Magnificent News: Coronavirus Updates: The lab-leak theory returns

Limited time offer: Get one year of digital access for just $29.

View offer

Read online

Important developments in the pandemic.

By Ben Guarino
with Lindsey Bever

The Post's coronavirus coverage linked in this newsletter is free to access from this email.

The latest

Renewed interest in the origin of the coronavirus pandemic has once again placed the Chinese city of Wuhan in the spotlight. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra urged the World Health Organization on Tuesday to undertake another investigation into the early days of the outbreak, though he did so without naming China.

And while many researchers who study animal-borne viruses say natural exposure is more likely, it has not been ruled out that the virus may have accidentally been released from a laboratory. This a fine line to follow: It's too early to dismiss the lab hypothesis as a conspiracy theory. But that doesn't mean the media's skeptical, early coverage was wrong. As reporter Aaron Blake notes, when Donald Trump claimed to be confident that the virus came from a lab, the president never offered evidence to back those claims up.

Infectious-disease experts such as Anthony S. Fauci recently called for further examination. This timeline, from The Post's Fact Checker, highlights some of the key developments so far in the attempt to find this virus's origin. These kinds of investigations aren't simple — it took more than a dozen years to discover the natural source, in bats, of the first SARS virus.

Meanwhile, investigators at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are studying a handful of cases of heart muscle inflammation in young people after vaccination. These events have not been affirmatively connected to injections. A CDC spokesman said that the cases "appear to be mild and often go away without requiring treatment."

Vaccine maker Moderna will seek authorization from the Food and Drug Administration to allow teenagers 12 to 17 to get the shots. Clinical trial data show that the vaccine reached 93 percent efficacy after the first dose. And teens had similar levels of antibodies as adults.

The Biden administration is planning to allow more federal employees to continue working from home post-pandemic, if their job permits. "We anticipate this guidance will leave room for decision-making at departments and agencies, to provide maximum flexibility for defining work requirements to meet mission and workforce needs," a senior administration official told The Post. An update from the administration explaining the policy is expected in June.

Other important news

Scenes from inside D.C. restaurants show the anticipation and nerves of the first night back at full capacity.

Patients in India need care so desperately they're seeking help over the Internet from U.S. doctors, such as this intensive care physician in Missouri.

Bystanders fearful of the coronavirus stopped giving CPR last year. But D.C. fire officials want to assure people the odds of saving a life through CPR are vastly higher than the odds of catching the virus.

Here's what 10 high school valedictorians had to say about graduating at the top of the class in a pandemic.

Guide to the pandemic

Track confirmed cases, hospitalizations and deaths in the U.S. and the spread around the world.

U.S. vaccine distribution and delivery, tracked by state.

Guides: Finding vaccine appointments | Vaccines | Variants | Masks

Follow updates about the pandemic from Post reporters across the globe.

Submit a question and we may answer it in a future story or newsletter.

Your questions, answered

"My wife and I are immunocompromised — she is a lymphoma patient and I am on immunosuppressants. We are fully vaccinated, but not fully protected. I do not trust that those without masks are necessarily vaccinated or safe. What do we do? We feel even more isolated and afraid than before. Marginalized. Left behind." —Mitchell in New York

It sounds like you and your wife may be among the estimated 3 to 4 percent of people in the United States for which the coronavirus vaccines may not work very well, or at all, because of immune system deficiencies.

We certainly feel for you and we understand that this is especially concerning as federal health authorities have started loosening restrictions for those who are fully vaccinated. But given that we've been getting quite a few inquiries from readers about vaccinating people with weakened immune systems, it's probably fair to say many of them empathize with you, too. So first things first: You're not alone.

You may already know this, but just because you and your wife are not "fully protected" does not mean that your immune systems have failed you. You two may have made some protective antibodies. And even if you didn't, Charlotte Cunningham-Rundles, an immunologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, recently told The Washington Post that the immune system can still enlist protective T cells — white blood cells that help protect against viral infections.

"Many people who don't make antibodies at all still have a working T-cell side, and the T-cell side can say: 'Okay, I can do some stuff here. I can help you out. I know how to kill viruses,'" she said.

And as time goes on, there may also be other ways to try to boost immunocompromised patients' immune systems, such as boosters or high-dose shots, as well as alternative treatments such as monoclonal antibodies. These laboratory-designed antibodies have been used to treat patients with active covid-19 infections. But several companies that make them are now looking into whether monoclonal antibodies may be used to prevent the disease. AstraZeneca is running a worldwide clinical trial to study whether they would protect people like you and your wife, who are at "increased risk of inadequate response to vaccination."

Hang in there. The coronavirus and the vaccines are still new. But we will learn more as things progress.

For now, as a precaution, it might not be a bad idea to assume that maskless people are unvaccinated and continue taking the precautions that health experts still recommend for immunocompromised people — hand-washing, mask-wearing and social distancing, particularly from those who are unvaccinated or who have the potential to be.