AMERICA RESPONDS 2020

America Responds Unprecedented global health crisis pushes nation into action • Businesses of all sizes weigh options • Stories of front-line heroes and survivors • Money and morale: Stars do their part

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Inside Retailers adjust to market’s new realities

Maribel Perez Wadsworth

h Walmart adds muscle to its online arm by hooking up with Shopify, as shopping habits see a radical shift. 10 h Kroger and other grocers keep the shelves stocked and reassure Americans that there’s plenty of food. 12 h CVS and Walgreens rev up testing capabilities. 14 h Lowe’s accelerates timeline for its digital revamp. 16

Publisher and President, USA TODAY Network

Nicole Carroll Editor in Chief

Tech fi rms are on point in COVID-19 era

Patty Michalski

h Microsoft accommodates a world that has crammed 2 years’ worth of transformation into just 2 months. 34 h Amazon Web Services plays a vital role, even as the pandemic creates tough questions for its parent. 36 h Apple moves its big show online. It and Google work together to make contact-tracing apps possible. 38, 40 h Dell recovers vital medical data and prints up PPE. 42 h Facebook makes a priority of getting out the vote. 44 h CDW infrastructure helps work shift to remote. 46

Executive Editor

Issue editor Lori Santos

Issue photo editor Emily Johnson

Issue designers David Anesta Tiffany Clemens Bill Campling

Wireless providers build connections

h Verizon sees a chance to help female entrepreneurs weather the viral storm, then come back stronger. 50 h AT&T keeps fi rst responders on the line and supports distance learning through a variety of initiatives. 52

Design manager Jennifer Herrmann

Auto insurers pay their customers back

h A drastic decline in driving — and accidents — leads Allstate, State Farm and others to offer discounts and rebates. Consumer groups say it isn’t enough. 54, 56

National Guard sees one of its ‘fi nest hours’

h It’s the largest domestic operation since Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Troops are conducting tests, helping at hospitals, delivering critical supplies and more. 66

Joel Stallworth’s store, The Small Shop LA, was hit by looters, but he won’t give in to anger: “I understand the hurt” in the community, he says. HARRISON HILL/USA TODAY

A year of body blows for small business

First came the disruptions of COVID-19, then damage and looting that accompanied demonstrations. Entrepreneurs across the U.S. contemplate an uncertain future. 86

Retailers make time for those at risk

Generosity becomes key business metric

Everyday Americans making a big impact

Stars have platform, and they’re using it

COVID-19 survivors may never be same

As stores began to reopen, many set aside special hours for older customers and people with underlying conditions. A look at what big chains are doing. 18

With the lives and livelihoods of employees and customers on the line, fi rms rethink priorities. 24 h Rescue program for midsize fi rms gets a late start, but a strong one. 48

A doctor on the front line.

A survivor putting his blood to work. A pharmacist who heals with art. A store owner staying open.

A teacher asking the right questions. And others. 58

Celebrities like Chris Rock leverage fame to raise awareness, raise money or just raise spirits. 68 h With no games to play, athletes apply their talents in helpful ways. 74

Interviews with people who fought the virus reveal lingering effects — some physical, others emotional. “The fear of the unknown, that’s really the worst part.” 78

ISSN#0734-7456 A USA TODAY Publication, Gannett Co. Inc. USA TODAY, its logo and associated graphics are registered trademarks.

All rights reserved.

Editorial and publication headquarters are at 7950 Jones Branch Drive, McLean, VA 22108.

About the cover Design: David Anesta Image: A medic in Paterson, New Jersey, arrives at a home to check on a possible case of COVID-19 in mid-April.

By Amy Newman/ NorthJersey.com

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Here’s to those helping others get through The coronavirus pandemic has expanded our defi nition of “hero.” This special edition is a tribute to the people and businesses that keep the nation going — whether they’re supplying essentials, creating safer ways to work and shop, opening their hearts and wallets, sharing their powerful and moving stories, or just off ering moral support. It’s USA TODAY’s salute to those Americans making a real diff erence. Be safe.

Clockwise from top left: A sign at a Kroger grocery store in Atlanta on May 5 limits beef purchases after multiple meat processors had to shut down. A paramedic in Paterson, New Jersey, arrives to check on a person with COVID-19 symptoms on April 16. Shoppers wear masks in Chicago on May 19. Nyasha Sarju gets a virus test on June 8 after participating in a Black Lives Matter protest in Seattle. JEFF AMY/AP, AMY NEWMAN/NORTHJERSEY.COM, SCOTT OLSON/GETTY IMAGES, ELAINE THOMPSON/AP

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Walmart adds muscle to its online arms Dalvin Brown USA TODAY

As the coronavirus pandemic shifted consumer spending out of physical stores and into online marketplaces on an unprecedented scale, Walmart struck a deal with e-commerce platform Shopify to capitalize on the surge.

The partnership will add 1,200 Shopify vendors to the Walmart Marketplace by the end of the year, giving online shoppers access to more products. Walmart Marketplace already off ers items sold by more than a million businesses.

Walmart will be able to off er products from more U.S.-based small and midsize businesses through the partnership, the retailer said June 15. “We’re excited to be able (to) off er customers an expanded assortment while also giving small businesses access to the surging traffi c on Walmart.com,” the company said.

Shopify is a selling platform that allows anyone to set up a store and off er products online and in-person. The deal gives merchants access to Walmart’s broad customer base. The partnership also helps Walmart better compete with Amazon and its third-party marketplace.

Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, has seen a surge in digital purchases from Americans under stay-at-home orders to curb the spread of the coronavirus. The company’s U.S. e-commerce business grew 74% in the fi rst quarter of 2020, and marketplace sales outpaced the overall business, Walmart said.

In the fi rst quarter, which ended March 31, Americans spent $160.3 billion online, up 13.7% from the same period in 2019, according to the latest U.S. Department of Commerce data. Those sales included a lot of the initial panic buying that took place as people stocked up after the pandemic was declared.

Elevated online spending continued throughout April and May, according to the research fi rm Digital Commerce 360.

Walmart was a lifeline to many consumers as the coronavirus spread, leading to surging profi t and sales for the world’s largest retailer.

Unlike online rivals such as Amazon, Walmart enjoys an extensive network of nearly 5,000 physical stores and a variety of delivery and pick-up options that it ramped up to meet crushing demand for essential items, from paper towels to

Customers maintain social distancing as they wait to enter a Walmart store in Milwaukee on May 31, 2020. The store boarded up its windows after looters struck several other retailers.

MARK HOFFMAN/MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL

canned food. Walmart’s reputation for low prices also helped as the unemployment rate spiked.

“Having a wide range of fulfi llment options, including delivery to home, collection from store — and by using stores

for fulfi llment — allowed Walmart to ramp up capacity in a way that many other players struggled to do,” said Neil Saunders, managing director at GlobalData Retail.

The Associated Press contributed

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This Kroger grocery in Newport, Kentucky, was well-stocked with produce in April even as the pandemic’s grip was tightening. ALBERT CESARE/CINCINNATI ENQUIRER

Kroger keeps shelves full, just like always Alexander Coolidge Cincinnati Enquirer

As supermarket shelves emptied of essential items in March, grocery executives like Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen tried to send a calming message.

In a meeting at the White House in March, McMullen and other retail industry leaders asked the McMullen administration to “let AP people know there’s plenty of food and plenty of things in the supply chain,” McMullen said. “And as long as customers just buy what they need and don’t hoard, there will be no problems at all — there’s plenty of food in the supply chain.”

McMullen urged the public to remember that the grocery business deals in perishable goods, so it is set up to be continually restocking the shelves. In Kroger’s case, the company also operates 37 factories producing an array of items, from milk and dairy products to maple syrup and canned goods — and all of those factories were working overtime.

Kroger has more than 2,700 grocery stores in 35 states and the District of Columbia. It operates stores under the Kroger name as well as brands like Ralphs, Dillons, Smith's, Fry’s, City Market, Pay Less, Harris Teeter, Pick ’n Save, Copps, Fred Meyer and Food 4 Less.

“Some stores get a delivery truck once a day, some every other day and some stores get multiple deliveries a day,” McMullen said. He acknowledged that

“As long as customers just buy what they need and don’t hoard, there will be no problems at all — there’s plenty of food in the supply chain.”

Rodney McMullen Kroger CEO

some vendors, such as those making hand sanitizers, were struggling to meet the high demand.

McMullen said he tried to stay apace with the crisis by inspecting one or two stores a day and conferring with industry peers as far as China, where the coronavirus was fi rst identifi ed in December before spreading worldwide.

He also said he’s encouraged by how Kroger employees rose to the occasion as the crisis deepened. “It’s exciting ... all our teams are really working full out. I’m so proud of our teams,” McMullen said.

Kroger Health, the supermarket retailer’s health care arm, said it was making free drive-thru testing for COVID-19 available at 50 locations in more than 12 states by the end of May for up to 100,000 tests.

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Drugstores kick tests into high gear CVS, Walgreens expand operations at drive-thrus and in parking lots across U.S. Nathan Bomey USA TODAY

Drugstore chains CVS and Walgreens launched and then expanded free coronavirus testing services.

CVS Health started off ering largescale testing in March at some locations in fi ve states. The next month, it announced that it would soon dramatically ramp up the use of "self-swab tests to individuals meeting Centers for Disease Control and Prevention criteria."

The new free self-swab testing was to take place at up to 1,000 CVS locations, which comes out to more than 1 in 10 of the company's stores.

Patients could schedule tests online and get tested in CVS parking lots or at drive-thru windows. The company said it wouldn’t do testing inside its stores.

The company said its goal was to process up to 1.5 million tests monthly.

Meanwhile, Walgreens said it would open free drive-thru nasal-swab testing sites in 49 states and Puerto Rico. It wasn’t immediately clear how many stores would off er tests, but the company said it expected to test more than 50,000 people weekly once the program was fully operational.

Walgreens already had 18 drive-thru testing sites open in 11 states. Patients were required to make an appointment online and meet CDC criteria.

Mega-retailer Walmart, which began opening free drive-thru testing sites in mid-March, planned to expand to more than 100 sites by the end of May. That would allow it to conduct 20,000 tests a week, the retailer said.

Walgreens said it would "focus its efforts on improving access to testing in underserved communities, and over time will also be working with companies to provide testing to employees, to help more businesses reopen in the weeks and months ahead."

CVS also said it would place a special emphasis on improving "access to testing and necessary care for historically underserved communities," including by boosting mobile testing options.

"Employees participating in the test collection process will maintain safety

CVS pharmacy technician Berto Cortez shows how COVID-19 tests are processed at a medical clinic in Phoenix in June. PHOTOS BY ROSS D. FRANKLIN/AP

using personal protective equipment and follow sanitization protocols after each test," CVS said in a statement.

People who seek to register for a test would be "asked a series of questions based on established CDC criteria for testing," CVS spokesman T.J. Crawford said. "If you meet that criteria, you’ll be able to choose a time slot."

A CVS customer stops at a drive-thru testing site in Phoenix to take the self-swab test. The tests were available to people who met the CDC’s criteria.

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Shopping at a Lowe’s in Farmingdale, New York. Lowe’s boosted store workers’ pay during the pandemic and revamped its online operation. BRUCE BENNETT/GETTY IMAGES

Lowe’s online renovation comes just in time Anne D’Innocenzio The Associated Press

An eff ort by home improvement retailer Lowe’s to revamp its outdated online business came just in time as shoppers stuck at home because of the pandemic shifted to online shopping for supplies for do-it-yourself projects.

The nation’s second-largest home improvement retailer, behind Home Depot, said quarterly online sales increased 80%. Lowe’s had been planning to start off ering curbside pickup service next year, but the pandemic sped up that timeline — to say the least. It launched the service in three days.

Meanwhile, the company’s comparable sales for the U.S. home improvement business increased 12.3% in the quarter that ended May 1. Marvin Ellison, Lowe’s CEO, said business got a boost also from shoppers using their stimulus checks on

“In late February, we shifted our priorities in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and immediately focused on how best to serve the needs of our communities during this unprecedented time.”

Marvin Ellison Lowe’s CEO

major appliances like refrigerators and washing machines.

“In late February, we shifted our priorities in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and immediately focused on how best to serve the needs of our communities during this unprecedented time,” Ellison said in a statement.

Lowe’s booming sales fi gures followed similarly healthy numbers from Home Depot, which also saw a surge in spending on cleaning products and home improvement items.

At the same time, however, retailers are also incurring extra costs related to the pandemic. Lowe’s had $340 million in virus-related expenses in the fi rst quarter, including bonuses and higher temporary pay for workers.

The Mooresville, North Carolinabased chain made two special payments of $300 apiece for full-time hourly associates and $150 apiece for part-time

hourly associates to help with unexpected expenses. Those payments totaled about $145 million. The retailer also increased pay by $2 per hour for the month of April for front-line associates.

Ellison said that as the economy reopens, Lowe’s has been seeing sales growth in its professional and do-ityourself businesses tracking higher than that of the overall company.

Ellison, a one-time Home Depot executive who took the top job at Lowe’s in 2018, has been trying to reshape the culture at Lowe’s, which had been a distant second in the sector for a while. Ellison has focused on getting Lowe’s back to the fundamentals of retailing, like making sure the right items are in stock and improving customer service.

The company has also been updating its website. Among the features on deck: Customers will soon be able to check out with one click.

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Retailers make time for the at-risk

A barrier cleverly constructed of shopping carts controls the flow of customers at a Costco store in Washington, D.C., in April. Many retailers closed temporarily as the coronavirus pandemic took hold. Others stayed open with adjusted schedules and policies, including special hours for seniors and others. JIM WATSON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Special shopping hours accommodate seniors and people with health conditions Kelly Tyko USA TODAY

As stores reopened after temporarily closing due to the coronavirus pandemic, many of them set aside time for their most vulnerable customers to shop.

Similar to what supermarkets and other essential retailers started doing in March to help protect older adults and people with underlying health conditions, retailers such as Kohl’s, JCPenney, T.J. Maxx, HomeGoods and Ross set aside special hours for those shoppers.

At-risk shopping hours were typically at the start of the day, when stores were at their cleanest.

On top of that, many stores initially reopened with reduced hours compared with their pre-COVID-19 operations.

As of early June, for example, Kohl's

was operating on reduced hours and had added curbside pickup to stores. It also set aside one hour a week on Wednesday mornings for seniors, pregnant women and people with health conditions.

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Like many retailers, Kohl's department stores took a cautious approach to reopening, starting with reduced hours and a special weekly time for at-risk shoppers.

"Everything we're doing, we're doing in a very measured and paced way,” Kohl’s CEO Michelle Gass said. “We’re ... going to gauge customer response.” JEFF CHIU/AP Continued from Page 18

"Everything we're doing, we're doing in a very measured and paced way,” Kohl’s CEO Michelle Gass said in an interview with USA TODAY. “We're really going to gauge customer response, our associate feedback and determine when and if we extend our shopping hours.”

JCPenney, which fi led for bankruptcy protection May 15 and planned to permanently close 242 stores with liquidation sales, said it had "designated shopping hours for our at-risk customers at all

reopened stores on Wednesdays and Fridays from 11 a.m. to noon."

Sara Skirboll, a shopping and trends expert at savings website RetailMeNot, said she hopes stores will continue to offer special hours for seniors and other immunocompromised shoppers. She encouraged such consumers to take advantage of curbside pickup or delivery to avoid crowds, as well as to look for stores that were allowing customers to set up shopping appointments.

“For those who need assistance from a sales associate, this is a great way to off er

that service without overwhelming shoppers,” Skirboll said.

As essential retailers, many grocery stores never closed but did operate on reduced hours. Many of those have since expanded their hours.

On May 16, for example, Publix stores expanded their open hours — to 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. — and pharmacies returned to regular hours. But the Florida-headquartered grocery chain also suspended its twice-weekly reserved shopping hours for seniors 65 and over.

Old Navy reopened its fi rst stores in

Texas in early May, and shoppers were waiting outside stores before they opened, Old Navy president Nancy Green said. Stores quickly expanded hours to 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily, she said.

“We'll just keep watching it and seeing where the customer need is and adjust accordingly,” Green said.

Diff erent retailers made diff erent decisions. For example, while Costco and Walgreens had resumed regular schedules as of June 1, Target and Walmart had Continued on Page 22

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not yet gone back to pre-COVID hours or announced plans to do so.

“We are continuously evaluating each decision we’ve made during our coronavirus response," Target said in a statement. "Our early store closings is to allow our team members to restock shelves with essential items our guests look for daily, as well as provide us an opportunity to deeply clean our stores."

Walmart offi cials told USA TODAY that its special shopping hour for seniors and those most vulnerable has been extended. The designated hour began in March and was set to end in late April but was extended through May and now until further notice.

Naveen Jaggi, president of retail advisory services at brokerage fi rm JLL, told USA TODAY that he doesn't see reduced store hours or senior hours lasting longterm "because retail thrives best when available to everyone.”

“For essential retailers, like grocery stores, I would expect this to continue longer than at discretionary retailers,” Jaggi said.

Once normal hours and restrictions on the number of people allowed in stores revert to pre-COVID-19 levels, Jaggi expects “specialized hours for diff erent age demographics to also cease.”

