Your guide to the latest Hill developments, news narratives, and media headlines from Hogan Lovells Government Relations and Public Affairs practice.

In Washington:

• In a statement on Monday, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Stephen Hahn and Peter Marks, director of the agency’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, responded that it was “premature” to start altering coronavirus vaccine doses to speed up the distribution process. The officials said such actions would not be rooted solidly in the available evidence. As reported yesterday, Moncef Slaoui, the chief science adviser for Operation Warp Speed, suggested that two half-doses instead of the two full ones now required would lead to an "identical immune response" to the normal dosage.

• Airlines for America, a lobbying group which represents the major U.S. airlines, called on the Trump administration to drop travel bans and replace them with a program of testing travelers entering the United States for COVID-19. In a Jan. 4 letter to Vice President Pence, the group proposed rescinding current entry restrictions on travelers from Europe, the United Kingdom, and Brazil. The U.S. has banned non-U.S. citizen travelers from these countries since March.

• On Thursday, President Trump extended an order suspending the issuance of several types of work visas for another three months, arguing the suspension will free up jobs for Americans out of work due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, immigrants’ entry on various visas will be prohibited through March 31 unless the incoming Biden administration rescinds the order. The largest program the order affects is H-1B visas, whose recipients are typically skilled workers in the tech industry who can stay in the U.S. for multiple years.

• In a new FAQ sheet, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that the COVID-19 vaccine cannot make you sick with COVID because it does not contain the live virus. The CDC did warn that it can take several weeks for a person's body to build up immunity after being vaccinated. This means it is possible to still get COVID-19 just before or after being vaccinated. The vaccines against COVID-19 are not 100 percent effective and some require two doses to be fully effective.

• According to CDC data, only 14 percent of the 2.5 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine has been distributed to nursing home residents and staff.

• On Monday, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that it is inviting public comment on how to implement the $3.2 billion Emergency Broadband Benefits Program that Congress included in the Consolidated Appropriations and pandemic relief legislation passed in December. The agency will distribute the aid through broadband providers that will give low-income households a $50/month subsidy.

• The Agriculture Department's (USDA) rule allowing meatpackers to increase the speed of processing lines in dozens of poultry plants is being blamed for worsening the spread of COVID-19 in those slaughterhouses. The faster lines made it difficult for workers to distance themselves in already tight quarters properly.

• The USDA announced that it will buy up to another $1.5 billion worth of food and redistribute it to food banks through its Farmers to Families Food Box Program. The program was funded in December's coronavirus relief deal passed by Congress.

In the News:

• An individual in Saratoga County, New York has contracted the new, more contagious strain of coronavirus, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced Monday. The case makes New York the fourth known state after Colorado, California, and Florida with a case of the variant.

• Los Angeles County has told its ambulance crews not to transport patients with a low chance of survival to hospitals and to limit the administration of oxygen. The memo comes amid an enormous surge in coronavirus cases that are swamping LA hospitals. The county health department said Monday there were 7,697 people in hospitals with coronavirus, a massive spike from the 791 hospitalized in early November.

• Canada will require air travelers to present a negative COVID-19 test in order to enter the country, officials announced Wednesday. Travelers coming into Canada by plane will have to get a negative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test within 72 hours of boarding, a rule that Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc said will likely be in place within a week.

• Check Point Software Technologies published a new report showing that cyberattacks on health care organizations have increased by 45 percent since November 2019. The coronavirus pandemic has made overwhelmed hospitals easy targets for extortive cyberattacks.
• Chicago school board officials report that nearly half of the almost 2,300 Chicago public school teachers ordered to return to work Monday to prepare for in-person instruction did not return.

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