Confirmed cases of COVID-19 have passed 185.5 million globally, according to Johns Hopkins University. The number of confirmed deaths stands at more than 4.01 million. More than 3.32 billion vaccination doses have been administered globally, according to Our World in Data.
US COVID-19 cases are up around 11% over the previous week, almost entirely among people who have not been vaccinated, officials said on Thursday, as the highly infectious Delta variant becomes the dominant COVID-19 strain in the country.
Viet Nam is aiming to vaccinate 50% of residents aged 18 or older by the end of this year and 70% by the end of March 2022, the health ministry said on Friday. It comes as tighter coronavirus curbs were imposed in more cities.
On Thursday, Indonesia reported a new daily record of 38,391 COVID-19 infections, plus 852 new fatalities, its second-highest daily death toll, official data showed.
Cumulative confirmed COVID-19 deaths globally and in selected countries.
Image: Our World in Data
Africa has seen its worst pandemic week ever, as it passed the second-wave peak during the seven days ending on 4 July 2021. More than 251,000 new COVID-19 cases recorded on the continent.
Sixteen African countries are now in resurgence - with Malawi and Senegal added this week. The Delta variant has been detected in 10 of these countries.
Africa has just marked the continents most dire pandemic week ever. But the worst is yet to come as the fast-moving third wave continues to gain speed and new ground, said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Director for Africa.
The global vaccine distribution scheme COVAX aims to deliver 520 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to Africa this year, its managing director said, with supplies ramping up from September after delays caused by Indian export restrictions.
In a news conference on Thursday organized by the World Health Organization's Africa region, Aurelia Nguyen, managing director of COVAX, said that the scheme had delivered around 25 million doses to 44 African countries so far, but she was not happy with the progress.
By the end of the first quarter of 2022, COVAX aims to supply nearly 850 million vaccine doses to the African continent, which has some of the lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates worldwide.
COVID-19 vaccine doses administered by continent
Image: Our World in Data
As part of work identifying promising technology use cases to combat COVID, The Boston Consulting Group recently used contextual AI to analyze more than 150 million English language media articles from 30 countries published between December 2019 to May 2020.
The result is a compendium of hundreds of technology use cases. It more than triples the number of solutions, providing better visibility into the diverse uses of technology for the COVID-19 response.
To see a full list of 200+ exciting technology use cases during COVID please follow this link.
The Olympics will take place without spectators in host city Tokyo, organisers said on Thursday, as a resurgent coronavirus forced Japan to declare a state of emergency in the capital that will run throughout the Games.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said it was essential to prevent Tokyo, where the highly contagious Delta variant of COVID-19 variant was spreading, from becoming a flashpoint of new infections.
People will also be asked not to gather for events on public roads, such as the triathlon, though officials said some venues outside the greater Tokyo metropolitan area would allow small numbers of spectators.
"It is regrettable that we are delivering the Games in a very limited format, facing the spread of coronavirus infections," Tokyo 2020 President Seiko Hashimoto said, following talks between government officials, Tokyo organisers and Olympic and Paralympic representatives.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.
People wearing protective masks shop in a Walmart store on May 18, 2021 in Hallandale Beach, Florida.
Joe Raedle | Getty Images
As the highly transmissible delta Covid variant continues to spread rapidly across the United States and elsewhere around the world, scientists and other health experts are warning that indoor mask mandates and other public health measures will likely make a return in the U.S. this fall.
The country, which just celebrated the Fourth of July with some of its first large gatherings in more than a year, is headed toward a "dangerous" fall season when delta is expected to cause another surge in new coronavirus cases, health experts say. Already the dominant variant in the U.S., delta will hit the states with the lowest vaccination rates the hardest unless those states and businesses reintroduce mask rules, capacity limits and other public health measures that they've largely rolled back in recent months, experts say.