Retailer hours vary Here’s a look at where things stood at major national retailers as of June 1. Special hours in some cases varied by location. Not all stores had reopened. Check retailer websites for up-to-date info. h Big Lots: Stores were reserving the fi rst hour of each day for seniors and "anyone who is vulnerable to this virus," according to Big Lots’ COVID-19 page. h BJ's Wholesale Club: Locations opened one hour early Monday through Saturday — from 8 to 9 a.m. — for members age 60 and up. On Sundays, stores had a dedicated hour from 8 to 9 a.m. for fi rst responders and health workers. h Costco: Most Costco stores, which returned to normal hours May 4, have designated an hour on Tuesdays and Thursday from 9 to 10 a.m. only for members age 60 and older or with disabilities.

Only members (not guests) would be admitted, Costco said on its COVID-19 updates page, which listed hours of stores with diff erent senior hours. h CVS: Most stores set aside an hour every Wednesday, from 9 to 10 a.m., for

Some locations of budget department store T.J. Maxx held dedicated hours for people age 60 and over or at high risk. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

at-risk customers. h Dollar General: The fi rst hour of every shopping day at the company's more than 16,000 stores in 44 states was reserved for senior shoppers. h Dollar Tree: The discount chain said it continued "to dedicate the fi rst shopping hour to our at-risk customers, including senior citizens, individuals with pre-existing health conditions, and pregnant women." h HomeGoods: Some locations held dedicated shopping hours for people age 60 and over and those at greater risk.

Check for special hours online. h JCPenney: On Wednesdays and Fridays, stores opened from 11 a.m. to noon for seniors, pregnant women and those with underlying health concerns. The retailer's general-purpose store hours were noon to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sundays. h Kohl's: Every Wednesday, Kohl’s stores were opening at 10 a.m. to off er one hour of dedicated shopping. Stores also were operating on reduced hours. h Marshalls: The retailer said it would hold dedicated shopping hours at some stores for people age 60 and over and those who are at greater risk. Check for specifi c hours online. h Ross: People 55 and older and those with "higher medical risks" could shop on Tuesdays from 9 to 10 a.m. during a designated time. h Sam's Club: The wholesale club had twice-weekly special hours for seniors,

people with disabilities and those with compromised immune systems, plus a "Shop from Your Car" concierge every Tuesday and Thursday from 7 to 9 a.m. h Target: The fi rst hour each Tuesday and Wednesday was "reserved for elderly guests, pregnant women, and those defi ned by the CDC as vulnerable or atrisk," Target noted on its website. Times varied by location, but at most stores the reserved hour was from 8 to 9 a.m. h T.J. Maxx: Some locations were holding dedicated shopping hours for people 60 and over and those who were at greater risk. Temporary store hours were 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday. h Walgreens: An hour every Tuesday from 8 to 9 a.m. was reserved for shoppers age 55 and older. On the fi rst Tuesday of each month, Walgreens also off ers a "Seniors Day" discount. h Walmart: Stores hosted an hourlong early-morning senior shopping event every Tuesday, an hour before the stores opened to the general public. Walmart also reserved a pickup window for online orders from 7 to 8 a.m. daily at select locations for seniors, high-risk shoppers and fi rst responders.

Special shopping at supermarkets Here’s what major grocery chains were doing for at-risk shoppers as of June 1. This list is not exhaustive; other chains may have similar policies. Hours

can vary by location, so check with your closest store before heading out. h Albertsons: From 7 to 9 a.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the company was reserving time for "those vulnerable shoppers who must leave home to obtain their groceries, unless otherwise locally mandated." h BI-LO: all Southeastern Grocers stores, including BI-LO, Fresco y Más, Harveys Supermarket and Winn-Dixie, were dedicating an hour for seniors and high-risk customers to shop from 7 to 8 a.m. Monday through Friday. h Fresh Market: The grocer, which has 159 stores in 22 states, was reserving the fi rst hour stores were open, from 8 to 9 a.m., for "seniors and those most at risk" Monday through Friday. h Kroger: Hours, including senior shopping hours, vary at the company's various grocery store chains and are listed at www.kroger.com/i/coronavirusupdate/store-information. h Meijer: The retailer reserved two hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6 to 8 a.m. for seniors and customers with chronic health conditions. It lengthened its regular store hours at most locations to 6 a.m. to midnight. h Publix: When Publix expanded its operating hours on May 16, it suspended its twice-weekly reserved shopping hours for people 65 and over. In a statement, Publix said it encourages shoppers who prefer to shop when stores are less crowded to shop during the fi rst hour of the day “when we can better accommodate that need.” h Safeway: From 7 to 9 a.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the company was reserving time for "those vulnerable shoppers who must leave home to obtain their groceries, unless otherwise locally mandated." h Stop & Shop: This retailer, which has more than 400 stores throughout Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York and New Jersey, set aside 90 minutes each morning from 6 to 7:30 a.m. for shoppers 60 and older or with a weakened immune system. h Trader Joe's: The fi rst hour of daily shopping was reserved for people 60 and over and shoppers with disabilities. Exact times varied by location. h Whole Foods Market: All Whole Foods Market stores in the United States and Canada were letting customers age 60 and older shop one hour before stores opened to the general public.

Contributing: Susan Selasky, Detroit Free Press

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Corporate compassion

Locally owned Tide Cleaners stores helped Tide offer free laundry and dry cleaning service to front-line workers. AUSTIN WALSH STUDIO 2017/PHOTO PROVIDED BY TIDE

Companies across country respond to extreme circumstances with kindness, generosity

T

Matt Alderton

Special to USA TODAY

o assess the health of a business, company executives commonly look at its balance sheet. With the lives of employees and customers on the line, however, leaders at many companies used COVID-19 as an opportunity to rethink their priorities. In the face of a global pandemic, they’ve come to understand that corporate health must be strategically aligned with public health, which means focusing as much on people as on profi ts — and, sometimes, sacrifi cing wealth for wellness. From retail and hospitality to technology and transportation, companies in virtually every sector have made kindness and generosity their newest performance metrics. Here are some of things they’ve done.

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Brian Kalma says Zappos “saw a need emerging” for what became “Customer Service for Anything.” ZAPPOS Continued from page 24

Zappos: How can we help you?

You may think of it as an online shoe store, but Zappos says its true purpose is “to live and deliver WOW.” In response to COVID-19, it has taken its customer-fi rst orientation to new extremes by launching “Customer Service for Anything.”

A hotline accessible by phone, text, email or social media, Customer Service for Anything helps pandemic-stressed customers navigate the new world in which they’re living by answering virtually any query, no purchase necessary.

Employees have facilitated food deliveries, for example, made Netfl ix recommendations and located out-of-stock grocery items. They’ve talked to single parents who needed adult conversation while quarantined with kids. They even helped a doctor get a hold of 300 pulse oximeters for remote monitoring of discharged COVID-19 patients.

“Zappos’ traditional customer service team has always answered any question that someone reaches out about. For example, customers have been known to call in for pizza delivery and help with navigational directions,” explains Brian Kalma, an “entrepreneur in residence” at Zappos. “We saw a need emerging in the world — solving for the uncertainty we ourselves were feeling — and quickly realized that by pivoting our customer service team to not only answer but specifi cally encourage these types of questions, we could serve our customers and community at large.”

Trampoline-park chain Sky Zone helped facilitate birthday parties even while closed. KEVIN WINZELER/PHOTO PROVIDED BY SKY ZONE

Tide: One less chore for heroes Americans have been using Tide laundry detergent to eliminate stubborn stains since 1946. During COVID-19, Tide saw an opportunity to off er a diff erent kind of cleansing. What it’s trying to remove isn’t so much grass, grease or coffee stains, but rather some of the stress that’s weighing on front-line workers dealing with the coronavirus. Tide hopes to give them one less thing to worry about with free laundry and dry cleaning through its Loads of Hope program.

Typically, Loads of Hope uses a mobile laundromat to provide charitable laundry service after natural disasters.

This time, however, Tide turned to its network of locally owned and operated Tide Cleaners stores.

“When we saw front-line workers working 12-hour days, self-isolating from their families and putting themselves in harm’s way for the good of oth-

ers, we knew that any little bit could help,” says Aga Orlik, Tide North America Fabric Care vice president. “If we could take laundry off their list, it would buy them just those few extra minutes with family they so desperately sought.”

As of early June, Tide Cleaners stores in 27 cities had dry cleaned more than 527,000 garments and washed and folded over 377,000 pounds of laundry for more than 69,000 front-line workers.

Sky Zone: It’s still party time COVID-19 forced families everywhere to cancel or postpone events of all kinds: weddings, funerals, reunions, vacations.

Also, birthday parties — more than 200,000 of which take place every year at Sky Zone, a chain of indoor trampoline parks with over 200 locations.

Although Sky Zone closed all of its parks in response to the pandemic, it wasn’t so quick to cancel the celebra-

tions for which it’s known. Instead, it decided to rethink them. On April 1, the company began off ering cost- and stress-free virtual birthday parties.

Sky Zone handles all the details. It creates a customized invite that parents can forward to guests, for example, and provides virtual party hosts who facilitate interactive activities like scavenger hunts and Tik Tok dance lessons. Birthday kids also receive a pass for a free jump at their local Sky Zone when it reopens, not to mention a virtual “Happy Birthday” serenade.

“Every child deserves a birthday party that makes them feel celebrated, even when they’re stuck at home,” says Fernando Eiroa, CEO of Sky Zone parent company CircusTrix. As of June, he noted, Sky Zone had hosted more than 3,000 virtual birthday parties for children around the world.

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DispatchHealth workers brought food along with medical care. DISPATCHHEALTH Continued from page 26

DispatchHealth: Bringing food, too If any business were tailor-made for a pandemic-stricken world, it might be DispatchHealth, which provides on-demand in-home health care to patients in more than 19 cities with the goal of reducing unnecessary emergency room visits. By treating minor injuries and illnesses at home, it has kept scared and vulnerable patients out of overburdened hospitals where they might have been exposed to COVID-19.

When cities and states began issuing stay-at-home orders, DispatchHealth realized it was in a position to provide not just health care, but also groceries.

“We wanted to be able to do more than treat (patients) from a medical perspective,” says Mark Prather, the company’s co-founder and CEO. “Providers were noticing that some patients — especially the elderly — were running low on food and didn’t feel safe leaving their homes during quarantine. After reaching out to partners and food banks across the U.S., we were able to collect enough food donations to put together bags of groceries that could be left with patients in need.”

As of June 1, DispatchHealth had donated more than 4,000 pounds of food to vulnerable patients, and more than $10,000 to local food banks.

IKEA: Essentials by the truckload Responding to a health care emergency like COVID-19 requires doctors and nurses, not to mention medical equipment, from masks, gloves and gowns to ventilators and vital signs monitors. But it also requires items more commonly

An IKEA store in Centennial, Colorado, fi lled a truck with items for A Precious Child, which helps at-risk children. IKEA

thought of as creature comforts. That’s why IKEA has donated $1.6 million worth of home furnishings and products to coronavirus relief eff orts, including blankets, bedding and storage items for blood drives, temporary hospitals and shelters.

Of that amount, IKEA donated $1 million worth to the American Red Cross, state health departments and local nonprofi ts. The remaining $600,000 of its contribution went toward individuals experiencing homelessness.

“During this time, it is diffi cult for homeless shelters to abide by social distancing guidelines. Many shelters are at capacity and looking at alternative locations to house individuals and families that were already homeless or recently displaced as a result of COVID-19,” says Javier Quiñones, president of IKEA Retail U.S. “For instance, the city of New Haven (Connecticut) has been working hard to move some people from the shel-

ter into hotels. These individuals are moving into empty apartments and IKEA New Haven worked with homeless shelter staff to provide key home essentials for 30 units that include kitchen tables and chairs, pots and pans, dressers, bed frames and mattresses, sheet sets, bed pillows, bath towels and bathmats.”

To date, IKEA has donated 147,513 products that have helped approximately 83,000 people.

Hilton: ‘Home’ for heath workers With travel at a standstill, the hospitality industry has been ravaged by the coronavirus. But instead of asking for help, some hoteliers mobilized quickly to give it. Hilton, for example, volunteered to house medical workers who deployed to COVID-19 hotspots around the country to assist with providing health care.

From April 13 to May 31, Hilton part-

nered with American Express to donate more than 1 million free room nights at approximately 3,000 hotels to front-line medical professionals who needed a safe place to sleep, recharge or isolate from their families to avoid potentially exposing them to the virus.

A third partner, World Central Kitchen, helped provide nearly 30,000 free, fresh meals to sustain health care workers during their stay.

“Medical professionals have been working in the most challenging conditions while sacrifi cing their own needs for the greater good. They represent the best of who we are, and it was important for us to do our part in taking care of them,” says Danny Hughes, Hilton executive vice president and president of the Americas. “We wanted to be their home away from home during this time.”

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Republic Services gave workers free meals and gift cards. REPUBLIC SERVICES Continued from page 28

Republic Services: Haul of fame At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, it sometimes felt as if the world had stopped spinning. But life went on ... and so did the need for waste hauling.

While other companies shut their doors to wait for brighter days, waste services company Republic Services had to keep on trucking — literally. Residential trash and recyclable volumes surged due to stay-at-home orders, and the company’s trucks averaged 5 million daily pickups in 41 states and Puerto Rico.

To thank its 28,000 front-line workers, Republic launched Committed to Serve, a $20 million initiative to recognize its workforce while also supporting small businesses. As part of the eightweek eff ort, it provided a weekly meal to its employees at work and a take-home family meal on Fridays, all purchased from local restaurants.

It also distributed $100 gift cards biweekly — a total of $400 per front-line worker — and asked employees to spend the money with struggling small businesses. Finally, it made a $3 million donation to its charitable foundation, which will award the money this summer to nonprofi t partners for the purpose of revitalizing small businesses.

“We wanted to bring certainty and stability to our front-line employees and the communities we serve,” says CEO Don Slager. “This initiative is targeted economic stimulus at the local level, designed to benefi t our small business customers as well as our employees, our company and our country.”

“People want to learn from experts about the changing world around them,” says Coursera CEO Jeff Maggioncalda. COURSERA

Vans: Footing the bill for friends Vans, the shoe brand of choice for skateboarders and other hip crowds for over half a century, donated more than 24,000 pairs of shoes to volunteers working at food banks in COVID-19 hotspots. It also donated more than 40,000 shoelaces to designer Michael Schmidt, who is using them to make 20,000 medical face shields to be donated to health care workers.

The highlight of the company’s efforts, however, is Foot the Bill, a global initiative whose goal is supporting 160 COVID-stressed small businesses across the United States, Europe and Asia. Each business was invited to design a custom pair of shoes and a T-shirt for sale on Vans’ website. Net proceeds from each sale go directly to the businesses, which include local skate shops, restaurants and music venues.

Nick Street, vice president of global integrated marketing, says, “As a brand ingrained in the belief that we aren’t a shoe and apparel company but a people

company that makes shoes and apparel, looking after … people has always been and will remain our top priority.”

Coursera: World has a lot to learn COVID-19 has changed the way Americans work, socialize and shop. And also, the way they learn. Online education platform Coursera has responded with initiatives designed to make education more accessible to students and workers aff ected by the coronavirus.

In March, the company started its Campus Response Initiative, which gives any college or university aff ected

by COVID-19 free access to the Coursera course catalog; by mid-June, it had launched more than 9,300 programs benefi ting more than 1 million students.

Also in March, it rolled out Coursera Together, off ering free public access to a curated collection of courses covering everything from mental health to career development. That was followed in April by the Workforce Recovery Initiative, through which local, state and federal

governments worldwide can off er free access to job-relevant courses for unemployed workers. Finally, in June came Coursera for University Students, which off ers free learning to undergraduate, graduate or recently graduated students.

Says CEO Jeff Maggioncalda. “Amidst uncertainty, people want to learn from experts about the changing world around them and how to cope.”

Lyft: More than just rides Because they’ve spent the pandemic sheltering in place, many Americans have never needed transportation less.

Others, however, have never needed it more. That’s why rideshare company Lyft activated LyftUp, a social responsibility program through which it provides expanded transportation access to riders and communities in need.

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with essential transportation needs during the pandemic. Among its many efforts are a program to provide free transportation to survivors of intimate partner and sexual violence, many of who need help fl eeing unsafe situations in which they’re stuck during quarantine; free scooter rides and bikeshare memberships for critical workers to help them commute; on-demand delivery of meals, groceries and medical supplies to children and seniors in need; and a program to off er free or discounted rides to unemployed workers who need transportation to job interviews.

“Social impact has always been baked into our company DNA,” says Lisa Boyd, Lyft’s director of social impact, “and we are constantly thinking about how to use our company’s unique superpower — the ability to provide access to transportation — to make an impact on the lives of people in need.”

Exelon: Unprecedented moves When cities and states issued stay-athome orders, the intention was to keep people safe. Unfortunately, not everyone’s home is safe enough for sheltering in place. With that in mind, energy provider Exelon implemented policies designed to help 10 million customers in fi ve states and the District of Columbia keep their lights on and their heat working during the pandemic.

