With 1 mln COVID-19 deaths, U.S. gov't has dropped most pandemic protections: article

NEW YORK, May 10 (Xinhua) -- With 1 million COVID-19 deaths, U.S. President Joe Biden has dropped most pandemic restrictions, stopped most national tracking, and failed to act on even the most basic federal actions to reign this pandemic in, an article published on the website of non-profit news organization Truthout has said.

"Disabled and chronically ill Americans have been left adrift - in a maskless world many of my colleagues and friends are unable to safely leave their homes," said the op-ed article on Sunday, which was authored by Analilia Mejia, a working Latina mother of two who have lost family members and neighbors, both old and young, to the coronavirus.

"Fighting this pandemic as if we can defeat it alone has failed," she wrote. "It's time: President Biden must work with Congress immediately to ensure that supplemental COVID funding includes significant global investments to end the pandemic. Our lives are at stake - and we cannot wait another moment."

Heading into the third year of the pandemic, billions worldwide still don't have access to COVID-19 vaccines and treatments, continuing to suffer even as pharmaceutical companies reach record profits, said the article, noting that globally, less-wealthy nations have been abandoned to "vaccine apartheid".

"Here in the United States, it's communities of color, low-income people and the disabled who face the greatest burden of COVID-19, in terms of death rates but also economically and socially," said Mejia in her article, adding that those working in lower-wage fields saw higher rates of death than in most other occupations.