The number of online grocery store shoppers using Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, or food stamps, has risen sharply amid the coronavirus pandemic. 

According to Bloomberg, the number of U.S. households using government benefits each month to buy groceries online has experienced a 50-fold increase this year after the Department of Agriculture (USDA) expanded options for recipients of food stamps to use their benefits for online shopping. 

The majority of online grocery shoppers have made their purchases through Amazon and Walmart, which Bloomberg reported are the only retailers in most states allowed to participate in the USDA’s online shopping pilot program. 

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In September, more than 1.1 million U.S. households used their government benefits to buy groceries online, although Bloomberg reported this is a small fraction of total food aid. 

The most recent SNAP program data showed that more than 22 million households received food stamps in April. 

According to the USDA, only eligible food may be purchased with SNAP benefits and “delivery fees and other associated charges may not be paid for with SNAP benefits.”

On Amazon’s SNAP page, the company says it now accepts SNAP in all states except Alaska, Hawaii, Louisiana, Maine and Montana.

This comes after Amazon opened its first Whole Foods Market online-only store in Brooklyn in September to fulfill online grocery delivery orders. 

Online grocery shopping has become increasingly popular amid rising coronavirus surges across the country. On Thursday, the U.S. for the first time surpassed a daily increase of 150,000 recorded infections, while the number of hospitalizations due to the virus hit a record of 67,096.

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A SpaceX rocket carrying three American astronauts and a Japanese astronaut launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Sunday bound for the International Space Station (ISS).

The mission, which is the first crewed mission to use a SpaceX rocket, successfully began Sunday evening after being delayed from an initial planned launch on Saturday due to onshore winds, according to a NASA press release.

Sunday’s launch was attended by Vice President Pence and his wife Karen PenceKaren Sue PenceSpaceX rocket takes off with four astronauts Gen. Milley’s nurse wife gave CPR to bystander who collapsed at ceremony Overnight Defense: Afghan war critic who said Europe too welcoming to ‘Muslim invaders’ installed at Pentagon | Trump, Biden mark Veterans Day with wreath layings | Senate Dems warn against nixing plan to change Confederate base names MORE, who wore masks and watched from a balcony.

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The SpaceX Crew Dragon craft is expected to dock with the ISS Monday evening. The three U.S. astronauts participating in the mission are Shannon Walker, Victor Glover and Michael Hopkins; they are accompanied by Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

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A campaign official for President-elect Joe BidenJoe BidenFeds charge Staten Island man over threat to Schumer, FBI Pence cancels vacation in Florida: report Romney shoots down serving in Biden Cabinet MORE slammed Facebook for allowing the spread of misinformation surrounding last week’s election.

Bill Russo, a Biden spokesman, criticized the tech giant in a series of tweets late Monday claiming it is allowing disinformation on its platform that is “shredding the fabric of our democracy.”

“We knew this would happen. We pleaded with Facebook for over a year to be serious about these problems. They have not,” Russo said. “Our democracy is on the line. We need answers.”

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Russo questioned Facebook’s actions on several pages and posts he suggested the platform took too little action on or was not swift enough in reacting to.

For example, Russo called out the platform for not banning former White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon’s page after Bannon called for the beheading of FBI Director Christopher Wray and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony FauciAnthony FauciUS sets new record for COVID-19 hospitalizations at more than 60,000 Hillicon Valley: Biden expected to take hard line on foreign interference | EU files antitrust charges against Amazon | Facebook takes down Bannon-linked network Overnight Health Care: Key conservative justices express openness to preserving ObamaCare’s protections | Fauci says he trusts Pfizer, will take vaccine if FDA approves it | Distribution of Eli Lilly antibody drug to begin this week MORE.

Russo also accused Facebook of only removing the video with Bannon’s comments “after a journalist inquired about the video.”

Unlike Facebook, Twitter suspended Bannon’s account, saying it violated the platform’s policy on the “glorification of violence.”

In addition to Bannon’s post, Russo hit Facebook for not quickly removing “thousands of calls for violence” on the platform in the days after Election Day.

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Facebook’s actions toward misinformation, Russo said, enabled the “mobilization of conspiracy theorists using ‘Stop the Steal’ groups ballooned to over 300k members, before finally being taken down under pressure.”

“After Facebook removed the initial group, multiple new ‘stop the steal’ groups formed and grew rapidly,” he added.