First, it suspended all service disconnections and late fees through at least July 1. Then it reconnected at no cost thousands of customers whose service had been cut off within the past year.

“We’ve never done anything like this before,” says Calvin Butler Jr., senior executive vice president for Exelon and CEO of Exelon Utilities. “We saw that our customers were suff ering — businesses were closing, homeowners were losing their jobs, parents were being forced to stay home with kids — so the fi rst thing we thought in mid-March was, ‘What can we do to help?’ ”

CommScope: Making connections Network infrastructure company CommScope is in the business of connectivity. And in a world reshaped by COVID-19, where Zoom calls, remote working and online learning are routine, connectivity is more vital than ever.

Yet many Americans still lack internet

Lyft’s Lisa Boyd says the company is always looking for ways to leverage its transportation “superpower” to help people. LYFT

“When you see somebody’s son or daughter talking to their teacher online and solving a problem, you know you’re making a difference in their life.

That feels incredible.”

Morgan Kurk

CommScope executive

access — especially in rural areas.

To help families in underserved areas, CommScope, working through the nonprofi t Information Technology Disaster Resource Center, began donating Wi-Fi and LTE access points to school districts so they could affi x them along with antennas to school buses, creating makeshift mobile hot spots. Districts could then park buses near schools, in residential neighborhoods or in business districts for the purpose of providing free wireless internet to students and teachers engaged in distance learning, as well as parents working remotely.

“When you see somebody’s son or

daughter talking to their teacher online and solving a problem, you know you’re making a diff erence in their life,” says Morgan Kurk, CommScope executive vice president and chief technology offi cer. “That feels incredible.”

Cigna, New York Life: For families Among the terms that have entered the common lexicon during the pandemic is PPE, short for personal protective equipment. PPE is critical to protecting front-line health care workers — and there has been a marked shortage of it since the pandemic began. Without proper protection, hospital staff working to save lives are putting their own at risk.

And some have been lost.

Although they can’t prevent occupational deaths from COVID-19, insurers Cigna and New York Life recognized that they could help those left behind. Their Brave of Heart fund will provide charitable relief grants to support the families of health care workers who die from the coronavirus.

Through their respective foundations, each company seeded the fund with an initial $25 million and pledged to raise an

additional $100 million from outside individuals and organizations. Additionally, New York Life will match the fi rst $25 million in individual contributions, while Cigna will provide free access to mental health and wellness resources for front-line health care workers experiencing fear, stress and anxiety as a result of COVID-19. Initial grants will total $15,000 to cover immediate expenses, while follow-on grants will total up to $60,000 for longer-term needs.

“When medical professionals and their support teams go to work on any given day, they generally don’t expect to risk their lives,” says Cigna president and CEO David Cordani. “And yet, some of those individuals are not only going to get COVID-19, but succumb to it and pass. We decided there needs to be some way of recognizing that level of service and selfl essness.”

Adds Ted Mathas, chairman and CEO of New York Life, “The pandemic calls for companies to dig deep and consider how they serve others. New York Life’s mission is to provide people with fi nancial security and peace of mind in uncertain times, so we’re doing what we do best for the families of health care workers.”

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The cloud is the place to be for Microsoft The Associated Press

The coronavirus pandemic has been a blow to Microsoft in some ways and a boon in others.

Financial results from the fi rst three months of the year showed that strong demand for cloud computing services — in a world where remote work has become the norm — helped Microsoft weather the pandemic’s eff ects on its other business lines.

Quarterly revenue was $35 billion, up 15% from a year earlier, and profi t was $10.75 billion, up 22%.

Microsoft’s “intelligent cloud” business segment was its most successful in the quarter, accounting for $12.3 billion in revenue, up 27% from the previous year. That segment includes the Azure cloud computing platform, sales of which grew 59%, the company said.

Microsoft had warned investors in late February that it was likely to take a signifi cant revenue hit on the personal computing segment of its business because of the virus outbreak that, at the time, was centered in China. Supply chain problems were aff ecting its Windows licensing business and Microsoftmade Surface devices.

However, the Redmond, Washington, company said its revenue still ended up in the range of its original forecast because of a quick improvement in supply chains combined with increased demand for PCs by workers forced by the pandemic to work from home.

The pandemic cut into Microsoft’s advertising revenue for its LinkedIn jobs network and Bing search engine. But the company said it increased demand for other Microsoft services, including Xbox games and its workplace videoconferencing service, known as Teams.

“We’ve seen two years’ worth of digital transformation in two months,” CEO Satya Nadella said. He added that the company’s cloud infrastructure and other services were helping its customers “adapt and stay open for business in a world of remote everything.”

Synovus analyst Dan Morgan said the Teams employee-communications service accounts for a fraction of Microsoft’s revenue but is part of its broader subscription strategy to hook customers on its suite of workplace software.

Microsoft has joined with dozens of tech firms, universities, federal agencies and research labs in the COVID-19 High Performance Computing Consortium, which makes powerful computer resources — “from small clusters to some of the largest supercomputers” — available for coronavirus research.

Projects that are making use of the consortium’s computing power include a simulation that predicts how the virus will spread within a country; research into using antibody therapy to neutralize the virus (which could be faster than developing a vaccine); and an effort to develop better testing through genome editing.

Microsoft stands to benefi t from this new world of “remote everything.” JOHANNES EISELE/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

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Trillionaire talk turns up the heat for Amazon Firm is indispensable in pandemic, but founder’s fortune is fl ash point Brett Molina USA TODAY

We already have trillion-dollar companies. How soon before we have our fi rst trillionaire?

According to Comparisun, a site that reviews and compares products and services for small and midsize businesses, the world's fi rst trillionaire is likely to be Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.

That prediction didn’t sit well with Amazon critics, who noted the contrast between Bezos’ burgeoning wealth and the fi nancial straits suff ered by millions as the COVID-19 pandemic sledgehammered the economy.

Comparisun projects Bezos to reach trillionaire status by 2026. The site said its projection is based on taking the 34% average yearly growth in Bezos’ net worth over the past fi ve years and applying it into the future.

Bezos' net worth was recently estimated at $143 billion

by Bloomberg's Billionaires Index. That’s up more than $28 billion in the past year.

Americans sheltering at home during the coronavirus pandemic relied on Amazon’s retail operation to deliver essential supplies. The company’s cloud computing arm, Amazon Web Services, was similarly a lifeline for businesses that transitioned to remote work.

The contrast rankled critics. "Jeff Bezos is about to become the world's fi rst trillionaire while we're about to enter a depression," said Twitter user @Thomas_A_Moore.

Amazon employees have staged public protests over their safety as they continue to work during the pandemic. On May 1, workers for Amazon and other companies including Instacart held a strike protesting a lack of "adequate protection in the workplace."

Amazon said it spent more than $800 million in the fi rst half of 2020 on safety measures including masks, hand sanitizer and additional hand-washing stations at warehouses. The company also hired 175,000 new workers to keep up with demand as millions of consumers leaned on Amazon to have goods delivered.

Earlier this year, Tim Bray, an Amazon vice president and "Distinguished Engineer" at Amazon Web Services, announced he was leaving the company over the fi ring of executives who spoke out against how workers were treated in Amazon warehouses.

AWS carries a load Amazon Web Services has played a variety of critical roles during the pandemic. AWS’s COVID-19 “data lake” is a vast, centralized repository of up-to-date information about the characteristics of the novel coronavirus as well as its spread. The data is available for analysis by anyone. Meanwhile, Zoom, a provider of business video and audio conferencing that runs primarily on AWS, offered universal free access to its core conferencing technology for calls of up to 40 minutes and 100 participants.

Jeff Bezos’ net worth has been estimated at over $140 billion.

MANDEL NGAN/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

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Apple’s big show goes online-only

Apple Fifth Avenue in New York was open on a limited basis in June for online order pickup and tech support by appointment. TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Annual event still makes news, but without crowds Mike Snider and Terry Collins Special to USA TODAY

Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference is famous for dramatic announcements to audiences packed into a convention center auditorium.

Obviously, 2020 was going to diff erent.

The conference’s keynote address, which Apple usually uses to highlight its latest products, was held online only June 22 because of crowd restrictions to combat the spread of the coronavirus. The tech giant discussed new versions of its operating systems and announced that it will start using Apple-made processors in Macs instead of Intel chips. It also took time to address social turmoil in the country and around the world.

CEO Tim Cook didn’t mince words in discussing why Black lives matter and in addressing the challenges of the coronavirus during the company’s fi rst-ever all-virtual conference. The event came amid an ongoing global pandemic that has forced many governments to order residents to shelter in place, as well as worldwide outrage over the smartphone-recorded deaths of George Floyd in Minneapolis and Rayhsard Brooks in Atlanta at the hands of police.

Cook said this year’s online WWDC allowed Apple to be “more inclusive.” He said that while “senseless” killings like those of Floyd and Brooks “are sadly not new,” they have aff ected the company. He got personal saying he wants Apple to be a force of change.

Apple CEO Tim Cook delivers the keynote of the 2020 Worldwide Developers Conference on June 22. Cook discussed how COVID-19 and the social justice movement have affected the company. BROOKS KRAFT/APPLE VIA AP

Cook & Co. unveiled operating system updates for iPhones, iPads, Apple Watches and Mac computers.

Public betas for those versions of iOS, iPadOS, MacOS and WatchOS will begin in July, with fi nal software versions available this fall, Cook said.

The Apple CEO also announced that Apple would begin making its own processors for Macs. Apple expects to ship the fi rst Mac with an “Apple Silicon” processor by the end of the year, with the transition to all Macs to take about two years.

Still, new Intel-based Macs are also in the works, and software updates to support Intel-based Macs will continue for years to come. "I have never been more confi dent for the future of the Mac than I am today," Cook

said. “Creating Apple’s own chips “is a game-changer.”

Apple WatchOS 7 also will have many new features including the ability to share watch faces, allowing you to easily update them from third-party apps, websites or from friends.

And in a nod to the ongoing pandemic, a new handwashing feature on the Apple Watch will detect how long you spend washing your hands. The watch will show a countdown and send haptic signals to make sure you wash long enough.

During the pandemic, Apple has seen users generate a 40% increase in messages. The company said iOS will include new ways to stay connected with improved group conversations and new Memojis.

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Google’s Android operating system powers about 86% of smartphones worldwide. It teamed with Apple, whose iOS mostly accounts for the other 14%. MATT ROURKE/AP

Apps turn phones into contact-tracing aids Jessica Guynn USA TODAY

Google and Apple, makers of the software that powers the vast majority of smartphones in use, developed a tool that allows Android devices and iPhones to talk to each other for the purpose of contact tracing. That technology was made available to public health offi cials to develop apps that can notify phone users if they’ve been near someone who tested positive for coronavirus.

Multiple states and at least 22 countries received access to the technology.

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, whose state was among them, described the smartphone technology as being “critical to getting communities and economies back up and running.”

Google has committed more than $800 million for COVID-19 response, and Google Cloud has been helping with coronavirus research.

Apps that use the technology rely on people who have tested positive to download the app to their phone and verify their diagnosis. Their phone then communicates with nearby app-enabled phones by Bluetooth. Anyone with the app who has been in the vicinity of an infected person for at least fi ve minutes will get an anonymous notifi cation.

According to research fi rm IDC, Google’s Android operating system has about 86% of the worldwide smartphone market. Apple’s iOS accounts for 14%. By joining forces, they make it possible — in theory, at least — for nearly all phones to participate in contact tracing.

But it can’t work if people don’t use it.

Nearly 3 in 5 Americans said they would be unwilling or unable to use the technology, a Washington Post-University of

Maryland poll found. Some research suggests that such apps would need to be enabled on as many as 60% of phones to be eff ective in containing an outbreak.

The sticking point: privacy.

Some public health offi cials have been frustrated by rules set by Apple and Google that limit their ability to gather location information, phone numbers and other personal details from users.

“We believe that these strong privacy protections are also the best way to encourage use of these apps,” Apple and Google said in a statement. “Each user gets to decide whether or not to opt-in to exposure notifi cations; the system does not collect or use location from the device; and if a person is diagnosed with COVID-19, it is up to them whether or not to report that in the public health app.”

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Recovering data, printing up PPE: Dell pitches in Special to USA TODAY

A globe-spanning tech giant like Dell has a lot of roles it can play in a globe-spanning crisis.

For example: h In January, a hospital in Wuhan, China, in the province where the coronavirus outbreak is thought to have originated, suff ered a critical loss of access to patient fi les. Dell was the main provider of IT infrastructure for the hospital, and it assembled a crack team of engineers that worked for 20 hours straight, overnight, to regain access and repair 100% of the aff ected fi les.

Impressively, the engineers solved the problem entirely remotely, in time for the systems to be up and running again by the time the hospital opened the next morning. h With the world facing critical shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) for health care workers, Dell leveraged its 3-D printing capabilities to produce and distribute masks and visors. h The company provided technological expertise to nonprofi t partners that needed to adapt quickly to remote working in order to continue their operations.

“We are committed to making this diff erence through our technology, our reach, our donations, and the remarkable eff orts of our 150,000 team members,” the company said in a statement.

It all came on top of the company’s usual business, which was booming as entire sections of the economy shifted to remote work that required new computers and infrastructure.

In the fi rst quarter, Dell saw orders with banking and fi nancial services, government, healthcare and life sciences customers up 15 to 20%, said Jeff Clarke, Dell Technologies vice chairman and chief operating offi cer.

“Customers need essential technology now more than ever to put business continuity, remote working and learning plans into practice,” Clarke said. “As the world pivots from response to recovery, we’ll continue to put our broad capabilities to work.”

According to the company website, Dell has been providing fi nancial aid to support those aff ected by the pandemic, including setting aside $3 million in funds and in-kind technology donated to help front-line organizations working to contain COVID-19. The company also matches every employee donation to support the response, up to $10,000 per employee per year.

Meanwhile, the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, a charitable nonprofi t established by the family of Dell’s founder, pledged $100 million to support COVID-19 response eff orts and to address the economic repercussions of the pandemic. The foundation is not affi liated with Dell Technologies.

“Customers need essential technology now more than ever to put business continuity, remote working and learning plans into practice.”

Jeff Clarke

Vice chairman and chief operating officer of Dell Technologies

2012 PHOTO BY JULIE JACOBSON/AP

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Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California. The company has come under heightened scrutiny for the role it plays in elections. JOSH EDELSON/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Facebook alert for 2020: You’ve got to vote Jessica Guynn USA TODAY

2020 would have been intense enough with a global pandemic raging and cities erupting in protests for racial justice. But the country is also hurtling toward a presidential election, with all the attendant rancor.

Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg views his company’s platforms as positioned to play a positive role in a year full of negatives. So Facebook is launching its largest voter registration drive yet, with the goal of registering 4 million people this year.

“The 2020 election is going to be unlike any other. It was already going to be a heated campaign, and that was before the pandemic — and before the killing of George Floyd and so many others forced us yet again to confront the painful reality of systemic racism in America,” Zuckerberg wrote in a recent opinion article in USA TODAY. “People want accountability, and in a democracy the ultimate way we do that is through voting.”

The initiative on Facebook, Instagram and Messenger will tell people how to register and how to request an absentee or mail-in ballot. It will include local election alerts about changes to the voting process from state election offi cials. And it will be prominently displayed at the top of the Facebook News Feed and on Instagram.

In addition, Facebook plans to introduce a new tool in the U.S. that will allow users to choose to see fewer political ads in their News Feed.

Zuckerberg: “Best way to hold politicians accountable is through voting.” DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES

Facebook is working closely with the World Health Organization UNICEF and national health agencies to connect people with accurate information and limit the spread of misinformation about the pandemic. It also launched a Coronavirus (COVID-19) Information Center on Facebook with the latest updates and tips from global and local health organizations.

Facebook has been undergoing heightened scrutiny for the role it plays in elections and over Zuckerberg’s decision to leave up a post from Donald Trump in which the president called protesters “thugs” and warned: “When the looting starts, the shooting starts.” Zuckerberg said he was standing fi rm on his commitment to free expression on Facebook, but he also told Facebook employees that he was open to some changes in how his company handles that kind of content.

“Everyone wants to see politicians held accountable for what they say — and I know many people want us to moderate and remove more of their content. We have rules against speech that will cause imminent physical harm or suppress voting, and no one is exempt from them. But accountability only works if we can see what those seeking our votes are saying, even if we viscerally dislike what they say,” Zuckerberg wrote. “Ultimately, I believe the best way to hold politicians accountable is through voting, and I believe we should trust voters to make (judgments) for themselves."

Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, challenged Zuckerberg, saying he's not taking "suffi cient action against politicians and their operatives who engage in voter suppression and incite violence."

"Without taking the comprehensive approach to protecting voting rights and fair elections that we’ve been demanding, this announcement is a half-measure," Gupta said in a statement.

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CDW

Work goes on thanks to IT infrastructure Special to USA TODAY

You might not be familiar with the name CDW, but the information technology giant has been instrumental in making it possible for America to work from home during the coronavirus pandemic.

As a direct marker reseller — the largest, in fact — CDW off ers IT products to business clients from an array of manufacturers. It tailors systems to clients’

operations and off ers ongoing support.

