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A divided U.S. Supreme Court blocked the centerpiece of President Joe Biden’s push to get more people vaccinated amid a Covid-19 surge, rejecting an Occupational Safety and Health Administration rule that would have required 80 million workers to get shots or periodic tests, Bloomberg News reported. The court let a separate rule take effect requiring shots for workers in nursing homes, hospitals and other facilities that receive Medicare and Medicaid payments from the federal government. The ruling on OSHA limits Biden’s options for increasing the country’s vaccination rate as the omicron variant propels a spike in cases. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says only 63% of the country is fully vaccinated and of that group just 37% have received a booster shot. More than 800,000 people in the U.S. have died from the virus. “Although Congress has indisputably given OSHA the power to regulate occupational dangers, it has not given that agency the power to regulate public health more broadly,” the court said in an unsigned opinion. The court’s three liberals — Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor — dissented. The decision “stymies the federal government’s ability to counter the unparalleled threat that COVID–19 poses to our nation’s workers,” they said in an unusual joint opinion. Biden said in a statement that he was disappointed the court blocked “common-sense life-saving requirements for employees at large businesses that were grounded squarely in both science and the law.” He said it was now up to states and private employers to determine whether to institute such requirements to keep their workplaces safe.

Prices rose at the fastest pace in four decades in December, increasing 7 percent over the same period a year ago, and cementing 2021 as a year marked by soaring inflation wrought by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Washington Post reported. Prices were also up 0.5 percent in December compared with the month before, according to data released Wednesday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. While high, inflation actually eased from the rapid price growth seen in October and November. On an annual basis, 2021 still saw the fastest price inflation since the early 1980s, as broken supply chains collided with high consumer demand for used cars and construction materials alike. Higher prices seeped into just about everything households and businesses buy, raising alarms for policymakers at the Federal Reserve and White House that inflation has spread throughout the economy.

Mexican carrier Aeromexico said yesterday that its creditors have overwhelmingly approved the company's restructuring plan as part of its efforts to emerge from bankruptcy, Reuters reported. Aeromexico said in a statement that the voting ended on 7 Jan. and 86% of the creditors who voted backed the plan. "The conclusion of the voting process and the strong support from the company's creditors represents a key milestone in Aeromexico's restructuring process," the company said. It also puts Aeromexico in a strong position to "obtain Court approval for the plan", the company added. Shares in the Aeromexico, which filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the U.S. last year amid the pandemic, have been wildly seesawing in recent weeks amid speculation about its bankruptcy proceedings. A meeting of the company's shareholders is due to be held on Friday, where they will discuss the restructuring plan. The court is then due to consider confirming the plan on 27 Jan., Aeromexico said.

The COVID-19 Omicron variant’s spread among U.S. factory workers is slowing operations and stretching staff for manufacturers, leading some to consider unconventional, and sometimes expensive, solutions to keep operating, the Wall Street Journal reported. Mounting absences among COVID-infected workers are bringing masks back to some factory floors, executives said, while manufacturers shuttle available workers to jobs and plants where they are most needed. Companies are also redoubling recruiting efforts to fortify workforces already worn thin by high turnover in a tight job market. The speed at which the highly contagious variant is spreading has stunned some executives, who said they had grown increasingly confident over recent months that their companies had navigated the worst of the pandemic. The apparent decreasing severity of the variant is providing some hope that the number of cases will lighten and the effect on companies will abate in coming weeks. Some sidelined workers are quarantining at home as a precaution. Meanwhile, with demand booming for manufactured goods from automobiles to medical equipment, executives said that idling production now isn’t an option. Manufacturers mostly have maintained operations since the start of the pandemic, in part because many operate in what are deemed essential industries. The surge in COVID-19 absenteeism threatens to deepen problems of supply-chain and transportation bottlenecks and delayed deliveries. A stretch of depleted workforces and lower production volumes also could fuel further cost increases and drive consumer inflation. Already, domestically made material input costs for manufacturers have grown at the fastest rate since the 1970s, up nearly 30% in November from a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Staffing shortages helped push an Iowa chain of nursing homes into bankruptcy as health-care providers continue to struggle with pandemic pressures, Bloomberg News reported. QHC Facilities LLC filed for bankruptcy last week, citing “crippling staffing and employee retention issues” in a court filing. The Clive, Iowa-based company operates eight skilled nursing facilities and two assisted living homes with a total of about 750 beds in the state and 300 workers. Occupancy rates plunged as COVID-19 spread through nursing homes, which accounted for a large proportion of deaths early in the pandemic. At the same time, the health-care sector has suffered from mass resignations as workers face burnout and seek more lucrative employment, contributing to swelling gaps in coverage. The chain was grappling with other problems ahead of the bankruptcy. It’s faced years of fines for substandard patient care, according to the Iowa Capital Dispatch. One of its facilities was damaged in a strong storm in 2020 and still hasn’t been rebuilt. The death of the company’s co-founder in June “had a devastating impact” on the business, his spouse and Chief Executive Officer Nancy Voyna said in the filing, leaving unmet obligations including a $4 million state fee.

The U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday that it disbursed about $2.9 billion in Emergency Rental Assistance funds to 665,000 renters and landlords during November, putting the program on pace for full-year 2021 obligations of $25 billion-$30 billion, Reuters reported. The Treasury also said that it disbursed $1.1 billion to communities deemed eligible for more funds as part of a reallocation process started at the end of September. More than three quarters of these transfers were accomplished through voluntary transfers between communities in the same state. Rental assistance funding of $46.5 billion was approved in two COVID-19 aid bills in December 2020 and March 2021. But the locally administered program was slow to ramp up, with some jurisdictions taking longer to launch programs and others facing less demand from renters and landlords. Communities that had obligated at least 65% of their first-round allocation were eligible for additional funds, while those allocating less than 30% stood to lose funds.