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A somber Christmas decoration decks the Capitol steps
For about an hour on Wednesday, a construction paper chain made up of nearly 5,000 interlaced rings — red, green, yellow, white and blue — bedecked the steps outside the state Capitol building. Each ring bore the name of one of Wisconsin’s 72 counties. Each county had one ring for every one of its residents […]
Home test, exposure app among state’s new pandemic-battling tools
Wisconsin is getting a few little presents in the midst of the continuing pandemic: A new home COVID-19 test. An app that reports if you’ve been exposed to someone with the coronavirus. And confirmation that the new COVID-19 vaccines will be free for the people who get them. But as state officials unwrapped those gifts, […]
Evers drafts ‘compromise’ bill on COVID-19, urges GOP leaders to act
In a move that carried the air of “put up or shut up,” Gov. Tony Evers sent the Republican leaders of the state Legislature a draft bill Monday incorporating what he described as “the items on which all of us can agree” to further address the COVID-19 pandemic in Wisconsin. Evers’ proposal incorporates items from […]
GOP lawmakers wipe out parts of PFAS emergency rule
Republican lawmakers voted Friday to strip out portions of an emergency rule to regulate firefighting foam containing PFAS chemicals — an action critics charged would gut the rule. Republicans on the Joint Committee for the Review of Administrative Rules (JCRAR) said the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) rule went outside the bounds of the legislation […]
High court hears 25% capacity limit arguments
Having stripped the state health department in May of its ability to unilaterally impose wide-reaching public health orders to curb a deadly disease, the Wisconsin Supreme Court heard arguments Thursday about whether even a more limited order was out of bounds. Thursday’s oral arguments revolved around the ill-fated limit on public indoor gatherings that Gov. […]
Unemployment insurance woes get auditors’ spotlight
Tens of thousands of people who have been waiting on their unemployment insurance claims may learn by the end of the year whether they will get paid and start receiving funds, the acting head of the state’s labor department told lawmakers Wednesday. Currently there are about 35,000 who have had to wait longer than three […]
Faith leaders join to lobby lawmakers for COVID-19 legislation
Faith group leaders are meeting with state lawmakers this week, urging them to pass legislation to combat the coronavirus pandemic with stronger public health measures. The lobbying visits will include Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Buddhist participants, according to the organizers. The campaign is the work of the “Faithful Action for a Healthy Wisconsin” coalition, a […]
Assembly COVID ideas fall flat with these small business owners
Michelle Tressler recalls the evening of May 13 after the state Supreme Court canceled Wisconsin’s Safer at Home order that had blocked sit-down traffic at bars and restaurants like hers to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. People she knew texted her with congratulatory messages. “I had no congratulatory feeling,” says Tressler, who with her […]
Regional health insurers hire Nygren to lead trade association
A former Republican lawmaker who spent much of his latter career advancing treatment-focused approaches to opioid addiction but who also opposed expanding Wisconsin’s Medicaid program will take the helm of a trade group for regional health insurance plans. John Nygren, who stepped down two weeks ago after a 14-year career in the Wisconsin Assembly — […]
First shipments of COVID-19 vaccine arrive in Wisconsin, to be given this week
The first COVID-19 shots in Wisconsin will be administered this week to healthcare workers, state health officials confirmed Monday, following the emergency use authorization over the weekend of the vaccine developed by Pfizer and its partner, Germany-based BioNTech. The first 10,000 vaccine doses for the state arrived Monday, Deputy Health Secretary Julie Willems Van Dijk […]
Advocate sees pandemic’s toll as it presses on the elderly
Wisconsin has been working to try to keep nursing homes safe from COVID-19. But as the pandemic has surged across the state this autumn, it has hit nursing home residents and employees hard, too. Just how hard was made clear by a new analysis from the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), which every four […]
Report: Nursing home infections, deaths from COVID-19 rose sharply in November
One in 50 Wisconsin nursing home residents died from COVID-19 in the four weeks ending Nov. 15, and infections from the coronavirus have tripled in the same period, according to new government data. Along with the surge in recent infections and deaths in that four-week period, COVID-19 cases among nursing home employees have doubled in […]