During the pandemic, it has bolstered its clients’ productivity by providing networks with enough capacity and secure endpoints for workers to access their fi les and applications from anywhere.

“As social distancing pervades nearly all aspects of our lives right now, technology helps us sustain closeness, both professional and personal, and has enabled work to ‘go on’ despite tremendous

obstacles,” the company said.

CDW acknowledged that there has been “signifi cant strain on the global supply chain” brought on by the virus and eff orts to halt its spread.

“CDW plays a critical role in combating the current coronavirus pandemic by continuing to supply IT product and services,” the company said. “With over 1 million square feet of distribution capacity, we are using our purchasing capabil-

ities and customer feedback to strategically stock our inventory,” it said. CDW said it was “actively prioritizing orders” directly connected to COVID-19, including for front-line health care workers.

“Our distribution and integration center coworkers are doing critically important work during this unprecedented situation,” the company said. “We are incredibly proud of their work and grateful for their eff ort.”

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Under the “Main Street Lending Program,” businesses with fewer than 15,000 workers or less than $5 billion in revenue can borrow $250,000 to $35 million. ROSE SHIELDS

Rescue program for midsize fi rms gets a late start, but a strong one Paul Davidson USA TODAY

A midsize manufacturer forced to shut down production for two months. A regional restaurant chain surviving on takeout service with sharply lower revenue. A hotel struggling to stay afl oat until Americans start traveling again.

Tens of thousands of midsize businesses left out of massive government rescue programs for small and large

Fed can back $600 billion in loans, but critics worry about plan’s one-size-fi tsall approach

companies amid the COVID-19 pandemic are fi nally getting their lifeline.

The Federal Reserve’s Main Street Lending Program for small and midsize companies got off to an encouraging start in June after months of delays.

More than 200 banks registered for the program in the fi rst week or so.

“We’re seeing a steady stream of lenders signing up,” said Eric Rosengren, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, who is overseeing the initiative.

Responding to critics worried about lukewarm interest in the program from banks and borrowers, he added, “We wouldn’t be seeing them sign up if they weren’t planning on lending.”

The $600 billion initiative, fi rst announced in March, is intended to fi ll the gap between the wildly popular Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), which provides forgivable loans to small businesses, and the huge bailouts and access to corporate bond markets enjoyed to

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AMERICA RESPONDS large companies.

But the program puts the Fed in an unprecedented and daunting role as a lender. That prompted the central bank to establish standardized loan criteria for thousands of borrowers and manage risk so it doesn’t suff er big losses.

“This is an extraordinary action refl ecting the nature of the pandemic,” Rosengren said.

Some economists, however, criticized the program’s cookie-cutter approach and said it should be better tailored to businesses based on their needs and creditworthiness.

Who’s eligible, and how it works Firms with fewer than 15,000 employees or less than $5 billion in revenue are eligible for a Main Street loan. Under the program, a bank extends a loan and then sells 95% of it to the Fed. That reduces the bank’s risk during a highly uncertain crisis and removes the loan from its books so it can lend to other companies.

The Fed recently lowered the minimum loan amount to $250,000 and raised the maximum to $35 million to open the program to more fi rms. To reduce monthly payments, loan terms were extended from four to fi ve years, and principal payments now can be deferred for two years, up from a year.

The interest rate, however, may not be a bargain at just over 3%. By comparison, PPP loans carry a 1% interest rate, cover eight weeks of payroll and other expenses, and are forgivable as long as the business keeps or rehires its workers.

That $660 billion program has been geared to businesses with fewer than 500 employees, many of which had enough cash to survive just a few weeks.

The Main Street program is aimed mostly at midsize companies that presumably have more fi nancial resources.

Yet many, especially those with little or no revenue during the pandemic, have struggled to obtain loans from banks that are wary of defaults with the economy mired in a recession marked by more than 40 million layoff s and furloughs and a 13.3% unemployment rate.

There are 110,000 fi rms with 100 to 10,000 employees, according to a Brookings Institution analysis of Census Bureau data. They employ about 50 million workers, or about 40% of U.S. payrolls.

The loans could allow many of them to avoid bankruptcy and hold onto their workers as states let businesses reopen, helping minimize long-term damage to

“We’re seeing a steady stream of lenders signing up. We wouldn’t be seeing them sign up if they weren’t planning on lending.”

Eric Rosengren

Boston Fed president, responding to concerns that banks won’t be interested in taking part in the program

Rosengren STEVEN OSEMWENKHAE/ FEDERAL RESERVE

the economy. The economy is expected to rebound, but experts say it will take a few years to recover all the lost jobs.

Loans may not attract some fi rms Some experts say a loan that must be repaid may not cut it for a business that doesn’t know how quickly its revenue will return, especially with the specter of a second wave of coronavirus in the fall.

“The hole is too big to cover with a loan” for many companies, said Nellie Liang, a former Fed economist and a senior fellow at Brookings. In a recent paper, Liang and former Fed economist William English said the Fed should: h Allow loan terms of more than fi ve years to further trim monthly payments. h Off er lower interest rates to borrowers with better credit. h Let banks lend to riskier borrowers if they hold a larger share of the loan. h Ease or scrap a requirement that businesses make “commercially reasonable eff orts” to keep employees. Some may need to cut staff amid lower sales and then rehire after a rebound. h Off er participating banks higher fees to make loans.

“If you want to help some fi rms, you probably need to be more generous,” Liang said. “Why isn’t the program more tailored? Why does the fi rm with 100 employees have the same terms as the fi rm with $5 billion in revenue and 15,000 employees?”

Even with such modifi cations, bank and borrower response to the program could be tepid, Liang said. Banks might lend to solid borrowers anyway and avoid risky ones even with the Fed’s aid, she said, although the program could become more appealing if the recovery is weak or there’s a second wave of the virus. If demand stays sluggish, she said, Congress should consider allowing portions of some loans to be forgiven.

‘Free money’ not an option Rosengren, however, said, “The changes we made ... address many of those concerns.” As an example, he cited the longer loan maturities designed to reduce monthly payments.

“The only solution can’t be free money,” Rosengren said. “It’s a lending program, and there’s a trade-off in how much Congress gave us to potentially lose against how we can structure it to help as many businesses” as possible avoid layoff s. “I think we set a reasonable

Main Street Lending Program h Firms with fewer than 15,000 employees or less than $5 billion in revenue are eligible for a loan. h Under the program, a commercial bank extends the loan and then sells 95% of the loan to the Fed. Taking most of the loan off the bank’s books reduces its risk and allows it to lend to more fi rms. Requiring banks to hold onto 5% of each loan is intended to deter irresponsible lending. h Minimum loan amount: $250,000. Maximum: $35 million. h Interest rate: Around 3%. h The U.S. has 110,000 fi rms with 100 to 10,000 employees, according to a Brookings Institution analysis. They employ about 50 million people, accounting for about 40% of U.S. payrolls.

balance.”

The Fed, he said, is targeting fi nancially solid fi rms that are going through a temporary disruption and are likely to bounce back as the economy does. Even so, he said, “If there’s a bad outcome in the economy, we may ... have very substantial losses.”

The Treasury Department is providing $75 billion to cover possible losses.

Rosengren said the Fed can’t customize the program for diff erent borrowers because it will be partnering with banks in overseeing thousands of loans. The large volumes demand uniform terms.

“It’s trying to standardize a nonstandard product,” he says. “We are doing this in a very automated way. We’re not hiring thousands of people to underwrite and close loans.”

In other emergency programs, the Fed has bought securities backed by loans, or announced its willingness to buy loans, but has not purchased loans directly.

“I’m highly confi dent that we will do plenty of lending,” he said. “It is risky lending. It is a nontraditional role for the Fed. But, I think given the pandemic, it is an important role.”

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Verizon connects female entrepreneurs Coral Murphy USA TODAY

Acting on survey results showing that female business owners were less confi dent about their enterprises’ ability to weather the coronavirus pandemic, Verizon’s business division announced in June that it was launching a mentorship and networking initiative.

Verizon Business worked with CircleAround, a for-profi t subsidiary of the Girl Scouts, and the National Association of Women Business Owners to develop the program. The free program was to start in early July.

In a Verizon survey of women-owned small businesses, 49% of respondents said it would be helpful to have access to a network of like-minded female business leaders to help them navigate the post-pandemic reality.

“It’s my belief that women need to help each other,” said Tami Erwin, CEO of Verizon Business. “We hope this program will provide a safe environment for listening, learning, helping and mentoring each other.”

The program will assign a business coach to each participating business.

The coach will help entrepreneurs better understand such things as how fi nance has changed in the current economy, how to restructure, how to expand or decrease a product line, and how to manage employees.

According to Verizon’s survey, women are less optimistic that they will be able to recover from losses caused by the pandemic. More than 30% said they were not confi dent their businesses will be able to recover from the blow, versus 21% of male counterparts.

“When you look at this particular recession, women are much more negatively aff ected,” said Lynda Bishop at the National Association of Women Business Owners. “(Their businesses) are also smaller and don’t make enough money to start with.”

According to Bishop, the food, retail and hospitality industries have a heavy concentration of women-owned businesses — and those are among the sectors most aff ected by the pandemic.

Bishop said the program could especially help female business owners of color, who are aff ected even more than white entrepreneurs.

Though it’s probably best known as a consumer wireless provider, Verizon offers a suite of services to business and government customers, including not just cell phone plans but also internet access, networking, cloud computing and data storage and security. BEBETO MATTHEWS/AP

“This is aff ecting women of color in an even more signifi cant way than one might automatically think of,” Bishop said. “Women of color have had a much harder time getting fi nancing and getting relationships to help them obtain the money they need.”

Through the program, the Girl Scouts-

affi liated group also hopes to mentor the women through the prism of Girl Scouts values.

“This is really taking it from one end of the spectrum to the next” said Chris Butler, COO of CircleAround. “The work we do with Verizon is actually helping the next gen of women leaders.”

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“They are working around the clock, on the front lines,” an AT&T executive said of medical staff. “We want to be there to keep them connected.” GENE J. PUSKAR/AP

AT&T lends hand to responders, others Special to USA TODAY

Telecommunications giant AT&T has a lot of experience in emergency response, experience that it leaned on when COVID-19 swept through the country. One of its most important constituencies: fi rst responders.

“We have a special responsibility to America’s fi rst responders and public safety community, who rely on FirstNet, the nationwide wireless broadband communications platform dedicated to them, built and managed by AT&T,” company spokeswoman Jessica Swain said.

AT&T announced in March that public-safety agencies would now get free smartphones “for life.” First-responder

AT&T contributed $5.5 million to provide meals for fi rst responders, medical personnel and others affected by COVID-19, and an additional $10 million to support distance learning.

agencies on FirstNet can get premium FirstNet Ready devices for free for their users to connect them to critical communications.

Among other initiatives: h In April, AT&T announced that it would be giving three months of free wireless service for eligible front-line nurses and physicians nationwide on the FirstNet network. The company broke the news on actor John Krasinski’s digital TV show “Some Good News.”

“They are working around the clock, on the front lines,” said Jeff McElfresh, AT&T Communications’ CEO. “We want to be there to keep them connected.” h The company contributed $5.5 million to provide meals for fi rst responders,

medical personnel and others aff ected

by COVID-19. That eff ort began with a $1.5 million contribution to World Central Kitchen. Contributions also supported Feeding America, the Salvation Army and Team Rubicon. h AT&T gave $10 million to support distance learning. The fi rst $1 million went to Khan Academy, an online learning platform. And $250,000 went to NBA Math Hoops, which uses basketball to teach math skills through a mobile app. h The company off ered 60 days of unlimited data at no cost to qualifi ed schools activating new eligible data-only lines nationwide to promote e-learning during the COVID-19 crisis. (Sign ups for that program ended May 23).

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If driving falls 50%, should premiums, too?

Aimee Picchi

Special to USA TODAY

Although major auto insurers have been giving policyholders rebates and discounts in recognition of the wholesale shift in driving habits brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, consumer advocates are pushing for more.

As of May, insurers were giving an average break on premiums of about 15%.

But critics said drivers were owed much more — twice as much, in fact.

A 30% discount would account for the roughly 50% decline in miles driven and accident claims during the crisis while also accommodating some higher insurer costs, such as an increase in missed premiums, says Birny Birnbaum, an economist and executive director of the Center for Economic Justice, which analyzed driving habits and accident claims.

Given the change in driving patterns, auto insurers’ rates “became excessive overnight,” Birnbaum says.

The pandemic has upended daily patterns for the nation’s more than 220 million licensed drivers. Prior to the pandemic, the average commuter spent about 55 minutes a day behind the wheel on the way to and from work. That commuting time dropped to zero for many as they worked from home, while others suff ered layoff s or furloughs. As a result, consumers hoped for a price break from insurers. The average consumer pays about $1,400 annually to insure a car, so it’s not an insignifi cant fi nancial issue.

One of those drivers is John Johnston, a computational specialist from Perry, Michigan. Working from home during the pandemic, he no longer had a 30-mile daily commute. He halted his frequent family trips to Canada and outings to restaurants and theaters with his wife.

“I’m barely driving,” he said.

When his insurer emailed him to say he’d receive a refund for April and May, he says he expected about $100 off his annual bill of about $1,800. Instead, he got a refund of $35.11.

“I expected it to be underwhelming, but not that underwhelming,” he said.

Other drivers said they were confused by the refunds off ered by their insurers.

Shauna Dillenbeck of Boise, Idaho, said her insurer, State Farm, told her it earmarked billions in refunds for customers — but she had yet to see a reduction in

A consumer advocacy group gave State Farm an “A” grade for its response to consumers during the pandemic. Other insurers didn’t do nearly as well. Above, a State Farm agent’s office in Knoxville, Tennessee. JENNIFER DEDMAN/KNOXVILLE NEWS SENTINEL

State Farm said it was working to reduce auto rates in every state. The national average for rate reductions was 11%, it said, saving customers about $2.2 billion. That rate cut was in addition to a $2 billion dividend credit, flexible customer payment options and philanthropic relief from State Farm. her monthly $160 insurance bill. “I would like to have seen maybe 50% off ,” she said in May, noting that she was driving about 10 miles a month compared with 500 miles a month before the pandemic.

State Farm said Dillenbeck and other customers would probably see refunds on their June statements. Those credits would refl ect a 25% discount for premiums from March 20 through May 31. The

company was reducing its auto rates by an average of 11%, although the rate reduction would go into eff ect when the customer renews their policy.

State Farm off ered one of the better responses to consumers, according to Birnbaum. His group gave the insurer an “A” rating for its response. Other insurers earned poorer grades, including GEICO, which scored a D-minus. GEICO off ered a 15% credit to customers who renew their polices from April 8 to Oct. 7, which means some customers could wait for months to see a refund.

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Auto insurers keep the relief coming Allstate, USAA and others extend payback programs Kelly Tyko USA TODAY

With Americans driving less — and getting in fewer accidents — because of the coronavirus pandemic, Allstate announced it was extending its shelter-inplace payback program through June.

In April, Allstate was the fi rst major insurance company to say it was going to give auto policy holders some relief because of the pandemic. It started by giving a credit of about 15% of monthly premiums for April and May. It then extended the credit through June 30.

Geico, State Farm, American Family, Progressive and many others have followed suit, off ering car insurance relief to customers because of COVID-19.

“While more people are back on the roads, the numbers of less severe accidents are below historical levels, so the payback will continue through June, representing approximately $1 billion back to customers over three months,” Allstate president and CEO Tom Wilson said in a statement.

Allstate said its personal insurance customers, along with those of its Esurance and Encompass subsidiaries, would receive an automatic credit to their accounts. Most would receive 15% off their monthly premiums.

Allstate also off ered free identity protection for the rest of the year to all U.S. residents, even if they are not customers if they signed up before June 30.

Other insurers also said they were giving customers a break.

In two separate announcements, USAA said it would be returning a total of $800 millon to its customers in pandemic relief. Policyholders received a 20% credit on their premiums for three consecutive months, USAA said.

In a statement to USA TODAY in May, Geico said that its “giveback credit,” fi rst announced in April, goes beyond the two to three months of relief that its competitors were off ering “to extend to the fullterm of the policy, which is at least 6 months.” The company added: “We were concerned that a credit for just a few months might just expose our customers

The Northbrook, Illinois, headquarters of Allstate, one of the nation’s largest auto insurance companies. NAM Y. HUH AP

Geico pointed out that its relief would extend for the full term of customers’ policies — not just for a couple of months — to avoid the possibility of “large catch-up payments.”

to large catch-up payments once events returned to normal.”

Nationwide said it was monitoring driving frequency and other trends to determine what additional relief might be necessary, said Joe Case, a company spokesman. Nationwide extended assistance through June 15 for the waiver of late fees, “acceptance of hardship and billing holds” and was “continuing to allow reinstatements for up to 60 days without a lapse in coverage,” Case told USA TODAY in late May.

