President Joe Biden has informed Congress he will end the national emergency and public health emergency declarations over COVID-19 in mid-May and will ask the federal government to treat the coronavirus as an endemic threat. The announcement comes after lawmakers repeatedly rejected requests from the Biden administration for billions of dollars in additional aid to combat the pandemic — including funding for free COVID vaccines and testing. Last year, COVID-19 remained the third leading cause of death in the United States for the third year in a row, surpassed only by heart disease and cancer. On average, the disease is killing more than 3,500 people per week across the U.S.