Coronavirus Daily News Brief – April 11: Bernie Sanders Unveils $10B Moonshot Bill for Long Covid, Covid May Stay in Your Body After Symptoms Abate

Shops in Toronto
Good afternoon. This is Jonathan Spira, director of research at the Center for Long Covid Research, reporting. Here now the news of the pandemic from across the globe on its 1,492nd day.
In news we cover today, Senator Bernie Sanders released a draft of his planned $10 billion Long Covid research legislation for discussion, a new study shows that SARS-CoV-2 can linger in a patient’s blood for many months, the U.K. Test to Treat program is closing, and the U.S. began to lead the world in Covid deaths four years ago.
TODAY IN COVID HISTORY
On April 11, 2020, for the first time in history, all 50 states in the union were under an emergency declaration at the same time. In addition, the U.S Virgin Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, the District of Columbia, Guam,and Puerto Rico were also under federal disaster declarations.
In the United States, the only state where there had not been a Covid death was Wyoming. There were at least 524,903 Covid cases in the country and a death count of at least 20,389, according to data published in the Coronavirus Morning News Brief on that day.
Also in the United States, most citizens received their economic stimulus checks, officially Economic Impact Payments. The $1,200 payments were part of the $2.2 trillion economic relief package passed by Congress in March 2020.
Further north, Canadian lawmakers passed legislation that will subsidize up to 75% of workers’ salaries to avoid even more mass layoffs during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In the United Kingdom, then Prime Minister Boris Johnson left the intensive care unit at London’s St. Thomas’ Hospital after a stay of three days. He remained, however, in hospital for further treatment.
Finally on that date, as the death toll in the United States, which at the time had almost four times the number cases as any other country – climbed past 20,000, which meant that the country had the world’s highest death toll from SARS-CoV-2. The United States has led the world in pandemic deaths without interruption through today.
LONG COVID
Senator Bernie Sanders unveiled a draft of his long-awaited Long Covid ‘moonshot’ bill to direct $10 billion to address the devastating condition.
The move comes after his heavily covered Senate hearing in January on Long Covid, which included moving testimony from individuals and members of Congress who either have Long Covid or who have a family member who has the condition.
Sanders, who is the chairman of the Senate health committee, is now seeking feedback from the Long Covid community on the proposal. Once passed, the legislation  would appropriate $10 billion in mandatory funding for the National Institutes of Health over the next decade to bolster its response to the condition through several new initiatives. However, the reactions to Sanders’ draft reveal significant and enduring divisions among Long Covidadvocacy groups.
SARS-CoV-2 can persist for months, or even years, in the human body after infection. A paper published on April 8 in the journal The Lancet strongly suggests that the virus has that capability.
The study, Plasma-Based Antigen Persistence in the Post-Acute Phase of Covid-19 and led by researchers at the University of California San Francisco and Harvard University, gives credence to the belief that the virus can linger in tissue and organs, even after the patient has recovered from acute infection.
The researchers analyzed blood samples from 171 adults who had been infected with SARS-CoV-2. They found that one-quarter of those had Covid proteins in their blood for up to one year after their initial infection.
The data brings greater confidence to the theory of viral persistence and the findings may be helpful in more rapidly developing tests and treatments for Long Covid.
GLOBAL NEWS
In the United Kingdom, the home so-called Test to Treat program is shutting down on April 16 , leaving disabled and vulnerable Covid-19 patients without suitable options for accessing timely diagnosis and care.
The program had allowed people to enroll and receive Pfizer’s Covid-19 and Flu Home Test.  If they were symptomatic and had a positive test, they could receive free telehealth services.
GLOBAL STATISTICS
Now here are the daily statistics for Thursday, April 11.
As of Thursday, at press time, the world has recorded 704.75 million Covid-19 cases, an increase of 0.01 million in the last 24 hours, and 7.01 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, 675.61 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus, an increase of 0.01 million in the same period.
The reader should note that infrequent reporting from some sources may appear as spikes in new case figures or death tolls as well as the occasional downward or upward adjustment as corrections to case figures warrant.
Worldwide, the number of active coronavirus cases as of Thursday at press time is 22,127,871, a decrease of 4,000 in the past 24 hours. Out of that figure, 99.8%, or 22,093,086, are considered mild, and 0.2%, or 34,785, are listed as critical. The percentage of cases considered critical has not changed over the past 19 months.
Since the start of the pandemic, the United States has, as of Thursday, recorded 111.82 million cases, a higher figure than any other country, and a death toll of 1.22 million. India has the world’s second highest number of officially recorded cases, 45.04 million, and the world’s fourth highest death toll, 533,568.
The last data made available by Russia’s Rosstat state statistics service in July 2022 showed that the number of Covid or Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic in the country was 823,623, giving the country the world’s second highest pandemic-related death toll, behind the United States.  Rosstat has not released any additional data on the death toll in Russia since then.
Meanwhile, France is the country with the third highest number of cases, with 40.14 million, and Germany is in the number four slot, with 38.83 million total cases.
Brazil, which has recorded the third highest number of deaths as a result of the virus, 711,380, has recorded 38.74 million cases, placing it in the number five slot.
The other five countries with total case figures over the 20 million mark are South Korea, with 34.57 million cases, as number six; Japan, with 33.8 million cases placing it in the number seven slot; and Italy, with 26.72 million, as number eight, as well as the United Kingdom, with 24.91 million, and Russia, with 24.12 million, as nine and ten respectively.
CURRENT U.S. COVID STATISTICS AT A GLANCE
In the United States, in the week ending March 23, 2024, the test positivity rate was, based on data released on April 1 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was 4.0%, and the trend in test positivity is -0.6% in the most recent week. Meanwhile, the percentage of emergency department visits that were diagnosed as SARS-CoV-2 was 0.6%, and the trend in emergency department visits is -21.1%.
The number of people admitted to hospital in the United States due to SARS-CoV-2 in the same 7-day period was 9,345, a figure that is down 13.9% over the past 7-day period. Meanwhile, the percentage of deaths due to SARS-CoV-2 was 1.5%, a figure that is down 16.7% in the same period.
VACCINATION SPOTLIGHT
Some 70.6% of the world population has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine by Thursday, according to Our World in Data, an online scientific publication that tracks such information.  So far, 13.57 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered on a global basis and 5,671 doses are now administered each day.
Meanwhile, only 32.7% of people in low-income countries have received one dose, while in countries such as Canada, China, Denmark, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, at least 75% of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
Only a handful of the world’s poorest countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia and Nepal – have reached the 70% mark in vaccinations. Many countries, however, are under 20% and, in countries such as Haiti, Senegal, and Tanzania, for example, vaccination rates remain at or below 10%.
In addition, with the beginning of vaccinations in North Korea in late September, 2023, Eritrea remains the only country in the world that has not administered vaccines in any significant number.
Finally, as of March 31, 2024 , only the following countries and territories have not reported any cases of SARS-CoV-2 infections whatsoever:
Antarctica
British Antarctic Territory
Peter Island
Overseas
Bouvet Island
Heard Island and McDonald Islands
Prince Edward Islands
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
Anna Breuer contributed reporting to this story.
The Coronavirus Daily News Brief is a publication of the Center for Long Covid Research. www.longcov.org
If you have Long Covid and need to talk to someone, call the Long Covid Patient Peer Counseling Phone Line, or HOPELINE.  The HOPELINE is our free, confidential support and information service.
☏ 844 LONGCOV (844 566-4268) 
(Photo: Accura Media Group)