Coronavirus Watch: US borders with Canada, Mexico to remain restricted

The U.S. borders with Canada and Mexico will remain restricted through at least June 21, with only trade and essential travel allowed until then, the Department of Homeland Security said Thursday.

The agency, in conjunction with its Canadian and Mexican counterparts, originally closed the northern and southern borders to leisure travelers in March 2020, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. It has been extended on a monthly basis ever since. Read more here.

It's Thursday, and this is the Coronavirus Watch from the USA TODAY Network. Here's more news you need to know:

• Vaccines work: A study of 280 nursing homes in 21 states across the U.S. provides real-world confirmation of the COVID-19 vaccines' effectiveness: Only 0.3% of residents tested positive for the virus more than two weeks after being fully vaccinated, researchers reported Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
• The number of Americans seeking unemployment aid fell last week to 444,000, a new pandemic low and a sign that the job market keeps strengthening as consumers spend freely again.
• India has recorded the highest single-day death toll, surpassing the highest in the U.S. The nation reported 4,529 deaths Wednesday, and the number is considered an undercount by most health experts. In the Uttar Pradesh village of Gahmar alone, 15-year-old Raju Chaudhry who works on the fishing boats told the The Guardian he recently had seen “around 50 bodies a day washing up."

Today's numbers: The U.S. has reported more than 33 million COVID-19 cases and 587,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Worldwide, there have been more than 165 million cases and more than 3.4 million deaths. Nearly 48% of people in the U.S. have received at least one vaccine shot, and nearly 38% are fully vaccinated, according to the CDC.

Tracking the pandemic: See the numbers in your area here. See where cases are rising here. See vaccination rates here. And here, compare vaccinations rates worldwide and see which countries are using which vaccines.

– Grace Hauck, USA TODAY breaking news reporter, @grace_hauck