Tom Wilson, president and CEO of Allstate, says the company’s premium paybacks amounted to $1 billion over three months. PAUL MORIGI/GETTY IMAGES FOR VITAL VOICES

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Humble heroes Everyday Americans have made a big impact with even small gestures Matt Alderton

Special to USA TODAY

Although it aff ects diff erent people in diff erent ways, COVID-19 typically manifests two to 14 days after exposure with such symptoms as fever, cough and shortness of breath. For anyone who has surveyed its impact on Americans more broadly, however, another symptom of the novel coronavirus has become exceedingly obvious: kindness. In the face a global pandemic that has robbed them of graduations, weddings and vacations — not to mention the more than 100,000 friends, neighbors and relatives whose lives it has claimed — Americans of all ages, professions and backgrounds have responded with acts of goodwill that no one expects but everyone needs. Here are just a few of their stories.

‘You hunker down and fi ght’ Dr. Alexander Salerno is a primary care physician with offi ces in Orange, East Orange and Newark, New Jersey. He inherited his practice, Salerno Medical Associates, from his parents, who established it in the 1950s. After race riots in Newark in 1967, many doctors and business owners fl ed the city for other, whiter communities. But the Salernos stayed and have been caring for New Jersey’s urban poor ever since.

“My parents taught me that when the going gets tough, you don’t get up and leave. You hunker down and fi ght. So that’s what we did when COVID-19 hit,” Salerno says. His practice began treating COVID-19 patients exclusively in March, when he set up tents outside his offi ces where clinicians could provide coronavirus triage, testing and treatment.

Testing was especially crucial, Salerno says, because of “silent spreaders” — people who have the virus but are showing no symptoms and transmit it without

Alexander Salerno SALERNO MEDICAL ASSOCIATES

A tent set up by Salerno Medical Associates to handle COVID-19 patients. SALERNO MEDICAL ASSOCIATES

knowing. So Salerno decided to test everyone he could.

Unfortunately, many people in lowincome communities lack transportation to get them to where they can be tested. Salerno therefore spent $42,000 on a van that he turned into a mobile clinic he could park on street corners, outside senior housing and at churches.

By June, his team had tested more than 6,000 people in New Jersey’s hardest-hit communities.

“Testing is really important, and it has to be done in every nook and cranny of our communities,” Salerno says.

Caring conversations As a physician at Clark Memorial Health in Jeff ersonville, Indiana, Dr. Rahel Teferra works on the front-most lines of the pandemic. When the virus peaked in southern Indiana, she was seeing as many as 20 suspected or confi rmed COVID-19 patients a day. Those who most appreciate her presence, however, are

Rahel Teferra COURTESY OF RAHEL TEFERRA

her patients’ loved ones, whom she personally calls every day since they aren’t allowed to visit.

“Families of these patients are scared,” Teferra says. “Sometimes conversations are diffi cult and sad. … There are stressful conversations, like end-oflife discussions. It can be trying, but it has to be done.”

Because some COVID-19 patients must spend more than a month sequestered in the hospital, the daily conversations give family members a sense of routine and connection.

“Family members tell us about what kind of a person their loved ones are, what they did, what hobbies they had.

These conversations make me feel I know the person as more than just a patient in a hospital bed at their worst time in their lives,” Teferra says. “Families feel reassured knowing that we can have a normal conversation with them — that there is a human being on the other side of the phone who is responsible for the care of their beloved.”

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Taylor Smith with other FEMA volunteers. COURTESY OF TAYLOR SMITH

EMT earns an ‘A’ in empathy When she was 16, Taylor Smith began volunteering for an emergency medical service near her home in South Jersey.

That’s when she decided to become a paramedic. Just a few years later, she’s studying emergency medicine at the University of Pittsburgh and working as an emergency medical technician in West Miffl in, Pennsylvania.

When COVID-19 hit its peak in the Northeast, the Federal Emergency Management Agency sought volunteers to help meet the increased demand for emergency medical care in New York. Although she was staring fi nals week in the face, Smith signed up. Just 20 years old, she was among the youngest responders deployed by FEMA to assist ambulance crews in the New York metro area.

“For the fi rst fi ve days, we worked 24hour shifts with 12 hours off in between,” says Smith, who deployed for two weeks in April and took her fi nal exams remotely between shifts.

Although many of her patients did have COVID-19, she says the people she helped most were those who didn’t have the virus but were terrifi ed that they might. “A lot of people were really scared but didn’t need to be. It was nice that we could reassure them.”

As for her fi nals: She ended the term with a 3.9 GPA — her best semester yet.

Jeramy Ragsdale builds a clear panel through which senior living residents can interact with loved ones. THRIVE SENIOR LIVING

A clear solution for families

Jeramy Ragsdale SARA HANNA PHOTOGRAPHY

Because COVID-19 is especially dangerous for older adults, Atlanta-based Thrive Senior Living made a diffi cult decision in March: It would stop allowing visitors at the 17 senior living communities it operates in eight states.

“While closing the communities to visitors was unquestionably the right thing to do, it has been so heartbreaking,” founder Jeramy Ragsdale says.

“Closing the communities has ripped apart spouses, pulled sons and daughters away from parents, and reduced the precious time that grandparents and great-grandparents have with the next generations.”

Although they supported his decision, many family members reached out to Ragsdale to plead for a way to interact with their loved ones — somehow, some way. His solution: “Clear Connection”

panels, transparent plexiglass barriers that allow residents and visitors to see each other and interact without coming into contact or breathing the same air.

(They speak through phones.)

“We custom-built each Clear Connection panel to fi t snugly inside the front doors of each community,” Ragsdale says.

He designed and constructed the panels himself with materials from Home Depot. “I enlisted the help of my dad, who is more skilled in this area, and we designed the prototype on graph paper over the phone,” he says.

Within 72 hours, Ragsdale had built 10 panels, and by early June he’d fi nished and installed 15. “There is certainly nothing proprietary about these … but the moments they’ve helped foster are truly magical,” he says.

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Adam Bishop COURTESY ADAM BISHOP

Survivor’s blood is in the fi ght As a fi refi ghter, Adam Bishop of Breezy Point, New York, is used to being the hero. When he got sick with COVID-19, however, he had to get comfortable with being the one in need of help.

“I have never felt so sick in my life,” says Bishop, a lieutenant in the New York City Fire Department who initially came down with a cough and low-grade fever, and soon was admitted to the hospital with double pneumonia in both lungs.

“Part of me didn’t want to go to sleep, as I thought I would not wake up.”

But he did wake up. And when he fi nally recovered, he decided to aim a fi gurative fi rehose at the coronavirus by volunteering for ImmuneRACE, a virtual clinical study wherein people who have been infected with COVID-19 donate blood samples to researchers for the purpose of studying their immune response to the virus.

“As someone who’s been infected and beat COVID-19, my immune system holds clues about how to detect and treat this horrible thing,” Bishop says.

“If my data can help scientists develop better tests, vaccines and treatments, I’m all in.”

Pharmacist and artist Myron Laban looks at one of his inspirational murals in Chicago. PHOTO PROVIDED BY MYRON LABAN

Delivering doses of hope For people with hypertension, diabetes and many other chronic conditions, pharmacists are the most essential of essential workers.

“Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve been coming to work day in and day out to make sure people have access to their medication,” says Myron Laban,

Myron Laban COURTESY OF MYRON LABAN

a Walgreens pharmacist in Libertyville, Illinois. “People still get sick, they still take their maintenance medications, and they still have questions about their health.”

Sometimes, however, people need an entirely diff erent kind of medicine.

That’s why Laban has spent his free time during the pandemic painting inspirational murals on Chicago’s North and West sides.

“I believe it’s very important to create something to give people hope during hard times,” Laban says. He has been painting his “Uplift” series of murals since 2017; each work depicts a large fi gure walking forward with a smaller fi gure riding on his shoulders, along with an inspirational message such as “You Deserve to Be Happy” or “Rain Eventually Goes Away.”

“At the end of the day, you can choose to move forward or let things hold you back. In my experience, the healthiest thing we can do is to persevere when things are hard.”

Cherished goodbyes

Brent Shehorn COURTESY OF BRENT SHEHORN

COVID-19 has made life diffi cult. But also, death. Because of state-mandated bans on large gatherings, funerals across the country have had to be kept small or skipped entirely, adding catharsis and closure to the list of commodities in short supply during the pandemic.

Thanks to funeral directors like Brent Shehorn, owner of Lake Shore Funeral Home & Crematory in Waco, Texas, families and friends don’t have to forgo farewells entirely. When the pandemic hit Waco, he began off ering families the opportunity to live-stream funeral services on the internet, and to host socially-distant drive-through visitations.

“Folks just pull up in the parking lot, roll down their windows and express their love,” Shehorn says. “It’s a parade of friends and family coming forward to express their condolences, and it’s a really beautiful thing.”

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Continued from page 60

Convenience with compassion When she opened her better-for-you convenience store, The Goods Mart, in New York’s SoHo neighborhood in 2018, Rachel Krupa was trying to make it easier for people to be healthy.

Two years later, she’s doing exactly that from her 300-square-foot storefront, which she has doggedly kept open during the pandemic despite a dramatic decrease in patronage.

“The reason The Goods Mart exists is to serve the community, and the best way to serve the community when you’re going through something like this is to stay open,” says Krupa, who describes her store as a cross between Whole Foods and 7-11. “Because whether you have four people come in during the day or 100, it makes a diff erence to those people that you’re there.”

To make an even bigger diff erence, Krupa collected over $10,000 in customer donations, which she has used to send care packages to health care workers at New York City hospitals.

“Every time we send snacks, the hospitals send us photos,” Krupa says. “You can’t see people’s faces behind their masks, but you can see them smiling in their eyes.”

Rachel Krupa’s NYC shop offers “mission-driven products” that are tasty, healthful and environmentally friendly. KATIA REPINA

Flowers from the plumber

Josh Savage, left, with one of his team members. HERO PLUMBING, HEATING AND COOLING

Plumbers aren’t used to seeing people smile. As COVID-19 bore down on the Midwest, however, smiles were exactly what Josh Savage thought his technicians needed to see.

Savage, owner of Hero Plumbing, Heating and Cooling in Minneapolis, was celebrating date night at home with his wife when he decided to buy her fl owers at the grocery store.

“This was at the beginning of the pandemic. Everyone was very rigid, very cold. … You could feel everyone’s fear around you,” Savage recalls. But his mood was instantly lifted when he arrived in the fl oral department. So much so that he decided to buy extra fl owers to give to his neighbors. “I ended up buying $350 worth of fresh-cut fl owers; the cashier thought I was nuts.”

On his way home, it dawned on him: If his wife and neighbors enjoyed receiving

“Receiving flowers as an unexpected gift makes customers feel instantly better about their day, and about what’s going on in the world. It also helps the technicians; when they see a customer’s face light up, it makes all their problems go away, too.”

Josh Savage

Owner of a Minneapolis plumbing, heating and cooling company that has given out more than 4,000 flowers

fl owers, so would his customers. So he called a friend in the fl oral business and arranged to buy a truckload of fl owers.

He divided the load among his technicians, each of whom was asked to give bouquets to customers, neighbors or even random strangers — which they did every day for more than two months.

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A teacher’s most important quiz When her school had to pivot from inperson learning to the virtual kind because of COVID-19, Ellie Donovan had to learn new ways of teaching. “We had to change our practices overnight,” says Donovan, who teaches sixth-grade language arts and social studies at San Francisco’s Presidio Middle School.

To engage auditory learners, for example, Donovan launched her own YouTube channel, where she read aloud every written resource that she posted in her online classroom.

But Donovan’s most important task wasn’t teaching at all; rather, it was supporting distressed students. To help her recognize which ones were struggling, she designed her own BuzzFeed-style online quizzes. Every week, she presented a new quiz — such as “Which SpongeBob Are You?” or “Which Beyoncé Are You?” — with humorous captions alongside emotive pictures of cartoon characters or celebrities experiencing joy, sadness, anger and other feelings. When a student indicated stress, she notifi ed a counselor or social worker, who followed up directly with the student’s parents.

“At the end of the day,” Donovan says, “the message I tried to convey to kids and families is: If you forget how to write a paragraph, it’s OK. If you don’t turn in an assignment, I don’t care. As long as you’re safe and healthy, my job is done.”

Pattie Guck CHARTWELLS K12

Filling bellies and hearts

2020-21 MDA National Ambassador Ethan LyBrand. MUSCULAR DYSTROPHY ASSOCIATION

Nothing stops these smiles

San Francisco middle school teacher Ellie Donovan. COURTESY OF ELLIE DONOVAN

COVID-19 is no joke. Especially not to people living with conditions that make them particularly vulnerable to the virus.

But if you ask 11-year-old Ethan LyBrand of Decatur, Alabama, who has Duchenne muscular dystrophy, the old adage is true: Laughter really is the best medicine.

In January, the Muscular Dystrophy Association named Ethan as its 2020-21 MDA National Ambassador. Normally, that would involve traveling around the country raising awareness and money

for muscular dystrophy research. Because of COVID-19, however, Ethan had to fi nd a new way to contribute to the cause. So, he decided to record a video “Joke a Day” through MDA’s social media channels while Americans sheltered in place.

“I’m a very positive person and a jokester at heart, so a joke series just made sense,” says Ethan, who recorded 42 jokes in all.

His favorite: Why can’t you tell eggs a joke? Because they’ll crack up! “ “I just really wanted to make people smile,” he says.

When schools closed due to COVID-19, many of the 30 million American children who depend on free school lunches lost their only reliable source of food. But kids in Birmingham, Michigan, didn’t, thanks to Pattie Guck of Chartwells K12, which provides food service for the city’s schools.

When the district shut down, Guck began serving more than 1,000 emergency meals a day to students, whose parents could pick up breakfasts and lunches at spots throughout the district — including an apartment complex whose residents could retrieve meals from a school bus parked onsite.

“Our goal was to make sure kids still had healthy meals every day,” says Guck, food-service director at Birmingham Public Schools, who kept things light by choosing a new theme every day for staff , kids and parents, some of who even decorated their cars according to the day’s theme. One day, for example, was superhero day. Another was Christmas in March. Still another was Disney. And every Friday was pajama day. “(The coronavirus) was scary, so I wanted to provide happy, positive energy,” says Guck, whose secret weapon is a tube of pixie dust in her pocket; when she senses someone needs it, she sprinkles a pinch on the ground. “It’s silly, but it really makes people’s day.”

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‘One of the National Guard’s fi nest hours’ Nearly 30,000 members of the National Guard and Air National Guard are now supporting COVID-19 response in all 50 states, three U.S. territories and the District of Columbia, offi cials say.

The COVID-19 response is the largest use of the National Guard for a domestic operation since Hurricane Katrina in 2005. More than 51,000 Guard members responded to Katrina.

“The men and women of the National Guard have been doing a great job fi ghting the coronavirus,” President Donald Trump said in extending their work through mid-August.

“It is one of the National Guard’s fi nest hours,” added Gen. Joseph Lengyel, who was preparing to retire as chief of the National Guard Bureau.

In New York, formerly the focus of the worldwide coronavirus outbreak, National Guard troops made a big diff erence, helping test about 300,000 residents, delivering over 17 million meals and assembling nearly 1.5 million test kits from Long Island to Niagara Falls.

According to the National Guard Bureau, current COVID-19 response missions include: h Augmenting medical staff at hospitals, nursing homes and assisted-living facilities. h Supporting warehouse operations and logistics eff orts to help deliver and distribute lifesaving medical equipment and critical supplies. h Delivering and distributing food in hard-hit communities and supporting food banks. h Working with industry and civilian partners to satisfy demand for personal protective equipment used by essential staff and fi rst responders. h Staffi ng 24-hour state Emergency Operations Centers to synchronize the Guard’s eff orts with those of local and state partners. h Performing mobile testing, sample delivery and processing.

Units of the National Guard and Air National Guard frequently train side-byside with state and local emergency responders, making them well-suited for domestic operations, according to the bureau. The nearly 450,000 members of the Guard branches work and live in nearly every community in the country.

National Guard COVID-19 response People screened:

2.4 million Missions supporting testing and screening:

More than 7,000 Meals packaged or delivered to those in need:

149 million Bulk food delivered: Lt. Col. Francisco Nieves, a physician with the 156th Medical Group of the Puerto Rico Air National Guard, conducts a COVID-19 test. MASTER SGT. CAYCEE WATSON/156TH WING PUBLIC AFFAIRS

Staff Sgt. Carley Dolan, a medical tech with the 103rd Medical Group, tests an airman for COVID-19 at Bradley Air National Guard Base in Connecticut.

STAFF SGT. STEVEN TUCKER/103RD AIRLIFT WING PUBLIC AFFAIRS

The annual hurricane season — which typically runs from June 1 through Nov. 1, when conditions for tropical storms are ideal — gives the Guard plenty of opportunities to practice.

“We are well-synced and extremely experienced from signifi cant hurricane response eff orts over the last few years,” said Air Force Maj. Gen. Steven Nordhaus, the National Guard Bureau’s director of operations. “Though conditions change, to include challenges with the COVID-19 virus, the National Guard will be ready to respond.”

This year, that also means taking into account personal protective equipment and other matters.

“Social distancing, PPE, screening and testing, sheltering and other impacts will cause us to change how we respond,” Nordhaus said. “But we will be ready with our interagency partners to save lives, prevent suff ering and mitigate destruction to property in the wake of natural disasters.”