With new mutations discovered every few weeks, many scientists now predict that Covid will continue circulating around the world for at least the next two to three years, requiring nations to reinstitute public health measures on an ad hoc basis for the foreseeable future. Authorities in Australia, South Africa and Asia have recently reintroduced curfews or other measures to curb rising delta outbreaks. Japan just declared a coronavirus state of emergency in Tokyo and banned spectators at the Olympics. High vaccination rates in the U.S. and the warm summer months have bought the country some extra time, but outbreaks across the world are giving Americans a preview of what may come this fall.
Health workers chat near an ambulance at the parking lot of the Steve Biko Academic Hospital, amid a nationwide coronavirus disease (COVID-19) lockdown, in Pretoria, South Africa, January 11, 2021.
Siphiwe Sibeko | Reuters
"I could foresee that in certain parts of the country, there could be a reintroduction of indoor mask mandates, distancing and occupancy limits" in the coming months, said Lawrence Gostin, director of the World Health Organization's Collaborating Center on National and Global Health Law.
He said he fears there will be "major outbreaks" in the U.S. this fall, especially in states with low vaccination rates.
"We are heading for a very dangerous fall, with large swaths of the country still unvaccinated, a surging delta variant and people taking off their masks," Gostin added.
The warning from scientists and other health experts comes as many businesses and offices across the U.S. have largely done away with their mask requirements, social distancing and other pandemic-related restrictions.
Almost immediately after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said fully vaccinated people didn't need to wear masks in most indoor settings in mid-May, WalmartandCostcofollowed suit, allowing fully vaccinated customers and employees to go maskless unless required by state or local laws. Likewise, Detroit automakers and the United Auto Workers union late last month agreed to make face masks optional for employees who are fully vaccinated.
A General Motors assembly worker loads engine block castings on to the assembly line at the GM Romulus Powertrain plant in Romulus, Michigan, U.S. August 21, 2019.
Rebecca Cook | Reuters
Other businesses like Apple and Amazon are making a big push for most of their workers to return to the office in some capacity this fall as more Americans get vaccinated against the virus. Goldman Sachs workers returned to the office last month while Citigroup and JPMorgan expect their employees to come back on a rotating basis this month.
Confirmed Covid infections in the U.S. have dropped to their lowest levels since the beginning of the pandemic, averaging about 15,000 new cases a day over the last seven days from a peak of around 251,000 average new cases per day in January, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Hospitalizations and fatalities have also fallen, with Covid deaths averaging about 225 a day down from a peak of more than 3,400 deaths a day on average in January.
If daily Covid cases should rise again in the fall, as health experts expect they will, some employers in states with low Covid vaccination rates may have to grapple with the difficult choice of reimplementing public health measures, such as wearing masks and social distancing, capacity limits, or sending office workers back home altogether.
There will be "two Americas," said Dr. Paul Offit, a pediatrician and vaccine advocate who has served on advisory panels for both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration. "There is the vaccinated America and the unvaccinated America, and I think the unvaccinated America is about to pay a price for that."
There are about 1,000 counties in the U.S. that have Covid vaccination coverage of less than 30%, mostly located in the Southeast and Midwest, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky recently said. The agency is already seeing increasing rates of infection in those areas due to the further spread of the delta variant.
That's prompted some state and local health officials to reinstitute public health measures they had previously dropped.
In Mississippi, for example, where less than a third of the state's eligible population is fully vaccinated, officials last week recommended that all residents continue to wear masks indoors as delta becomes the dominant variant in the state. About 96% of new Covid cases in Mississippi are among unvaccinated people, state health officials said on a call with reporters.
White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said people may want to consider wearing masks in states like Mississippi where transmission is high and vaccinations are low, even if they are fully inoculated.
"Depending on your personal situation, you might," Fauci said in an interview scheduled to air Friday with SiriusXM's "Doctor Radio Reports" with Dr. Marc Siegel. "For example, someone who's an elderly person who may not actually have a full robust protection, even though the protection is very, very high, or someone with an underlying condition" may still want to wear a mask, he said.
Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions hearing to examine an update from Federal officials on efforts to combat COVID-19 in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on May 11, 2021 in Washington, DC.