In response to Russo’s tweets, a Facebook spokesperson defended the company’s actions before and after the election but did not directly address the instances highlighted by Russo.

“In the lead-up to this election, we announced new products and policies to reduce the spread of misinformation and the potential for confusion or civil unrest. We built the largest third-party fact-checking network of any platform and they remain actively focused on claims about the election, including conspiracy theories,” the spokesperson said in a statement. 

“We changed our products to ensure fewer people see false information and are made aware of it when they do, and highlighted reliable election information where nearly everyone on Facebook and Instagram saw that Vice President Biden was the projected winner of the U.S. election.”

Last week Facebook took down a group called Stop the Steal that was spreading pro-Trump election misinformation after it had accumulated well over 300,000 members.

Biden was projected as the winner of the election on Saturday, but Trump has not conceded. Instead, Trump and his allies have sought to cast doubt on the results by alleging election fraud without providing any supporting evidence. Before the election, Trump repeatedly claimed mail-in voting led to widespread voter fraud, despite no findings to support those claims.

Public health experts had argued in favor of mail-in voting options given the risks of transmission at polling locations during the coronavirus pandemic. Social media posts from Trump and others that included misinformation about mail-in voting have been labeled by both Facebook and Twitter.

The Biden campaign had called on Facebook ahead of Election Day to strengthen its policies against election-related misinformation. Russo also called out the platform for applying the same label with additional voting information to Trump’s and Biden’s posts over the summer.

Trump and many Republicans, however, have also criticized social media giants over their handling of fact-checking and have accused the companies of anti-conservative bias. But despite these accusations, conservative voices are dominant on Facebook, based on publicly available data about post interactions.

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Shortly after the first time Twitter placed a label on one of Trump’s tweets in May, he signed an executive order aimed at increasing the ability of the government to regulate social media platforms targeting Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Section 230 provides a legal liability shield for content posted on their platforms by third parties. 

Biden has signaled he would want to take action on Section 230, telling the New York Times editorial board in December it should be immediately revoked, but he has not yet detailed a definitive plan or agenda.

Updated at 3:10 p.m.

A Michigan judge on Friday rejected a GOP effort to block the state’s largest county from certifying its election results, ruling that the lawsuit’s claims of widespread voter fraud were “incorrect and not credible.”

Judge Timothy Kenny of Michigan’s Third Circuit Court in Wayne County, which covers the Detroit area, rejected a request by Republican poll challengers for an injunction against finalizing the election results in a battleground state where President-elect Joe BidenJoe BidenTrump: New York won’t receive COVID-19 vaccine immediately Biden considering Yellen as possible Treasury secretary: report Obama hits Trump for refusing to concede, says there’s ‘no legal basis’ for challenges MORE has been projected to defeat President TrumpDonald John TrumpTrump: New York won’t receive COVID-19 vaccine immediately Biden considering Yellen as possible Treasury secretary: report Trump puts Giuliani in charge of election lawsuits: report MORE.

Kenny said in a 13-page decision that he found witness testimony in support of the lawsuit unbelievable, and that stopping the vote count would harm the public interest.

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“This Court finds that there are legal remedies for Plaintiffs to pursue and there is no harm to Plaintiffs if the injunction is not granted,” Kenny wrote. “There would be harm, however, to the Defendants if the injunction is granted.”

“Waiting for the Court to locate and appoint an independent, nonpartisan auditor to examine the votes, reach a conclusion and then finally report to the Court would involve untold delay,” he continued. “It would cause delay in establishing the Presidential vote tabulation, as well as all other County and State races. It would also undermine faith in the Electoral System.”

The lawsuit was brought by two Republican poll challengers in Wayne County who made sweeping allegations of fraud by poll workers. They alleged, among other things, that unregistered voters were allowed to cast ballots, late absentee ballots had been backdated and that ballots had been processed with false information.

Kenny said in his decision that witness testimony supporting the lawsuit had been severely undermined by that of elections officials overseeing the counting process.

“Plaintiffs’ affiants did not have a full understanding of the TCF absent ballot tabulation process,” Kenny wrote, referring to the Detroit convention center where vote counting took place. “No formal challenges were filed. However, sinister, fraudulent motives were ascribed to the process and the City of Detroit. Plaintiffs’ interpretation of events is incorrect and not credible.”

