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Trump indicators funding invoice amid Covid reduction push

President Donald Trump signed a week-long government funding extension Friday as Congress rushed to secure coronavirus spending and relief.

The Senate passed the measure in a vote earlier in the day, and the House approved it this week. Funding would have expired on Saturday if Washington hadn’t passed a spending plan.

The law will fund the government until December 18th. Congressional leaders hope to have both a year-round funding package and pandemic aid approved by then. You have tried to reach an agreement on both fronts.

The appropriators have agreed on a $ 1.4 trillion price for the legislation to keep the government running through September 30, 2021. However, they have not agreed on exactly where the money should go.

Despite the most frantic effort in months to develop a coronavirus bailout, Congress must resolve several major disputes to reach an agreement. Millions of Americans await help as an uncontrolled outbreak ravages communities across the country, creating hunger that has not been seen for years.

If the legislature cannot pass relief laws in the coming days, around 12 million people will lose unemployment benefits the day after Christmas. An eviction moratorium and provisions for family leave introduced at the beginning of this year will also expire at the end of December.

Two senators, the independent Vermont-based Bernie Sanders and the Missouri Republican Josh Hawley, threatened to block the spending measure when they urged Congress to send more aid to Americans. Legislators wanted to vote on a proposal to send another direct payment of up to $ 1,200 for individuals and $ 500 per child.

Sanders said he decided not to object to government funding on Friday but would do so next week if Congress didn’t seek more relief.

“We are more hungry in America today than ever before in the modern history of this country,” said the senator when pressing for direct payments.

For months, Congress failed to provide more aid to Americans, despite ongoing health and economic crises. A GOP-backed proposal to give businesses immunity from coronavirus-related lawsuits and a plan to send more aid to state and local governments backed by Democrats and many Republicans remain the biggest sticking points in reaching a settlement .

Democrats have also criticized the fact that the recent $ 916 billion aid offer from the White House, blessed by GOP congressional leaders, does not include additional federal unemployment insurance funds. It has a direct payment of $ 600, half the total of the March stimulus checks approved by Congress.

Democrats have put their weight behind a $ 908 billion package put together by a non-partisan group. The measure would include unemployment benefit of $ 300 per week but no direct payments.

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Business

Inventory Tank Swimming pools for Your Yard

If you happened upon the internet last spring for an inflatable Intex pool to turn up empty-handed, you had company. Pool & Hot Tub Alliance president and chief executive officer Sabeena Hickman said pool sales skyrocketed as Americans faced a quarantine season at home.

Based on the number of permits, 94,000 new residential pools sunk into the ground will be built by the end of 2020, an increase of almost 21 percent compared to 2019. (The demand for whirlpools is more noticeable: the number has increased by 400 percent this year compared to the previous year. According to Ms. Hickman’s tubs are largely overloaded for six months.)

A shortage of conventional pools has brought to the fore a new type of soaking machine supported by social media: the storage tank pool. Made from a galvanized metal tank traditionally used as a feeding trough for farm animals, a storage tank pool can be put together in one day with some DIY items available at most hardware stores. As the cooler weather approaches and states head towards potential closures, some water lovers are opting for the next best thing: the do-it-yourself hot tub.

According to Ben Uyeda, the designer and co-founder of HomeMade Modern, an online design source that publishes home furnishings and project instructions, the moment of the DIY hot tub has definitely come. Mr Uyeda’s videos detailing how to make your own hot tub have been viewed a million times. His first video showed a wood heater, and his second, more user-friendly, iteration included heating from a propane tank.

“Every time we’ve done a hot tub-related project like this, the thumbnails have just generated a huge amount of clicks,” he said.

The popularity of the hot tub videos reflects both the zeitgeist and this particular moment of the pandemic, Uyeda said. “You start with the basics and then add things for efficiency.” He said people are now more likely to take up DIY projects that involve lifestyle improvements, as opposed to when the pandemic started when they looked for remedies for immediate problems.