Jim Lo Scalzo | Getty Images
Officials in Los Angeles County, California, also recommended last week that "everyone, regardless of vaccination status," wear masks indoors in public places as a precautionary measure.
Offit, who advises the FDA on Covid vaccines, said he expects several more states to reimplement indoor mask requirements this fall.
The United States is still "undervaccinated," and states with low vaccination rates are likely to get hit the worst, Offit said. Less than half of the U.S., about 158 million people, has been fully vaccinated, with more than a dozen states fully immunizing less than 40% of their populations, according to CDC data. In Texas, the second-most-populated state behind California, just 42% of its residents are fully inoculated, the data shows.
Even people who are fully protected have cause for concern when it comes to Covid variants, Offit said. While the vaccines protect well against severe disease and death, they may not protect as well against mild disease or spreading Covid to others, he said. No vaccine is 100% effective, he noted.
"It is not a bold prediction to believe that SARS-CoV-2 is going to be circulating two or three years from now. I mean there are 195 countries out there, most of which haven't been given a single dose of vaccine," Offit said. "Will it still be circulating in the United States? I think that would be very, very likely."
Dr. Christopher J.L. Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, agreed that more states will have to reimplement mask mandates this fall. More vulnerable Americans may even need to wear masks every year during peak Covid and flu transmission season: November to April, he said. However, he noted it may be difficult to get some Americans to use face coverings now that the pandemic has waned.
"Given pandemic fatigue, it is going to be harder to get most Americans to follow guidance on mask use and social distancing. When cases and hospitalizations begin to surge again, potentially not until the fall or winter, then it may be easier to persuade some to take measures to be careful," he said.
People crowd outdoor dining at a restaurant as coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions are eased in Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S., April 4, 2021.
Emily Elconin | Reuters
Dr. Vin Gupta, a Harvard-trained lung specialist and NBC contributor, said mask requirements should be reimplemented this fall but enforced at the local level and dependent on what's happening in the surrounding community with Covid vaccination rates and transmission.
"There has to be some specificity there and several local jurisdictions have to make their own decision, especially as the seasons shift and get back into cold, dry air," he said.
In the meantime, the federal government's mask mandate on public transportation, including airplanes, commuter buses and rail systems, is scheduled to expire Sept. 13 unless the CDC extends it once again.
Whether the CDC does so is an open question, scientists said. Walensky and the White House have both indicated that there is no desire to reinstitute lockdowns and will leave much of the decisions on public health measures up to the states.
"A lot of this isn't science. It's political science," said Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease professor at the University of Toronto. "If you have high rates of community transmission of Covid-19 and you have high rates of unvaccinated individuals, it makes sense to mask indoor from a scientific perspective. Whether or not that will be converted to policy is a different question."
Last year, Kings Island replaced Haunt with a Tricks and Treats Fall Fest last year, which was fun for the young crowd but did not offer that much for older teens and adults who pack the parks haunted houses each fall.
The website said from late September through Halloween, it will offer scares and night rides on The Beast, Banshee, Diamondback, Mystic Timbers, and other rides.
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. As the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic took Staten Island by storm, the Advance/SILive.com shared tragic stories daily of illness, suffering, isolation, pain and death.
Yet, in between, there were tales of determination, triumph, resilience and recovery.
As we get closer to putting the worst pandemic in 100 years behind us, wed now like to share the stories of Staten Islanders who battled COVID-19 and made it through.
Though many returned home from hospitals after battling the virus, lives were forever changed. Some lives are unrecognizable, some are back on track, and some through an enlightened perspective are better than they ever were before.
If you are one of the survivors, will you allow us to share your story?
Wed like to spotlight your bravery and perseverance through a historic health crisis that turned our borough and the world upside down.
Reach out to abarron@siadvance.com to let us know youre willing to be interviewed and featured in the Advance and on SILive.com.
