As the contagious Delta variant continues to reach across the United States, more and more companies are delaying plans to reopen offices.
By the numbers: A recent survey of 1,000 HR professionals by the Society for Human Resource Management and Lucid found that half of U.S. organizations are worried about Delta. Some corporate players have started mandating vaccines for employees in an attempt to combat the variant.
Florida's Board of Education on Friday unanimously approved an emergency rule that will allow parents to obtain vouchers to move their children to another school if they perceive any type of "COVID-19 harassment" against their child as related to mask or testing mandates, the Tampa Bay Times reports.
Why it matters: Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has been vocal about giving parents the right to choose whether their children wear masks in schools. The rule was crafted by his administration after he pushed the state's education department to discourage school districts from enforcing mask mandates.
Unvaccinated people are more than twice as likely to be reinfected with the coronavirus compared to those who are vaccinated, per a study from the CDC released Friday.
State of play: The research found that unvaccinated people were "significantly" more likely to get reinfected with COVID — more specifically 2.34 times more.
A lawyer representing Indiana University students filed an emergency petition on Friday asking the Supreme Court to block the school’s vaccine mandate, one of many set to take effect this fall.
Why it matters: It's the first time the nation's high court has been asked to weigh in on the issue. Public and private entities are increasingly mandating vaccines amid surges in COVID cases due to the Delta variant.
President Biden trumpeted the strong July jobs report on Friday as evidence that his economic plans are working, but emphasized that more work still needs to be done to ensure the economy's full recovery as the Delta variant continues to spread.
Why it matters: The U.S. added 943,000 jobs in July, while the unemployment rate fell from 5.9% to a new pandemic-era low of 5.4%. But the jobs survey was taken in mid-July — meaning it doesn’t fully reflect possible effects from the recent surge in COVID-19 infections driven by the Delta variant.
United Airlines will require its 67,000 U.S. employees to be vaccinated by Oct. 25 or risk being fired, CNBC reports.
Why it matters: It's the first major U.S. airline to impose a vaccine mandate, in a move that will likely increase pressure on its competitors to do the same.
The Biden administration — already under fire for its handling of masking guidance — is losing control of the narrative surrounding coronavirus vaccine booster shots.
Why it matters: The vast majority of vaccinated Americans don’t need to worry about their level of protection against the virus, at least not yet. But the void of information from the federal government about what should be expected going forward is being filled by drug companies, other countries and nervous Americans themselves.
McKesson and Cardinal Health are sitting on huge inventories of personal protective equipment, some of which they estimate won't be used or will expire, resulting in a $164 million loss for McKesson and a $197 million loss for Cardinal in the second quarter.
Between the lines: Last year, during the height of the pandemic, PPE was in high demand but short supply, leading to high prices and long waits.
Now that supply has caught up, some medical distributors have too much and believe a lot will go unsold, although McKesson said it would donate some of its excess PPE.
