COVID

Three staffers for Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo are facing new charges in connection to an investigation into a $11 million COVID-19 outreach contract.

COVID-19 variant HV.1 has become the variant responsible for most COVID cases here in the United States in just a few short weeks.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, local teacher Deidre Kelly turned to TikTok to inspire her students, and she has since garnered a massive following.

The ban applies to all private businesses, including health care facilities like hospitals, which can jeopardize the health of those with compromised immune systems or other underlying conditions.

The Lone Star State’s iconic theme park brands Schlitterbahn and Six Flags would come under the same ownership as part of a merger announced Thursday.

The state of Tennessee has agreed to pay $150,000 to settle a federal lawsuit by its former vaccine leader over her firing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The legislation, which Republican lawmakers have been trying to pass since 2021, offers no exceptions for doctors’ offices, clinics or other health facilities.

Pfizer lost more than $2 billion in the third quarter as an expected COVID-19 product sales decline clipped revenue.

The COVID-19 treatments millions of have taken for free from the federal government will enter the private market next week with a hefty price tag.

While it may not be as severe as in recent years, health officials say COVID-19 cases are increasing daily, but research shows many African Americans refused or delayed getting vaccinated.

There are several illnesses going around right now. Some of the most common are COVID, respiratory syncytial virus, and strep.

The bill offers no exceptions for doctors’ offices, clinics or other health facilities. Senators agreed to let those entities require unvaccinated employees to wear personal protective gear or take other “reasonable” measures to manage the spread.

What’s going around in the Houston area?

A Senate panel on Tuesday advanced such a measure. The debate centered largely around the safety of the vaccine and whether doctors’ offices and health care facilities should be exempt.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is announcing $40 million in funding to help develop messenger RNA vaccines in Africa.

Researchers in the United Kingdom found that symptoms can persist for weeks after common respiratory infections like the common cold.

Doses aren’t arriving at providers’ offices at uniform, predictable intervals. Shipments are largely dependent on individual providers’ ability to work out the logistics of ordering, stocking, training and paperwork.

The once-critical white COVID-19 vaccination cards are being phased out.

A Houston man who was the head of a multimillion-dollar COVID-19 relief fraud ring and six of his co-conspirators were sentenced for fraudulently obtaining more than $20 million in forgivable Paycheck Protection Program loans that the Small Business Administration guaranteed under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, the United States Department of Justice announced Tuesday.

A new report says the U.S. Census Bureau’s career staffers valiantly conducted the 2020 census under unprecedented challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fall vaccination season is in full swing, with health officials urging both an updated COVID-19 shot and flu vaccine for most everyone.

Gatwick Airport, London’s second-busiest, is limiting flights this week, partly because of an outbreak of COVID-19 within air traffic control.

Texas and Washington D.C, are the only two parts of America spiking on the CDC weekly flu chart right now.

France is sending military forces to distribute water on the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte.

The Food and Drug Administration plans to greenlight updated versions of the Covid booster as early as Friday, according to four people familiar with the agency’s plans.

The COVID-19 virus is ever-changing and continuously evolves over time.

A brand new COVID variant labeled “BA.2.86″ has now been identified and reported in Texas.

A group of friends and neighbors meets for a weekly meal, choosing from a special menu of nutritious foods paid for by social programs meant to keep older adults eating healthy.

China will no longer require a negative COVID-19 test result for incoming travelers, a milestone in its reopening to the rest of the world after an isolation that began with the country's borders closing in 2020.

Hundreds of people have been charged with the theft of more than $830 million in COVID-19 emergency aid following a nationwide operation conducted by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, the U.S. Justice Department announced Wednesday.

The CDC’s most recent data shows that the percentage of weekly hospitalizations per 100,000 people in Harris County due to COVID-19 has increased more than state and national rates.

New Zealand has removed the last of its remaining COVID-19 restrictions, marking the end of a government response to the pandemic that was watched closely around the world.

From heat-related illness to contagious viruses, here’s what doctors across our area say is “what’s going around.”

From breathing troubles to contagious viruses, here’s what doctors across our area say is “what’s going around.”

Official figures show that German beer sales resumed a long-term downward trend in the first six months of this year after rallying in 2022 thanks to the end of most COVID-19 restrictions.

