Monday, April 13, 2020
Critics charge that the spread of coronavirus was merely a pretext to the administration’s real goal of continuing to turn away people at the border and denying them the due process rights.
“That was a goal from Day One, and he found the perfect opportunity to do it,” said Ur Jaddou, an expert at America’s Voice.
But supporters said it just makes sense to limit travel across the border at a time of pandemic, and that the U.S. needs to think about the health of Border Patrol officers who “are risking their lives out there to keep us safe.”
Reports of the “Title 42” expulsions come as Immigration and Customs Enforcements confirmed 61 cases of COVID-19 among detainees in its facilities and 19 cases among workers at its detention centers.
Tags: border patrol , covid19 , fear , customs , immigrants , Image
Pima County had seen 668 of the state’s confirmed cases.
The coronavirus had killed 122 people statewide, including 29 in Pima County, according to the state and county health department.
In Maricopa County, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases had risen to 2,020.
The state remains under Gov. Doug Ducey’s stay-at-home order that has closed a wide number of “non-essential” businesses, including many retail stores, barbershops, salons, and swap meets. Public parks remain open but amenities such as playgrounds and restrooms are closed.
Under the stay-at-home order, Arizonans are still able to shop for groceries, medical and household needs, and pet supplies. They can also go work, pick up a take-out meal from a restaurant, travel to take care of a family member, friend or pet, and can still go walking, hiking, biking and golfing, provided that they adhere to social distancing guidelines.
Sunday, April 12, 2020
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Arizona had reached 3,539 as of Sunday, April 12, according to the morning report from the Arizona Department of Health Services.
Pima County had seen 622 of the state’s confirmed cases.
The coronavirus had killed 115 people statewide, including 29 in Pima County, according to the state health department.
Pima County is no longer running its own numbers and is now directing those looking for statistical updates to the state site, in order to keep consistency.
In Maricopa County, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases had risen to 1,960, including 48 deaths.
Unfortunately, the state does not give out statistics on recoveries, but according to Johns Hopkins' Coronavirus Resource Center, there have been 412,534 worldwide, with 32,314 recoveries in the U.S.
The state remains under Gov. Doug Ducey’s stay-at-home order that has closed a wide number of “non-essential” businesses, including many retail stores, barbershops, salons, and swap meets. Public parks remain open but amenities such as playgrounds and restrooms are closed.
Under the stay-at-home order, Arizonans are still able to shop for groceries, medical and household needs, and pet supplies. They can also go work, pick up a take-out meal from a restaurant, travel to take care of a family member, friend or pet, and can still go walking, hiking, biking and golfing, provided that they adhere to social distancing guidelines.
Ducey announced four new executive orders this week:
Friday, April 10, 2020
- We started the day with the morning report of AZDHS updated statistics in Arizona, with 3,112 positive cases now being reported in the state, and 97 deaths overall. 543 of those cases and 26 deaths come out of Pima County. Maricopa had 1,741 cases reported.
- Arizona food-stamp recipients may soon be able to buy their groceries online, after the federal government’s swift approval this week of the state’s request in the face of coronavirus-related stay-at-home orders.
- In the wake of President Trump’s move to push aside the official who was supposed to lead the coronavirus bailout watchdog group, four other members are just as vulnerable.
- As if we didn't already have enough of a reason to love eegee's, now they've come through on a request to support those who are helping our city through these trying times.
- Unfortunately, we still aren't really sure how many people in the hospital actually have COVID-19.
- With libraries and schools closed there are families across Pima County without reliable access to free or low-cost books, but adventures are available in the palm of your hand thanks to Make Way for Books’ smartphone app.
- UA President Robert Robbins warned this week that a return to normal life could be months away—or longer.
- A local charity is helping youth members of Pima County 4-H and Future Farmers of America after their annual livestock auction moved online when this year’s Pima County Fair was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tags: update , stats , coronavirus , covid19 , tucson , roundup , arizona , eegee , mayor romero , Image
UA President Robert Robbins: "Until There's a Vaccine, We’re Never Going To Be Completely Risk Free"
UA President Robert Robbins warned this week that a return to normal life could be months away—or longer.
“The facts are that until there's a vaccine, we’re never going to be completely risk free,” Robbins said in a teleconference on Wednesday evening. “That’s probably a year at least before we would have a vaccine. We’ve been working for 30 years on an HIV vaccine and still don’t have one because that virus mutates frequently. But this is a coronavirus, there have been lots of studies done on coronavirus. I know that several of our top basic scientists have been working on coronavirus here at the U of A for more than two decades. So we know a lot about coronavirus, but this is a novel virus, so we've got to hope it follows the biology of other viruses.”
If the community spread of COVID-19 is still significant in the fall, international and out-of-state students likely will not return to campus, which could have a significant impact on the university’s tuition revenue.
Robbins said 40 percent of all students are from outside Arizona, and about 15 percent are international students. He said they’re currently modeling what that hit in revenue could look like.
“We just don't know by the fall where people's minds are going to be about coming back to campus or not,” Robbins said. “The financial impact, we’re modeling it, but as you could imagine our net tuition revenue is derived greatly from out-of-state and international students. So we’re going to have significant shortfalls in the projections of what we’re going to have in tuition revenue.”