For Andrew Rowland, 30, and Caitlin Wallace-Rowland, 29, who live in New Orleans, the recent addition of a storage tank hot tub was a luxury that followed a long list of renovations. “We renovated all of our front and back yards and then ran out of activities,” said Ms. Wallace-Rowland. After taking numerous weekend trips to the Mississippi coast so their 2-year-old daughter Laurel could swim, they decided a pool was the next project to tackle.

In September they built their current whirlpool from a galvanized storage tank with a heater configured from a propane tank. Ms. Wallace-Rowland, an artist and textile designer, planned where the pool would go and devised a landscaping scheme for it. Mr. Rowland, a system operations manager at a charter school, took on the task of building the actual tub, which he described as a “very peaceful installation”. The result is a bathtub that fits into your small garden and offers enjoyment all year round.

34-year-old Sara Haddox installed a hot tub for storage tanks in her home in Llano, Texas, which she also rents mostly through Airbnb in September. “My husband went on a big hunting trip and I got bored while he was away, so I decided to bring the idea of ​​the hot tub to life,” Ms. Haddox said.

Ms. Haddox, who manages her family’s rental property, relied on her degree in civil engineering and created an insulated reservoir hot tub with an electric heater (instead of a propane heater) to help it reach a higher temperature and stay hot for longer.

Her initial inspiration, she said, came from Pinterest and Instagram, where people posted photos of tank pans in stunning settings. “I just loved these shots of those isolated tubs where you can just be in nature and see it forever and just enjoy being outside in a new way,” she said. “These pictures really have sunk.”

She had considered building a tub for several years, she said, but the events of 2020 forced her hand. The result is a tub that drew attention to her family’s Airbnb, which appears on Instagram as @houseonthellano. While winter visitors may not be able to enjoy the nearby freezing Llano River or the city’s restaurants and museums, they can enjoy the property’s fire pit and now the winter-friendly hot tub.

“We had to offer a more complete vacation package,” said Ms. Haddox. Their homemade hot tub helped.

A whirlpool started out as a hot weather pool project for E. Spencer Schubert. A Kansas City, Missouri sculptor, Mr. Schubert, 43, decided to set up a storage tank pool on his property at the beginning of the pandemic to make up for his family’s lost summer. He and his wife Ryann, 42, rented an excavator and installed an 8-foot storage tank pool with surrounding terraces. Converting the pool into a whirlpool was “just the next iteration,” said Schubert.

The storage tank is now heated with propane heating, and Mr. Schubert has converted the yard into a multi-year oasis with a fireplace and “circus lights”. “During the reasonable temperature of the year, the place of the house that we use most is the back yard,” he said.

Though the tub’s temperature reaches around 90 degrees, Schubert said Missouri’s cold winters are likely to cut its use in February. Even so, the DIY whirlpool will extend the life of the Schubert family’s pool season.

E. Spencer Schubert’s storage tank pool.

The storage tank pool grew in popularity at the start of the pandemic, said Jovana Johnson and Janice Luna, the owners of H20 Tank Avenue in Santa Clarita, California, which supplies storage tanks to customers in that state, Arizona and Nevada. When they started their company in May, Ms. Johnson and Ms. Luna immediately sold all 27 tanks they ordered.

“We said, ‘OK, you know what? I think we’ll be ordering another set of tanks, but this time we’ll get dealer status, ”Ms. Johnson said. She and Ms. Luna have placed their second order for 150 storage tanks, many of which were pre-ordered through Instagram.

Now that the season has changed, they see potential in the market for tubs with heating options and have added a “tankuzzi” service to extend the storage pool season. They sell a tankless propane heater that increases the water temperature to 105 degrees.

“We are fortunate to have very mild winters here in Southern California,” said Ms. Luna, who allows customers to use her pools and tubs year round.

Ms. Johnson pointed out that a storage tank hot tub is flexible. (“If you do decide to move, you can take it with you,” she said.) A traditional hot tub can weigh over a ton and is often left behind when moving. The standard tank hot tub aesthetic has also developed a unique following.

“It’s just a fancy look,” Ms. Johnson said.

Mr. Uyeda insists that part of the point is rolling up the sleeve of the reservoir. “It’s a homemade all-moment,” he said.

