Gavin Good
The hospital's decades-long reputation for aggressively billing patients has resurfaced anew during the pandemic.
Illinois Department of Public Health
Influenza-like illness (ILI) activity has decreased compared to previous years in Illinois. The highest ILI rate was in mid-February of 2020 at 7.4%. That is a 93.2% decrease to 0.5% of ILI activity in February of 2021 compared to 2020.
The U.S. Small Business Administration has announced details about the Restaurant Revitalization Fund, a program established under the American Rescue Plan Act Congress passed…
Champaign residents erupted on social media in early March about the excess litter in the Champaign area, especially North Prospect, with some claiming they have never seen the city so polluted before. In late spring this year, resident Michael Chrasta expects “a revival” of the Loving Our City cleanup initiative that was cancelled in March 2020 as COVID-19 entered the community.
Students selling negative saliva test samples on Snapchat. Fraternity members threatening students for taking pictures of long bar lines. People leaving quarantine and isolation dorms to pick up Doordash food orders and then socialize. These were the events among the 200 complaints sent to university officials in the latter part of the fall semester in 2020 at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign.
A fourth-year international Ph.D. student who was dismissed from the University of Illinois for COVID non-compliance in the fall 2020 semester has been readmitted after public outcry. Now, he has proposed solutions to create a more “transparent and humane” policy.
Among the most trending topics locals discussed on Facebook and Twitter were the highest rate of COVID-19 vaccination in Illinois, the first UK variant of COVID-19, Pritzker tour, Market Place Mall looter’s guilty plea, mysterious Walmart fight and, of course, the weather.
The Local Initiative Supports Corporation partnered with Verizon to open a grant program for small businesses.
The Small Business Administration released more data about businesses who received Paycheck Protection Program loans under $150,000. Previously, the SBA did not release business names for businesses that received loans under $150,000.
After an opening week of classes where cases on campus ranged from 8 to 20 or so, the university reported 66 cases on Monday. On Feb. 2, the Champaign-Urbana Public Health District reported the first cases of the U.K. strain of COVID-19 in Champaign County.
