tax and federal student loan payments
Seizing the power of his podium and his pen, President Donald Trump on Saturday bypassed the nation’s lawmakers as he claimed the authority to defer payroll taxes and replace an expired unemployment benefit with a lower amount after negotiations with Congress on a new coronavirus rescue package collapsed.
At his private country club in Bedminster, New Jersey, Trump signed executive orders to act where Congress hasn’t. Not only has the pandemic undermined the economy and upended American lives, it has imperiled the president’s November reelection.
Perhaps most crucially, Trump moved to continue paying a supplemental federal unemployment benefit for millions of Americans out of work during the outbreak. However, his order called for up to $400 payments, one-third less than the $600 people had been receiving. Congress allowed those higher payments to lapse on Aug. 1, and negotiations to extend them have been mired in partisan gridlock, with the White House and Democrats miles apart.
Trump largely stayed on the sidelines during the administration’s negotiations with congressional leaders, leaving the talks on his side to chief of staff Mark Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin.
Trump’s embrace of executive actions to sidestep Congress runs in sharp contrast to his criticism of former President Barack Obama’s use of executive orders on a more limited basis. And the president’s step-back from talks with Congress breaks with his self-assured negotiating skills.
Now, Trump, who has not spoken with Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi since last year, sought to play the role of election-year savior, with the $400 weekly assistance, as well as a deferral of payroll tax and federal student loan payments and the continuation of a freeze on some evictions during the crisis.
Read more here. —Associated Press
2,190 new known COVID-19 cases, 18 additional deaths
For the second time in more than two months — and the second day in a row — the statewide count of newly confirmed cases of COVID-19 surpassed 2,000 in Illinois.
Public health officials said Saturday 2,190 new cases were logged during the last 24-hour period, and another 18 people with COVID-19 had died. Before Friday, when 2,084 new cases were reported, the last time the confirmed case number surpassed 2,000 was May 24, when the state reported 2,508 cases.
The new daily tally brings the statewide count of known cases to 192,698. There have been 7,631 deaths of people with COVID-19 in Illinois since the pandemic began earlier this year.
—Chicago Tribune staff
Friday
Chicago Public Schools delays release of remote learning plan but CEO promises more live instruction and accountability
Chicago Public Schools on Friday delayed the release of its plan for remote learning in the fall, days after the district announced it would start the new school year virtually rather than with the hybrid reopening model it first proposed.
The district now plans to issue its final reopening framework “in the days ahead,” according to an email to families Friday.
“We believe an improved remote learning model that engages students for the full school day is the right way to begin the new school year based on both the evolving public health situation and feedback from our families,” CPS CEO Janice Jackson and Chief Education Officer LaTanya McDade said in the email. “… We are taking additional time to work with school leaders and labor partners to ensure the plan we finalize for the new school year is thorough and thoughtful, and we will be sharing those guidelines as soon as they are ready.”
Chicago Teachers Union leaders are demanding the district include members as equal partners in improving on how remote learning went in the spring. After the news that CPS would not be releasing its plan Friday, CTU Vice President Stacy Davis Gates tweeted about the tentative agreement on distance learning negotiated between the Los Angeles Unified School District and the United Teachers Los Angeles.
Read more here. —Hannah Leone
From hybrid model to remote learning: Inside Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s Chicago Public Schools’ fall pivot
In the days and hours before she gave up on in-school learning at Chicago Public Schools this fall, Mayor Lori Lightfoot was getting squeezed from the outside and the inside.
Coronavirus cases continued their seemingly implacable rise despite her constant entreaties to residents to wear masks and follow social distancing rules.
Her political nemeses in the Chicago Teachers Union repeatedly accused Lightfoot of putting students and teachers at risk, even as the rumblings about an impending strike vote grew louder.
Read more here. —John Byrne and Gregory Pratt
Breaking coronavirus news
Stay up to date with the latest information on coronavirus with our breaking news alerts.