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Health

FDA advisory panel meets at this time to vote on whether or not to advocate approval of Pfizer’s Covid vaccine

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A panel from the Food and Drug Administration will meet Thursday to vote on whether to recommend Pfizer and BioNTech’s emergency approval of the coronavirus vaccine.

Prior to voting by the Agency’s Advisory Committee on Vaccines and Related Biological Products, the independent panel of medical experts will evaluate the Pfizer clinical trial data and provide their opinion on the vaccine, including whether the benefits outweigh the risks in an emergency .

The FDA is not required to follow the advice of the advisory group, but it often does.

A recommendation from the advisory committee is the final step before the FDA is likely to give final OK to the distribution of the potentially life-saving doses in the United States. The vaccine would be the first to be approved for use in the United States

Read CNBC’s live updates for the latest news on the Covid-19 outbreak.

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Politics

Trump official Mick Mulvaney’s hedge fund in search of no less than $1 million from buyers

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, December 10, 2019.

Al Drago | Reuters

Mick Mulvaney, former acting chief of staff to President Donald Trump, plans to raise at least $ 1 million from outside investors for his newly formed hedge fund.

Mulvaney, now representing the outgoing administration in Northern Ireland, and his business partner Andrew Wessel announced that they are aiming for this minimum amount in a CNBC first-examined filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The filing gives fresh insight into Mulvaney’s Exegis Capital fund’s plans to operate in the post-Trump era. The SEC form was signed on December 1, weeks after Democrat Joe Biden was appointed president-elect.

Mulvaney, a former Republican Congressman from South Carolina, was also head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau within the Trump administration.

Investments appear to be in the direction of the fund limited partnership called Exegis Financial Sector Fund, the document says. The SEC form contains the same North Carolina address for the limited partnership and Exegis Capital. Mulvaney and Wessel’s names are both on the form.

The document also shows that Exegis is fundraising under the SEC’s 506 (b) rule. According to the SEC’s website, this rule allows companies to “raise unlimited funds and sell securities to an unlimited number of accredited investors.”

Mulvaney and Wessel, who have extensive experience as former portfolio managers at Sterling Capital Management in North Carolina, first announced the creation of the fund in an interview with S&P Global in August. They said at the time they wanted to invest in stocks in the small to mid-cap financial sector.

In an interview on Friday, Wessel confirmed that the $ 1 million was just the minimum they were asking investors. The hedge fund, he said, is trying to raise money from both “high net worth” and “very high net worth” individuals who may be worth at least $ 30 million.

Wessel declined to say who invested or who signaled interest in investing.

“The fundraiser is going well,” he said. “We have little interest from a number of high net worth individuals.” Wessel added that the fund had held numerous investor meetings both in person and through Zoom.

Wessel said that so far they have aimed to invest in small and mid-cap financials, with less of an emphasis on banks and interest in lenders and fintech companies.

Mulvaney’s role in the firm includes providing guidance to the best companies to invest in based on Exegis’ expectations for tighter regulation of the financial services industry under the Biden administration.

According to Wessel, Mulvaney’s experience in Washington – as acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, as director of the Office of Management and Budget, and as a member of the Financial Services Committee during his tenure in Congress – gives the firm a strong insight into the in-depth regulations it could provide for its business potential investments.

“For the Biden administration we are probably aiming for more regulation, not less, and we will choose our places there,” said Wessel of her investment tactics.

Wessel said Mulvaney approved the establishment of the fund with both the White House and the State Department and “he has not been to Ireland in a while”. He referred other questions about possible ethical hurdles Mulvaney may face to the former South Carolina congressman.

A State Department official told CNBC after the release that Mulvaney is considered a government special employee (SGE) and is limited to 130 calendar days of official work per year. He is not prohibited from looking for external employment, said the spokesman.

Mulvaney did not return a request for comment prior to posting.

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Business

United Airways turns to CO2 elimination expertise to offset emissions

United Airlines Boeing 767-400 ER Extended Range with aircraft powered by 2 CF6-80 engines landing at Amsterdam Schiphol International Airport AMS EHAM in the Netherlands, the capital of the Netherlands.

