Coronavirus in Illinois updates: Here’s what’s happening Thursday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area

Illinois public health officials Wednesday reported they had logged 2,273 newly diagnosed cases and 35 additional confirmed deaths of people with COVID-19, raising the statewide tally to 293,274 known cases and 8,672 deaths.

Additionally, the central Illinois region around Champaign-Urbana could be hit with stricter restrictions on restaurants, bars and other businesses as the percentage of positive coronavirus tests is on the rise, state public officials warned on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Chicago was expected to release details Thursday of its guidelines for Halloween, a day after state officials guidelines for the holiday, urging trick-or-treaters to socially distance on Halloween, while cautioning the holiday is best celebrated without the usual celebrations.

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Here’s what’s happening Thursday with COVID-19 in the Chicago area and Illinois:

7:10 a.m.: Lightfoot, Arwady to announce Chicago plans regarding Halloween

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and city health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady were scheduled to announce plans Thursday afternoon “for a safe and healthy Halloween.”

Arwady has previously talked about possible restrictions the city could put in place for Halloween revelry. Asked specifically about door-to-door trick-or-treating, the health commissioner has said there’s still time to get cases down, but things will certainly be different from normal.

“We’re going to have to have guidance that will be different in some way. I’m not going to get into the details of exactly what that’s going to look like,” she said. “People have said, ‘Are you canceling Halloween?’ I’m not canceling Halloween. We are going to be thinking about how to do this in ways that are as safe as they can be.”

State health officials Wednesday released guidelines for the holiday Wednesday, urging trick-or-treaters to socially distance on Halloween, while cautioning the holiday is best celebrated without the usual celebrations. —Chicago Tribune staff

6 a.m.: Column: As arts in Chicago and the nation suffered, the Kennedy Center in D.C. was about to open a nightclub on its roof

Of all the strange and desperate cultural stories to emerge from a pandemic that has sent daggers straight through the heart of the performing arts in America, here is one of the weirdest. It comes from Washington, D.C. (where else?) and is the tale of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and a planned rooftop nightclub called, believe it or not, “Heist.”

There was a sudden reversal Wednesday. But first some backstory.

In March, the Kennedy Center found itself on the defensive after the Congress earmarked $25 million within the initial $2.2 trillion federal coronavirus relief bill. Around Capitol Hill, there was some predictable back-and-forth with Republicans complaining that Democratic members had privileged a “swanky opera house” over needier causes, but the Kennedy Center and its allies were able to effectively counter by rightly reminding people that it was a job creator, a crucial cultural asset and a shuttered institution so deprived of critical revenue as to be in the middle of an existential crisis not of its own making.

All of that was true. The Kennedy Center is a glorious place. The bigger issue, though, which neither party seemed to see, was that the politicians' notion of earmarked arts relief was limited to their own back yards. Read the full column here. —Chris Jones

5 a.m.: A nervous person’s guide to viewing fall foliage in the Midwest. —

Watching leaves turn color and drop dead — “Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away” (Emily Bronte) — may be one of the few activities this autumn you can do safely, without too many caveats. Maybe don’t get into a bus full of leaf peepers this year. Maybe don’t call yourself a leaf peeper to begin with. Look, just stay in your car, OK? Roll down the window and peep, then roll up the window. Peep with familial peepers. Maybe don’t stay overnight, all right? Do I sound stressed? I am stressed. Here’s the thing: So are trees.

Stress creates fall foliage.

Stress is also what makes the annual admiring of foliage — aka leaf peeping — so poignant this pandemic year. “The trees are stressed, yet so is everyone else,” said David Lorenz, vice president of Travel Michigan, the agency that produces those nearly somnolent, stress-relieving “Pure Michigan” tourism spots. Scientifically, foliage is all sacrifice and hunkering down — leaves change colors because their trees are prepping for months of austerity. Aesthetically, fall foliage is all metaphor and melancholy. Because “nothing gold can stay” (Robert Frost), we spend three too-short months noticing what Gwendolyn Brooks called “summer-gone.” We wonder if leaves dream “how comfortable it will be to touch the earth” (Mary Oliver). We ascribe to foliage our own need for calm. Read the full story here. — Christopher Borrelli

In case you missed it

Here are five stories from Wednesday related to COVID-19:

Halloween 2020: Illinois officials released socially distanced trick-or-treating guidelines for those who “choose to gather anyway.”

Hair loss. Memory problems. Strange rashes. COVID-19 patients report a litany of symptoms outside official criteria, some persisting for months.

COVID-19 cases were traced to adult volleyball games at a Gages Lake restaurant.

Hotel job losses in Illinois could double without additional federal aid, an industry group warned.

Chicago’s outdoor dining street closures will continue into the fall and winter — here’s the schedule.

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