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Instruction
News Release
Friday, July 2, 2021
The National Institutes of Health is funding five additional projects to identify ways of safely returning students and staff to in-person school in areas with vulnerable and underserved populations. The awards are the second installment of the Safe Return to School Diagnostic Testing Initiative, launched earlier this year as part of the NIH Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics Underserved Populations (RADx-UP) program. The new awards will provide up to $15 million over two years for five projects in California, Arizona, Hawaii, Nebraska and Florida. The 8 initial awards, totaling $33 million over two years, were made in April 2021.
The new awards reaffirm NIHs commitment to use evidence-based research to inform policy makers of the safest ways to return to schools in vulnerable and underserved communities, said Eliseo J. Prez-Stable, M.D., director of NIHs National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities and co-chair of the RADx-UP program.
The program addresses the needs of children with unequal access to COVID testing as well as those facing barriers to attending school remotely, including children who lack access to computers and internet connectivity, or who may not have family members available to help with virtual learning. Without in-person schooling, many children will miss out on school-based meals, speech or occupational therapy and after school programs. Loss of such services disproportionately affects minorities, socially and economically disadvantaged children, children with disabilities and those with medical complexities, such as those with medication-related problems, mental health issues, severe neurologic conditions or other serious health conditions and those who are dependent on medical technology for daily living. Award recipients also will explore strategies for including preschoolers in return to school efforts.
The new projects will focus on implementing COVID-19 testing regimens for students younger than age 12, who are ineligible for vaccination, exploring the influence of vaccination for eligible staff and students, addressing vaccine hesitancy and seeking information on circulating variants and breakthrough infections. One of the new projects will focus on native Hawaiians and other Pacific islanders, groups not addressed in the previous awards. Researchers will work closely with state, tribal and local officials in planning their investigations.
The in-person school environment and the wide range of services offered there are critical to the development of our nations young people. By learning the best practices and methods through research, we can get children back in the classroom safely and equitably, said Diana W. Bianchi, M.D., director of NIHs Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), which is managing the initiative.
RADx-UPSMis a registered service mark of the Department of Health and Human Services.
About the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD): NICHD leads research and training to understand human development, improve reproductive health, enhance the lives of children and adolescents, and optimize abilities for all. For more information, visit https://www.nichd.nih.gov.
About the National Institutes of Health (NIH):NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.
NIHTurning Discovery Into Health
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The West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR) reports as of July 2, 2021, there have been 3,016,020 total confirmatory laboratory results received for COVID-19, with 164,149 total cases and 2,899 deaths.
DHHR has confirmed the deaths of an 83-year old male from Mercer County and an 83-year old male from Wyoming County. Vaccines are safe and effective, said Bill J. Crouch, DHHR Cabinet Secretary. If you are eligible, I am asking you to do your part to end further deaths from the pandemic by scheduling a COVID vaccine.
CASES PER COUNTY: Barbour (1,515), Berkeley (12,847), Boone (2,179), Braxton (1,018), Brooke (2,247), Cabell (8,888), Calhoun (392), Clay (543), Doddridge (644), Fayette (3,557), Gilmer (885), Grant (1,317), Greenbrier (2,900), Hampshire (1,927), Hancock (2,844), Hardy (1,583), Harrison (6,198), Jackson (2,260), Jefferson (4,800), Kanawha (15,496), Lewis (1,290), Lincoln (1,607), Logan (3,300), Marion (4,655), Marshall (3,538), Mason (2,064), McDowell (1,615), Mercer (5,193), Mineral (2,985), Mingo (2,764), Monongalia (9,399), Monroe (1,223), Morgan (1,227), Nicholas (1,905), Ohio (4,314), Pendleton (725), Pleasants (959), Pocahontas (681), Preston (2,959), Putnam (5,331), Raleigh (7,096), Randolph (2,858), Ritchie (761), Roane (665), Summers (864), Taylor (1,282), Tucker (547), Tyler (748), Upshur (1,970), Wayne (3,182), Webster (546), Wetzel (1,392), Wirt (457), Wood (7,948), Wyoming (2,059).
Free pop-up COVID-19 testing is available today in Barbour, Berkeley, Grant, Jefferson, Lincoln, Logan, Marshall, Mineral, Monongalia, Morgan, and Wayne counties.
Barbour County
9:00 AM 11:00 AM, Barbour County Health Department, 109 Wabash Avenue, Philippi, WV
1:00 PM 5:00 PM, Junior Volunteer Fire Department, 331 Row Avenue, Junior, WV
Berkeley County
10:00 AM 5:00 PM, 891 Auto Parts Place, Martinsburg, WV
Grant County
Jefferson County
10:00 AM 6:00 PM, Hollywood Casino, 750 Hollywood Drive, Charles Town, WV
12:00 PM 5:00 PM, Shepherd University Wellness Center Parking Lot, 164 University Drive, Shepherdstown, WV
Lincoln County
Logan County
Marshall County
Mineral County
Monongalia County
9:00 AM 12:00 PM, WVU Recreation Center, Lower Level, 2001 Rec Center Drive, Morgantown, WV
Morgan County
11:00 AM 4:00 PM, Valley Health War Memorial Hospital, 1 Health Way, Berkeley Springs, WV
Wayne County
10:00 AM 2:00 PM, Wayne Community Center, 11580 Rt. 152, Wayne, WV
Paramedics attend to a patient during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak as the country faces tighter restrictions at the MASA (Muslim Association of South Africa) Medpark, in Johannesburg, South Africa, July 1, 2021. REUTERS/ Sumaya Hisham
JOHANNESBURG, July 2 (Reuters) - South Africa registered more than 24,000 cases of COVID-19 on Friday, its highest tally of new infections since the pandemic began, as a third wave of the virus spread through a population in which just 5% have been vaccinated.
