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Jersey City Times Staff

Murphy to Lift Indoor Mask Mandate for the Vaccinated Before Memorial Day

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According to a report in northjersey.com, Governor Phil Murphy will lift the state’s indoor mask mandate for vaccinated people before Memorial Day. The information came from “a  government source who was briefed on the decision said Friday.”

Murphy is expected to announce the new policy at a briefing today at 1 p.m.

The new rules will bring New Jersey into harmony with guidance from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A CDC “Interim Public Health Recommendation” on May 13 announced that “fully vaccinated people can resume activities without wearing a mask or physically distancing, except where required by federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules, and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance.”

Covid-19 cases in New Jersey have fallen precipitously following a mass vaccination effort. On January 7, new Covid-19 cases totaled 7,749. On Saturday, that number fell to 378.

Jersey City Times Staff

Murphy Ends Outdoor Mask Requirement But Leaves Others in Place

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Governor Murphy has signed an executive order repealing the requirement that individuals wear masks at outdoor public spaces. Masks will still be required in indoor public spaces and workplaces. Individuals at small gatherings in private residences are not required to wear masks indoors.

“New Jersey is making incredible progress towards our vaccination goals and our COVID-19 case numbers continue to trend downwards, allowing us to eliminate the need for masks outdoors,” said Governor Murphy. “Outdoor environments pose a lesser risk of transmission of the virus than indoor settings, and lifting the indoor mask mandate at this time could lead to a rise in transmission among those not yet fully vaccinated, including children who are either not yet eligible or who have just recently become eligible. As we approach our vaccination target in the coming weeks, we expect to be able to safely lift the indoor mask requirement soon.”

Current masking requirements at child care facilities, youth summer camps, preschool programs and elementary and secondary schools, including charter and renaissance schools, are unaffected by this order.

Additionally, any masking requirements for outdoor spaces in healthcare settings and at congregate facilities, such as long-term care facilities and state correctional facilities, will remain in place.

Murphy is taking a more cautious approach than New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, who announced that New Yorkers will no longer be required to wear masks or face coverings in most settings beginning Wednesday, under new state regulations that align the state with CDC guidance.

Photo by Polina Tankilevitch from Pexels

Esther Wintner

Letter: Mayor Fulop, Slow Down on Returning City Employees to Worksites

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Dear Mayor Fulop,

Last week, an article in NJ.com informed the public of 18 Jersey City police and fire dispatchers taken ill by COVID19, with one in hospital. It is our understanding that one employee has passed away. This is a concern for various reasons including the response time in answering 911 calls for dispatching public safety personnel, and the health of municipal employees.

While it may be the case that dispatchers must work on site due to the type of phone and computer systems necessary to perform their duties, those requirements are not the same for all municipal employees such as those that work in administrative functions.

In January, Jersey City municipal employees were notified by HR that they were no longer required to take COVID testing every 30 days. This change of policy came at a time when the number of positive COVID tests were increased and on an upward trajectory according to the Jersey City Tableau chart for COVID-19 cases.

According to the Tableau, the number of positive cases in March 2021 fall within the same range as spring 2020 and are nowhere near the low numbers we saw during the summer of 2020. The NY Times Covid tracker classifies Hudson County at an “Extremely High Risk” of exposure to Covid19 with only 14% fully vaccinated as of April 6th.

In the interest of the public, CivicJC would like to see the following information made available:

-What is the contingency plan for emergency dispatch in the case of reduced number of dispatchers or in the event that all dispatchers are out

-Copy of the uniform practice of informing employees when someone tests positive in the same building

-Schedules of building sanitation and vent cleaning including the protocols that are followed

-The number of employees that tested positive for Covid (including dates and work location)

-Will Council members, Planning and Zoning Board members, and Municipal Court meet with each other in person for meetings

Tuesday’s announcement to mandate employees back to the office in full force does not seem to follow a logical safe practice for a return to office given the current high positive rate and the non-requirement of Covid testing for employees.

