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The Pittsburgh Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles will both start their respective NFL schedules without fans in the stands when they play at Heinz Field and Lincoln Financial Field, respectively. What will it take for that to change? Health Department Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine weighed in on Friday, just days before both teams play their season openers on the road and two weeks before each plays a home game amid the coronavirus pandemic. Both franchises have said that they won’t have fans in attendance until at least the end of September, but each said in emails to their season ticket holders...

Desks sitting six feet apart will not allow students to skirt the universal mask or face shield mandate ordered by the state Department of Health, according to guidance that was issued on Monday to school officials. Pennsylvania’s Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine said on Tuesday this guidance is a clarification, rather than a change, in rules that were sent out to schools in July that drew a lot of questions. “What we heard is some of the language isn’t as clear as it could be so we wanted to make sure that we were as clear as possible,” Levine said...

Students over the age of 2 will be required to wear face coverings for nearly the entire school day under Pennsylvania’s universal mask order, according to a Department of Education memo released this week. There will be a limited number of instances in which students will be allowed to remove their face coverings, according to the memo. These include while eating or drinking, or during an activity that makes mask-wearing unsafe. Students can also take their masks off during 10-minute “face-covering breaks.” “For the safety of students, staff and families and to avoid community spread of COVID-19, students and staff...

Pennsylvania’s health secretary said Thursday she expects students will return to classrooms in August. However, Dr. Rachel Levine also said school reopening is closely tied to success in quelling the recent resurgence of cases, which is highly dependent on state residents wearing face masks and following other steps intended to slow the spread of COVID-19. She said “it’s critical to drive the case counts down now … in order for schools to reopen. If we don’t do that now, we put [school reopening] in jeopardy.” Levine noted that some school districts are planning a combination of classroom and online education....

Pennsylvania Health Department Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine took to Pittsburgh’s KDKA NewsRadio on Thursday morning to further explain the expanded mask-wearing order she signed on Wednesday. Levine hit on a number of familiar talking points. She repeated her familiar refrain: “my mask protects you and your mask protects me.” And she said that the order, which says citizens should wear a face-covering anytime they leave their home and will be around other people unless they’re under the age of two or have a medical or work-related reason not to, is not political. Rather, it’s meant to help prevent an outburst...

At least 54,000 residents and workers have died from the coronavirus at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities for older adults in the United States, according to a New York Times database. As of June 26, the virus has infected more than 282,000 people at some 12,000 facilities. Nursing home populations are at a high risk of being infected by — and dying from — the coronavirus, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, is known to be particularly lethal to adults in their 60s and older who have underlying...

Employees who likely don’t know they have COVID-19 are carrying it into long term care facilities in Lebanon County and infecting residents. While that leads to a high case count for the facilities, it also reflects the prevalence of COVID-19 in the larger community, according to state Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine. Levine said a “combination of community spread” and long term care cases are responsible for the recent high rate of increase in Lebanon County. That has made Lebanon the only county in the state that hasn’t been cleared to enter the green reopening status. “The nursing homes...

HARRISBURG — In the fall of 2016, Karen Murphy, then secretary of Pennsylvania’s Department of Health, pledged to reform how the state oversees its nursing homes. The auditor general, Eugene DePasquale, had identified serious problems in the state’s conduct: outdated regulations, dangerously low staffing requirements for nurses, and overarching issues with weak and inconsistent inspections. Some of the issues had persisted for more than a decade, the audit found, and compromised the safety of elderly residents. In 2019, the auditor’s office followed up to see if the Department of Health’s oversight had improved as promised, only to find many of...

There are calls for resignation and profuse offers of apology after a Pa. township official attacked Pa. health secretary Dr. Rachel Levine’s gender. As KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh reports, it happened in Scott Township, Allegheny County, where Commissioner Paul Abel made these comments during Tuesday night’s commissioner’s meeting broadcast over Zoom: “I’m tired of listening to a guy dressed up like a woman,” said Abel, referring to Levine. The comment came after Abel asked Commissioner Angela Wateska about the “green” phase and what comes after that as the township emerges from the coronavirus lockdown under Pennsylvania’s phased reopening largely being led...

Several Pennsylvania counties could remain under lockdown until June 5, Gov. Tom Wolf (D) indicated on Friday. Wolf said during Friday’s press briefing that his stay-at-home order has saved lives, and he announced two weeks of sustained reductions in hospitalizations of coronavirus patients, dropping by nearly 1,000 patients from May 8 to May 21. Forty-nine of the state’s 67 counties are currently in the state’s yellow phase of reopening. That number will increase to 57 next Friday, with the addition of Dauphin, Franklin, Huntingdon, Lebanon, Luzerne, Monroe, Pike and Schuylkill moving to the yellow phase. However, Wolf signaled that the...

JERSEY SHORE – A state House member accuses the Department of Health of not having any idea of what is happening at the ManorCare Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Jersey Shore except what it is being told. “I find this not only unacceptable but grossly negligent if not criminal” that the department does not know how many patients there have died from COVID-19, Rep. Gareth D. Everett, R-Lycoming, wrote Tuesday email to a number of state officials including Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine. The department’s statistics of seven deaths and 71 residents and 14 staff testing positive differ from...

HARRISBURG, Pa. — A man born as Richard who now identifies as Rachel, and who has officially led Pennsylvania’s Department of Health as secretary since 2018, is being broadcast on television screens across the commonwealth on a daily basis as he provides regular briefings on the status of COVID-19 in the Keystone state, exhorting residents on taking care of their physical and mental health. “Your job right now is to stay calm, stay safe and please stay at home,” Levine said in a press conference on Monday, wearing a scarf, black dress with Mary Jane shoes, and nail polish. “As...

A state senator from Franklin County has called for the immediate resignation of Pennsylvania Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine, saying her actions were a major factor in the large number of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the state’s nursing homes. Sen. Doug Mastriano, a first-term Republican representing Franklin, Adams and a part of York counties, said Levine has committed the equivalent of policy malpractice in her handling of the coronavirus pandemic, specifically in her handling of the virus’s spread through nursing homes and other long-term care facilities. Mastriano specifically targeted Levine for a policy which called for nursing home and...