Coronavirus Briefing: What Happened Today

• India’s health minister stepped down in the face of anger about the country’s Covid response.

• A group of virologists made a case against the lab-leak theory.

• Japan’s Covid emergency is part of a wider surge in Asia.

• Get the latest updates here, as well as maps and a vaccine tracker.

New rules for schools

The C.D.C. released new guidance for schools today, and the main takeaway is striking: Schools should fully reopen this fall, even if they can’t follow all of the recommended safety precautions to curb the spread of the virus.

The guidance is a sharp departure from the agency’s past recommendations, and is an acknowledgment that virtual learning has been deeply damaging for many students. Officials said they were confident this is the correct approach, even with the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant, and the fact that children under 12 are not yet eligible for vaccination.

The agency also said that school districts should use local health data to guide decisions about when to tighten or relax prevention measures like mask wearing and physical distancing.

“Officials didn’t say so explicitly, but it seems to me like the benefits of opening schools now outweigh the risks,” Sheryl Gay Stolberg, who covers health policy for The Times, told me. “At the same time, the C.D.C. recognized that a national approach was no longer workable; there is simply too much variation between communities in both spread of the virus and rates of vaccination. So it was time to localize the approach.”

Some experts praised the new guidelines for their flexibility, while others pushed for clearer recommendations, or even fewer restraints. The feedback demonstrates just how divisive the issue of school closures has been since the outset of the pandemic.

“Providing school guidance is tough business for the C.D.C.,” Sheryl added. “They are damned if they do, damned if they don’t.”

Pfizer’s booster push

Pfizer and its partner BioNTech released early results from studies of people who received a booster dose of their mRNA vaccine, and said that “a third dose may be needed within 6 to 12 months after full vaccination.”

But many scientists were critical of the announcement, pointing to evidence that the current two-dose regimen is powerfully effective against the coronavirus. “We are prepared for booster doses if and when the science demonstrates that they are needed,” the F.D.A. and the C.D.C. said in a joint statement.

Some experts also questioned the need for boosters for Americans while much the world has yet to receive even a single dose. Every unvaccinated person offers the virus additional opportunities to mutate.

“If we’re worried about variants,” said Dr. Céline Gounder, an infectious disease specialist at Bellevue Hospital Center in New York, “our best protection is to get the rest of the world vaccinated, not to hoard more doses to give third doses of mRNA vaccines to people here in the U.S.”

Pfizer also announced a plan to begin clinical trials of a new version of its vaccine to specifically target the Delta variant, as a sort of backup effort in case the boosters of the original vaccine should falter.

Pandemic love stories

A few weeks ago we asked readers to tell us about their pandemic silver linings — the positive things that may have come out of an incredibly dark time. During the last 15 months, you found extra time with loved ones, changed careers, or picked up new hobbies. Some of you — the very lucky ones — even found love.

It turns out that isolating pandemic circumstances — lockdowns, social distancing, and quarantine — can also bring people together.

“I met the love of my life in March of 2020 on the Norwegian Spirit cruise ship in the middle of the Indian Ocean,” wrote Kimberly Goff from Atlanta. “We were one of a dozen or so ships ‘trapped at sea’ — no island or nation would allow us to dock for 17 days.”

“Tom and I were friendly on the ship, but we began to talk each day of our quarantine, and then every day for four months until we finally had our first date,” she added. “He retired this month and is moving to Atlanta to be with me next week. We plan to have a ‘do-over’ cruise with the same route in December.”

As people reconfigured their lives during lockdown, many found themselves in places, and with people, they normally wouldn’t be. Emily Johnson’s new beau moved to her town of Savannah on a whim after the virus halted his job in television production. The pandemic brought Alex Patterson’s wife to Rhode Island, where he lived, and they began dating. And after the outbreak, Lauren Kopchik moved home to Wappingers Falls, N.Y., where she reconnected with someone she had first met in the second grade. She told us that the complicated social rules brought on by the virus actually made dating easier.

“As an anxious dater, the pandemic offered me an opportunity to try apps in a less stressful way: I could talk to people but had a built-in and guilt-free reason to turn down in-person dates if I ended up wanting to bail,” she wrote. “It turns out that the slower pace you need to get to really know someone is perfect for dating during a pandemic, and my relationship started with a lot of phone conversations and outdoor, socially distant walks.”

Lockdown, while stressful for many, also had a surprising upside for some: It allowed them to focus.

“My sweetheart and I met at mutual friend’s Thanksgiving dinner in 2019,” Norene Scott Peters wrote from the Seattle area. “My husband of 50 years had died 14 months earlier and I wasn’t ready for a new man. He was 70, I was 79. He asked me to marry him that night. Wait! I was very busy. Then, Covid. All busyness stopped. He moved in with me and we spent long, languid hours learning each other. No need for nor desire to see anyone else. Time slowed. We believe that we will live forever in this delicious vacuum with each other.”

Misha Safyan from Berkeley, Calif., told us that he always wanted a long-term partnership and to start a family, but found it difficult with a packed social calendar, frequent international travel, and “a string of false-start relationships” that took “a toll on my morale.” And yet, he wrote, “during lockdown, all of that went away and I had way more space to give dating the attention it needed.” He met a “wonderful woman,” and after “an awkward initial few weeks of ‘social-distance’ dating,” they found their rhythm. They recently moved in together and she is now three months pregnant.

Not everyone who found love during the pandemic needed to meet someone new.

“I went so many days wearing comfortable clothes with no makeup, I learned to love my own face, my own body in any stage,” wrote Bridget Bishop from Rockford, Ill. “Now, a (vaccinated) night out doesn’t always involve makeup and styled hair. It involves my favorite outfits that make me feel my newfound confidence. The pandemic taught me to love myself, flaws and all.”

What else we’re following

• The Times’s Mitch Smith has a quick visual look at the virus situation across the U.S.

• Researchers say England’s soccer celebrations and an increase in cases could be linked.

• An experiment in Paris suggests indoor concerts can be held safely, with precautions.

• For some people, working from home sped up the decision to retire.

• Seismic shifts in how families live and work are creating a surge of baby boom households with multiple generations.

What you’re doing

After having the virus then being fully vaccinated I decided to live out one of my dreams: Travelling the TransAmerica Bicycle Trail. From Astoria in Oregon to Yorktown in Virginia, I planned on spending 90 days doing it. Sixty-seven days later I’ve accomplished it, and more. I saw some of the most spectacular views this planet has to offer, but the thing that changed me most was the people I met. There are a lot of good people out there, but seldom do they get credit or headlines. I hope more people become like them, I know I will.

— Redman Ferguson, Nappanee, Ind.

Let us know how you’re dealing with the pandemic. Send us a response here, and we may feature it in an upcoming newsletter.

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Adam Pasick contributed to today’s newsletter.

Email your thoughts to briefing@nytimes.com.