News Desk (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta Thu, June 17, 2021 2021-06-17 18:13 24 ef61debc7c9ec5e1a7dfe462b79086be 1 National COVID-19,coronavirus,virus-corona,daily-rise,Delta-variant Free
Health authorities reported 12,624 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, the highest daily rise since February, bringing the total number of cases to 1.95 million.
The national COVID-19 task force also reported 277 new deaths from COVID-19 on the same day, taking the total to 53,753. Meanwhile, a total of 1.77 million patients have recovered.
According to the official count, the number of active cases has risen by nearly 5,000 to 125,303. The highest number of active COVID-19 cases in Indonesia was recorded in February, when there were up to 177,000 active cases in one day.
Jakarta recorded the highest single-day jump in the archipelago with 4,144 additional cases. Significant surges were also reported in West Java and Central Java with 2,800 and 1,752 cases, respectively.
Read also: Delta variant behind Kudus COVID-19 spike, officials say
The country has seen surges of COVID-19 cases in several regions of the country, including Central Java and parts of East Java. The rising case numbers have occurred in the weeks following increased mobility during the Idul Fitri holidays.
Kudus regency became the hardest-hit region in Central Java after it reported nearly 930 new cases between May 24 and 30 -- up from 26 cases detected the week before. Cases in the regency grew by a factor of about 77 in the three weeks following the Islamic national holiday.
Health authorities found that the Delta variant of the coronavirus, which was first detected in India, most likely caused the recent surge in Indonesia.
Health Ministry spokesperson Siti Nadia Tarmizi said on Tuesday that authorities had found 145 samples containing any one of three variants of concern during a whole-genome sequencing effort conducted in 12 provinces. Of the 145 samples, 104 contained the Delta variant.
Read also: Back to square one
Many experts have urged the government to reimpose large-scale restrictions to prevent further COVID-19 transmissions as healthcare services in several regions have been overwhelmed by suspected and confirmed patients. The COVID-19 hospital bed occupancy rate has reached at least 70 percent in several regions.
However, the government has opted out of imposing stricter restrictions, with the Health Ministry saying that the current micro-scale public activity restrictions (PPKM Mikro) have been very effective. (kuk)
As a part of series of health awareness lectures on Covid-19 Pandemic, Faculty of Dentistry, Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) organized yet another e-lecture on Living with the times: Managing mental health during Covid-19 on June 11, 2021, through the Cisco-Webex platform.
The guest speakers for the programme were Dr Ashok Kumar Jainer, MBBS, MD Psychiatry (K.G.M.C, Lucknow), MRC Psych, U.K, FRC Psych, U.K, Consultant Psychiatrist, NHS, U.K and Ms Meena Arora Ex-Squadron Leader, Certified Life coach, NLP (Neuro linguistics Programming) practitioner & trainer and a Clinical Psychologist.
As a tradition of JMI, the programme commenced with seeking the blessing from the Almighty by rendition of verses from the Holy Quran by Dr Mohd Saleem, Associate Professor, Pathology.
Prof Najma Akhtar, Vice-Chancellor, JMI was the Chief Guest for the programme. Addressing the gathering, Prof Akhtar emphasized covid-appropriate behaviour (mask, sanitizer and social distancing) is the key to control the pandemic, the disregard of which a few months ago by the public lead to the emergence of the second wave.
She said Covids deadly second wave sparked off a visible yet hidden/silent outbreak of- fear-demic- the fear amidst the people are of dying, losing their loved ones, being alone, losing their jobsanxieties that add a new dimension of mental-health issues to the ongoing crisis. Other mental health issues such as helplessness, panic, grief and guilt, and post-traumatic stress disorders are also on rise.
She told the audience about the universities initiatives to cope with the mental stress during the pandemic by opening a dedicated cell to look after mental health last year in the first wave to help the students and staff to manage the anxiety and depression of the lockdown.
She also informed the success of the Covid-19 Vaccination camps for age groups above 45 and assured the possible arrangements for younger age groups soon.
