Vaccine survey. Suburban Cook County residents can now fill out a form identifying themselves, their professions, their medical conditions and their demographics to help the county gauge interest and map priorities for administering COVID-19 vaccines …
■ … but it’s not technically a sign-up for getting shots …
■ … and the county says residents of Chicago, Evanston, Skokie, Oak Park and Stickney Township are on their own, because they have their own health departments.
■ The virus is spreading faster than vaccinations in the U.S. …
■ A computational biologist tackles the question, “How many people need to be vaccinated … to control thais this pandemic?”
■ A Wisconsin pharmacist accused of trying to ruin hundreds of vaccine doses allegedly last week told his wife the world was “crashing down.”
A year ago … STAT’s Helen Branswell reported: “The mysterious and growing cluster of unexplained pneumonia cases in the Chinese city of Wuhan has infectious disease experts parsing limited public statements from Chinese authorities for clues to what is happening …”
■ … and now, 147 stories later, she says, “It never occurred to me … that the United States would handle a pandemic worse than almost any other country.”
■ England has launched its third lockdown: At least six weeks at home.
No-shows. Half the teachers ordered back to Chicago classrooms didn’t report yesterday.
■ The University of Illinois’ saliva test for COVID-19 is closer to government approval—and school districts can hardly wait.
‘We are … fighting over whether or not America will be a democracy.’ Historian Heather Cox Richardson puts this week’s political dramas in context.
■ As goes Georgia today, so goes the nation.
■ And that includes the state’s “worst surge” of the pandemic.
■ The Sun-Times’ Lynn Sweet says one of the Republicans fighting today to keep her Georgia Senate seat, Kelly Loeffler, portrays herself as an Illinois farm girl—but leaves out her life’s ritzy Chicago chapters.
■ Chicago Democrats are working hard to defeat her.
‘Call them … the radical right.’ Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan: Stop referring to Donald Trump’s enablers as “conservative.”
■ Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler: Trump’s false and misleading claims as president now total more than 29,500.
Kenosha killings hearing. Updating coverage: An 18-year-old Illinoisan, Kyle Rittenhouse, was due to enter a plea today in connection with the deaths of two people during August’s Wisconsin protests of police violence.
■ Wisconsin’s governor has the National Guard on alert in Kenosha.
■ For the first time, a woman will lead the Cook County Circuit Court’s criminal division.
■ A PBS series debuting tonight profiles an Illinois man’s life after his release from prison.
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