South Africa flattens its coronavirus curve—and considers how to ease restrictions

For many jobs across the country, working from home is a fairly easy adaptation to cope with social distancing measures. But for many scientists who work in laboratories with ongoing research, a work from home solution does not quite fit. Labs and universities are finding ways to adapt and prioritize which experiments to put on hold.

As colleges and universities across the United States have shifted to online classes and shut down their campuses, not every student simply has the ability to move home. To help support these students, many of whom are low-income or international, the Stay Together Appalachian Youth Project began working with local communities to find housing for displaced students, as well as to provide other support like money or supplies.

As California’s Bay Area is weeks into its shelter-in-place order – the first in the nation – experts are seeing indications that it’s working in the fight against COVID19, but at the same time needs to continue. Health officials are seeing signs that the increase of cases could be flattening, which was the goal of social distancing, and has been giving the area more time to prepare for a spike, which other experts say is inevitable. Either way, the stay-at-home mandate is helping reduce strain on the healthcare system.

By running a network of 3-D printers, universities like USC and UCLA Extension, as well as volunteer firms and nonprofits mobilize their resources to create backup masks. The masks are more effective than basic disposable surgical masks, and serve as reserves for hospitals in the region. The network operates with the assistance of the Los Angeles Mayor’s office.

Rather than send local residents to city-run testing sites in the East Bay of California, clinics in East Oakland are now running their own testing sites to better serve their community. Although one of the sites has already tested nearly 100 people and residents who are underinsured or uninsured can be tested for free, some believe the effort should have started much sooner.

By rapidly instituting mandatory testing of all inmates at a covid-19-stricken federal prison and segregating ill inmates, authorities reduced the number of new infections within weeks. At one point, nearly 70% of the inmates at the Terminal Island federal prison in San Pedro, California, had tested positive for the coronavirus as it raced through a facility where inmates normally interact constantly in crowded communal areas. As of mid-May, eight inmates had died and more than 500 had recovered.

As the U.S attempts to reopen, restaurant owners from California to Florida are expanding their restaurants into nearby outdoor space, including sidewalks and parking lots. In doing so, they are able to offer patrons a safer dining environment, as there is more room to keep tables further apart and follow social distancing precautions, and it also helps restaurants earn more revenue than if they were limited to indoor space. Some city governments are streamlining the process, including Brookhaven, Georgia, which made it free to access short-term permits for outdoor dining.

The coronavirus made cramped or high-risk polling locations untenable so at least 39 sports arenas have opened up their facilities for voting. Their expansive size allows them to welcome large numbers of voters while maintaining social distancing protocols. Many are outdoors, which lowers the risk of transmitting the virus even further. Prompted by calls from athletes, arena owners’ site the summer’s racial-justice demonstrations as inspiration for supplying the spaces since voting is a key way to create definitive changes. Voters were thrilled to cast their ballots in a sports arena.

The state of Vermont has been able to keep COVID-19 cases to a minimal, at least in part by focusing on offering preventive protections for the most at-risk and vulnerable – such as the unhoused. The state's response has included "state-supported housing for the homeless, hazard pay, meal deliveries, and free, pop-up testing in at-risk communities," all of which prioritize high-risk populations rather than those who can easily self-isolate at home.

Disaster preparedness in the form of close inter-agency coordination and communication helped Cuyahoga County, Ohio, protect its unhoused population from COVID-19 to a greater extent than Lane County, Oregon. Although Cuyahoga (Cleveland) is larger, with more resources, its effective responses still offer a model to Lane County (Eugene), where a scattered approach and homeless-camp sweeps proved counterproductive. In Cleveland, hotels were quickly enlisted to house people, reducing crowding in shelters by half and street homelessness by 30%. Its largest men's shelter ended up with a low infection rate.