Contributing: National Guard Bureau

More than 88,000 tons Masks made:

18 million Personal protective equipment delivered:

190 million items Increased capacity at alternate care facilities:

More than 18,000 beds Calls answered or made at call centers:

700,000

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Stars have platform, and use it Ellen Wiessner

Chris Rock and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo show how it’s done. SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES

Special to USA TODAY

In ways both silly and serious, celebrities put their star power to good use as the COVID-19 pandemic engulfed the globe, taking advantage of their public platform to encourage people to be safe, stay positive and give what they can to those who are suff ering.

Taking a poke at celebs’ stereotypical self-seriousness, actor Ryan Reynolds said in a video posted on social media March 23: “In times of crisis, I think we all know that it’s the celebrities that we count on most.

They’re the ones who are going to get us through this, right after health care workers, of course, fi rst responders, people who work in essential services, ping pong players, mannequins ... childhood imaginary friends” and “like 400 other types of people.” In the video, which he referred to as “another important message from an important celebrity,” Reynolds urged: “Stay at home, practice social distancing, wash your hands.”

Ben Stiller exhorted people to stay home in a Twitter message posted March 22 by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose daily media briefi ngs propelled him to a celebrity status of his own. “Take up a hobby. I’ve always been interested in chain saw art and never had the time to explore it,” Stiller said with a straight face.

Other New Yorkers turned up at a Cuomo briefi ng May 28, like Brooklyn comic Chris Rock, who said, “Posse up and get tested,” and actress Rosie Perez, who said, “To mi gente (my people): Oye! Wear a mask.”

Robert De Niro did a star turn as well, rehashing the warning he gave Stiller (who played his daughter’s hapless boyfriend) in the movie “Meet the Parents.”

“We all need to stay home. Please. I’m watching you,” DeNiro said, pointing fi ngers fi rst at his eyes and then at the audience’s in streetwise sign language.

Reality show B-lister Mike Sorrentino, aka The Situation from “Jersey Shore,” appeared in an offi cial state public service announcement to say: “We know Jersey loves to party but … STAY HOME.” Reprising the inept Garry Gergich, his character on television’s “Parks and Recreation,” actor Jim O’Heir took to Twitter March 23 and bragged about his vacation time share in Muncie, Indiana. “The Gergiches, we are hunkered down. ... We are not going anywhere.

That’s what you should do too,” he said.

Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis made a video to announce the launch of a Quarantine Pinot Noir wine with Continued on page 70

Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis.

GETTY IMAGES

“We all need to stay home.

Please. I’m watching you.”

Robert De Niro

Rehashing the warning he gave in the movie “Meet the Parents.”

Robert DeNiro. USA TODAY

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vineyard Nocking Point, with the proceeds going to COVID-19 relief. The Hollywood couple said the wine sold out its initial allotment of 2,000 cases in just eight hours and raised $1 million.

Aaron Paul and Bryan Cranston announced that proceeds from Dos Hombres, the artisanal brand of mezcal they own, would benefi t the U.S. Bartenders’ Guild, the Hospitality Industry Relief Fund and the America’s Food Fund.

“Let’s all raise a glass to our commitment to #fl attenthecurve,” the co-stars of the hit series “Breaking Bad” wrote on Instagram in late March.

Jared Leto introduced a T-shirt design he was selling for $30 a pop to raise money for COVID-19 relief. It reads, “May the forced quarantine be with you.” The actor said he would personally match the money raised from sales.

Singer Harry Styles launched a Tshirt of his own, with profi ts going to the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund for the World Health Organization.

Cast members of the slightly prophetic 2011 pandemic movie “Contagion” reunited virtually on March 27, with Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne and Marion Cotillard appearing together to call for social distancing and Kate Winslet adding: “Wash your hands like your life depends on it.”

Lady Gaga put together a star-fi lled lineup — Paul McCartney, Lizzo, Elton John, Keith Urban, John Legend, Sam Smith and others — for the “Together at Home” benefi t concert April 18 that raised nearly $130 million for the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund and local responders.

Olivia Wilde, who played a physician on the drama “House,” posted a video April 7 on Twitter in which she and other actors who have played doctors and nurses on TV thanked real-life health care workers and called for donations “on behalf of fake doctors everywhere.”

Among them: Omar Epps (“House”) Patrick Dempsey (“Grey’s Anatomy”), Zach Braff and Sarah Chalke (“Scrubs”) Julianna Margulies and Maura Tierney (“E.R.”) Edie Falco (“Nurse Jackie”) and Kate Walsh (“Private Practice”).

Neil Diamond recast the familiar lyrics of his “Sweet Caroline” in an online video, singing: “Hands washing hands, reaching out, don’t touch me, I won’t touch you.”

“Wonder Woman” star Gal Gadot collected some famous friends to sing

Harry Styles. INVISION/AP

Lady Gaga. GLOBAL CITIZEN VIA AFP

Olivia Wilde. GETTY IMAGES

John Lennon’s “Imagine” on Instagram.

Among those chiming in were Kristen Wiig, Jamie Dornan, Labrinth, James Marsden, Sarah Silverman, Eddie Benjamin, Natalie Portman and Norah Jones.

Mark Ruff alo headlined an online appeal to help the Navajo nation, hard hit

by COVID-19, with help from Ricki Lake, Joely Fisher, Debra Messing, Danny Pino, Andy Garcia and Matthew Modine.

The humanitarian organization Save the Children launched “Save With Stories,” in which celebrities read books on video to entertain children — and raise money for Save the Children and No Kid Hungry. Led by Amy Adams and Jennifer Garner, the initiative boasted a superstar roster of readers, including John Grisham, Hugh Grant, Drew Barrymore, Jimmy Fallon, Steve Carell, Jill Biden and Lupita Nyong’o. Reese Witherspoon noted that 30 million U.S. children relied on schools for meals before schools closed because of the pandemic.

“As COVID-19 hits the U.S., millions of kids need our help to learn & eat.” Lin Manuel Miranda and America Ferrera read their choice of books in Spanish, and Meghan Markle read “Duck! Rabbit!” with the help of 1-year-old Archie on her lap turning the pages and Harry, the Duke of Sussex, shooting the video.

John Krasinski staged a moraleboosting series of online shows titled “Some Good News,” or SGN, as the show’s colorful hand-drawn sign read.

The actor hosted graduation ceremonies with help from Oprah Winfrey, Jon Stewart, Steven Spielberg and Malala and cooking sessions with Martha Stewart, Stanley Tucci and chefs David Chang and Guy Fieri. The series’ highlight was the original cast of “Hamilton” performing the musical for a girl who had been given tickets to see the hit show for her 9th birthday but could not attend because of the pandemic.

For some stars, relief eff orts were intensely personal. Michael Che of “Saturday Night Live” said on Instagram that he was paying one month’s rent for 160 apartments in a New York City public housing complex where his grandmother lived before she died from the virus.

Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood reached out to those trying to maintain their sobriety during self-isolation, as Alcoholics Anonymous and other recovery meetings shut down or moved online. Wood, who has been sober for a decContinued on page 72

John Krasinski. SOME GOOD NEWS

America Ferrera. USA TODAY

Michael Che. AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

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ade, read from recovery literature in a series of videos starting in March. “In these strange times, maybe people who are in the program can’t get to a meeting,” he said in one video.

Charlize Theron, whose mother shot and killed her abusive father in self defense when Theron was 15, wrote on Instagram that she was raising money to fi ght domestic violence through her charity, the Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project. “For the millions of women and children around the world sheltering with their abuser, home can be dangerous,” she wrote.

Eric Stonestreet of “Modern Family” donated 200,000 meals to Harvesters Community Food Network in Kansas City, his hometown, and comic Amy Schumer put out a plea for protective gear for nurses like her childhood best friend, working at a New York hospital.

Pink said on Instagram that she was donating $500,000 to an emergency fund at Philadelphia’s Temple University Hospital, in honor of her mother who worked there for 18 years. The singer gave the same amount to an emergency COVID-19 crisis fund in Los Angeles.

On the corporate side, Twitter’s Jack Dorsey pledged $1 billion to fi ght the virus.

Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman committed to prohibiting layoff s at the top-tier investment bank and called for U.S. corporations to continue to pay dividends as they are a source of income for many shareholders, not just the banks themselves. “A lot of individuals out there who need that money and frankly particularly in this time," Gorman said.

Lenny Kravitz launched a food voucher campaign for people in the Bahamas, where he lives part-time, focusing on the islands’ most vulnerable residents like those with disabilities or illness who may need special diets.

Jake Johnson, the voice of Peter Parker in the animated fi lm “Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse,” off ered help to parents of small children in quarantine. Send an email, he said on Instagram, and he would respond with a message of encouragement.

Lizzo staged an online meditative session in mid-March, seated with a tray of crystals and playing a recorder. “I want us all to meditate on people being clean, taking all the precautions,” she said. The Grammy Award winner also sent food donations to the staff of several hospitals

Pink donated half a million dollars apiece to emergency funds in Philadelphia and L.A. SUZANNE CORDEIRO/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES

Ronnie Wood. GETTY IMAGES

in Seattle, Detroit and Minneapolis.

When Tom Hanks tested positive in mid-March, as he and wife Rita Wilson recovered, Hanks used a Twitter update to urge others to stay safe: “Sheltering in place works like this: You don't give it to anyone - You don't get it from anyone.

Common sense, no?”

Matthew McConaughey hosted a virtual bingo night April 6 for residents at a senior living center near Austin, Texas, and has delivered tens of thousands of face masks to rural hospitals across Texas. On Twitter, he wrote: “There is a green light on the other side of this red light that we’re in right now. I believe that green light is going to be built upon the values that we can enact right now. Values of fairness, kindness, accountability, resilience, respect, courage.”

Lenny Kravitz. WIREIMAGE

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Sidelined athletes suit up however they can Ellen Wiessner

Special to USA TODAY

With no games to play and no crowds to cheer them on, sports stars applied their talents elsewhere — raising money for people in need due to the coronavirus, as well as sending messages of encouragement.

Hall of Fame pitcher Pedro Martinez launched an initiative, dubbed Step Up to the Plate, to help deal with the crisis in his native Dominican Republic.

Dozens of other Dominican athletes joined in, including Juan Soto of the Washington Nationals, Melky Cabrera of the New York Mets, retired New York Yankee Alfonso Soriano, the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Gregory Polanco, Nomar Mazara of the Chicago White Sox, Dinelson Lamet of the San Diego Padres and the Milwaukee Brewers’ Freddy Peralta.

The virus has been devastating for the Caribbean country, where food and other resources have been scarce. Appearing from the Dominican Republic in a video with his wife, Carolina, Martinez said: “We’re here to help people that really, really need it here.”

His former Red Sox teammate David Ortiz took to Facebook to thank the doctors, nurses and staff at Massachusetts General Hospital. “We all are cheering for you because we know how much you guys are sacrifi cing to help people out in this incredible epidemic time,” said the baseball player known as Big Papi.

Ortiz spent more than seven weeks at Mass General in Boston last year after being shot in a case of mistaken identity in his Dominican homeland.

New York Yankees outfi elder Giancarlo Stanton posted a video encouraging people to stay home: “We can set the perfect example for the rest of the country and the world during this fi ght.”

In Florida, Alex Rodriguez and Jennifer Lopez donated to an array of food and meal-delivery charities. “We know there are many families struggling to put food on the table during this uncertain time," A-Rod wrote on Twitter.

Houston Astros pitcher Justin Verlander said he and his wife, model Kate Upton, decided to donate his paychecks to charities such as American Gold Star Mothers, which supports families who Continued on page 76

Pedro Martinez, now a special instructor with the Boston Red Sox, organized a relief effort for his homeland, the Dominican Republic.

JONATHAN DYER/ USA TODAY SPORTS

Justin Verlander. USA TODAY SPORTS

David Ortiz. USA TODAY SPORTS

J.Lo and A-Rod. USA TODAY

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have lost a child in the military, to help with COVID-19 aid.

Golden State Warriors guard Steph Curry turned his talents to interviewing, hosting a live half-hour Instagram chat with Dr. Anthony Fauci. The nation’s leading infectious disease expert answered Curry’s questions with a basketball hoop behind him in his offi ce, and more than 50,000 people watched and listened as the two discussed testing efforts, the impact of warm weather on the evolution of the pandemic, and other aspects of the situation.

Curry and his wife, actress Ayesha Curry, also said in a Twitter video that they were helping provide more than a million meals to children who would otherwise be going withCurry USA out food because schools TODAY SPORTS were closed.

Washington Wizards point guard John Wall set up a charity eff ort, “202 Assist,” to help with rent payments for residents in the Ward 8 neighborhood in the national’s capital, where the team’s practice facility is located.

“I grew up in an environment of what they’re going through,” Wall said in an interview on the NBA’s website. “A lot of these parents can’t aff ord to pay rent right now. I think it was dope to help them out.”

Twelve-time Olympic medalist swimmer Dara Torres entertained fans by performing squats on Instagram, holding her fl uff y, mid-sized dog as a weight.

“For those of you who are bored at home and have pets who are probably bored at home, too, incorporate them into your exercises,” she suggested.

Boxing great Sugar Ray Leonard stepped in to read a children’s book aloud on Instagram, part of the Save With Stories campaign for children who rely on schools for their meals. He read “The King of Kindergarten.”

Karl-Anthony Towns of the NBA’s Minnesota Timberwolves made a heartfelt plea on Instagram after both of his parents were diagnosed with coronavirus, and his mother Jacqueline was on a ventilator in a medically induced coma.

“Please protect your families, your loved ones, your friends, yourself,” he said. “This disease, it’s deadly.”

His mother later died.

Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid announced he was donating a half-

Swimmer Dara Torres encouraged folks to stay active. MATT RYERSON/USA TODAY SPORTS

million dollars to help fi ght COVID-19 as well as to assist team employees after the franchise announced pay cuts following the suspension of the NBA season in March. The team quickly changed its tune after Embiid’s announcement and said it would keep workers at full pay.

“Where I’m from, the way I grew up, I saw a lot of struggle,” said Embiid, who was born in the African nation of Cameroon. “Being in my position, where I have the power to change people’s lives, and to help people, it’s just me. I didn’t even have to think twice about it.”

NBA and NHL players teamed up for Tony Trimble, an 18-year-old coronavirus patient at St. Louis Children’s Hospital and a passionate sports fan. Several of them shared videos on a Facebook

page for Trimble, who has a genetic disorder called Prader-Willi syndrome.

“Hey Tony, this is Vladdy. Keep fi ghting this thing, buddy,” said St. Louis Blues winger Vladamir Tarasenko. We are with you.”

Joining him were teammate Alex Pietrangelo, Boston Celtics forward Jayson Tatum, Willie Cauley-Stein of the Dallas Mavericks and the Tampa Bay Lightning’s Pat Maroon, who said: “I know you can get through it, I know it’s tough, but just remember all the people around you supporting you. We’re all in this together, and we’re all going to get through it together.”

Trimble recovered and is home.

Houston Texans defensive end J.J. Watt and his wife Kealia Ohai Watt,

who plays soccer with the Chicago Red Stars, said they were giving $350,000 to the Houston Food Bank. New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees and wife Brittany gave $5 million to deliver meals to needy people in Louisiana.

Longtime Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis appeared on Twitter to support stay-at-home appeals by Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan and described fi rst responders and health care workers as “the backbone to this society.”

Louisiana State University football coach Ed Orgeron made an appearance on Twitter for Gov. John Bel Edwards to ask viewers to cover their coughs and wash their hands. “For every winning team, a key to success is learning the playbook.

That’s true in football, and it’s also true as we take on Orgeron USA the coronavirus,” the titleTODAY SPORTS winning coach said in his distinctive Cajun growl.

The governor added: “When Coach O speaks, we all listen.”

Soccer superstars Neymar and David Beckham posted videos applauding health care workers. Beckham clapped along with three of his children and wife Victoria Beckham from their home in England's Cotswolds.

Nadia Comaneci, the fi rst female gymnast to score a perfect 10 in the Olympics, referenced that Comaneci 1976 feat to encourage GETTY IMAGES hand-washing. “The perfect 10 has been a big number for me all my life, but now I’m focusing on the perfect 20,” the Romanian said. “Wash your hands for 20 seconds.”

Tennis great Roger Federer and his wife, Mirka, made a donation worth more than $1 million to help the vulnerable families in his native Switzerland.

To raise money for COVID-19 relief efforts, golf superstars Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson joined legendary NFL quarterbacks Peyton Manning and Tom Brady for a live-streamed charity golf match in Florida.

Woods and Manning soundly beat Mickelson and Brady, raising $20 million and drawing some 6 million viewers in a country starved for live sports entertainment. The show also drew some goodnatured pokes at Brady’s performance off the gridiron.

“Tom has to be a couple seconds away from a club toss here,” J.J. Watt tweeted.

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They survived coronavirus Many might never be the same Rick Jervis, Lindsay Schnell, Alan Gomez and Deborah Barfield Berry

USA TODAY

An avid skier will lose eight fi ngers and three toes because of complications from the coronavirus. A 27-yearold who beat the virus is plagued by panic attacks and depression. A Florida survivor struggles with memory and vision loss.

