U.S. bracing for post-Christmas COVID-19 surge

 

• Despite warnings from health officials to limit travel amid rising COVID-19 cases in the U.S., more than 6.7M people have passed through TSA checkpoints in the seven days heading into Christmas, 
• That is over a 3% increase for the same period through Thanksgiving Day last month. In two weeks, the post-Thanksgiving COVID-19 surge led to a 20% rise in new COVID-19 cases, with a 21% rise in hospitalizations and a 39% jump in fatalities.
• "We had Thanksgiving, we had Labor Day, we had Halloween, and each one of these events brought lots of people together and just gave the virus more fuel to move through the population," CNN quoted a health expert as saying. 
• The fresh concerns over another spike in case numbers emerge as a new COVID-19 variant detected in the U.K., which has prompted many countries to impose travel restrictions on the country. Last week, the CDC warned that the new variant could already be circulating in the U.S. without notice, given the insufficient number of COVID-19 cases that have been sequenced across the country. 
• Meanwhile, the investors appear to be bullish over the companies focused on COVID-19 testing and treatments. Despite vaccine hopes, the ETFMG Treatments, Testing, and Advancements ETF (NYSEARCA:GERM) has returned +25.1% over the past six months, outperforming the +12.6% rise in the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (NASDAQ:IBB).
• Last week the analysts at JPMorgan Chase upgraded their price targets for Quest Diagnostics (NYSE:DGX) and Laboratory Corporation of America (NYSE:LH), anticipating ‘better than expected COVID-19 molecular testing volumes’, to offset the ‘weaker than expected organic testing volume.’
• https://seekingalpha.com/news/3647428-u-s-is-bracing-for-post-christmas-covidminus-19-surge