While we recognize that not all employees can perform their duties from home, where it is possible employees should continue on a work from home with a rotating schedule for onsite work to keep contact and possible transmission to a minimum.

We value the health and well being of our municipal employees and recognize that keeping distance helps to minimize transmission of the virus which is in their best interest and the best interest for the public as well in reducing COVID19 transmission numbers.

Hudson County, New Jersey Covid Case Tracker – The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Esther Wintner

CivicJC

Jersey City Times Staff

COVID-19 Variants Help Drive NJ Infection Rate to Highest in Nation

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Despite steadily mounting case load, Gov. Murphy defends loosening restrictions on size of outdoor gatherings, raising capacity limits on indoor and outdoor sports events

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By Colleen O’Dea

New Jersey currently has the highest rate of new COVID-19 infections in the nation, likely fueled at least in part by the presence of large numbers of viral variants that state health officials are having a tough time quantifying due to the dearth of specialized testing.

Despite this, and the fact the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is characterizing the current level of community transmission in every New Jersey county as high, Gov. Phil Murphy on Monday expanded the numbers for limited types of gatherings. He increased the number who can gather outdoors to 200 and raised the capacity percentages at such large venues as sports arenas to 20% for all indoor facilities that seat at least 2,500 and 30% for outdoor venues. Both take effect Friday.

Murphy said he feels comfortable that these will still allow for appropriate social distancing and noted that all other indoor limits — for dining and businesses — remain.

“Yes, cases are rising. They’re up. Hospitalizations are up two (200) to 300 over the past week to 10 days,” Murphy said. “We predicted this, expected it. We did not change the overall indoor capacities so it’s still the gather limits are 25. The indoor dining, gyms and indoor entertainment are still at 50% and I suspect they’ll stay there. We did raise it on large venues …They’re doing an exceptional job and going to 20% does not come anywhere close to having people need to be within six feet of each other.”

According to the latest data from the CDC, New Jersey’s rate of coronavirus cases over the past week was 346 per 100,000 people. The only other state with a rate higher than 300 was Michigan, with 327 cases per 100,000. The total number of COVID cases reported by the state rose by 3,600 on Monday. A NJ Spotlight News analysis of case data shows that the total number of cases has increased by more than 31,000 since last Monday to a total of more than 900,000, or roughly 10% of the state’s population.

READ: Tracking cases of COVID-19 county by county in New Jersey

WATCH: Five hundred vaccinated at new FEMA Site during soft launch, 6,000 expected this week 

Finding reasons for NJ’s increased caseload

Murphy blamed the steady rise in cases since mid-February on several factors: the state’s population density, fatigue among the public to stay mainly at home, the prevalence of vaccine variants — some of which are more contagious or can cause more severe illness — and weather than has not allowed for widespread outdoor gatherings as in southern states. With the exception of Florida, the CDC’s map of recent case rates generally shows lower rates in the south and west than in the northeast.

Dr. Edward Lifschitz, medical director of the state Department of Health’s communicable disease service, said it is difficult to know exactly how many new cases — close to 31,000 over the past week, according to the CDC — are due to variants, because only about 2% of COVID samples are examined to determine variant strains. Still, he estimated that between 10% and 40% are likely due to the U.K. and New York variants. The U.K. variant has been named a variant “of concern” by the CDC because it is both easier to transmit and appears to be more deadly.

The state reported 671 cases of seven variants found in New Jersey as of Monday, 83% of which were the U.K. variant. While the overall numbers remain low, these strains are spreading rapidly in some spots. The number of variants reported rose by nearly one-third since last Wednesday in some locations, according to an analysis of state data.

Variants spread throughout NJ

The variants in New Jersey first emerged weeks ago, with the highest numbers in Ocean and Monmouth counties, and seven strains have since been identified with at least one case of some form in each of the 21 counties, the state data shows. Hudson, with six of the seven strains, was experiencing a rapid rise last week, but the quickest growth seems to have shifted since then to central and south Jersey. While total numbers are still low, cases with the U.K variant doubled since last Wednesday in Atlantic and Camden and grew 225% in Gloucester. Monmouth County saw a U.K. variant cases rise by one-quarter during that time, while reports of the New York variant grew 400%, from one to five cases.

