Coronavirus: latest news from around the world

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said that Covid-19 hospitalizations in the state are the highest since Aug. 9. 

Polis said that there are currently 200 Covid-19 positive patients hospitalized and that state officials continue to be concerned about the upward trend in cases and hospitalizations.

While 200 hospitalizations do not stress the overall hospital capacity, Polis said that the worry is the upward trend. He said that two weeks ago, just 120 people were hospitalized due to the virus. 

Polis continued to encourage residents to wear a mask, avoid large gatherings and wash their hands to prevent the spread of the virus.

Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association just announced that for 33 consecutive days, no MLB player has tested positive for Covid-19.

Two team staff members did test positive for Covid-19 during this past testing window.

MLB’s postseason began with 16 teams this past Tuesday, with divisional series' starting next week.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in a letter to colleagues, laid out the major issues still holding up a broader Covid-19 stimulus agreement. 

She said there are "five notable areas of concern" as well as "other areas of disagreement that are part of the discussion, which we continue to work on as well."

The five areas she said are a priority for democrats include: unemployment insurance, funding for schools and state and local governments, children, testing and tracing, and appropriations.

"We are expecting a response from the White House on these areas and others with more detail. In the meantime, we continue to work on the text to move quickly to facilitate an agreement," the letter said.

California is holding off on issuing reopening guidelines for amusement parks and similar attractions for the time being and will reevaluate at a later date. The guidelines had been expected to be released publicly this week.

Earlier this week Disney announced the layoffs of 28,000 employees. Parks Chairman Josh D’Amaro blamed California in part for its “unwillingness to lift restrictions that would allow Disneyland to reopen.” 

When asked Thursday if he would bend to pressure and reopen theme parks, Gov. Gavin Newsom was blunt:

More than 700 students from Northumbria University in Newcastle, England, have tested positive for Covid-19 and are in self-isolation, with the university saying they could be expelled if they fail to comply.

In a statement to CNN, the university said that as of Friday, at least 770 people had tested positive for Covid-19 –– 78 of them had symptoms. The students as well as their flatmates and any close contacts will now be self-isolating for 14 days. 

“We are supporting all students who are self-isolating, providing them with food and other essential items, as well as welfare support including 24/7 online mental health support and one-to-one support from our wellbeing teams where required which is accessible through multiple channels,” a spokesperson for the university said.

The university also said they are providing laundry, cleaning materials and other support in partnership with campus resources.

The university also said the early detection of these cases was a reflection of the “good access to and availability of testing, as well as rigorous and robust reporting systems.”

“In parts of the UK where universities started term earlier, numbers of student cases surged in induction week, and then reduced,” the spokesperson said.

NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy tells CNN that two additional Tennessee Titans players have tested positive for Covid-19 this morning.

The two new cases brings the total to 13 within the club – seven players and six staff members. 

The Titans played the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday. The Vikings have reported zero positive coronavirus cases. 

The NFL postponed the Titans-Pittsburgh Steelers game scheduled for this Sunday to a later, undetermined date.

Frontline health care workers and those who provide health care facility services should be the first to get vaccinated with any eventual coronavirus vaccine, followed by people at high risk of severe illness because of underlying health conditions, experts advising the federal government said Friday.

Next should come older adults living in congregate settings, like nursing homes, a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) committee said in a final report.

But local leaders should also make sure to give priority to vulnerable communities, the independent committee, formed at the request of the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said.

That change was added after criticism over the group’s draft report issued last month, which did not mention minority communities hit hardest by the pandemic.

But instead of placing specific minority groups into the proposed phases, the final report notes that “equity is a crosscutting consideration.” 

Within each phase, the committee recommends state, tribal, local and territorial authorities prioritize people in high vulnerability areas, identified by a tool like the CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index. The index uses US census variables to identify communities in particular need of disaster support, which the committee says considers the factors that place racial minorities at higher risk of Covid-19.

The third phase proposes vaccination for young adults, children, and those in industries where people may receive some protection but are still at risk of exposure, such as banks and universities. The committee notes vaccination of children will depend on whether a vaccine has been tested in that population. 

The final phase covers anyone who has yet to receive vaccination.

The committee says that there will be inevitable consequences of not prioritizing some groups, but the focus is on saving lives. “The non-trivial effects of an economic downturn or an online semester can at least be partially reversed,” the report states. “Death is an irreversible outcome.”

In addition, the report calls on the US Department of Health and Human Services to plan for the logistics of vaccine distribution, ensure there are no out-of-pocket costs for those being vaccinated, and begin vaccine promotion and education.

The Spanish capital city is getting ready for new coronavirus restrictions to come into effect at 10 p.m. local time tonight.

People in Madrid will be required to stay at home except to go to work, classes, to sit exams, to meet legal obligations or for extreme circumstances.

Bars and restaurants will be forced to reduce their capacity by 50%, offer table service only, and will have to close at 11 p.m with the last entry one hour before closing time.

Shops will slash capacity and will be required to shut at 10 p.m. and will have to close early.

Gatherings will remain restricted to no more than six people, in both public or private spaces.

The move comes after a steady increase in the number of coronavirus infections in the Madrid area over the past couple of months.

Spain has reported 778,607 cases so far, the worst in the European Union. At 31,973 people have died of the virus in Spain.

Both the President's daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner tested negative for the coronavirus Friday morning, a White House official tells CNN.

The President's youngest son, Barron Trump, has also tested negative for the coronavirus.