David Kallman, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs, did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

Biden is leading Trump by about 150,000 votes in Michigan as the counting process nears completion.

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Moderna announced Monday morning that its coronavirus vaccine candidate was 94.5 percent effective in an interim analysis, a second promising data point in the push for a successful vaccine.

The announcement comes one week after Pfizer announced its vaccine was over 90 percent effective, meaning there are now two vaccines with very high levels of efficacy in interim analyses of clinical trial data.

Moderna based its data on a large clinical study involving 30,000 volunteers, half of whom received two doses of the vaccine over a 28-day period. There were 95 cases of coronavirus recorded among participants, with only 5 of them in the group receiving the vaccine.

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“This is a pivotal moment in the development of our COVID-19 vaccine candidate,” Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement. “Since early January, we have chased this virus with the intent to protect as many people around the world as possible. All along, we have known that each day matters.”

The company said it will apply for emergency authorization from the Food and Drug Administration “in the coming weeks,” once it has the final safety and efficacy data, which includes having two months of safety data on participants.

There are not “any significant safety concerns” so far, Moderna said. Some participants experienced reactions like muscle pain and fatigue, the company noted.

The company also said the trial data show that the vaccine can prevent severe disease. There were 11 severe cases of COVID-19 in the trial data, all of which occurred in the group of people receiving placebo, not the actual vaccine.

It is important to have multiple vaccines that are shown to be effective because there will not initially be enough doses of any one vaccine to vaccinate everyone.

Moderna says it is expects to have 20 million doses for the United States by the end of 2020, a similar number to Pfizer, and will produce 500 million to 1 billion doses globally in 2021.

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The Trump administration has entered contracts with both companies for 100 million doses of each vaccine, with the option to purchase more.

While high-priority groups like health care workers could start receiving the vaccine in December, experts say the general public likely will not be able to get the vaccine until sometime in the spring, because supply will initially be constrained. There is also a daunting challenge to distribute the vaccine across the country.

Moderna received $955 million from the U.S. government for development of its vaccine, unlike Pfizer which did not receive development funds, and an additional roughly $1.5 billion to purchase the doses.

The coming months are still likely to be brutal, before the vaccine is widely available, as coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continue to rise heading into winter.

“The light at the end of the tunnel just got even brighter,” tweeted Dr. Atul Gawande, a coronavirus adviser to President-elect Joe BidenJoe BidenObama: US ‘adversaries have seen us weakened’ US sees 1M new coronavirus cases in one week GOP shows limited appetite for pursuing Biden probes MORE, in reaction to Moderna’s announcement. “We may now have multiple, very effective vaccines distributing widely in spring and summer. Now we must pull together to get everyone we can through that tunnel alive and with jobs intact.”

–Updated at 7:48 a.m.

The rising popularity of alternative social media app Parler is raising concerns over the spread of misinformation and potential for radicalizing users on a platform that’s taken a hands-off approach to regulating content.

The app has been boosted by conservatives, surging since Election Day, as Republicans amp up allegations of anti-conservative bias from social media giants like Twitter and Facebook that have clamped down on pro-Trump election misinformation.

Experts warn that a total lack of content moderation could prove harmful beyond creating political echo chambers and further spreading conspiracy theories.

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“Anytime you take a laissez faire approach to moderation — you say, ‘anything goes’ right up until actual threats of real world violence — that creates a huge space for some really problematic things to happen,” said Bret Schafer, a fellow focusing on disinformation at the Alliance for Securing Democracy.

Founded in 2018, Parler describes itself as “committed to free speech” and boasts that it “does not censor content based on politics or ideology.” 

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The company has criticized Facebook and Twitter over their approaches to moderating content, with Parler’s rhetoric largely echoing that of Republican lawmakers who have accused social media giants of silencing conservative voices and points of view.

While Facebook and Twitter said in the lead-up to the election that they would label content that prematurely declares victory, Parler released a memo detailing plans to “host unfiltered content during the 2020 election season.”

“Can we now move everybody from Twitter to Parler?” Fox News host Sean HannitySean Patrick HannityRubio: GOP must rebrand as party of ‘multiethnic, multiracial, working-class’ voters The tribal journalism of cable news is at a crossroads Why this election won’t bring us together MORE said on air earlier this week. “Can we just make the shift together? Just say, ‘goodbye, Twitter. See ya at Jack [Dorsey]. Nice try.’ ”

Installs of Parler began to surge on Election Day, with more than 2 million U.S. installs from app stores estimated from Nov. 3-9, according to data from marketing intelligence group SensorTower.