With 132 cases, Ocean County has had by far the largest number as of Monday. But Lifschitz said it’s impossible to know if that is a true hotspot due to the lack of testing.

“We’re looking to increase the total amount of variant testing we’re doing at this point,” he said. “We are working to get that higher. We also want it to be more random, because the question came up as to whether Ocean really is having more variants or that it’s just being reported and at this point, I don’t have an exact answer because the testing isn’t random enough to get a good sense of that. We are hoping within the next couple of weeks we’re going to have a more widespread network that will give us better answers as far as these things go.”

Both the high case rate and the presence of variants underscore the need to get people immunized quickly. While some of the variants can spread more quickly than the original COVID-19 virus and research so far is limited, experts believe the existing vaccines are largely effective in preventing severe sickness and death in those exposed to mutations identified to date.

Murphy said the small scope of variant testing and its lack of randomness make it hard for the state to target Ocean or any other county with additional vaccine doses to try to prevent the continuing spread of variant cases.

State officials again did not provide data on the number of doses they are allocating to each county weekly. NJ Spotlight News has asked several times for this data during briefings and filed open public records requests with both the state Department of Health and governor’s office. The governor’s office deemed the request overly broad in denying it and referred us to the department of health. The DOH has not responded to our request.

Murphy said there is “no mystery associated with” vaccine allocations, but rather than quantifying the number of doses given to each county, state health commissioner Judith Persichilli said only that the “allocation by county varies every week, depending on how many doses we’re getting, and the allocation formula.” She repeated that the formula takes into account such criteria as equity, population, race and ethnicity, disease burden, deaths, social vulnerability of the population and how effective each county is at distributing its allocations.

Unexplained differences in vaccine rates

But there continue to be unexplained differences in the percentage of residents vaccinated by county. Cape May County, whose population is about 15% Black, Hispanic and Asian, has had an infection rate of nearly 9% and 209 deaths per 100,000 residents, leads all counties, with almost a quarter of its population fully vaccinated. Hudson County lags all counties in vaccinations, with little more than 10% of the population fully vaccinated, despite having a population that is 79% minority, an infection rate of close to 12% and 313 deaths per 100,000.

Murphy said the situation is going to continue to improve as the state continues to get more vaccine doses.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency will be opening a community vaccination center on the campus of the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark on Wednesday. This site is meant to serve vulnerable and medically underserved communities, including Newark, Paterson, Elizabeth and Hudson County, with up to 42,000 doses per week, although it will be open to anyone. These doses are in addition to the state’s allotment, with this week totals more than 490,000 doses, about 20% more than last week.

“This is a game changer,” Murphy said, adding he plans to visit the new FEMA site on Wednesday. “It’s not the only game changer, I mean, supplies are clearly going to go up.”

Overall, Murphy touted the state’s increasing vaccination numbers and rates, saying that the state has administered more than 4 million doses since mid-December and close to 1.5 million New Jerseyans have been fully vaccinated, meaning about two of every 10 adults has received full viral protection.

READ: After early stumbles state hotline delivers more vaccination appointments for seniors

WATCH: New study reveals how COVID-19 affects pregnancy

— Lilo H. Stainton contributed to this story.

 

Header: Photo by Adam Nieścioruk on Unsplash

Jersey City Times Staff

Virus Variants Rising in Hudson County, Murphy Promises Vaccine Help

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Pressure growing to get more vaccinated in county last in the state for immunizations

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By Lilo H. Stainton

Gov. Phil Murphy pledged Wednesday to improve the equity of COVID-19 vaccine distribution in New Jersey’s urban communities in response to criticism that Hudson County — whose diverse, closely packed communities were particularly hard-hit by the coronavirus — has not been receiving its fair share of the state’s shots.