Economou | NurPhoto | Getty Images

United Airlines is turning to technology to capture carbon dioxide from the air and store it underground to fully offset carbon emissions by 2050. This is a change from the compensation programs that the aviation industry and others have traditionally relied on to reduce their footprint.

The Chicago-based airline announced Thursday that it is making a multi-million dollar investment in a carbon capture joint venture between subsidiary Occidental Petroleum and private equity firm Rusheen Capital Management. The company is developing a carbon capture facility in the Permian Basin in Texas.

While the coronavirus pandemic has decimated air travel around the world, airlines typically cause around 2% of global carbon emissions. Carriers have used biofuels and carbon offsets bought in exchange for forest conservation and other projects.

“It may feel good in the short term, but the math just doesn’t nearly add up,” said Scott Kirby, United’s CEO, speaking to reporters on Wednesday about carbon offsetting. “The only way to really reduce atmospheric carbon is by capturing and binding air directly.”

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Health

Amid Pandemic, Scientists Reassess Routine Medical Care

Now the Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium, a federally funded research group, is prospectively collecting data during the pandemic from more than 800,000 women and nearly 100 mammography centers across the country.

Millions of women missed their regular mammograms in the first wave of the pandemic.

Before the pandemic, around 100,000 women had screening mammograms every day in the United States. In the spring, almost all mammography centers closed for three months, and although they reopened in the summer, almost all of them did not work normally until October. That may change as new coronavirus infections rise, but for now women who want mammograms can get them.

Clinics have had to slow the speed at which they perform mammograms due to the precautions taken by Covid-19, including physical removal and cleaning of equipment between exams. But they make up for the delays by keeping longer hours and opening on weekends.

The situation may be different for women with worrying findings, such as a lump or a suspicious finding on a mammogram. The wait for diagnostic imaging and biopsies can be long, stretching for weeks or months, said Dr. Christoph Lee, Professor of Radiology and Health Research at the University of Washington.

Doctors expect many women who missed their mammograms this past spring will not return because they can do the screening test again, some because they fell out of the habit, others because of the social and economic impact of the pandemic. Women may have to stay home to look after children or they may have lost their jobs and health insurance.

The Breast Cancer Consortium should have the first results of the screening shutdown’s impact on patient outcomes in six months, said Dr. Lee.

“We have never been able to argue to stop screening for a period of time as the standard of care is regular screening,” said Dr. Lee. “We’re trying to find out whether less screening leads to more or less harm.”

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Business

Zoom Lessons. No Probability Conferences. Is Digital Enterprise College Well worth the Value?

“I feel very happy,” he said. “The pandemic has forced me to think about my priorities as well. I could step back and pause and ask, ‘What do you really want to do?’ “

Mrs. Reichert had the opposite experience. She did an internship at Chewy, the pet food website, last summer from her parents’ home in Spotsylvania County, Virginia – 1,000 miles from Chewy’s headquarters in Dania Beach, Florida. While she praised the company for its efforts to make the most of a bad situation, she decided to return to the consultation.

Networking is a big part of the MBA experience. It’s the component that could pay the most dividends well after closing. But in a virtual or socially distant world it got stunted.

“The social component was disappointing,” said Emma Finkelstein, a sophomore at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business. “When I’m a floating head at Zoom, I will have a different relationship with my professors and classmates than in social situations.”

Mr Garg, who describes himself as an introvert, said he had pushed himself to get out.

“It’s a lot about being proactive,” he said. “I’ve had coffee with people. It takes a lot of effort. There are some days when you don’t want to do this. But then you realize that you’ve been home for three days and haven’t seen anyone. “

And it’s not just less sociable students who feel left out of the social aspect of business school. International students who have not been able to return to the USA and students from underrepresented minority groups are also affected.

“Of course, I would say that the impact of the pandemic on the nature of informal networking on our campus could be more impactful for students who, for some reason, felt less enclosed among their MBA peers,” said Dr. Rockoff from Colombia. “These missed opportunities for networks and connections will have a significant impact on them.”