Before that, Parler’s biggest download spike was over the summer, when it peaked at 120,000 installs on June 26.

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Despite some conservatives threatening to leave Twitter, many of the prominent figures who have gained large Parler followings have not severed their ties.

Hannity, for example, remains active on Twitter, where he has 5.4 million followers. His Parler account has 3.2 million followers.

The same goes for congressional critics of traditional social media platforms.

Sen. Ted CruzRafael (Ted) Edward CruzTrump told advisers he could announce 2024 bid shortly after certification of Biden win: report Trump, Pence, Haley top GOP 2024 betting odds at Bovada The Memo: Experts fear damage from Trump’s election pushback MORE (R-Texas), who has amassed 3.6 million followers on Parler, used Twitter to urge his followers to join him on Parler. But Cruz still tweets to his 4.1 million followers.

For those who have abandoned Twitter and Facebook in favor of Parler, it could create a new dynamic on the mainstream social media platforms.

“The idea that these people are leaving those platforms and no longer trying to red pill individuals to see their conspiracy theories on large platforms like Facebook and Twitter, I think that’s a good thing,” said Jason Blazakis, director of the Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism at the Middlebury Institute.

He added that the shift to Parler could mean fewer people on Facebook and Twitter are “exposed to these ideas,” and “migrating to more obscure platforms” may ultimately result in a smaller audience for misinformation.

Parler is not an anomaly in marketing itself as a place for unregulated speech. Message boards such as 4chan, where the QAnon conspiracy originated, and 8chan, where the conspiracy later migrated, became homes for hate speech.

What makes Parler different, Schafer said, is that it attracts a more mainstream conservative audience.

“This is not aggrieved 20-year-old gamers flooding to Parler. This is your aunt and uncle,” he said, noting that the content isn’t too different from what’s circulating in conservative circles on Facebook and Twitter, especially on the election.

But unlike those two platforms, he said, the content on Parler is not only free from labels, it’s also unchecked by any dissenting voices on the site.

“It’s not as if Parler is taking you to the worst parts of the internet in terms of speech. It’s just an entirely conservative ecosystem, and that is problematic in the same way if you had an entirely left-wing ecosystem it would be problematic,” Schafer said.

Trump has yet to create a Parler account, but his campaign has one, known as Team Trump, that has been used to spread some of the same content that Twitter and Facebook have clamped down on.

For example, Team Trump on Nov. 4 posted that Trump won Pennsylvania. News networks and The Associated Press called the state for President-elect Joe BidenJoe BidenBiden has spoken with some GOP senators, chief of staff says Trump told advisers he could announce 2024 bid shortly after certification of Biden win: report Obama ‘troubled’ by GOP attempts to cast doubt on election results: ‘That’s a dangerous path’ MORE three days later, citing his lead in the vote count.

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On Parler, the Trump campaign post went unchecked, whereas similar premature claims of victory from Trump and his allies were labeled on Twitter and Facebook as part of the platforms’ amped up content moderation measures surrounding the election.

In an interview with Cheddar, Parler CEO John Matze defended the platform’s decision to leave the Pennsylvania post up unchecked.

“Anybody can say what they want. It’s a free country,” Matze said. “We believe in people and their ability to solve these things on their own, without our heavy hand. We don’t want to get involved.”

When reached for comment about misinformation concerns surrounding the platform’s hands-off approach to content, Chief Operating Officer Jeffrey Wernick responded by saying: “Parler is a breath of fresh air for those weary and wary of the way they’ve been treated by our competitors. And now that many of their friends are already on Parler, they’ve decided it’s worth their investment of time to give us a try. We plan to earn their continued business.”

Schafer noted that Facebook and Twitter also didn’t aim to moderate content — or fact-check the president — when they first launched. But as issues popped up, they adapted to moderate a bit more aggressively, he said.

Some experts warn that if Parler starts chipping away at the number of Twitter and Facebook users, those two platforms may consider loosening their own policies aimed at mitigating misinformation.

Facebook and Twitter declined to comment for this story. Neither platform, however, has strongly indicated they are planning to scale back their content moderation policies.