Murphy’s comments came the day after U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) shared his “deep concern” that Hudson County residents do not have equitable access to the vaccines in a letter that cited several NJ Spotlight News reports, including a story posted last week on how Hudson had the lowest vaccination rate in New Jersey. With just 9% of its residents fully immunized, Hudson remains the only county with a single-digit vaccination rate, according to state data.

Home to coronavirus variants

Adding to the concern is the recent growth of coronavirus variants, which appear to be spreading quickly in some communities, including parts of Hudson and Essex counties, although testing is limited. Hudson County is home to six of the seven mutant strains identified so far in New Jersey. And while the numbers are still small, in Hudson cases involving the New York variant, jumped 60% since Monday alone, according to state data. Essex County is home to three variants.

“There’s no denying that we’re not where we want to be on equity” in vaccine distribution, Murphy said at his regular media briefing Wednesday, stressing that limited supply from federal sources remains a significant barrier. “We’re proud of the record we’ve got as far as getting shots in arms,” he added, “but as far as equity, this is a work in progress. But we will get there, period, full stop.”

Asked about the outreach from Menendez, Murphy said, “We take that letter very seriously,” adding that it echoed the message he was hearing from other urban leaders from both Hudson and Essex counties. “We’re not telling you we might — we will get to all corners, especially the hard-to-reach elements of our urban communities over the next period of time,” he said.

Unanswered questions about allocations

Murphy has insisted that his team works closely with leaders from all counties on vaccine allocation, but the state has declined multiple requests for a county-by-county breakdown of the shots distributed. The process is also complicated by the uncertain supply; state officials said they only learn one week in advance how many doses they will receive from federal sources and the number can shift by tens of thousands each week.

While equity has always been a factor in the state’s distribution process, New Jersey officials forged recent partnerships with churches and other community groups to do a better job getting COVID-19 vaccine to minority communities that have suffered an outsize burden during the pandemic. On Wednesday Murphy said they plan to expand these options as more vaccines become available and are also working to outfit a trio of vans that can serve as mobile immunization clinics that can be dispatched directly to at-risk communities.

While Black and Hispanic individuals are more likely than white New Jerseyans to be infected, hospitalized and die from the virus, they are being vaccinated at a slower pace. According to state tracking, less than 5% of the more than 3.6 million shots given since December have gone to Black people, just over 7% to Hispanics and more than 58% to whites.

Logistical difficulties

That data indicates the challenges involved with vaccinating people in Hudson County, which has the third-highest percentage of Black and Hispanic residents — after Essex and Passaic counties — a high concentration of poverty and more homes without cars than any other county. With many of the state’s immunization sites operating as drive-throughs, automobiles are considered an important factor in accessing shots. And the dense population makes the disease more likely to spread.

Given the demographics and the high COVID-19 incidence, Hudson County officials — egged on by growing public pressure, including several opinion pieces in the Jersey Journal — are now calling on Trenton to do more. Hudson County Commissioners have also prepared a resolution urging Murphy to “significantly increase” the vaccine supply and identify the “causes of the lagging vaccination rates” in the county, according to a draft obtained by NJ Spotlight News.

Since the first reported case in March 2020, nearly 878,000 COVID-19 diagnoses have been recorded in New Jersey, including more than 24,200 fatalities. Hudson has identified more than 77,000 cases — or nearly 11 per 1,000 residents, the second-highest rate after Passaic’s 124/1,000 — and more than 2,000 deaths.

State Department of Health commissioner Judy Persichilli described in detail the state’s vaccine allocation process Wednesday, noting “we look first at equity” — employing a formula designed to create parity in the distribution process — “and then we look at disease burden,” using death and hospitalization rates. The review also applies the “social vulnerability index,” a data tool that includes poverty rates, the racial mix of the community, access to automobiles and other factors, she said.

“Then we look at throughput — how many doses can each point of dispensing move through in a day. We don’t want to get them more then they can handle because the doses end up on a shelf,” Persichilli continued. “Lastly, we look at inventory,” assessing how many doses each clinic already has in stock for the coming weeks, she said. “And we do that for all 600 sites” that are part of New Jersey’s COVID-19 immunization program, Persichilli explained.

