In Washington

• Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA) has tested positive for coronavirus. Cassidy took a test on Thursday evening after being informed that he had been exposed to an individual with COVID-19. He is quarantining for the next 14 days. Former Secretary of State James A. Baker III and his wife, Susan Baker, have also contracted the virus.
• President Trump on Wednesday, pushed again for universities to reopen in-person for the fall term. “We have learned one thing, there’s nothing like campus, there’s nothing like being with a teacher as opposed to being on a computer board,” Trump said Wednesday at a briefing. Trump’s push comes as more clusters are being reported at colleges. White House Task Force Coordinator Deborah Birx is recommending universities test students returning for fall classes and set up “surge” testing, which would require processing 5,000 to 10,000 samples in one day.
• Federal Reserve officials believe the steady spread of COVID-19 threatens to slow or even reverse the economic recovery. According to the minutes from the 28-29 July meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee released Wednesday, the Fed’s top policymakers believe that “the ongoing public health crisis would weigh heavily on economic activity, employment, and inflation in the near term and posed considerable risks to the economic outlook over the medium term,” the minutes read.
• Thirty-one lawmakers sent a letter to airline executives with concerns of the “patchwork of public health-related measures” that the individual airlines are enacting in response to COVID-19. They are urging the airline companies to establish comprehensive industry-wide policies that ensure the health and safety of all passengers and employees. The lawmakers prepared a list of inquiries on their safety measures and asked that they respond to questions within 14 days.
• Operation Warp Speed chief Dr. Moncef Slaoui predicts that a COVID-19 vaccine will be widely available sometime next year around April to June. He said the vaccines currently being tested should yield data showing whether they work or not before the end of the year.
• The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the Trump administration-backed lawsuit to strike down the Affordable Care Act (ACA) on 10 November, one week after the presidential election. A decision invalidating the ACA would likely roil the country’s healthcare system and unsettle debates in Washington over a replacement plan, with heightened stakes during the pandemic.
• President Trump is again clashing with his administration’s health experts. The President accused scientists of purposely stalling the emergency authorization of blood plasma as a COVID-19 treatment for political reasons. “You have a lot of people over there that don’t want to rush things. They want to do it after November 3rd,” he said. Dr. Anthony Fauci and other health officials had intervened due to there wasn’t enough evidence of its effectiveness.
• The number of unemployment claims has spiked back up as about 1.1 million Americans filed first-time applications for unemployment insurance, the Department of Labor announced Thursday. That amount is up from 971,000 the prior week.
• Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, underwent surgery Thursday to remove a polyp from his vocal cord.
• The Department of Health and Human Services published a notice Wednesday, allowing coronavirus tests developed by individual labs to be used without undergoing the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) review. Public health experts are concerned that this could lead to the widespread use of faulty tests. The policy also goes against current FDA guidance that says during an infectious disease outbreak tests “should not be used for clinical diagnosis without FDA’s approval, clearance or authorization.”
• The FDA has granted emergency use authorization to an antigen coronavirus test made by British company LumiraDX that gives results in about 12 minutes.

In the News

• The percentage of people infected with COVID-19 who die of the virus is falling in most states, a hopeful sign that the battle against the virus is entering a new phase. In Arizona, for example, May’s 5 percent fatality rate has declined by about half. Health experts pointed to several reasons for the decline: better treatment methods, younger patients, and more widespread testing identifying cases among those who show few or no symptoms.
• Teachers in the New York City public school system are planning a strike if schools reopen without substantial COVID-19 testing and other public health protocols. The United Federation of Teachers, representing 133,000 of the city’s public school educators, clarified their demands on Wednesday.
• Massachusetts public health officials announced Wednesday that the flu vaccine will be required for all students attending child care, pre-school, kindergarten, grade school, and colleges or universities.
• Airbnb announced a global ban on parties and events at Airbnb listings, with an occupancy cap of 16 people worldwide.
• A person who visited a bar in Sturgis, S.D., during its annual motorcycle rally has tested positive for the coronavirus and could have exposed others, state health officials say.

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