AP News in Brief at 11:04 p.m. EST

Omicron less likely to put you in the hospital, studies say

Two new British studies provide some early hints that theomicron variant of the coronavirusmay be milder than the delta version.

Scientists stress that even if the findings of these early studies hold up, any reductions in severity need to be weighed against the fact omicron spreads much faster than delta and is more able to evade vaccines. Sheer numbers of infections could still overwhelm hospitals.

Still, the new studies released Wednesday seem to bolster earlier research that suggests omicron may not be as harmful as the delta variant, said Manuel Ascano Jr., a Vanderbilt University biochemist who studies viruses.

“Cautious optimism is perhaps the best way to look at this,” he said.

An analysis from the Imperial College London COVID-19 response team estimated hospitalization risks for omicron cases in England, finding people infected with the variant are around 20% less likely to go to the hospital at all than those infected with the delta variant, and 40% less likely to be hospitalized for a night or more.

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High court to hold special session on vaccine requirements

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court says it will hold a special session in just over two weeks to weigh challenges to two Biden administration policies covering vaccine requirements for millions of workers, policies that affect large employers and health care workers.

The high court’s announcement Wednesday that it will hear arguments in the cases Jan. 7 comes amid rising coronavirus cases and is an extraordinarily fast timeline. The court had not been scheduled to hear cases again until Jan. 10.

A three-judge panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled 2-1 on Friday that the vaccine or testing regime for workers at larger companies could take effect. The plan requires workers at larger companies to be vaccinated or wear face masks and get tested weekly. The requirement could affect some 84 million U.S. workers.

Republican-led states, conservative organizations and businesses had challenged the requirement after the Occupational Safety and Health Administration published the rule in early November. The rule was to go into effect Jan. 4.

The high court also will hear arguments over a rule published Nov. 5 by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid that applies to a wide range of health care providers that receive federal Medicare or Medicaid funding. It requires their workers to receive the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by Dec. 6 and be fully vaccinated by Jan. 4. It was projected to affect more than 17 million workers in about 76,000 health care facilities as well as home health care providers.

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Pfizer pill becomes 1st US-authorized home COVID treatment

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. health regulators on Wednesday authorized the first pill against COVID-19, a Pfizer drug that Americans will be able to take at home to head off the worst effects of the virus.

The long-awaited milestone comes as U.S. cases, hospitalizations and deaths are all rising and health officials warn of a tsunami of new infections from the omicron variant that could overwhelm hospitals.

The drug, Paxlovid, is a faster way to treat early COVID-19 infections, though initial supplies will be extremely limited. All of the previously authorized drugs against the disease require an IV or an injection.

An antiviral pill from Merck also is expected to soon win authorization. But Pfizer’s drug is all but certain to be the preferred option because of its mild side effects and superior effectiveness, including a nearly 90% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths among patients most likely to get severe disease.

“The efficacy is high, the side effects are low and it’s oral. It checks all the boxes,” said Dr. Gregory Poland of the Mayo Clinic. “You’re looking at a 90% decreased risk of hospitalization and death in a high-risk group — that’s stunning.”

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China orders lockdown of up to 13 million people in Xi’an

BEIJING (AP) — China ordered the lockdown of as many as 13 million people in neighborhoods and workplaces in the northern city of Xi’an following a spike in coronavirus cases, setting off panic buying just weeks before the country hosts the Winter Olympic Games.

State media reported that city officials ordered all residents to stay home unless they had a pressing reason to go out and suspended all transport to and from the city apart from special cases.

One person from each household will be permitted out every two days to buy household necessities, the order said. It took effect at midnight Wednesday, with no word on when it might be lifted.

There was no word on whether the virus was the newly surging omicron variant or the far more common delta. China has recorded just seven omicron cases — four in the southern manufacturing center of Guangzhou, two in the southern city of Changsha and one in the northern port of Tianjin.

Social media posts recorded panic buying of groceries and household products, with the government saying new supplies would be brought in. Residents posting on Thursday however, said the situation remained relatively calm, with people allowed to travel in and out of the compounds in which they live.

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Hong Kong university removes Tiananmen massacre statue

HONG KONG (AP) — A monument at a Hong Kong university that commemorates the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre was removed by workers early Thursday over the objections of its creator from Denmark.

The 8-meter (26-foot) tall Pillar of Shame, which depicts 50 torn and twisted bodies piled on top of each other, was made by Danish sculptor Jens Galschiøt to symbolize the lives lost during the bloody military crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989.

But the statue became an issue of dispute in October, with the university demanding that it be removed, even as the decision drew backlash from activists and rights groups. Galschiøt offered to take it back to Denmark provided he was given legal immunity that he won’t be persecuted under Hong Kong’s national security law, but has not succeeded so far.

Workers barricaded the monument at the University of Hong Kong late Wednesday night. Drilling sounds and loud clanging could be heard coming from the boarded-up site, which was patrolled by guards.