 

Header:  Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash

Covid-19 image
Jersey City Times Staff

Murphy To Pause Further Reopening as Cases Rise

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In an interview on CNN today, Gov. Phil Murphy said New Jersey will probably pause its reopening plans as Covid-19 cases begin to rise again in the state.

Indoor capacity for restaurants and other businesses is currently limited to 50%.

CNBC, which reported the story, noted that, as of Sunday, the state’s seven-day average of new Covid-19 cases has increased to just over 4,000 per day — a more than 10% jump from the previous week, according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. CNBC also reported that New Jersey leads the U.S. in new cases per capita over the past week, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

New COVID cases in Jersey City have been ticking up with the seven day average now at 133. That compares with the 14 and 30 day averages of 126 and 115 respectively.

Murphy was asked if the state would “hold off” on reopening plans for a week or two. He responded that, “I think what you’ll see going forward is we will do that.”

Murphy expressed optimism, however, that the situation would improve as the weather gets warmer and more people in the state get vaccinated.

Cases are rising in other states too as they reopen. Health officials worry that that could cause a new surge as highly contagious variants spread across the nation.

In New Jersey, officials have identified 160 cases of the U.K. B.1.1.7 variant, one case of the South African B.1.351 strain and two cases of the Brazilian P.1 variant, according to the CDC.

In a press conference today, Murphy lauded the state’s success in administering vaccinations but warned residents who have been vaccinated to continue social distancing saying, “the vaccine doesn’t make you bulletproof.”

So far 123,123 people in Hudson County have received at least one vaccination dose. For the state, that number is 2,333,719.

 

 

Jersey City Times Staff

Covid Gathering Limits to Increase Next Week

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Governor Phil Murphy has signed an executive order increasing indoor capacity limits for certain businesses and increasing both the general indoor and outdoor gathering limits. These changes will go into effect on Friday, March 19th at 6:00 a.m., aligned with increases in capacity in Connecticut and New York.

“We believe we can confidently take these steps today as our COVID-19 metrics continue to trend in the right direction,” said Governor Murphy. “However, our mask mandate and COVID-19 health and safety protocols remain in effect. I am hopeful that we’ll be able to take further steps in expanding capacity responsibly and incrementally guided by public health data.”

Indoor businesses will be permitted to increase indoor capacity limits from 35 percent to 50 percent. This includes restaurants, cafeterias, food courts and bars, barber shops and nail salons. In addition, it includes businesses in recreation amusement and entertainment such as casinos and gyms.

These businesses must continue to abide by current health and safety protocols, including face covering and physical distancing requirements.

Small non-business related indoor gatherings may now include up to 25 people.  Limits on religious services or ceremonies, political events, weddings, funerals, memorial services, or performances will remain unchanged.

The outdoor gathering limit will increase from 25 people to 50 people. Limits on outdoor gatherings that are religious services or ceremonies, political events, weddings, funerals or memorial services will remain unchanged.

Photo by August de Richelieu from Pexels

Jersey City Times Staff

NJ’s Home Rule Seems Set to Trump CDC Guidance on School Reopening

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‘It is still very much a district-by-district, case-by-case’ decision, says official with the state’s most powerful teachers union

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By John Mooney

For all the fanfare surrounding Friday’s guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on how to reopen schools nationwide, New Jersey’s famous home rule still appears the prevailing guidance when it comes to public education in this state.

That seemed the general reaction from education leaders and stakeholders here, as the 35-page report from the CDC about how and when schools can reopen starts to sink in — and by and large, not change much.

Scott Rocco is superintendent of the sweeping Hamilton Township district whose 11,700 students and 23 schools have been in some form of remote or hybrid instruction since the start of the school year.

Rocco said he appreciated the CDC’s detailed guidance as providing more backing for practices already in place. And as he seeks to bring more students back to in-person learning in the spring, that research is no small thing. But Rocco said that will still be a local decision, one aided by already significant guidance and data from the state.