With more than 20,000 people expected to attend, White Linen Night is known as a vibrant community event that started in 2006 in the wake of Hurricane Katrina by the New Orleans community that moved to Texas and missed their original event.

The Biden administration has asked a federal appeals court to block a lower court’s order limiting executive branch officials’ discussions with social media companies regarding alleged misinformation.

The Spanish government has declared an end to the health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and says people no longer have to wear masks in health and care centers as well as pharmacies.

As Marisol Perez fought for her life in a Texas hospital in autumn 2021, her mother, Alma Salas, sat with her every day praying.

Confidence in the scientific community declined among U.S. adults in 2022, a major survey shows, driven by a a partisan divide that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Aid agencies will struggle to draw the world’s attention back to Syria at an annual donor conference hosted by the European Union in Brussels for humanitarian aid to Syrians.

A U.K. parliamentary committee is meeting to conclude its inquiry into whether former Prime Minister Boris Johnson misled lawmakers over parties at his Downing Street office that breached COVID-19 lockdown restrictions.

An Austrian federal court says the state can’t be held liable for a COVID-19 infection from an outbreak at an Alpine ski resort as the coronavirus pandemic hit Europe The Supreme Court of Justice on Thursday announced its verdict in a long-running legal battle involving a German resident who traveled to Ischgl in March 2020 and visited several apres-ski venues before returning home six days later.

Japan’s economy has grown at an annual pace of 1.6% in the quarter through March.

One outcome is clear as Washington reaches for a budget deal to end the debt ceiling standoff: The ambitious COVID era of government spending is giving way to a new focus on stemming deficits.

The World Health Organization says that COVID-19 no longer qualifies as a global emergency.

The Biden administration will end the last remaining federal COVID-19 vaccine requirements next week when the national public health emergency for the coronavirus ends.

The next novel from Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Cunningham, his first in a decade, is a family saga set in New York City before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Thousands of people say they’ve developed tinnitus after they were vaccinated against Covid. While there is no proof yet that the vaccines caused the condition, theories for a possible link have surfaced among researchers.

Beyonce’s BeyGOOD Foundation is, once again, doing its part to help support small businesses impacted by economic inequalities.

The longstanding racial gap in U.S. stroke death rates widened dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Big changes could be coming for how Americans pay for COVID-19 tests.

The U.S. national emergency to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic has ended.

An analysis that was the basis of a highly criticized recommendation from Florida’s surgeon general cautioning young men against getting the COVID-19 vaccine omitted information that showed catching the virus could increase the risk of a cardiac-related death much more than getting the shot.

Chinese health officials have defended their search for the source of the COVID-19 virus and lashed out at the World Health Organization after its leader said Beijing should have shared genetic and other information earlier.

A top Bosnian government official and two others have been convicted and given prison sentences over the procurement at highly inflated prices of inadequate medical equipment during the COVID-19 pandemic.

South Korea this month will begin weekly tests of sewage produced by its major cities and towns to track the spread of COVID-19 and identify future waves.

Is it 'voodoo' or does a procedure called a stellate ganglion block help patients with long Covid-related loss of smell or taste?

Asian shares are trading mixed following a rally on Wall Street as worries over banks following the collapses of several lenders in recent weeks eased further.

When tragedies such as school shootings happen, many parents begin to evaluate their own children’s safety at school, and some parents are now considering home-schooling.

Moderna’s CEO is defending a plan to more than quadruple the company’s COVID-19 vaccine price.

President Joe Biden has signed a bipartisan bill that directs the federal government to declassify as much intelligence as possible about the origins of COVID-19 more than three years after the start of the pandemic.

Hoda Kotb returned to NBC’s “Today” show on Monday after spending a few weeks tending to her 3-year-old daughter, Hope.

China has accused Washington of improperly attacking Chinese companies after genetics analysis giant BGI Group and 17 others were hit with curbs on access to U.S. technology on security or human rights grounds.

A Spanish lawyer says 42 families in Spain are pursuing legal action against a nurse whom they allege faked the process of administering routine vaccines to their children.

For the second day in a row, China is dismissing U.S. suggestions that the COVID-19 pandemic may have been triggered by a virus that leaked from a Chinese laboratory.