“No party has ever obtained any approval from the university to display the statue on campus, and the university has the right to take appropriate actions to handle it at any time,” the university said in a statement Thursday.

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Pause on student loan payments is extended through May 1

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration on Wednesday extended a student loan moratorium that has allowed tens of millions of Americans to put off debt payments during the pandemic.

Under the action, payments on federal student loans will remain paused through May 1. Interest rates will remain at 0% during that period, and debt collection efforts will be suspended. Those measures have been in place since early in the pandemic, but were set to expire Jan. 31.

President Joe Biden said financial recovery from the pandemic will take longer than job recovery, especially for those with student loans.

“We know that millions of student loan borrowers are still coping with the impacts of the pandemic and need some more time before resuming payments,” he said in a statement, adding it was an issue he and the vice president “both care deeply about.”

The omicron variant of COVID-19 that has swept through the U.S. with a fury has lent a new urgency to the question over whether the moratorium would be extended. Administration officials had initially said they expected the January extension to be the last. But even as the economy improves, there are concerns that borrowers are not ready to start payments again. Once the moratorium ends, those who were already behind on payments could have wages and benefits taken away as part of debt collection efforts.

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He wore a wire, risked his life to expose who was in the KKK

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) — For nearly 10 years, Joseph Moore lived a secret double life.

At times the U.S. Army veteran donned a white robe and hood as a hit man for the Ku Klux Klan in North Florida. He attended clandestine meetings and participated in cross burnings. He even helped plan the murder of a Black man.

However, Moore wore something else during his years in the klan – a wire for the FBI. He recorded his conversations with his fellow klansmen, sometimes even captured video, and shared what he learned with federal agents trying to crack down on white supremacists in Florida law enforcement.

One minor mistake, one tell, he believed, meant a certain, violent death.

“I had to realize that this man would shoot me in the face in a heartbeat,” Moore said in a deep, slow drawl. He sat in his living room recently amid twinkling lights on a Christmas tree, remembering a particularly scary meeting in 2015. But it was true of many of his days.

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After SCOTUS hearing, a new look at baby ‘safe haven’ laws

PHOENIX (AP) — For years, Nicole Olson had longed for a baby and gone through a rigorous and emotional adoption process. Then Olson and her husband got a call asking if they’d like to adopt a newborn. That day. As soon as possible.

The baby had been relinquished through what’s known as a safe haven law. Such laws, which exist in every state, allow parents to leave a baby at a safe location without criminal consequences. The laws began to pass in state legislatures in the early 2000s in response to reports of gruesome baby killings and abandonments, which received copious media attention. Infants are at the highest risk of being killed in their first day of life, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Olson rushed to a Target, filled four carts with baby stuff and was home with the newborn boy by dinnertime. Ten years later, the baby Olson and her husband, Michael, named Porter is thriving. He’s athletic, funny and has adjusted well after a rough time during the pandemic, Olson said.

Safe haven laws drew attention this month when U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett raisedthe role they play in the debate around abortion rights. Barrett made the comments during a hearing this month on aMississippi law that would ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy — and possibly upend abortion rights established by the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion throughout the United States, and upheld by the court’s 1992 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Barrett, with a long record of personal opposition to abortion, zeroed in on a key argument against forcing women into parenthood, suggesting safe haven laws address those concerns. “Why don’t the safe haven laws take care of that problem?” she asked.

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Biden and Dems scramble to salvage social, climate package

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden, along with progressive and moderate Democrats, appears determined to return to the negotiating table with Sen. Joe Manchin, the holdout Democrat who effectively tanked the party’s signature $2 trillion domestic policy initiative.

In the days since the West Virginia lawmaker gave a thumbs down on the package, delivering a stunning blow to months of negotiations on Biden’s agenda, Democrats of the left and center have joined the White House in attempting to salvage the social services and climate change bill.

“We have worked too long and too hard to give up now, and we have no intention of doing so,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said in a statement Wednesday.

Jayapal said she and members of the caucus have expressed the need for the White House to pursue achieving the plan’s goals through a combination of Biden’s executive powers and legislation, instead of legislation alone.

“The legislative approach, while essential, has no certainty of timing or results,” she said, “and we simply cannot wait to deliver tangible relief to people that they can feel and will make a difference in their lives and livelihoods.”

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‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’ actor Sally Ann Howes dies at 91

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Sally Ann Howes, who played as a child actor before she later starred in the 1968 film “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” with Dick Van Dyke, has died. She was 91.

Her son Andrew Hart Adler confirmed his mother’s death in an interview with the Press Association on Wednesday. Her nephew, Toby Howes, said on Twitter that the family hoped Howes could “hold on” until the Christmas screening of “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,” but he said she ultimately died peacefully in her sleep.

The cause of Howes’ death has not been released.

The New York Times reported she died in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, on Sunday.

Howes, an English actor, began her career on the big screen at the age of 12 in the 1943 film “Thursday’s Child,” where she played a schoolgirl turned successful actor. She comes from an acting lineage that includes her parents, Bobby Howes and Patricia Malone.