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Coronavirus

Fauci: Virus under better control in U.S.

(AP) — Dr. Anthony Fauci said Wednesday the coronavirus is under better control in the United States. but the pandemic isn’t over — and the challenge is how to keep improving the situation. “We are in a different moment of the pandemic,” said Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, in an interview with The Associated Press. After a brutal winter surge, “we’ve now decelerated and transitioned into more of a controlled phase,” he said. “By no means does that mean the pandemic is over.” His comments came a day after he said on the PBS “NewsHour” that ...

State’s active COVID -19 cases rising

CHARLESTON — Active COVID-19 cases have increased three straight days in West Virginia, according to the statistics from the state Department of Health and Human Services. The low this week was 308 active cases on Tuesday. Active cases on Friday were 437. The pandemic high during the delta variant surge was more than 21,700 in late January. The state also reported 117 new cases of the virus were received in the 24-hour period between Thursday and Friday’s pandemic updates. Three more confirmed deaths from the virus were reported on Friday, raising the total dead to 6,794 ...

Verdict on lockdowns

What were the benefits and costs of the COVID-19 restrictions implemented over the last two years? It’s a good time to ask that question, especially now that the masks are coming off and the lockdowns are canceled. One useful scorecard comes from the prestigious National Bureau of Economic Research, in the form of a paper by three market-friendly economists, Casey Mulligan (University of Chicago), Stephen Moore (Heritage Foundation) and Phil Kerpen (Committee to Unleash Prosperity). They evidently disagree with the nation’s most prominent advocate of massive restrictions, Dr. ...

2 local counties have no COVID cases

ELKINS — Active COVID-19 case totals have fallen to zero in two local counties. On Thursday, the number of virus-related hospitalizations in the state — at 193 — had fallen below 200 patients for the first time since August. That number dropped to 171 on Friday, with 43 of those patients currently in ICU. More good news is that there are currently only three children in the state hospitalized with the virus, according to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources. Statewide, there are currently 460 active COVID-19 cases, with all 55 counties in the state ...

Returning to normalcy

Are we returning to normalcy? The word “normalcy,” as history buffs know, was used (but not invented) by our only journalist president, Warren G. Harding, to sum up his 1920 campaign. Normalcy was political shorthand for returning to normal times after a European war, prosecutions of peaceful protesters, sharp inflation and depression, terrorist bombings at home, totalitarian revolutions abroad and a pandemic influenza that killed, proportionately, more than twice as many Americans as COVID-19. Normalcy was popular, too. Harding won the popular vote 60% to 34%, the largest ...

COVID and the Capitol

For the second year in a row, the West Virginia Press Association’s Legislative Lookahead went all virtual on Friday instead of the in-person event we normally have each year at the Culture Center in Charleston. The event was originally supposed to be in-person, but a combination of someone with the Press Association testing positive for COVID-19 and the snowfall the state started receiving Thursday afternoon into Friday led to the event being put on Zoom. I’m a bit disappointed, as I was looking forward to the in-person event. Frankly, I’m at my wit’s end when it comes to ...