“A lot of it is what we have been doing already,” Rocco said. “Nothing in here that says, ‘Wow, that’s different from what I was thinking.’ ”

Already looking to get more students back 

With the data on infections and transmission pointing in the right direction lately, he added, Hamilton’s senior staff was already looking at options for bringing back more students.

“We’ll try to open up a little more,” Rocco said. “What that will look like, we’re not sure yet.”

The power of local decision-making is nothing new in New Jersey, even long before the COVID-19 pandemic. But it has become a prevailing mantra for Gov. Phil Murphy as he seeks to guide more schools to move to in-person instruction but lets them decide for themselves.

That has led to the widely disparate forms of instruction taking place in the state as the pandemic continues; just under 100 districts are operating with all in-person instruction but twice as many have all-remote and the vast middle a mix of the two.

The CDC’s guidance was seen as a potential balm to unify schools across the country to move toward more in-person instruction and especially send a message to those resistant to the move.

The report said that schools could safely reopen under certain well-known protocols, including mask-wearing and social-distancing. But it also threw in conditions around a complex formula of community transmission, and withheld judgment on the thorny topic of teacher vaccinations. In fact, it held back on many mandates at all.

“I want to be clear with the release of this operational strategy, CDC is not mandating that schools reopen,” Rochelle Walensky, the CDC’s director, said on Friday. “These recommendations simply provide schools a long needed roadmap for how to do so safely under different levels of disease in the community.”

Front and center on the issue have been teachers unions, including in New Jersey, which have been hesitant — if not outwardly opposed — to moving to in-class instruction if it could put their members at risk.

NJEA praises research-based findings

The New Jersey Education Association, the state’s most powerful teachers union, has so far not said much publicly about the new CDC guidelines beyond praise for the researched-based findings and recommendations.

Steve Baker, the NJEA’s communications director, said Tuesday that a letter to its 200,000 members would likely go out in the next week summarizing the guidelines but also saying they should be only part of ongoing conversations between educators and their districts.

“It was a breath of fresh air to listen to the CDC talk about these issues in a very science-based way,” Baker said of the Friday announcement. “It provides educators with a lot more confidence.

“But it doesn’t make the decisions any easier where some of the issues still remain,” he said. “I think it is still very much a district-by-district, case-by-case basis.”

Nevertheless, leaders of the American Federation of Teachers — the national union representing many of the country’s urban districts, including Newark — sent a strong signal Tuesday night that resistance may be softening. The AFT released a poll of its members that said a vast majority were ready to return to the classroom.

“Teachers want a path to safely return to their classrooms because they understand the importance of in-school learning for their kids,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the AFT. “If we can implement commonsense safety protocols, we can not only open, we can do it safely and with the overwhelming support of teachers and support personnel.”

 

Header:  Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Jersey City Times Staff

The Telling Numbers: How COVID-19 has Hit Black Residents in NJ

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Higher impact of the disease is associated with existing health factors as well as social factors

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By Colleen O’Dea

More evidence of COVID-19’s disparate impact on New Jersey’s African Americans can be found in an analysis by state health officials and a study by Rutgers University professors.

The state Department of Health adjusted cases, hospitalizations and deaths from the disease caused by the novel coronavirus for age and found the rate of infection among Black residents exceeded that of white residents, 4,181 per 100,000 compared with 3,332. African Americans were more than twice as likely as whites to be hospitalized from COVID-19 (810 per 100,000 versus 303) or to die from the disease (267 per 100,000 versus 120). Earlier this month, death data for 2020 showed COVID-19 was the number one killer of Blacks in New Jersey, with one of five African American deaths attributed to the disease and related conditions.

Health officials have noted the disparate impact the virus was having on Black and brown communities since early in the pandemic. The state’s COVID-19 information portal breaks out cases, hospitalizations and deaths by race. The state health commissioner typically relates some of this information during her briefings on the pandemic.

A recent study by a group of Rutgers University researchers published in the Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities found that COVID-19 mortality racial disparities in the U.S. are associated with such social factors as income, education and internet access and highlights the need for public-health policies that address structural racism.