Federal officials say they’re working to cut down on a growing backlog of complaints lodged against health care providers and government agencies by patients who claim their civil rights or privacy have been violated.

If you get health care coverage through Medicaid, you might be at risk of losing that coverage over the next year.

WHAT’S GOING AROUND?

The IRS says most relief checks issued by states last year won't be subject to federal taxes, providing late guidance as taxpayers have begun filing returns.

South Korea says it will remove the entry restrictions it placed on short-term travelers from China since the start of the year as officials see the COVID-19 situation in that country as stabilizing South Korea in early January stopped issuing most short-term visas at its consulates in China, citing concerns about a virus surge and the potential for new mutations.

A federal jury convicted a man on Wednesday for his role in a scheme to fraudulently obtain and launder millions of dollars in forgivable Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans guaranteed by the Small Business Administration (SBA) under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.

A court-ordered psychiatrist ruled that Evan Edwards was incompetent to stand trial, but the doctor’s report raised more questions than answers.

A growing online conspiracy theory is using the tagline “died suddenly” to baselessly claim that COVID-19 vaccines are killing people.

Starbucks reported lower-than-expected sales in its fiscal first quarter, hurt by COVID restrictions in China and lower consumer demand in other markets.

House Republicans have begun their promised aggressive oversight of the Biden administration.

U.S. health officials want to make COVID-19 vaccinations more like the annual flu shot.

The European Union's highest court says travelers whose package tours were ruined by the imposition of restrictions to combat the COVID-19 pandemic may be entitled to at least a partial refund.

Japan and South Korea are defending their public health restrictions on travelers from China after Beijing stopped issuing new visas in both countries in apparent retaliation.

Safe to say, a lot of people really buckled down when it came to cleaning over the past couple years, given the COVID-19 pandemic.

The move to take news reporters off the Senate floor was implemented in 2021 as a COVID-19 precaution, but an official said Friday the measure would continue in the upcoming session.

As COVID-19 rips through China, other countries and the World Health Organization are calling on its government to share more comprehensive data.

A virtual memorial wall created by a Houston-area couple to honor people from around the United States who have died of COVID-19 is marking two years of memorializing lives lost to the pandemic.

Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo will take a temporary leave of absence beginning next week, her office announced Wednesday.

The head of the World Health Organization says the agency is “concerned about the risk to life in China” amid the coronavirus’ explosive spread across the country and the lack of outbreak data from the Chinese government.

The Chinese government has sharply criticized COVID-19 testing requirements being imposed on visitors from China and threatening countermeasures against countries involved.

European Union nations will try again on Wednesday to mold a coordinated approach on if and how to check incoming airline passengers from China for any new COVID-19 variants after several member nations announced individual efforts over the past week.

A possible strike by thousands of New York City nurses is looming even though nurses at one hospital reached a tentative agreement hours before their contract was set to expire.

Australia and Canada have joined a growing list of countries requiring travelers from China to take a COVID-19 test prior to boarding their flight, as China battles a nationwide outbreak of the coronavirus after abruptly easing restrictions that were in place for much of the pandemic.

Chinese manufacturing contracted for a third consecutive month in December, in the biggest drop since early 2020, as the country battles a nationwide COVID-19 surge after suddenly easing anti-epidemic measures.

China is on a bumpy road back to normal life as schools, shopping malls and restaurants fill up again with the easing of COVID-19 restriction.

Japan has started requiring COVID-19 tests for all passengers arriving from China as an emergency measure against surging infections there and as Japan faces rising case numbers and record-level deaths at home.

The U.S. will soon require COVID-19 testing for travelers from China.

In early 2022, Jordyn Bashford thought things were as good as they could be for a nurse amid the COVID pandemic.

China will drop a COVID-19 quarantine requirement for passengers arriving from abroad starting Jan. 8.

It’s going to be cold the next few days, so Houstonians who plan to be outside may want to be aware of the signs and symptoms of frostbite.

As many of us utilize public transportation to visit family and friends for the holidays, METRO has released its adjusted schedule to help us with our travel plans. In observance of the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, METRO will operate on the following schedule:

A bill to rescind the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for members of the U.S. military and provide nearly $858 billion for national defense has passed the Senate and now goes to President Joe Biden to be signed into law.