The death toll from COVID-19, the disease brought on by the coronavirus, has garnered much of the nation’s attention, with U.S. fatalities topping 100,000 by late May. But many of the more than 2.3 million Americans who have tested positive for the virus are dealing with puzzling, lingering symptoms, including aches, anxiety attacks, night sweats, rapid heartbeats, breathing problems, and the loss of smell or taste. Many are living a life unrecognizable from the one they had before.

USA TODAY interviewed more than a dozen COVID-19 survivors to capture their thoughts on fi ghting and prevailing over the virus that is known to have infected more than 10 million people worldwide — and likely many more — and to learn how their lives have changed. Here are their stories.

Home again after 18 days in the hospital, but every breath serves as a reminder

Angel Andujar, 73, before falling ill, and back at home, where he’s receiving supplemental oxygen.

Lately, Angel Andujar, 73, can’t walk from his bedroom to his living room without getting winded. Oxygen runs through tubes into his nose and down to lungs recently ravaged by COVID-19.

Andujar spent 18 days in a Clifton, New Jersey, hospital, struggling to survive. Once he returned home, his initial recovery was tough. He would sleep only a few hours at night before waking, gasping for air. He stayed away from the MSNBC news broadcasts he once watched regularly because too much COVID-19

coverage made him anxious.

Andujar, a retired respiratory therapist originally from Puerto Rico, is used to keeping busy — doing projects around the house, cutting the grass, visiting his grandchildren. All that has been put on hold.

He doesn’t know if he’ll have long-term lung damage. For now, he’s enjoying being surrounded by friends and family. Earlier this month, he watched through a bedroom window as his grandson Miguel celebrated his fourth birthday in his yard. A neighbor, a retired fi reman, parked a fi re truck on the street and ran the siren, to Miguel’s delight. “As long as I have my daughter and grandkids, I don’t need anything else,” he says. “That’s enough for me.”

Wondering why she lived when others didn’t, she hopes her survival can be an inspiration Two months after she relocated to Denver, Ravi Turman thought her nagging cough was residual altitude sickness or a bad cold.

She checked into a hospital emergency room on March 22, where she collapsed into a coma and spent 10 days on a ventilator, racked with COVID-19.

After she returned home to fi nish recovering, Turman, 51, constantly asked herself why she had recovered when so many other African Americans were dying of the disease. Reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that Black Americans are being hospitalized and dying from COVID-19

Ravi Turman, 51, was in a coma and spent 10 days on a ventilator. She feels she’ll be back at 100% soon.

at disproportionately higher rates than whites.

Turman’s Facebook page is fi lled with reports of friends and loved ones across the country dying from the disease. In one family she knows from Indianapolis, all seven members contracted COVID-19, and three of them died.

She still struggles with back pain but feels she’ll be back at 100% soon. She wants to show African Americans and other people from other minority groups they can survive COVID-19, too.

“It isn’t necessarily a death sentence,” she says.

“You can beat it. Don’t give up hope.”

First 9/11, now COVID-19: ‘Sometimes I think I’m destined to live through tragedies’

Wendy Lanski, 49, wonders if the rapid heartbeat and fatigue cause by the virus will be permanent.

In her darkest moment, when her lungs squeezed closed and she felt near death, Wendy Lanski latched onto one thought: “Osama bin Laden didn’t kill me.

I’m not dying from this virus.”

Lanski, 49, a survivor of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, spent 13 days in a New Jersey hospital battling the coronavirus. Her fever spiked to 103 degrees, she had terrible chills, and it felt like “something was sitting on my chest,” she says. Doctors debated putting her on a ventilator but decided to keep her on oxygen instead. She slowly recovered.

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Now back home, Lanski worries about whether the rapid heartbeat and fatigue that followed her home will be permanent.

It’s not her fi rst brush with death. She was at her desk on the 29th fl oor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center when a jet crashed into her building on Sept. 11, 2001. She scrambled down the stairs and into the street, just as another jet hit the other tower.

The initial fog of confusion surrounding those attacks — Who did it? Where is it safe? — feels a lot like the uncertainty circling the coronavirus, Lanski says.

“Sometimes I think I’m destined to live through tragedies,” she says.

For now, she wears a heart monitor to keep track of her rapid heartbeat. She often wakes up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. “The fear of the unknown, that’s really the worst part,” she says.

Father brought virus home unknowingly; he died as she struggled to recover Tracey Alvino thought things were looking up when she fi nally brought her dad home in March from the Long Island, New York, nursing home where he was rehabbing from neck surgery. She didn’t know Daniel Alvino, 76, was carrying the coronavirus.

The virus spread through her home like a brushfi re, infecting not only her but also her mother, brother and boyfriend. Two days later, Daniel Alvino became so sick he had to be rushed to a hospital.

Tracey Alvino battled the virus from home. She got a high fever and lost her sense of taste and smell. Pain in a foot she fractured years ago suddenly fl ared up.

Her armpit glands hurt, too. But the toughest part by far was when a doctor asked whether she wanted to take her dad off his ventilator. The hospital staff said there was nothing more they could do. As she suff ered from the same virus that was killing him, she made the decision to let him go. He died four days later.

It took 17 days to cremate Daniel Alvino and another month to inter him because of the backlog of bodies. In May, a few limited family members gathered at a cemetery to fi nally lay his remains to rest.

Jacki Palmer, 27, with husband Ethan on the cruise that exposed her, left, and after donating plasma.

Even after the physical symptoms wane, anxiety can retain a powerful grip Jacki Palmer is no longer gasping for breath with chest pains. Instead, she faces a new host of challenges: crying fi ts, insomnia and depression that some days makes it hard to get out of bed.

Palmer, 27, an IT auditor in Houston, spent four days in a hospital in March after contracting the coronavirus while on a cruise to Mexico with family. She remembers how the nurse would dress head to toe in “I’m a very protective gear to bring her strong, medicine — how alien and terrifi ed that made her feel. independent Back at home, it took young woman about 10 days for the back pain and fatigue to fade, but and this has just seeing TV reports about other patients dying alone crippled me in hospital rooms sent her with fear.” into depression. Questions whirled through her head Jacki Palmer incessantly: Why did she survive? When will she start feeling normal again?

What if the dark moods never go away? “It’s a constant, anxious spiral in my head,” she says.

She started seeing a counselor online and joined a support group on Facebook. Donating plasma also helped brighten her mood, though she could only donate once a month due to her weakened condition.

Anxiety is never too far off . Seeing someone at a supermarket without a face mask sent her heart racing. “I was losing my mind,” she says.

Palmer says people should realize the battle against COVID-19 doesn’t end when survivors leave the hospital. “I’m a very strong, independent young woman, and this has just crippled me with fear.”

‘It’s like a dragon waiting to eat you alive.

It will take everything it can from you’ Tracey Alvino with her mother shortly before catching the virus, and later while recovering.

For 11 days, Patricia Cruz Elostta lay in a bed at a fi eld hospital set up in New York’s Central Park to treat coronavirus patients. Cold air seeped into the

tents spread across the fi eld, and thunderstorms shook the air around her. At times, she could hear other patients gasping for air and dying.

“Shortness of breath, weakness, desperation,” says Cruz, 57, recalling her experience. “Your spirit was just broken down.”

Her condition eventually improved enough to be transferred to a nursing home for rehab. There, she met up with her mom, Maria Alvarado, 80, who was also recovering from COVID-19. One day, as they sat together at a table, Cruz watched as Alvarado seized up and collapsed from a heart attack.

Alvarado survived, and mother and daughter returned to their Astoria, New York, home to continue recovery. These days, Cruz, an occupational therapist originally from Colombia, is trying to get strong enough to return to work, while taking care of her mother, who mostly stays in her bedroom.

When she goes for walks outside, Cruz takes frequent breaks, stopping on benches to catch her breath. She’s starting to cook meals and clean her home, tasks she cherished before the pandemic. But the constant sharp pains in her back and right hand remind her the virus is not done with her yet.

“It’s like a dragon waiting to eat you alive,” she says of the virus. “It will take everything it can from you.”

Patricia Cruz Elostta, 57, before being infected, and with her mom as they both recover from the virus.

The ‘people in between’ have survived but not recovered; their fi ght goes on Lucretia Sette Morrone spent seven days in a hospital on New York’s Long Island with chills and fever from the coronavirus. When doctors sent her home, she knew that it wasn’t because she was “well” — just that she was better off than the crush of sicker patients streaming into the hospital.

At home, she had a fever for 30 straight days, quarantined to her bedroom as her husband left meals at her door and cared for their adult son, who has autism. She was feeling better when one day she had trouble catching her breath. She returned to the hospital, where doctors found a pulmonary embolism — a blockage in a lung artery. Five more days in isolation.

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gen-starved while on the ventilator, and doctors were preparing to amputate eight fi ngers and three toes.

Despite the setbacks, Garfi eld, who owns a credit card processing company, says he’s lucky to be alive and surrounded by supportive friends and family. His days now consist of early morning stretches followed by physical therapy — wall squats, exercise bike — three days a week. One of his top goals: get back on the ski slopes.

“Today is really the only day you can count on. Tomorrow may not be here,” he says.

When pneumonia falls on top of COVID-19, morphine and antibiotics are essential Lucretia Sette Morrone, left, came home from the hospital, then had to go back with complications.

“It’s never-ending,” she says.

Since returning home, her body and legs still ache.

One day she took a walk with her husband and had to come straight home for a nap. She hopes the symptoms will one day vanish, but she’s not sure they will.

It frustrates Morrone when people talk only about those who have died or those who have fully recovered. “There’s a whole bunch of people in between who are suff ering and fi ghting it still,” she says.

Despite the damage done, survivor counts his blessings and looks toward the slopes Gregg Garfi eld uses a walker to steady his balance.

His fi ngertips are black and gnarled and will soon be removed, a constant reminder of the 31 days spent on a ventilator fi ghting for his life against COVID-19.

Garfi eld, 54, was “Patient Zero” at Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, California, outside Los Angeles. He caught the coronavirus while on a skiing trip with friends in Italy in February and was admitted to the hospital on March 5, becoming its fi rst COVID-19 patient.

During his 64-day hospital stay, Garfi eld’s lungs collapsed four times, his kidneys failed and infections fl ared throughout his body. Doctors gave him a 1% chance of survival. His hands and feet became oxy-

Gregg Garfi eld, 54, with his girlfriend A.J. Johnson and with her and sister Stephanie Garfi eld Bruno.

Curtis Jefferson, 58, isn’t sure where or how he got the virus. He wishes others wouldn’t take chances.

“People are going back to beaches in certain states, and rates are going up. What are we doing?

This is crazy to me.”

Curtis Jefferson

Curtis Jeff erson thought he was on his way to recovering from the coronavirus when he felt a sharp, severe pain in his left side.

This was a new symptom. He had endured fever, a dry cough, headaches, the loss of his sense of taste.

None of those had sent him to the emergency room, but this one did.

The diagnosis: along with COVID-19, he now had pneumonia. He’d have to stay in the coronavirus ward for six days, getting shots of morphine for the pain and swallowing antibiotics to fi ght pneumonia.

“I knew I wasn’t dying,” he says, “but it was such an ordeal.”

In the hospital, he saw “only a few nurses, a couple doctors, and they were covered head to toe. They didn’t come near me unless they had to.”

Afterward, Jeff erson quarantined in his basement, away from his wife and three teenage children, watching “Law & Order” reruns and westerns. He slept restlessly at night. Climbing the stairs to the bathroom left him gasping for breath for fi ve minutes.

Now “99%” recovered and back to work in Washington, D.C., as an electric construction mechanic, Jeff erson, 58, still isn’t sure how or where he contracted the virus. And he can’t understand why so many others seem to cavalier about it.

“I walk around my neighborhood and see people with no masks, talking in each other’s faces,” he says.

“People are going back to beaches in certain states, and rates are going up. What are we doing? This is crazy to me.”

Back at work after a bout with the virus, nurse gets geared up to lift people’s spirits When Cliff Roperez hugged his 7-year-old daughter for the fi rst time in almost six weeks, she snuggled into him and started to cry.

“Daddy,” she said, “now we can play again!”

A few weeks earlier, during her birthday party, Roperez, 47, couldn’t celebrate with her or play hideand-seek. After testing positive for coronavirus March 30, Roperez and his wife agreed that he would quarantine himself in their bedroom in a tent.

A nurse at an elderly care facility outside San Jose, California, Roperez was infected early even though he began wearing an N95 mask as soon as the virus was confi rmed in the U.S. At one point, he and his wife worried he would die. He reviewed his life insurance.

He recovered, he says, with “Asian therapy”: His wife made tinolang manok, a Filipino chicken soup, and ginger tea with honey. Three times a day, he’d inhale steam from a basin of salted, boiling water.

After quarantining himself for 12 days, Roperez returned to work, where COVID-positive employees had their own entrance. His energy sapped, he’d tire easily. But in a facility with 120-plus elderly patients terrifi ed of the virus, he’s trying to lift spirits. He makes his personal protective equipment into costumes — astronaut one day, superhero the next — “and it gives light to everybody,” he says.

He tested negative on May 11. Santa Clara County, where he lives, requires two negative tests before residents can declare themselves virus-free. In late May he was waiting for results from his second test.

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Cliff Roperez, 47, isolated in a tent. Back at work, he turned his PPE into costumes, such as an astronaut.

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“ The doctor will see you now.”

If you’ve been avoiding medical care—from routine checkups to treatments for chronic health conditions and immunizations—you could be putting your health at risk even further.

With safety precautions in place, doctors’ offices are now reopening across the nation. Don’t postpone treatment any longer.

Make an appointment. See your doctor.

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Fatigue, arthritis that’s worse than ever and the persistent fear of reinfection Margaret “Margie” Waldrum had a panic attack at the grocery store. She didn’t want to touch the cart.

She was afraid she might get the coronavirus again.

For nearly two months, Waldrum, 68, battled the virus, including a 10-day stay at Valley Hospital in New Jersey with double pneumonia.

But life after COVID-19 has also been hard. She’s 18 pounds lighter. She’s still winded, still fatigued. Her rheumatoid arthritis feels worse than ever, so bad she can’t turn the cap on a water bottle, can’t grip a steering wheel. A walk lasted about six minutes before she felt unbearable pain in her feet and knees. “I’m 68 years old, but I wasn’t like this before,’’ she says.

She’s anxious about her future. Will the virus invade her body again? Should she get psychotherapy?

Will she be able to return to work as a receptionist at the front desk of an assisted living facility?

In the days ahead, she had a chest X-Ray and a scan planned to check her lungs.

“It’s going to take a little longer for me to jump back,” she says. “You can’t give up.”

Mary Pflum Peterson, 47, was an avid runner.

Now a long walk outside can leave her exhausted.

Now she’s winded after walking up the four fl ights of stairs to the front door of her Manhattan home. Long walks outside, she says, can “cloak me in exhaustion.”

The worst of her symptoms — complete loss of taste and smell, burning lungs and the sense that someone “really, really big was sitting on my chest” — have passed. But the weariness lingers. She’s traded daily runs for daily naps.

Her 13-year-old son is still sick with coronavirus, fi ghting off high fevers and crippling headaches. He’s the only other person in their family to test positive.

She knows fi rsthand he won’t be back to normal anytime soon. “A lot of us want to snap back,” she says.

“And you have this realization that the virus is going to be here for a while.”

Though it’s her fourth time in the hospital, she counts herself as ‘one of the lucky ones’

Margie Waldrum, 68, says she lost her appetite while in the hospital and lost 18 pounds.

Being young, healthy and in good shape is no guarantee you won’t get knocked down Mary Pfl um Peterson’s four children didn’t like it when their mother was sick with coronavirus, cordoned off in her bedroom and unable to play with them. But now that she’s recovering, they like it that Mommy can’t raise her voice to scold them because even the slightest exertion leaves her breathless.

“You know I can’t yell, but you know you’re really in trouble,” she says when they act up.

Pfl um Peterson, a 47-year-old writer living in New York City, tested positive for coronavirus on March 21.

She’s not sure how she contracted it or from whom.

Even if you’re young, healthy and in good shape, she says, the virus “shows you who’s boss.”

She used to run 2 to 5 miles a day in Central Park.

In her hospital room in Fairfax, Virginia, Donna M. Talla keeps the television on CNN to track the death toll and learn more about hydroxychloroquine.

She suspects that the medicine used to treat her COVID-19 weeks earlier may have saddled her with side eff ects, including a racing heart that landed her in the hospital for the fourth time since March.

“It’s been a hell of a ride,’’ she says. “It’s the roller coaster you get on, and you just want to get off it.”

Donna Talla says it’s been a “roller coaster” since she fi rst tested positive for the virus in March.

Talla tested positive twice for COVID-19. She suspects she picked up the virus while grocery shopping in March. She had a backache, then a rash, then headaches. Later came fevers and chills. After she struggled to climb stairs, she went to the emergency room.

Later, news of blood clots on her lungs ‘’almost broke me. ... But I bounced back.’’

As her health improved, she returned to working from home as a director of sales for a media company.