Categories
Politics

Supreme Court docket Rejects Texas Lawsuit Difficult Biden’s Victory

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton responded with his own letter on Friday morning. “Whatever Pennsylvania’s definition of turmoil,” he wrote, “moving this court to heal grave threats to Texas Senate suffrage and the suffrage of its citizens in presidential elections affirms the Constitution, which is the opposite of turmoil . ” ”

Allegations that the election was tainted by widespread fraud have been rebutted by Mr Trump’s own Attorney General William P. Barr, who said this month the Justice Department had not uncovered election fraud “on a scale that could have changed the election. “

Some 20 Democratic-led states, in a brief endorsement of the four battlefield states, urged the Supreme Court to “reject Texas’s last-minute attempt to discard the results of a popular vote that is safely monitored and certified by its sister states. ”

Georgia, which won Mr Biden by less than 12,000 votes out of nearly five million votes cast, said in his letter that it had handled his election with integrity and care. “In this election cycle,” the letter said, “Georgia has done what the constitution was empowered to do: it implemented electoral processes, managed the election in the face of the logistical challenges posed by Covid-19, and confirmed and confirmed the election.” Results – over and over again. Even so, Texas sued Georgia. “

Even ahead of Election Day, Mr Trump and his Republican allies filed nearly five dozen lawsuits against the treatment, casting and counting of votes in courts in at least eight different states.

They generally lost these cases and often drew blistering reproaches from judges who heard them. Along the way, Mr Trump has not nearly overturned election results in a single state, let alone the minimum of three he would need to claim Mr Biden’s victory.

The first set of measures preceded the elections and was aimed at ending or rolling back the voting measures that states across the country had been taking to deal with the coronavirus crisis. In Texas, for example, Republicans were prosecuting a failed attempt in federal court to stop the drive-through vote in Harris County, home of Houston. A similar move was taken in Pennsylvania to prevent the state from accepting postal ballot papers received after election day.

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Business

NY Gov. Cuomo holds a press briefing as state prepares to distribute Covid vaccine

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New York Governor Andrew Cuomo will hold a press conference Friday on the coronavirus pandemic as the state prepares to receive a Covid-19 vaccine, which could be approved and dispensed in the coming days.

Cuomo is represented by Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Rep. Grace Meng (D-NY), Rep. Karen Bass (D-CA), Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-TX) and Rep. Deb Haaland (D- NY) accompanies D-NM).

The Democratic governor has announced that New York is expected to receive an initial allocation of 170,000 doses of Pfizer’s vaccine once the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approves the shots. New York could get the cans this weekend, Cuomo’s office said in a press release on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, New York is considering restricting indoor eating if state hospitals continue to be overcrowded with Covid-19 patients. Cuomo said Monday if New York hospital stays don’t stabilize within five days, the state could shut down indoor dining in the city as early as next week.

Read CNBC’s live updates for the latest news on the Covid-19 outbreak.

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Health

Pfizer’s Covid vaccine permitted by FDA for emergency use

The Food and Drug Administration has approved Pfizer and BioNTech’s coronavirus vaccine for emergency use. This is a monumental turning point in the one-time pandemic that killed nearly 300,000 Americans and devastated the US economy in less than a year.

FDA chief scientist Denise Hinton told Pfizer in a letter Friday that she approved the company’s emergency use of the vaccine.

President Donald Trump called it a “medical miracle” in a video tweet. “We delivered a safe and effective vaccine in just 9 months,” Trump said. “This is one of the greatest scientific achievements in history.”

Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said the decision “promises to change the course of this pandemic in the United States.” “With the science guiding our decision-making, the available safety and efficacy data to support the approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine because the known and potential benefits of the vaccine significantly outweigh the known and potential risks,” he said.

FDA approval for the emergency will now boost the federal government’s distribution of the potentially life-saving doses to 64 states, territories and major cities across the country. The government plans to distribute 2.9 million doses of the vaccine within 24 hours, followed by another 2.9 million doses 21 days later, for patients to receive their second shot, General Gustave Perna, who runs the logistics for the Operation Warp vaccination program Speed ​​monitored by President Donald Trump said Wednesday. Pfizer’s vaccine requires two doses three weeks apart.