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Unchecked content also risks exploitation of misinformation by foreign actors, much like it did on U.S. social media platforms in 2016, said Saif Shahin, an assistant professor at American University’s School of Communications.

But he said Parler’s success underscores that misinformation in the U.S. is now fundamentally a domestic problem.

“We have people in this country divided so sharply along partisan lines that they actively are seeking what we consider to be disinformation, but what they consider just one type of information,” Shahin said.

“It is a domestic problem, a social problem, within American society. As the problem exists we’ll have newer apps, and foreign actors trying to exploit those new apps,” he added. “But those are the outcomes — those are not the causes. The cause is really the partisan divide and how people drive their own identities based on this division.”

Disney on Thursday reported millions of dollars in fourth-quarter losses as its California theme parks remain closed amid the coronavirus pandemic, although the corporation still outperformed expectations by analysts. 

According to The Associated Press, Disney posted a loss of $629 million, or 39 cents per share, in the three-month period that ended Oct. 3. This, however, was lower than the 73 cents per share that analysts had predicted, according to financial data company FactSet.

Disney’s revenue also fell about 23 percent to $14.71 billion, again higher than the $14.15 billion expected by analysts. 

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The entertainment company has been able to maintain a substantial amount of revenue through its streaming service, Disney Plus, which launched a year ago and now has 73.7 million subscribers, the AP reported. 

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Due to the pandemic, the company announced in October that it would be restructuring its business units to focus on streaming. The company created separate content divisions for sports, general entertainment and its production studios, which include Star Wars and Marvel. 

Disney Plus has gained success partly through its release of films that had been prevented from opening in movie theaters amid the pandemic, including the live-action remake of “Mulan” and the upcoming Pixar film “Soul,” which is scheduled for a December release. 

The company also reportedly plans to launch another international streaming service called Star in 2021. 

Florida’s Walt Disney World Resort has reopened to a limited number of visitors, with mask and social distancing requirements, and a phased reopening of California’s Disneyland is set to begin this month. 

The company’s other parks in Paris, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Japan have also reopened with limited capacity requirements. 

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However, the Florida park said in August that it would be scaling back operating hours after seeing fewer visitors than anticipated. 

In September, due to limited attendance and diminished revenue at the parks, Disney announced it would be laying off 28,000 employees, which included executive, salaried and hourly workers. 

“We initially hoped that this situation would be short-lived, and that we would recover quickly and return to normal,” Josh D’Amaro, chairman of Disney Parks, Experiences and Products, wrote in a letter to Disney employees. “Seven months later, we find that has not been the case.

“For the last several months, our management team has worked tirelessly to avoid having to separate anyone from the company,” he added. “We’ve cut expenses, suspended capital projects, furloughed our cast members while still paying benefits, and modified our operations to run as efficiently as possible, however, we simply cannot responsibly stay fully staffed while operating at such limited capacity.”

At least two people were wounded on Wednesday in an attack on a non-Muslim cemetery during a ceremony organized by the French Consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, to commemorate the end of World War I. 

According to The New York Times, Nathalie Goulet, a French senator and a member of a parliamentary group between France and Gulf countries, said an explosive device had apparently been thrown at the cemetery. 

Goulet added that the two people wounded in the explosion suffered minor injuries. 

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The Associated Press reported that several countries had representatives at the ceremony Wednesday, the 102nd anniversary of the armistice ending World War I. The day is commemorated each year in several European countries. 

French officials, who spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymity due to regulations limiting them from speaking publicly, condemned the attack, adding that no group has yet claimed responsibility. 

Saudi officials have not yet commented on the incident, according to the AP. 

Wednesday’s attack comes after the Oct. 29 stabbing of a guard at the French Consulate in Jeddah. The attack was believed to be carried out by a Saudi man, although there was no clear motive. 

The stabbing occurred the same day three people were killed in a knife attack at the Notre Dame Church in Nice, France. Police arrested the suspected attacker, whom the AP later named as Ibrahim Issaoui, after the officers wounded him in a confrontation. 

Authorities have since brought multiple people into custody in connection with the Nice attack. 

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Issaoui, who was born in Tunisia, reportedly had a copy of the Quran and a bag with two unused knives. Another bag with his belongings also had two knives.

The AP reported that Issaoui received a notice that he was being expelled from Italy for illegal entry and was given seven days to leave. This was later confirmed by Italy’s interior minister, Luciana Lamorgese. 