Tags: COVID-19 , Coronavirus , University of Arizona , Robert Robbins , Michael Dake , Betsey Cantwell , Research , Testing , Antibody , Dorms , Image
Late last month, Vice President Mike Pence sent a letter to administrators of the nation’s 6,000 hospitals requesting a favor.
He asked them to complete a form each day with data on the patients they are treating with COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, and submit it to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The data will help us better understand disease patterns and develop policies for prevention and control of health problems related to COVID-19,” Pence wrote.
Now, as COVID-19 nears an apex in some parts of the country, it’s unclear how many hospitals have submitted the requested information. For its part, the CDC has not released the data publicly, saying only that it plans to do so soon.
As if we didn't already have enough of a reason to love eegee's, now they've come through on a request to support those who are helping our city through these trying times.
After an appeal from Mayor Romero, eegee's will bring a special delivery of Watermelon to Tucson Fire and Police members, as well as volunteers from the Community Food Bank.
"Our community is working so hard to make sure our residents are cared for and I thought a watermelon eegees would be a Tucson way to lift the spirits of those on the front lines," Romero said in a prepared statement. "I was delighted when eegee's said they would help."
The crew at eegee's said they dug into the reserves to fulfill the request, said CEO Ron Petty.
"We were pleased to help Mayor Romero with this special request and used what limited watermelon inventory we had to meet the request," Petty said.
Romero will be present when the Watermelon eegees are delivered to members of the downtown Tucson Fire Department at 1 p.m. After this initial stop, eegees will be delivered throughout Tucson to different fire and police stations, as well as to the Community Food Bank, all accompanied by "Thank You" notes from Mayor Romero.
Like almost every other restaurant in town, eegee's has shifted to drive through only at its locations.
Earlier this week, they revealed their new logo, which features a sleek design with some throwbacks to earlier branding.
Tags: eegee , watermelon , romero , fire , police , food bank , Image
In the wake of President Trump’s move to push aside the official who was supposed to lead the coronavirus bailout watchdog group, four other members are just as vulnerable.
Trump was able to remove the panel’s chosen head, Glenn Fine, by naming a new Defense Department inspector general and bumping Fine to the No. 2 job at the Pentagon watchdog office. No longer an acting inspector general, Fine was disqualified from serving on the panel he was supposed to lead.
Fine’s removal sounded an alarm among Democrats in Congress, who had demanded that spending safeguards be built into the $2 trillion recovery package. House Democrats rushed out a proposed tweak that would stop further removals like Fine’s by opening up eligibility to senior officials in IG offices, not just IGs themselves.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Arizona had reached 3,112 as of Friday, April 10, according to the morning report from the Arizona Department of Health Services.
Pima County had seen 543 of the state’s confirmed cases.
The coronavirus had killed 97 people statewide, including 26 in Pima County.
In Maricopa County, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases had risen to 1,741.
The state remains under Gov. Doug Ducey’s stay-at-home order that has closed a wide number of “non-essential” businesses, including many retail stores, barbershops, salons, and swap meets. Public parks remain open but amenities such as playgrounds and restrooms are closed.
Under the stay-at-home order, Arizonans are still able to shop for groceries, medical and household needs, and pet supplies. They can also go work, pick up a take-out meal from a restaurant, travel to take care of a family member, friend or pet, and can still go walking, hiking, biking and golfing, provided that they adhere to social distancing guidelines.
Ducey announced four new executive orders this week:
• Visitors from areas with major community spread of COVID-19 must enter quarantine for two weeks if they come to Arizona.
• Restaurants can sell more of their bulk goods and supplies as groceries. Tucson Mayor Regina Romero announced this week that local restaurants could now operate pop-up grocery stores and sell their bulk goods without any changes to their certificates of occupancy.
Thursday, April 9, 2020
When it became clear that local healthcare facilities would face a shortage of critical supplies in the coming weeks, a group of more than 300 Chinese Americans from across Arizona came together to answer the call.
Among them is Oro Valley resident Fang Fung, who pulled up to the loading docks of Oro Valley Hospital Thursday morning with several boxes of Level 1 masks in the trunk of her SUV.
Donning a face mask and gloves, Fung spoke with thankful hospital executives as an employee loaded the donation on a hand cart.
“We need to help health workers because of the lack of masks,” Fung said. “We need to support the first line first.”
That support of local healthcare professionals isn’t limited to Oro Valley. The Chinese American COVID-19 Relief AZ group is responsible for several similar donations at hospitals across Arizona. The group has also made stops at Banner Health facilities in Tucson and the Greater Phoenix Area, the Dignity Health Foundation, the Chandler Regional Medical Center and the Golder Ranch Fire District on Tucson’s north side.
Fung initiated the local effort and was introduced through a mutual friend to organizers in Phoenix. Both parties realized they could have a greater impact together.
“We all have the same wish,” Fung said. “We hope healthcare workers can protect themselves when they're working with others. It was easy to get people involved.”
The group operates through a Facebook page, Chinese Americans Covid-19 Relief AZ, which was founded in early March. A GoFundMe page was set up March 18, and currently sits at $48,000 of its $50,000 goal, though the group said they’ve surpassed that goal with outside donations.