The vaccine couldn’t come at a more crucial time. Hospitals in the U.S. already have higher numbers of Covid patients than ever before, and the country’s outbreak is poised to break even grimmer records. According to a CNBC analysis of the Johns Hopkins University data, the US reported 3,124 new Covid-19 deaths on Wednesday, the pandemic’s deadliest one-day record to date. The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Robert Redfield, warned earlier this month that the next few months of the pandemic would be “some of the most difficult in the history of this country’s public health.”

Initial doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be limited as production begins. Officials predict it will be months before everyone in the US who wants to be vaccinated is vaccinated. Pfizer has announced that it will ship 50 million doses of vaccine this year, enough to vaccinate 25 million people. The vaccine is expected to be distributed in phases where the most critical U.S. workers and vulnerable people receive it first. The CDC has given states an outline recommending that priority be given to health workers and nursing homes first. However, states may distribute the vaccine at their own discretion.

An emergency permit, or EEA, is not the same as a full permit, which can typically take months. Pfizer has only submitted safety data for two months, but it typically takes the agency six months for full approval. The vaccine has been approved for people aged 16 and over.

On Friday, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn said the agency was “working fast” to clear the vaccine in case of emergency. Shortly after Hahn testified, Trump, who has repeatedly said he had urged the FDA to move faster in the vaccine development process, told the agency in a tweet: “Get the dam vaccines out NOW.”

The FDA’s announcement comes after a key agency advisory body voted 17 to 4, with one abstention, to recommend the vaccine for emergency approval on Thursday. The Advisory Committee on Vaccines and Related Biological Products plays a key role in approving influenza and other vaccines in the United States and verifying that the vaccines are safe for public use. While the FDA does not need to follow the advisory board’s recommendation, it often does.

FDA approval marks a record breaking time frame for a process that typically takes about a decade. The fastest vaccine development to date against mumps took more than four years and was licensed in 1967. Pfizer and BioNTech announced plans to develop a coronavirus vaccine in March and filed an emergency clearance application with the FDA in November. Health authorities in Canada, the UK and Bahrain have approved Pfizer’s vaccine for most adults.

Pfizer’s vaccine uses messenger RNA or mRNA technology. It’s a new approach to vaccines that uses genetic material to trigger an immune response. Moderna, another front runner in the Covid vaccine race, also uses mRNA technology. Late-stage clinical trial data shows Pfizer’s vaccine is 95% effective against Covid, safe, and appears to ward off serious illness. For maximum effectiveness, the vaccine requires two doses about 21 days apart.

Pfizer’s vaccine requires a storage temperature of minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit, which poses potential logistical challenges for rural areas and inner cities that may not have good health infrastructure. For comparison: According to Moderna, the vaccine can be stored for up to six months at minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit.

FedEx and United Parcel Service on Thursday expressed confidence in their networks to distribute the vaccines across the country in a Senate hearing and outlined plans to monitor the location and temperatures of the shipments.

The Federal Aviation Administration asked the airports late Friday to ensure that they have adequate staff when the vaccines arrive. In a statement hours before the vaccine was approved, the FAA said airports should consider providing areas for trucks for vaccines to be picked up on arrival. The agency has announced that flights with cans and related supplies will be given priority.

U.S. officials plan to continue to monitor for side effects of the Pfizer vaccine among the health care workers and nursing homes who receive it, said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, during the agency’s meeting on Thursday. The officers will use an SMS system called v-safe, which is designed to provide early warning of possible side effects of the vaccine.

During the meeting, FDA vaccine reviewer Dr. Susan Wollersheim found that the study data showed a “numerical imbalance” in Bell’s palsy, a condition that causes temporary weakness or paralysis of the muscles in the face. She said there were four cases in the vaccine group and none in the placebo group. Although the frequency of the cases was inconsistent with the general population, the FDA recommended further monitoring once the vaccine becomes more widely distributed.

Read the full letter from the FDA below: