$1 Million Vax Lotto; ‘A Hell Out Here’; Oldest Organ Transplanted

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Over the coming weeks, Ohio will award $1 million to five residents who received a COVID-19 shot, in a lottery aimed at boosting the vaccination rate across the state. (CBS News)

As of Thursday at 8:00 a.m. EDT, the unofficial U.S. COVID-19 toll reached 32,815,408 cases and 583,690 deaths, increases of 35,994 and 842, respectively, since this time yesterday.

A report from the Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response said the world’s failures “allowed the pandemic to turn into a catastrophic human crisis,” and suggested a top-to-bottom overhaul. (Science)

More than 4,000 people in India have died for the second day in a row, as the country’s raging COVID-19 crisis spreads to rural villages. “It is a hell out here,” said one patient at a hospital in northern Uttar Pradesh. (Reuters)

In the U.S., Indian-American doctors struggle with how to help. (Los Angeles Times)

To that end, two U.S. pediatricians suggest we don’t use coronavirus vaccines on healthy children here while crematoriums in India are working around the clock. (Washington Post)

American citizens abroad are calling on the U.S. government to send surplus COVID-19 vaccine doses to their local embassies so they can get the shot. (Reuters)

In an Axios-Ipsos survey, close to two-thirds of respondents said airlines should make passengers show proof of COVID-19 vaccination, and 57% said sporting events should as well.

Vaccinated but wary, epidemiologists begin tiptoeing out into the world. (New York Times)

Top executives of Emergent BioSolutions will face questions at a House hearing next week on the millions of doses of Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine that went to waste at the company’s Baltimore facility. (The Hill)

An Oregon physician has been barred from practicing medicine until the end of the state of emergency there due to the staunchly anti-mask stance at his medical practice. (BuzzFeed)

Frightened by the latest pandemic conspiracy theory — vaccine shedding — some anti-maskers are considering the unthinkable … donning face coverings for protection. (Vice)

In more mask-related news, the governor of South Carolina blocked schools and local governments from issuing mask mandates, and also banned use of vaccine passports in the state. (NPR)

In other news:

• A phase III trial of pembrolizumab (Keytruda) as neoadjuvant and adjuvant therapy in early-stage triple-negative breast cancer met both its primary endpoints, Merck announced.

• Brain injuries from unknown causes have reportedly affected over 130 U.S. spies and diplomats stationed abroad over the last half-decade, far more than was previously known. (New York Times)
• Sanofi is accused of destroying employee emails connected to the 2019 recall of ranitidine (Zantac), according to legal filings from lawyers representing patients who took the popular heartburn drug. (FiercePharma)
• A neurological mystery in Canada’s New Brunswick province has seen dozens stricken with symptoms similar to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease over the past few years, but tests have all come back negative. (Washington Post)
• A 95-year-old deceased man made history as the oldest organ donor in U.S. history after his liver was used in a recent transplant. (CNN)
• Former star college football quarterback Colt Brennan died at age 37 after reportedly ingesting a substance laced with fentanyl. (CBS Sports)
• FDA approved Acuvue Abiliti, overnight orthokeratology contact lenses for the management of myopia, Johnson & Johnson Vision announced.
• Mining the possible health benefits of ancient feces. (CNN)