Chicago artist Jeremih leaves hospital after COVID-19 scare (LIVE UPDATES)

Kevin
Winter/Getty Images

Here’s the latest news on how COVID-19 is impacting Chicago
and Illinois. Follow for live updates.

Latest Rapper Jeremih leaves Chicago hospital
after COVID-19 bout Kevin
Winter/Getty Images Jeremih performs onstage at the 2019 BET Awards
on June 23, 2019 in Los Angeles, California.

Chicago R&B artist Jeremih is on the mend at home after a
near-death scare with the coronavirus.

Jeremih left Northwestern Memorial Hospital this week after a
three-week battle with COVID-19,
TMZ reported Saturday.

Last month, Jeremih’s condition appeared dire when reports
surfaced that he was in the intensive care unit and on a ventilator
after experiencing complications from symptoms of COVID-19. That
news prompted several celebrities, including Chance the Rapper and
50 Cent, to rally around the 33-year-old singer.

Jeremih’s health took a turn for the better two weeks ago and
he was moved to a regular hospital room.

Since returning home, Jeremih told TMZ he’s “getting
stronger” and looking forward to hanging out with his sons. He
also thanked his family and friends who supported him and expressed
appreciation for his fans who prayed for him.

Read the full story here.

News 8 a.m. 208 more Illinois coronavirus
deaths Saturday, 2nd-highest daily toll of the pandemic

State health officials on Saturday announced an additional 208
people have died of the coronavirus, marking the second most deaths
reported in a single day over the last nine months of the
pandemic.

The Chicago area accounted for 64 of the latest fatalities. The
vast majority of those deaths reported statewide were among people
60 and older, with people under 60 accounting for 18 of the
deaths.

Illinois is in the midst of its deadliest stretch of the
pandemic. Saturday’s troubling news comes just three days after
the state reported a record-setting 238 fatalities, a figure that
shattered the previous record of 191 deaths on May 13.

Since Thanksgiving, Illinois has logged 1,224
coronavirus-related deaths, which is more than 9% of the state’s
pandemic death toll of 13,179.

Read
the full report from Madeline Kenney here.
Analysis & Commentary 12 p.m. LETTERS: State
prisoners should be among those who get pandemic vaccine quickly

Letter submitted by Ted Pearson, Co-Chairperson, Emeritus –
Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression

I agree that hospital and other health care workers and
residents of long-term care facilities
should get priority for receiving the new COVID-19 vaccine. But
let us not forget the 40,000 people crammed into Illinois prisons
and the prison staff, plus the thousands more in county jails all
over the state.

Illinois has abolished the death penalty but these men and women
are facing death from this pandemic; it is raging through
facilities where social distancing is not a choice they can make,
and where testing, masking, and cleaning supplies are not readily
available.

This is not only a moral and human rights crisis. It’s a
public health crisis. Prison staff go home every day carrying
whatever they have contracted inside. Prisoners are released at the
end of their sentences every day and are cast out into a world that
is hostile to them, often with little or no available health care
or social services. Employment, housing and medical care are not
assured and some become homeless.

From both a public health and a humanitarian perspective,
prisons and prisoners should be near the top of the list of those
to receive the new vaccines.

Read the full edition of Letters to the Editor here.

9:11 a.m. Fact-check: Yes, conservatives did share false
post about Pritzker’s daughter

While explaining why his family would not celebrate Thanksgiving
together this year, Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker blasted online
accusations that his daughter broke COVID-19 protocols at a
restaurant.

“A parody Twitter account posted a picture of a group of
individuals eating outside a Chicago restaurant, supposedly
breaking the COVID rules the city put in place,” Pritzker said at
a Nov. 17 press conference. “And the person posting the photo
claimed one of the people in it was my daughter.”

“My office put out a statement making clear this wasn’t my
daughter,” Pritzker said. “But that didn’t stop Republican
elected officials, a network of propaganda publications in the
state and some radio shock jocks from telling people that the
picture was of my daughter, despite knowing that this was a
lie.”

Pritzker said his teenage daughter, Teddi, was in Florida with
his wife, and would “remain there indefinitely” because she had
started receiving “hateful and threatening messages.”

Teddi is not identifiable among the group of 14 diners in the
photo. We decided to find out where the misinformation came from
and who shared it.

Read the full fact-checking analysis from the Better Government
Association.

Read the Full Article