Houston is "getting close" to reimposing a lockdown, city and county officials said June 11, according to Bloomberg.
Texas reported 2,534 new cases June 10, marking the largest single-day increase since the pandemic started. The number of hospitalizations and intensive care unit patients is steadily rising, according to the Houston Chronicle. The average age of hospitalized patients is also decreasing.
Six other pandemic updates to know:
1. Eleven states reported record high seven-day averages of new COVID-19 cases June 11, according to data tracked by The Washington Post. The states are Texas, South Carolina, Utah, Arizona, North Carolina, Arkansas, Alabama, California, Nevada and Florida.
2. Oregon pushed back its next reopening phase after reporting its highest single-day increase in cases, according to OregonLive. Gov. Kate Brown on June 11 said she would not roll out new reopening efforts for at least seven days. The state confirmed 178 new cases June 11, the most reported in a single day.
3. Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and the state's six largest health systems are dismissing concerns about hospital capacity amid a surge in COVID-19 cases, according to The Arizona Republic. The state has seen a 76 percent increase in cases since May 28, prompting national media attention and concerns about intensive care unit capacity. Mr. Ducey called these concerns "unfounded." The health systems, which include Phoenix-based Banner Health and San Francisco-based Dignity Health also offered reassurance in a joint statement released June 11.
4. Antibody tests should not be used to guide Americans' return to "normal life" because they are too unreliable, the American Medical Association told Congress June 12. The medical society is concerned that false-positive results may cause people to incorrectly think they have immunity and put themselves in situations that increase their infection risk, Jesse Ehrenfeld, MD, immediate past chair of the AMA Board of Trustees, told the House Oversight and Reform Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy.
5. A New York City face covering mandate was linked to 66,000 fewer COVID-19 infections between April 17 and May 9, according to an analysis published June 11 by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Researchers analyzed trend and mitigation measures in New York City from Jan. 23 to May 9, and calculated the avoided COVID-19 case count by taking the difference between reported values May 9 and projected case numbers, which were determined using data prior to the onset of face covering. The study found that airborne transmission is the dominant mode of spread and face coverings significantly reduce the number of infections. Other mitigation measures, such as social distancing, are not enough to inhibit the virus's spread on their own, the authors conclude.
6. Moderna says it could manufacture up to 1 billion COVID-19 vaccine doses each year, beginning in 2021. In July, the company’s vaccine candidate mRNA-1273 will enter Phase 3 of clinical trials. Moderna intends to produce around 500 million doses per year, with the potential to manufacture up to 1 billion doses every year, beginning in 2021.
COVID-19 data snapshot
U.S.
Cases: 2,023,690
Deaths: 113,822
Recovered: 540,292
Global
Cases: 7,547,702
Deaths: 422,062
Recovered: 3,563,583
Counts reflect data available as of 9 a.m. CDT June 12.
Editor's note: This article was updated June 15 at 1:05 p.m.