She tested negative — twice. She posted on a Facebook page for survivors, borrowing quotes from “Rocky” and encouraging others to fi ght.

Then she was back in the hospital, this time with concerns about her heart. “There are people who are dying in this hospital,” she says. “I’m one of the lucky ones, and I don’t take that for granted for a minute.”

Kevin Rathel with wife Stacie before the virus , and with plasma donor James Crocker during recovery.

‘Easter miracle’ was cause for celebration, but the road back will be a long one His wife called it an “Easter miracle.” After eight days in a medically induced coma, Kevin Rathel awoke in his hospital bed that Sunday, April 12, tears trickling down his face as he saw his wife and three children talking to him on an iPad. Five days later, doctors and nurses cheered him on as he left the Orlando hospital where he received the plasma injections he credits with beating COVID-19.

But for Rathel, 52, the agony was just starting.

He’s trying to regain the 25 pounds he lost. He used to routinely walk 4 miles a day. Now? A quarter-mile, maybe a half, because he tires so easily. He wakes up with night sweats and quietly covers his side of the bed with a towel so his wife can keep sleeping. “Poor girl, she spent a month trying to save my life,” he says.

He can’t see like he used to, can’t retain information. When he grasps for a memory or a name, he screams: “COVID brain!”

During a recent group Bible reading, Rathel squinted to see the words on the page. He dragged his fi nger under each word. And, after memorizing the books of the Bible as a child, he now struggles to list the four gospels.

“John, Luke … ” he says. “I can’t remember.”

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Joel Stallworth owns The Small Shop LA in downtown Los Angeles, which was struck by looters on May 29. Stallworth says he’s not going to complain about fi nancial losses he suffered as a result of protests over George Floyd’s death when Floyd’s loved ones, particularly his daughter, have lost so much more. HARRISON HILL/USA TODAY

A year of body blows for small businesses First COVID-19, then protests and looting; entrepreneurs contemplate uncertain future

Jessica Guynn USA TODAY

Joel Stallworth is smiling in front of his tiny, boarded-up shop in downtown Los Angeles. He’s wearing a black T-shirt he designed not long after looters swarmed through the smashed door and carried out armloads of clothing and accessories.

Around a photograph of The Small Shop LA in tatters, red lettering says: “We love y’all. Thanks for the energy.” And that’s his message for every person who walked out with his merchandise May 29: “That is not a stolen good. That is a fi ght for freedom.”

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Stallworth opened his 300-squarefoot storefront fi ve years ago on a historic stretch of downtown Los Angeles. The shop carries streetwear, including his own brand, Lost in LA. One of the most popular T-shirts: “Love Is Energy.”

Watching over him on the wall of his shop is a picture of his grandfather Bishop Lewis Dolphin Stallworth Sr., a police chaplain whose name graces a charter school in Stockton. The picture says: “Go With God.” The night his store was looted, Stallworth’s phone rang nonstop. This is what he told his worried friends: “Let them do whatever they have to do. Right now I want to focus on lives. Lives over shops. I understand the hurt.”

From coast to coast, small businesses reel Behind all the broken glass are broken dreams. From a Chinese restaurant in Seattle to a New Jersey liquor store, small businesses were ravaged by looting following the death of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police offi cer, dealing a second crippling blow to those already reeling from COVID-19.

Years of hard work and life savings were wiped out overnight, putting postpandemic reopening plans on hold and forcing small businesses to seek relief from insurers or their communities.

The losses have been particularly devastating to minority-owned businesses, which typically don’t have as much cash on hand and aren’t as well insured.

Such businesses were already being disproportionately harmed by the pandemic, says Robert Fairlie, an economics professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz. The coronavirus hit African Americans harder than other groups, with higher mortality rates and more job losses, a harrowing setback that many fear will deepen existing inequities.

A recent study Fairlie did for the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research found the number of active business owners in the U.S. plunged by 3.3 million, or 22%, from February to April as the coronavirus shut down the economy, the steepest decline on record.

African-American–owned businesses declined the most — 41% — followed

by Latino-owned fi rms, 32%, and Asianowned, 26%. Damage from looting, Fairlie said, “is going to make things even worse.”

“We don’t have to look at this as a bad thing as far as the looters,” says Joel Stallworth.

“I don’t 100% agree with them, but people are out here looting because of a Black life, because of a human life ... a person who will never see his child again.”

HARRISON HILL/USA TODAY

Snapshots of small businesses across America reveal a range of complicated emotions and reactions.

Business owners told USA TODAY that they share protesters’ pain over Floyd, and many of them have taken to the streets to make their own voices heard. They support uprisings across the country that are leading to a much-needed and long-deferred national reckoning with police brutality and racial injustice.

And they point out that the looting was often not the work of protesters, but of outside agitators and opportunists.

But as they sweep up shattered pieces of their lives, some say they’ve become needless victims of misplaced anger and senseless destruction.

In Los Angeles: ‘It saddens me that I can’t even be sad about my shop’ Stallworth knows well what it means to be Black in America.

He was raised in Stockton, California, a city east of San Francisco hard-hit by

the 2008 housing crisis. It is one of the nation’s most diverse cities yet suff ers from chronic economic and health disparities and racial tensions. Stallworth, one of 10 children, graduated from California State University Stanislaus. A two-sport athlete in basketball and track, he qualifi ed for the Olympic trials in 2008 and last year was inducted into the California Collegiate Athletic Association Hall of Fame.

He didn’t study fashion, but on his own began making the kind of clothing and hats he liked to wear. People stopped him so many times on the street to ask about his gear that his wife persuaded Stallworth to make a career out of it.

“I love people,” Stallworth says. “I try to be as positive as I possibly can.”

A year ago, a white manager of a Nike store in Santa Monica accused him and his wife of stealing a $12 basketball that they had just bought for their toddler. In an exchange caught on video, the manContinued on page 90

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ager called police even though the couple had the receipt. Nike later apologized and fi red the manager.

Stallworth says he’s been thrown into the backseat of a police cruiser for no reason. His goal is for his 2-year-old son to never know that kind of terror and for Floyd’s young daughter to know the power of her father’s life and legacy.

“It saddens me that I can’t even be sad about my shop. But I am thinking about the little girl who will never see her dad physically again. How can I go to her and say: ‘Hey, they messed up my shop which I have insurance on.’ How can I go to her and say: ‘I’m mad,’ ” Stallworth says. “I don’t want her to ever read an article that says the guy at The Small Shop LA is complaining about this after the police stuck his knee on her father’s neck. ... I can replace everything that was stolen, and if I can’t, who cares?”

A GoFundMe campaign for The Small Shop LA raised more than $15,000. Stallworth says he will use the money not to rebuild but to “move up.”

“I don’t want to go back to the old ways,” he says.

“This right here,” he adds, “is going to elevate humanity.

“We don’t have to look at this as a bad thing as far as the looters. … I don’t 100% agree with them, but people are out here looting because of a Black life, because of a human life … a person who will never see his child again.”

In Seattle: ‘We are just trying to hold ourselves together’ Under a bright red awning in Seattle’s Chinatown-International District is one of the city’s popular dim sum joints. A colorful mural on the plywood covering the front window shows the cityscape with the message: “We’re open!” Above is a “Black Lives Matter” sign.

In the kitchen, steam rises from pots.

Cooks chop ginger, scallions, Chinese broccoli and green beans at a fevered pace. The aroma of pork and shrimp dumplings fi lls the restaurant as the phone rings with order after order. Not a single ray of sunlight peeks through the boarded-up windows.

“It’s pretty much like a war zone” in the area, says Eric Chan, whose family opened Jade Garden nearly two decades ago. They’ve been open every day since.

Continued on page 92

Eric Chan’s family owns a dim sum restaurant in Seattle that has suffered one devastating blow after another in 2020. IVY CHAN

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But never before have the days been quite this hard or quite this long.

First came the novel coronavirus, which was fi rst identifi ed in China, fueling age-old prejudices against those of Chinese ancestry and hurting business.

Then the extended shutdown vaporized 95% of Jade Garden’s sales. Ongoing social-distancing regulations have put the restaurant’s future at risk. Even now that Jade Garden is permitted to operate at 25% capacity, such a small restaurant, with just 18 tables, means Chan can only seat diners at four tables.

“This is crippling us,” he says. “We are taking it month by month.”

For up to 14 hours a day, Chan, the fi rst in his family to go to college, has struggled to pay the mortgage and keep afl oat the restaurant that is his extended family’s only income.

Pandemic pressures keep piling up.

Higher food costs are taking a bigger bite out of meager margins. Chan even ran out of soy sauce packets and to-go boxes.

At the end of March, someone cracked a window trying to break into Jade Garden, setting him back $2,000. Rather than risking another break-in, Chan paid $1,500 to board up all the windows.

Then late on the night of May 31 following peaceful protests, a small group ripped the plywood off the windows, stole money from the cash register and ransacked the restaurant in what Chan believes was the work of a small band of thieves using the protests as cover.

“Here in the Asian community, we see what’s going on,” Chan says. “What’s happening is a revolution. But what’s happening with the revolution, you have opportunists who want to take advantage of this.”

The family started cleaning up after midnight and fi nished up around 4 a.m., one hour before their workday began. A friend started a GoFundMe campaign.

“We are just trying to hold ourselves together, but obviously there are lessfortunate businesses right now that are being hit even harder than us,” Chan says. “What they are going through, I can’t even imagine. Closing up shop permanently is just devastating.”

In North Carolina: ‘My heart breaks for my fellow business owners’ A stream of haunting images and words on social media about Floyd’s death shook Raleigh, North Carolina, na-

Members of the community came out to help Megan George Cain clean up damage at her store, The Zen Succulent, in Raleigh, N.C. COURTESY OF MEGAN GEORGE CAIN

tive Megan George Cain while she was holding her newborn son.

“I am a fi rst-time mother. Knowing that my Black son, my African American son, could potentially meet that same fate, hit me like a wave,” she says.

The past few months had already been diffi cult for The Zen Succulent, her plant and gift shop.

Growing up, her parents’ home overfl owed with lush green plants. The foyer had a 20-foot palm tree, long vines trailed from the kitchen to the den, and the backyard had ferns and hostas. Her job was caring for them all. “I learned to care for something other than myself,” she says.

What began as a passion project in

2012 with her mom, Margaret George, a research scientist who moonlights as a terrarium artist, blossomed into a thriving small business with two airy brickand-mortar locations and an e-commerce site, tilled by revived interest in custom terrariums, mini-gardens that bring the outdoors in and can turn anyone into an amateur horticulturist. In 2016, Cain was even asked to create a living wall installation with faux succulents and preserved mosses set in native North Carolina hardwood for HGTV. After COVID-19 hit, she temporarily closed the storefronts in downtown Durham and Raleigh, furloughing most of her employees and making deliveries to people’s doorsteps. With the economy

restarting, she was busy restocking The Zen Succulent and preparing to reopen when streets fi lled with protesters.

The Raleigh store was broken into.

Cain woke her husband, and together they watched a remote video feed.

“You are seeing what’s happening but feeling so helpless. There is nothing we can do,” she says. “The protesters had all gone home. This was a rowdy group that went from street to street breaking things for the sake of breaking things.”

At daybreak, Cain gingerly stepped through broken glass into her store. Paper goods and plants, her “living inventory,” were soaked in alcohol. Pots lay shattered on the fl oor. The cash register and purchase order system were broken, laptops stolen.

Within an hour, the community showed up. Hundreds of people converged on the block, off ering to help her and other business owners.

An online fundraiser by a concerned community member quickly raised more than $8,000. Cain says she’ll use the funds to support other small businesses.

“It makes your heart so full,” she says.

Still, the aftershocks keep coming.

Ahead are diffi cult conversations with her insurance company and her landlord. In the meantime, just to replace the 15-by-15-foot window — which used to lure passersby with glimpses of artfully curated plants and goods — will set her back $16,000, more than what she pays in rent for most of the year.

She’s far from the only one facing a long road back.

“As a Black business owner, my heart breaks for my fellow business owners,” Cain says. “I feel for the people that thought this was a way to be heard, that their voice was so stifl ed that they had to go into the streets and riot and burn things and break things because their heart is broken like mine.”

In Minneapolis: ‘We lost our livelihood. Floyd lost his life’ Kacey White and Charles Stotts collectively spent four decades cooking and working in other people’s restaurants before realizing their dream in 2016 of opening their own.

Stotts, a Minneapolis native, had longed to move back to the Twin Cities after 17 years. “It really was the only thing we talked about for years,” White says.

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cal landmark, lit up the entryway to The Town Talk Diner & Gastropub, a 1940sera greasy spoon diner that the husbandand-wife team transformed into a modern eatery serving a seasonal menu from the bounty of local farmers.

Regulars used to fi ght over who got to sit on the original diner stools. Stotts and White greeted every guest from the semi-open kitchen as they whipped up handmade pastas, BBQ ribs and a seven vegetable coconut forbidden rice dessert. House rules? “Come early. Stay late.

Eat better. Be happy.”

The restaurant, which was 150 yards from the 3rd Precinct station of the Minneapolis Police Department, took years to build and two nights to destroy.

The fi rst night, windows were smashed. The bar, stocked with local spirits, house-made bitters and a large collection of wine, was emptied.

Stotts and White waded through ankle-deep water still pouring from the sprinkler system and into the dining room. “Fortunately, there wasn’t much damage in the kitchen, and it appeared that, while it would take some time, we would be able to repair all the damage,” White recalls.

The restoration company ordered new windows, and Stotts and White boarded up the restaurant. Already weary from months of holding their business together with curbside pickup and takeout, they joined the protests outside.

“Everything about it felt to me like that night was the bad night and this was where Minneapolis would start to turn the corner,” Stotts says.

Instead, the police station was set on fi re. By dawn, when the smoke cleared, all that remained of the Town Talk Diner & Gastropub was rubble. Stotts and White wept over the ruined business, joined by neighborhood regulars.

Clayborn Turbeville, who started a GoFundMe for the couple, says his friends never took time off , not for their birthdays or wedding anniversary. Yet, the morning after the restaurant burned to the ground, when Turbeville railed at how unfair it was, Stotts told him: “We lost our livelihood and our dream. George Floyd lost his life. … We will rebuild.”

“That’s the type of person Chuck is,” Turbeville says.

“Our goal is to keep cooking. That’s what we know,” White adds. “It’s a diffi cult situation for the community here and in other cities right now.”

“It changed my life.

Everything I had worked so hard for was just being taken away.”

Amin Arias

Trenton, New Jersey, store owner

Amin Arias’ liquor store in Trenton, New Jersey, suffered hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage and stolen goods. LATINO MERCHANT ASSOCIATION OF NEW JERSEY

In New Jersey: ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen next’

Kacey White and Charles Stotts' restaurant in Minneapolis was left in ashes after two nights of unrest.

COURTESY OF KACEY WHITE AND CHARLES STOTTS

Amin Arias left his native Dominican Republic by himself when he was 16 for Trenton, New Jersey, where his brother worked at a minimart grocery store.

Three years later, he and his brother bought the minimart, and they ran it together for the next 14 years. In 2013, Arias sold his half of the business and used the money to buy Tony’s Liquors, a 2,500square-foot liquor store on East Hanover Street in downtown Trenton.

A key reason for the move: Arias wanted his business to be in a safer neighborhood. The store, located just two blocks from Trenton City Hall, should be much safer to operate, he reasoned. “It was in the center of the city,” Arias said. “I thought it’d be more secure.”

Arias, who is vice president of the Latino Merchant Association of New Jersey, was working at his store on May 31 when protesters began amassing downtown. He handed out bags of chips and

bottles of cold water. At around 7 p.m., he closed the shop and headed home.

Later that evening, he began getting calls from employees who live in an apartment above the store: People were trying to break in. He opened an app on his phone that’s connected to security cameras at the store and saw streams of people running in and out with armfuls of bottles and merchandise.

“It changed my life,” Arias said of those initial grainy images on his phone.

“Everything I had worked so hard for was just being taken away.”

By the time he got there, the police had chased away the looters. But what he saw made his heart sink: The front rollaway security door had been ripped from its mounts. Shelves were emptied. Bottles were smashed in heaps on the fl oor.

Looters took more than $350,000 worth of liquor and cash. Arias said his insurance may cover up to $80,000, but probably less. In his seven years owning the liquor store, he hadn’t had a single robbery. Now, his store was in ruins.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen next,” he said.

The group he belongs to, the Latino Merchant Association, started a GoFundMe page to raise money for Arias and other businesses that were damaged. Starting last month, the group has handed out 3,000 hot meals to help people aff ected by the coronavirus.

Trenton has a thriving Latino business community. According to a 2019 report from the New Jersey Policy Perspective think tank, immigrants own a higher share of Main Street businesses in New Jersey than in any other state except California, generating about $1 billion in economic activity every year.

Sixty of the 100 or so businesses that suff ered damage in downtown Trenton belong to members of the Latino Merchant Association of New Jersey, according to its president Manuel Hernandez.

“All Latinos, we feel their pain,” he says of protesters. “But our mom-andpop stores should never be looted. We are always helping out the community.”

Contributing: Rick Jervis

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