Then, Prof (Dr) Sanjay Singh, Dean, Faculty of Dentistry, JMI and the organizing chairperson of the programme, welcomed and introduced both the speakers to the audience. He also announced the live broadcast of the programme on Radio Jamia 90.4 FM and the podcast will be uploaded on Radio Jamia app available on Google Play Store, to be seen anytime, and anywhere.
Dr Ashok Jainer began with how Covid has triggered the rising mental health issues, stress and personality changes, with younger adults more likely to report these symptoms. Focussing on how to deal with irrational fear/belief and anxiety, he gave the 4 magic bullets: time of Covid treatment; availability of correct life-saving information and treatment; evidence-based Uniform protocol; and centralised sources of information. He also emphasized on 3 Ds of Covid treatment: right Drug in right Dose for right Duration.
Meena Arora focussed on the psychological aspects such as the warning/red signs of the need for psychological help/ counselling. She gave important and precise tips to take care of yourself such as sleep, break from social media content, preventive measures, carefree and creative activities and most importantly exercise, meditation and family time. Throughout the speakers also highlighted Vaccination as the key to reduce the future burden of the disease.
Read: JMI research scholar receives Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Abstract Award for Scientists 2021
Read: 6 Jamia Research Scholars get Prime Minister Research Fellowship (PMRF)
A handful of countries, including the U.S., are leading the way toward a future where Covid-19 has faded into the background.
Even as the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus is propelling new infections world-wide, these governments are hoping that their high vaccination rates will protect many of the most vulnerable to the disease, allowing a return to more normal life.
It is a future where officials hope that they will be able to treat the coronavirus like influenza, which causes tens of thousands of deaths in the U.S. every year without prompting damaging economic lockdowns. Vaccinations are the key: Covid-19 causes many more fatalities per infection than the flu, but vaccines significantly reduce peoples chances of catching the coronavirus and the seriousness of the disease if they do.
The virus will remain, however, a fact of life. This is a virus that were going to have to learn to live with, and were going to have to learn to manage and were going to have Covid-19 patients for the foreseeable future, said Edward A. Stenehjem, an infectious-disease specialist at Intermountain Healthcare in Murray, Utah, where cases resulting from the Delta variant have risen lately.
These highly vaccinated countries are the exceptions in a world where most have largely unvaccinated populations. Their authorities appetite for risk varieseven across jurisdictions in the U.S. and Canadabut vaccinations are breaking a pattern seen earlier in the pandemic when rising case rates inevitably prompted tightening restrictions.
Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, scientists all over the world have been struggling to pin down the origin of the coronavirus that caused it.
Linfa Wang knows they may never succeed.
Dr. Wang, a professor in the emerging infectious diseases program at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, is an expert in bat viruses. He has joined the hunt for the origin of Covid-19 even though he and fellow scientists are still searching for the precise source of a different coronavirus: the one that causes severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS. That virus emerged in 2002 and killed nearly 800 people world-wide.
Research on the origin of SARS and other deadly viruses offers a cautionary example of the manifold challenges that confound the pursuit of the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19.
SARS started as an outbreak in China, rapidly traveled around the world infecting and killing people, and disrupted the global economy. The Chinese government was criticized at home and abroad for not sharing information quickly enough with the public and with World Health Organization officials trying to get a handle on the disease.
People with diabetes, for instance, may have breath that smells fruity or sweet. The odor is caused by ketones, chemicals produced when the body begins to burn fat instead of glucose for energy, a metabolic state known as ketosis.
The idea that exhaled breath could hold diagnostic potential has been around for some time, Dr. Davis said. There are reports in ancient Greek and also ancient Chinese medical training texts that reference a physicians use of smell as a way to help guide their clinical practice.
Modern technologies can detect more subtle chemical changes, and machine learning algorithms can identify patterns in breath samples from people with certain diseases. In recent years, scientists have used these methods to identify unique breathprints for lung cancer, liver disease, tuberculosis, asthma, inflammatory bowel disease and other conditions. (Dr. Davis and her colleagues have even used V.O.C. profiles to distinguish among cells that had been infected with different strains of flu.)
