COVID-19 Enters a New Phase

The federal public health emergency for COVID-19 -- which was first declared in late January 2020 -- ended yesterday.

Public health emergency determinations, which are made by the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, need to be renewed every 90 days, and the Biden administration let it expire. 

What does that mean to you? Good question. Kate Yandell, one of our SciCheck writers, has some answers for you in her article "Q&A on the End of the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency." 

Kate answers questions about how the end of the PHE will affect COVID-19 testing, vaccines, treatments and data collection. There are also changes to Medicaid and nutrition benefits, some of which had already taken effect prior to the end of the PHE.

Anne Sosin, a policy fellow studying rural health equity at the Nelson A. Rockefeller Center at Dartmouth, told Kate that most Americans "won’t feel a difference immediately at the end of the public health emergency.” But, she added, the impact will "accumulate over time and will be felt differentially depending on who you are.”

One thing that is certain: COVID-19 is not over. There were still more than 1,000 deaths and 77,000 new cases for the week ending May 3, according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

“It doesn’t mean COVID is gone,” Jennifer Kates, senior vice president and director of global health and HIV policy at KFF, told Kate. “It just means that we have truly entered a new phase of living with COVID in the country.”

Reader: Did the administration on the first day in office eliminate the immigration procedures such as "remain in Mexico" that were in place and working?

FactCheck.org Director Eugene Kiely: No, but not for lack of trying. 

On Feb. 1, 2021, less than a month into office, President Biden issued an executive order directing the Department of Homeland Security to review the Migrant Protection Protocols, better known as the “remain in Mexico” policy. Under that policy, which the Trump administration instituted in 2019, asylum seekers were sent to Mexico to await their court appearances in the U.S. 

On June 1, 2021, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would terminate the program. But Texas and Missouri sued the administration and the federal courts blocked termination of the program – which the administration had restarted under new standards after the court rulings, even as it continued to take steps to end it.

In June 2022, the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, ruled that the Biden administration had the power to end the program, and the administration again announced in August 2022 it would end the program. 

In December 2022, a federal judge in Texas again blocked the administration’s August 2022 attempt to end the program. But the judge didn’t order the administration to restart the program, and Mexico, in February of this year, said it would not cooperate if the “remain in Mexico” program was reinstated.

So, the administration has been trying since June 2021 to shut down the program, which as of today remains suspended. 

Wrapping Up

Here's what else we've got for you this week:

• "FactChecking Trump’s CNN Town Hall": Former President Donald Trump’s town hall event felt like a lightning round of false and misleading claims — most of which we’ve heard before — on voter fraud, immigration, classified documents and more.
• "Posts Share Fake Chelsea Clinton Quote About Global Childhood Vaccination Effort": An international initiative called the Big Catch-Up aims to increase vaccination among children who have missed routine vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic. In describing the project, Chelsea Clinton did not say it was time to “force-jab every unvaccinated child in America,” nor will the project impose mandatory vaccinations, contrary to claims.
• "COVID-19 Vaccine Benefits Outweigh Small Risks, Contrary to Flawed Claim From U.K. Cardiologist": Dozens of studies support the use of the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, which have a good safety profile and work well in preventing severe disease and death. Yet, citing a single, flawed paper, a British cardiologist known for peddling misinformation has misleadingly argued that the shots are harmful and “should never have been approved.” 
• "The Political Disagreement Over a Health Exception for Later Abortions": In recent years, Democrats in Congress have introduced a bill that would bar states from prohibiting abortion after a fetus is viable outside the womb in cases where the patient’s life or health is at risk. Republicans claim that the bill would allow abortion on demand “up to the moment of birth.” Democrats counter that’s not what they support. 
• "Unpacking the Claim that Blinken ‘Lied’ to Congress": Republican Sen. Ron Johnson says Secretary of State Antony Blinken lied to Congress about communicating with Hunter Biden via email. But there is less to the accusation than Johnson suggests.

• "Preguntas y respuestas sobre el fin de la emergencia de salud pública por el COVID-19": El 11 de mayo marcará el final de la declaración federal de emergencia de salud pública del COVID-19, lo que traerá consigo cambios en la atención médica y en los beneficios para el público. 
• "Publicaciones comparten una cita falsa de Chelsea Clinton sobre una iniciativa mundial de vacunación infantil": Una iniciativa internacional llamada “La gran puesta al día” busca aumentar la vacunación entre niños que no recibieron las vacunas de rutina durante la pandemia del COVID-19. Al describir el proyecto, Chelsea Clinton no dijo que era hora de “vacunar a la fuerza a cada niño no vacunado en EE. UU.”, ni el proyecto impondrá vacunas obligatorias, contrariamente a lo que se afirma.