The knife attack came in the aftermath of the Oct. 16 beheading of a French middle school teacher who showed his class caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad for a lesson on free speech. 

The caricatures were published by satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and cited by the men who gunned down the newspaper’s editorial meeting in 2015, leaving 12 dead. 

French President Emmanuel MacronEmmanuel Jean-Michel MacronBiden shrugs off Trump, GOP on election Biden says Trump’s failure to concede is an ’embarrassment’ Biden speaks to world leaders following election win MORE has supported the caricatures as a form of free speech in the country, drawing condemnation from some Muslims who view the depictions as forms of incitement and hate speech.

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Former national security adviser Susan Rice said Friday that the Trump administration’s repeated refusal to meet with members of President-elect Joe BidenJoe BidenViolence erupts between counter-protestors, Trump supporters following DC rally Biden considering King for director of national intelligence: report Here are the 17 GOP women newly elected to the House this year MORE’s transition team “puts our national security at risk.” 

In an op-ed published by The New York Times, the former Obama administration official wrote that “without access to critical threat information, no incoming team can counter what it can’t see coming.” 

“Mr. Biden and his top national security team have not been provided the daily intelligence briefings to which they are entitled,” Rice, who currently serves on the Biden-Harris transition advisory board, wrote. 

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“Mr. Biden’s team is not receiving classified information,” she added. “The Biden-Harris agency review teams are constituted but have been denied access to every element of the executive branch. Vital exchanges of information and expertise that would help combat Covid-19 and jump-start the economy remain stalled.” 

Rice, who also served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2009 to 2013, added that “instead of acting in the national interest to orchestrate a responsible, democratic transition, Mr. Trump and many Republicans are spending time sowing false doubts about the legitimacy of Mr. Biden’s election.” 

“Tragically, but not surprisingly, Mr. Trump appears determined to take a final wrecking ball to our democracy and national security on his inevitable way out the door,” Rice concluded. 

In the opinion piece, Rice also revealed that the more than 12 hours she spent in 2016 advising her successor, retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, “and those of other White House officials with their incoming counterparts, plus President Obama’s two-hour meeting with President-elect Trump, proved to be the sum total of the 2016 national security transition at the highest levels.” 

Rice wrote that in 2016, the incoming Cabinet “was apparently told not to meet with their Obama counterparts in their respective departments and most did not do so.” 

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Rice’s remarks come as multiple news outlets have reported that General Services Administration (GSA) head Emily Murphy, a Trump appointee, has refused to sign paperwork releasing Biden’s $6.3 million share of nearly $10 million in transition resources and giving his team access to agency officials and information. 

Staff at multiple federal agencies have also reportedly been instructed to not cooperate with Biden’s transition team until the election result is certified by the GSA. 

While all major news outlets declared Biden the projected winner of the 2020 election last week, Trump has since refused to concede, with his campaign leading legal battles challenging results in multiple key battleground states over claims of voter fraud. 

Pennsylvania and Michigan courts on Friday rejected GOP lawsuits challenging election results in those states, with multiple election expert groups also disputing claims of voter fraud and voting irregularities advanced by Trump and his allies.

Stocks kicked off Monday with major gains after Moderna announced that its coronavirus vaccine candidate was 94.5 percent effective, according to preliminary data, boosting hopes of a quicker rebound from the COVID-19 recession.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average opened with a gain of more than 350 points Monday, rising 1.2 percent. The Nasdaq composite rose roughly 0.1 percent, and the S&P 500 index rose 0.8 percent.

Moderna’s announcement boosted hope among investors that COVID-19 could be brought under control sooner, allowing the U.S to recover faster from the economic damage of the pandemic.

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News of Moderna’s successful vaccine candidate comes one week after Pfizer announced its vaccine was also more than 90 percent effective at curbing coronavirus infections. The availability of another effective vaccine could help countries vaccinate a greater proportion of their residents quicker.

While progress toward two vaccines may mark another step closer to curbing the coronavirus pandemic, the U.S. will likely face several daunting months until they are distributed broadly across the country. 

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The Trump administration struck deals with both companies to purchase at least 100 million doses of each vaccine. But while vaccines could be available for health care workers and other high-priority groups by December, they might not be widely available for the general public until spring.