access so-called no-year funds appropriated to the Public Health Emergency Fund and.grant an extension or waiver requirements of certain Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration grants on a state-by-state basis.make temporary personnel available to respond to the emergency.conduct and support investigations into the cause, treatment, or prevention of the disease or disorder.Among other things, once a public health emergency is declared, the Secretary can: Such a declaration does not require a formal request from state or local government. Under Section 319 of the PHSA, the Secretary can declare a public health emergency if it is determined that a disease or disorder presents a public health emergency, or a public health emergency-including significant outbreaks of an infectious disease or a bioterrorist attack-otherwise exists. Depending on the type of emergency declaration, state actions authorized can include activating state emergency response plans, using certain funding, or deploying personnel, equipment, and stockpiles ( ASTHO 2012). In some instances, state-declared emergencies may allow for additional flexibility within the state Medicaid program. These statutory authorities are described in detail below.Īll states, the District of Columbia, and the territories have made state emergency or public health emergency declarations ( ASTHO 2020). The declarations provide for different types of responses and can be made concurrently. 93-288, as amended) or the National Emergencies Act (P.L. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (P.L. 115-96, as amended), or the President can declare a disaster or emergency under the Robert T. Department of Health and Human Services (the Secretary) can declare a public health emergency under Section 319 of the Public Health Service Act (PHSA, P.L. The federal government has three vehicles for declaring an emergency in an emergency or disaster: the Secretary of the U.S. It’s a welcome step back to normalcy and to putting COVID, with all its upheaval, in the nation’s rear-view mirror for good. Whether it ends at once, on May 11, or at some date in between, the state of emergency is, at long last, on its way out. 382, a terse directive to bring the public health declaration to an immediate end. The House is expected to vote this week on H.R. With the House now under GOP control, that’s about to change. Last November, a bipartisan Senate majority voted 62-36 to cancel the emergency declaration, but the measure went nowhere in the House of Representatives because former speaker Nancy Pelosi refused to let it come to a vote. In the end, it was Congress that forced Biden’s hand. That is nearly eight months after he affirmed on national TV that the pandemic was over and even longer after many states had already ended their own public health emergency declarations. And there is good reason to think that even that number significantly overstates the chances of dying from COVID.Īfter balking for months at lifting that declaration of emergency, Biden informed Congress on Monday that it would come to an end on May 11. For the past nine months, the number of daily deaths has hovered at around 400. At its peak in early 2021, there were more than 3,300 confirmed US deaths per day from COVID. Social distancing has ended shops, theaters, and restaurants have long since reopened COVID testing sites have shut down and mask-wearing is no longer expected in most settings. (Including in my family - both of my parents died in 2021 after being infected with the virus.) But Americans can see for themselves that the nation is no longer in the grip of a pandemic. More importantly, infection now results in far fewer hospitalizations and deaths than it once did, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.ĬOVID took a terrible, terrible toll. By now, thanks to vaccinations and previous infections, at least 80 percent of Americans have acquired a measure of immunity to the coronavirus. COVID has certainly not vanished, but like the rhinovirus (common cold) and the flu, it has subsided to endemic status. For all intents and purposes, the pandemic is over. The president is well known for his verbal blunders - he has even called himself a “ gaffe machine” - but this wasn’t one of them. “We still have a problem with COVID we’re still doing a lot of work on it. Noting that it was the first show to be organized since before COVID-19 struck, Pelley asked: “Is the pandemic over?”īiden’s answer was straightforward. In the course of taping an interview with “60 Minutes” last September, President Biden strolled through the Detroit Auto Show with CBS newsman Scott Pelley.
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