Beleaguered business owners and families separated by COVID-19 restrictions rejoiced Wednesday after the U.S. said it will reopen its land borders to nonessential travel next month, ending a 19-month freeze.

While COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations have dropped nationally, a local infectious disease expert says the situation is a little more complex than whether or not the nation is reaching herd immunity.

“Although we are already into fall, we are expecting a warm weekend and West Nile virus remains a risk until the first hard frost,” Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said in a statement. 

But with a week to go until her declared deadline, Mayor Lori Lightfoot stepped back and said she would not discipline unvaccinated employees. 

When COVID-19 vaccines were first rolling out in the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended waiting 14 days between the shots and other immunizations as a precaution. But the agency has since revised its guidelines and says the wait is unnecessary.

President Joe Biden on Thursday championed COVID-19 vaccination requirements, determined that the roughly 67 million unvaccinated American adults must get the shot even as he acknowledged that mandates weren’t his “first instinct.”

Pfizer asked the U.S. government Thursday to allow use of its COVID-19 vaccine in children ages 5 to 11 – and if regulators agree, shots could begin within a matter of weeks.

Provisional data from the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, released early Wednesday, suggest the homicide rate for the United States rose 30% between 2019 and 2020. 

For women in the U.S., breast cancer is devastatingly common, with one in eight expected to develop the disease over the course of their lifetimes. And for Black women in the U.S., what comes after the diagnosis is especially worrying.

The commissioner of the Chicago Department of Water Management told members of the City Council that it was “quite impressive” that city crews had replaced 10 of the approximately 400,000 lead service lines responsible for contaminating Chicagoans’ tap water in 13 months.

Cook County Board of Commissioners President Toni Preckwinkle has announced she will run for a fourth term as the county’s top elected official, putting her response to the COVID-19 pandemic at the center of her bid for reelection.

Amid all the focus on COVID-19 vaccinations, U.S. health experts have another plea: Don’t skip your flu shot.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot acknowledged that she cannot force alderpeople to get vaccinated against COVID-19 since they are independently elected and do not report to the mayor.

The mayor said Wednesday she would not delay her order to require all city workers to be vaccinated against COVID-19 by Oct. 15 — despite pushback from the unions representing Chicago’s 11,000 police officers.

Heading out to a bar, restaurant or theater in Chicago? You may be asked to show proof of vaccination against COVID-19. Proof is not required — and a coalition of restaurateurs say it shouldn’t ever be. But a group of City Council members have a different view.

Like the Spanish flu, the coronavirus may never entirely disappear from our midst. Instead, scientists hope it becomes a mild seasonal bug as human immunity strengthens through vaccination and repeated infection. That could take time.