The researchers looked at the association between COVID-19 cases and deaths in 2,026 U.S. counties from January to October 2020 and social determinants of health that can raise the risk for infection and death. They also looked at factors known or thought to impact COVID-19 outcomes, including the counties’ population density and such health factors as obesity, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and high blood pressure.

Lack of internet is important indicator

The study found that a higher rate in a county’s percent of Black residents, uninsured adults, low birth-weight infants, adults without a high school diploma, incarceration rate and households without internet increased that county’s COVID-19 death rates during the period examined. Counties that were the most deprived socioeconomically had a 67% increase in the COVID-19 death rate. Michelle DallaPiazza, lead author of the study and an associate professor at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, said the percent of households without internet — which provides updated knowledge of the pandemic and allows remote working and learning — and the percentage of adults without a high school diploma were the factors most associated with a county’s COVID-19 death rate.

“The findings are consistent with historical health inequities in marginalized populations, particularly Black Americans,” DallaPiazza said. “This adds to the extensive literature on racial health disparities that demonstrate that social and structural factors greatly influence health outcomes, and this is particularly true when it comes to COVID-19.”

Dr. Robert Johnson, dean of the Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and interim dean of Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, said it is well-known that certain factors influence the way diseases like COVID-19 impact African Americans and others and policymakers need to make greater efforts to change these.

“They’re adversely affected by poverty,” Johnson said. “They’re adversely affected by the environment they live in, adversely affected by poor nutrition. All these things need to be changed. Every time we have a severe chronic illness this is the outcome we get because the health disparities are real.”

 

Header: Photo by Maria Oswalt on Unsplash

Jersey City Times Staff

Comcast Backs off Plan to Impose New Fees on Heavy-Duty Internet Users

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Cable-company criticized for asking customers to pay more during public-health emergency, when high-speed internet is critical to students, some employees

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By Tom Johnson

Comcast is postponing until July its plan to impose new fees on customers who are heavy users of its internet services after widespread criticism for proposing to increase bills during a public-health emergency.

The postponement came after pressure from lawmakers and consumer advocates. They argued such a step was inappropriate at a time when many students and others are relying heavily on the internet because of the coronavirus pandemic. The cap on data use was effective Jan. 1 for Comcast customers in the Northeast region, including New Jersey,

In New Jersey, lawmakers have introduced legislation (S-3410) that would prevent internet service providers from increasing rates during a public-health emergency. In Pennsylvania, the state’s attorney general’s office secured a commitment last week from Comcast, a Philadelphia-based cable company, to delay imposing the new fees on data usage to current customers there and throughout the Northeast.

The plan calls for a monthly data-usage cap of 1.2 terabytes. If customers exceed the data limit, they could be charged anywhere from $10 to $100 on top of their existing bills, depending on their data usage. Comcast began monitoring customers’ data usage at the beginning of the year, but had held off imposing the fees until March.

‘Unconscionable’ to levy an extra fee

“During the COVID-19 pandemic, it is unconscionable for a cable company to levy an extra fee for using their internet,’’ said Sen. Nicholas Scutari (D-Union), the sponsor of the bill in the New Jersey Legislature. “Right now people are relying on their home internet more than ever — for work, for their children to attend school, to shop for groceries and to schedule COVID-19 testing and vaccinations.’’

The legislation, introduced a week ago, has not yet moved in either house of the Legislature.

In a news release, Comcast said it is delaying imposition of the new fees for six months to provide its customers in the Northeast time to familiarize themselves with the data-usage plan and their service options.

The company said the new limit on data usage only affects a “very small percentage of its customers.’’ Comcast is also giving its low-income customers some help by doubling the speed for those who subscribe to its Internet Essentials service and not imposing data limits on that plan for the rest of the year. In addition, the company is waiving early termination fees for customers who do not want to be subject to caps on data usage.

In New Jersey, the state Board of Public Utilities has received some complaints from customers about the new fee but is unable to take action because it does not regulate internet service, according to Peter Peretzman, a spokesman for the agency. There are no plans to investigate the problem, he added.

 

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