Before Covid hit, Breathomix had been developing an electronic nose to detect several other respiratory diseases. We train our system, OK, this is how asthma smells, this how lung cancer smells, said Rianne de Vries, the companys chief technology and scientific officer. So its building a big database and finding patterns in big data.
Last year, the company and many other researchers in the field pivoted and began trying to identify a breathprint for Covid-19. During the viruss initial surge in the spring of 2020, for instance, researchers in Britain and Germany collected breath samples from 98 people who showed up at hospitals with respiratory symptoms. (Participants were asked to exhale into a disposable tube; the researchers then used a syringe to extract a sample of their breath.)
Thirty-one of the patients turned out to have Covid, while the remainder had a variety of diagnoses, including asthma, bacterial pneumonia or heart failure, the researchers reported. The breath samples from people with Covid-19 had higher levels of aldehydes, compounds produced when cells or tissues are damaged by inflammation, and ketones, which fits with research suggesting that the virus may damage the pancreas and cause ketosis.
The Covid patients also had lower levels of methanol, which could be a sign that the virus had inflamed the gastrointestinal system or killed the methanol-producing bacteria that live there. Those breath changes combined give us a Covid-19 signal, said Dr. Thomas, a co-author of the study.
Strict lockdowns in New Zealand last year appear to have contributed to a recent outbreak in children of respiratory syncytial virus, or R.S.V., a highly contagious, flulike illness whose symptoms include a runny nose, coughing, sneezing and fever.
Children in New Zealand were mostly stuck indoors amid lockdowns last autumn, which runs from March to May in the Southern Hemisphere. After the country reopened last winter, health officials say, few of them contracted seasonal viruses and infections, probably because they had been underexposed to germs.
In a typical year, New Zealand sees a peak of cases of respiratory infections from June to September. But in 2020, the country experienced the complete absence of an annual winter influenza epidemic, with a 99.9 percent reduction in flu cases and a 98 percent reduction in R.S.V., according to a study published in Nature in February.
This year, however, the same children have been more vulnerable than usual to those same ailments.
Since the start of winter five weeks ago, during which there have been no coronavirus restrictions, childrens wards in New Zealand have seen dozens of patients, many of them infants, battling the sometimes deadly disease, while some elementary schools have reported having as many as half their students absent because of respiratory illnesses.
The country has reported 969 cases of R.S.V. in five weeks, compared with an average of 1,743 cases over the entire 29-week winter season in the five years before the pandemic, according to New Zealands Institute of Environmental Science and Research.
The recent surge has yet to reach a plateau, said Dr. Sue Huang, a virologist at the Institute of Environmental Science and Research and the lead author of the Nature study.
The exponential increase is very sharp, she said in a statement. The absence of R.S.V. last winter meant there is a young cohort of children from last year, plus a new cohort this year, who have not been exposed to the seasonal virus.
Doctors around the world have warned of the risk of immunity debt, when a decline in the number of viral and bacterial infections during lockdowns is followed by more sickness once restrictions are lifted.
In a paper published in May in the journal Infectious Diseases Now, a team of French medical researchers suggested that less exposure to microbial agents could create a lack of immune stimulation for susceptible people, particularly in children. The longer these periods of viral or bacterial low-exposure are, the greater the likelihood of future epidemics, they wrote.
New Zealand closed its borders early in the pandemic, unveiling stringent lockdown measures that were lifted last April and May and have allowed the country to all but eliminate coronavirus transmission. No community cases have been reported for more than four months.
In other developments around the world:
Spain is facing a further hit to its summer tourism season after Germany classified the entire country as a risk area. As of Sunday, travelers entering Germany from anywhere in Spain, including its Balearic and Canary archipelagoes, will have to provide a negative coronavirus test or proof of vaccination or recovery to avoid quarantine. The Italian government also warned on Saturday that it was considering greater restrictions on travelers from Spain as well as Portugal. Both countries have been grappling with a surge in coronavirus cases fueled by the highly contagious Delta variant, particularly among unvaccinated young people.
