* Read the whole thing…

Abandoning masks and social distancing now would be the worst possible move for Americans and their political leaders. The 1918 pandemic teaches us why. […]

(I)n the past several months, different variants have surfaced almost simultaneously in Britain, South Africa, Brazil, and now in California and New York. Each of these variants has independently developed similar and in some cases identical mutations and achieved greater transmissibility by binding more efficiently to human cells.

A virus that binds more efficiently to cells it infects would, logic suggests, also be more likely to bind to a larger number of cells, which could, in turn, increase disease severity and lethality. On Wednesday, BMJ, formerly the British Medical Journal, reported that Britain’s so-called U.K. variant was 64 percent more lethal than the virus it replaced.

There is not enough data to evaluate the variants first identified in South Africa and Brazil, but whether or not they are also more lethal, one thing is certain — more variants will arise. Mutations are random. Most either make the virus so defective it can’t function or have no impact at all. But this virus has already demonstrated that it can become more deadly and evade some immune protection, making vaccines less effective. If we allow the virus additional opportunities to mutate, it will have more opportunities to become the worst version of itself. […]

There is no reason to expect that this virus will suddenly turn into 1918. There are limits as to how far it can mutate. But the more people who abandon masks and social distancing, the more infections can be expected — and the more variants will emerge.

* Unreal…

NO ONE vaccinated at Nursing Home until @cbschicago starts asking questions. https://t.co/TI3Yapmvxd

— Brad Edwards (@tvbrad) March 12, 2021

More here from the Tribune.

* NYT…

As spikes in virus infections and exposures have forced more educators to stay home, the teacher shortage — exacerbated by limited access to COVID-19 testing and contact tracing — is among the main reasons that schools and even entire districts have had to shut down in-person instruction, often for weeks on end.

* Mitch Dudek at the Sun-Times…

Soldiers running the mass vaccination site at the United Center have been hungry because they haven’t been fed enough food, a problem the Army says it’s aware of and trying to fix.

There are 222 soldiers, most from the 101st Airborne Division, who are staffing the vaccination site that opened Tuesday.

The soldiers arrived in Chicago on Friday and the food that’s been supplied to them since through a vendor hasn’t been adequate, Capt. Harpa Magnusdottir, an Army spokeswoman, acknowledged Wednesday. […]

Military spokesman Tim Lundberg said the issue arose because the contract with the vendor “wasn’t in firm enough language to ensure the food requirement was being met.” […]

[The wife of one of the soldiers working at the site] pointed to one meal consisting of a small salad and an orange and said her husband had lost weight since he’d been in Chicago.

Oh, for Pete’s sake.

* Kyra Senese and Eric Fan at the Sun-Times…

When the coronavirus first hit Chicago and Cook County last spring, Black residents bore the brunt of the surging death toll.

But over the past year, as Cook County deaths have climbed toward 10,000, the virus has wreaked havoc in nearly every corner of the region. Low-income communities of all ethnicities have been hit especially hard, from the heavily Hispanic neighborhoods around Cicero to majority-white areas like Niles and Oak Lawn.

Early pandemic hot spots like South Shore have been surpassed by communities like Cicero, where two low-rated nursing homes and a profusion of multifamily apartment buildings have led to consistently high death rates, according to interviews with public health experts and government officials and an analysis of Cook County death data and medical records by the Chicago Sun-Times and the Brown Institute for Media Innovation’s Documenting COVID-19 project.

The number of total deaths in Cook County is only below the dense counties that makeup New York City and Los Angeles. Cook County also ranks in the top third of large U.S. counties in per-capita COVID-19 death rate, at 193 deaths per 100,000 people — far behind the nation’s hardest-hit areas, such as the Bronx, Queens and Brooklyn, but far worse than metro areas like Cleveland, Dallas and Manhattan.

* Manny Ramos at the Sun-Times…

Linda Blunt sat anxiously in the lobby of the Garden House Apartments in Maywood on Thursday, awaiting her turn to receive the single-shot Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.

She chatted merrily with her neighbors, bounced her legs and held her registration papers tight. Blunt, 65, was more than ready to move on, a year after the pandemic led to a lockdown that has kept her away from her family. […]

Blunt was among 100 residents, caregivers and staff of the senior living community, 515 S. 2nd Ave. in Maywood, who registered to get COVID-19 shots at Cook County Public Health’s pop-up vaccination event. […]

Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch grew up just down the street from the Garden House. It was a special moment for him, Welch said, to see his constituents and neighbors finally being vaccinated.

* Chicago Tribune live blog headlines…

City investigators cite eight businesses for COVID-19 violations

Fully vaccinated but scared to remove your mask? Experts say getting back to a mask-free norm may take time for some.

One year after the St. Patrick’s party raged, Chicago bars say they can’t risk bending the rules: ‘The challenging part will be turning people away’

How did life change during the last year of the pandemic? Here’s what readers told us, in 7 charts.

Biden sets May 1 target to have all adults vaccine-eligible, outlines plan for ‘independence from this virus’ by Fourth of July.

Health experts say not to hold out for a certain vaccine. But Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson doses are available in Illinois. Can you choose?

Cook County deploys mobile vaccination teams as details of United Center sign-ups for suburban residents to come next week.