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After rising for weeks, the rate of daily COVID-19 cases in the U.S. has started to level off. But now, just as we saw in the spring, the country is facing a spike in deaths.

In the new issue of The Atlantic, two stories share the cover. One, by Ed Yong, is about the pandemic. The other, by Ibram Kendi, is about racism in America. Both ask the same question: how did it come to this?

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Millions of students are getting ready to head back to school. Some already have. NPR’s Anya Kamentez reports on what happens when positive cases crop up — as they inevitably will.

School nurses understand the challenges of returning to school safely better than just about anyone. But NPR’s Clare Lombardo reports somenurses have no input in the process.

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Rosa Brooks, law professor at Georgetown University, recently helped organize an experiment to game out what might happen if the winner on election night isn’t immediately clear. She explains what she found.

And NPR’s Sally Herships reports on cuts at the postal service — and concerns they’re politically motivated.

Garrett Graff wrote about how election day could go off the rails for Politico Magazine.

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The spread of the virus exceeds our capacity to test, contact trace, and isolate those who test positive. Some public health experts say the only option that remains is a second shutdown. NPR’s Rob Stein reports on what that would look like.

Derek Thompson, writer and editor at The Atlantic, says there’s another part of our virus strategy we may need to rethink. He calls it ‘hygiene theater.’

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The CEOs of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google faced questions today from a House subcommittee. Some lawmakers believe those companies have too much economic and political power. Former Facebook policy executive Dipayan Ghosh agrees.

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John Lewis, the civil rights icon and late congressman from Georgia who represented Atlanta for more than three decades, spent his life fighting for equal voting rights in America.

Myrna Perez, Director of the Voting Rights and Elections Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, explains why his work remains unfinished.

Lewis spoke to ‘Fresh Air’ in 2009. Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

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This morning in Savannah, Georgia, the first volunteer was injected in a phase-three vaccine trial administered by Moderna and the National Institutes of Health. Dr Anthony Fauci hopes that up to 15,000 volunteers will be in place by the end of the week. (Tens of thousands more will be needed for additional vaccine trials.)

It will take months to learn if the vaccine produces an effective immune response. Scientists who’ve studied antibody reactions in coronavirus patients have reason to be optimistic, at least in the short-term.

And Dr Elke Webber, psychology professor at Princeton University, explains why the pandemic may be getting too big to wrap our heads around.

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More than 25 million Americans have been receiving expanded federal unemployment benefits — $600 a week. Those benefits disappear in days.

Congress is unlikely to agree on new package before the end of next week. And temporary moratoriums on evictions are coming to an end in many places around the country.

NPR’s Noel King spoke with Matt Desmond, founder of Princeton University’s Eviction Lab, about what could happen if Congress doesn’t provide more help, and why so many American families were already in trouble before the pandemic.

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Monument Avenue is a large, tree-lined street in Richmond, Virginia that used to have several confederate statues and monuments. In the wake of protests against racism and police brutality, the city has removed most of the. But a monument of Robert E. Lee still stands — for now.

Even before the statues started coming down, WVTF’s Mallory Noe-Payne reports that Richmond residents began reclaiming the space where it stands.

And historian Julian Hayter tells NPR’s Scott Simon there’s a way for confederate statues to tell a different story.

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Up to 70% of vote this November could be cast by mail. But not all states will allow it.

And a recent NPR survey found that 65,000 absentee or mail-in ballots have been rejected this year for being late.

NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly visited a county in Pennsylvania to see what challenges lay ahead for election night in a critical swing state.

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