The surge in cases in Africa's most industrialised nation has overwhelmed hospitals, especially in the main city of Johannesburg, and left overworked healthcare personnel struggling to find enough beds for critically ill patients.
Bureaucratic failures have worsened the health crisis. The South African Medical Association threatened on Thursday to take the government to court because more than 200 new junior doctors cannot find placements despite desperate staff shortages. NL2N2OD2E3
South Africa has recorded just over 2 million cases and more than 60,000 deaths during the pandemic, according to government data, while 3.3 million people have been vaccinated out of a population of just under 60 million.
President Cyril Ramaphosa last Sunday announced a raft of measures, including suspension of alcohol sales and a halt of indoor dining in restaurants, for two weeks to minimise the impact of the new wave, which scientists say is driven by the highly contagious Delta coronavirus variant first found in India and now circulating widely around the world.
The country's low vaccination rate is due to a combination factors including bad luck - the government had to destroy 2 million contaminated Johnson & Johnson (JNJ.N) vaccines - lumbering South African bureaucracy, and rich countries with plentiful vaccine supplies inoculating their own citizens first while much of the developing world waits for doses.
Ramaphosa has been highly critical of what he called global "vaccine apartheid."
He has called on drugmakers and allied Western governments to waive their patent protections to allow emergency local manufacturing of vaccine doses, so far to no avail.
(Removes extraneous word 'of', paragraph six)
Reporting by Tim CocksEditing by Bill Berkrot
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Health workers carrying AstraZeneca vaccines against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19 arrive for the mass vaccination part of the "Paqueta Vacinada" (Paqueta vaccinated) project, that aims to vaccinate the whole population over 18 years old on Paqueta Island in Guanabara Bay, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil June 20, 2021. REUTERS/Pilar Olivares
BRASILIA, July 2 (Reuters) - Municipalities across Brazil on Friday denied a newspaper report that said health ministry data showed cities administered at least 26,000 expired AstraZeneca (AZN.L) COVID-19 vaccine shots.
The southern city of Maring, cited in the Folha de S.Paulo story as being the municipality to have used the most expired shots (over 3,500), denied the allegation, saying the doses only appeared to have expired on public databases due to a delay in the registration of new data in the Health Ministry system.
"There were no expired vaccine doses in Maring, but there was an error in the system of (public health network) SUS," said the city's Health Secretary Marcelo Puzzi in a statement. Other cities blamed the confusion on the same data issue.
Local governments for the cities of So Paulo, Juiz de Fora and Belo Horizonte, which were also mentioned in the Folha story, issued statements denying having given out-of-date shots.
Brazil's vaccine rollout has faced widespread criticism. The government was slow to buy vaccines, and is now dealing with an alleged corruption scandal surrounding its procurement efforts. read more
Expired vaccine doses can be less effective. In Africa, a number of countries have found themselves with batches that have passed their shelf life sparking a debate over extending expiry dates. In May, Malawi destroyed nearly 20,000 doses that had expired.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has so far declined to take a vaccine and has sowed doubts about inoculations, pushed unproven miracle cures and underplayed the severity of a pandemic that has killed over a half a million Brazilians.
According to the report, the expired vaccines came from batches imported from India by the public Fiocruz biomedical institute, or acquired through the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
Neither the Health Ministry, nor PAHO immediately responded to requests for comment. The Serum Institute of India, which made the shots, also did not immediately reply. Fiocruz said it did not produce any expired shots.
The AstraZeneca vaccine is one of the two dominant COVID-19 shots in Brazil, alongside China's CoronaVac.
Reporting by Ricardo Brito; additional reporting by Stephen Eisenhammer; writing by Pedro Fonseca and Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Aurora Ellis and David Gregorio
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) Several area health officials say they have been seeing more sick children than normal for this time of year, and they believe a big part is because many of them are too young for the COVID-19 vaccine.
You dont want to worry if you child is one of the ones who has a severe reaction to getting COVID, said Sedgwick County Health Director, Adrienne Byrne. Thats another reason why its important for people to get vaccinated, is because some people dont have a choice.
With the July 4th weekend here, Sedgwick County health officer Dr. Garold Minns and others are worried about the spread of the new COVID-19 Delta Variant, It appears to be more likely to be transmitted between people and it appears to cause more severe disease. It has gradually emerged as becoming one of the more dominant strains were seeing.
Dr. Amy Seery with Ascension Via Christi says the hospital is seeing other contagious viruses among children, but its hard to tell what it is if parents dont have their kids tested.
Dr. Seery explained, Unfortunately without testing, we cant tell the difference between if its COVID-19, regular old school Coronavirus, Rhinovirus, or Respiratory Syncytial Virus, also known as RSV. Were seeing a very offseason spike of [RSV].
This rise in cases of RSV, plus the Delta Variant of COVID-19 is causing problems for busy hospitals, In terms of an outpatient setting, were seeing lots and lots of kids with viral UI-type symptoms, added Dr. Seery.
As Professor Stuart Turville, a virologist from the Kirby Institute, told the ABC, the Delta variant is both more contagious and not nearly as deadly.
Looking at the 28-day follow-up after infection, the death rate for the original variants was 1.9 percent mortality, he said. So far, the Delta variant is showing 0.3 percent mortality.
Over time, there is more room for confidence. Peter Collignon, a physician and microbiology professor at the Australian National University, whom I often talk to about the pandemic, reminded me this week that Australia is better off now than it was a year ago because even though the vaccine rollout has been slow, more than 7 million jabs have already been given.
And the people with the highest rates of vaccination, he noted, are the most vulnerable people Australians older than 70.
In the next three months, if more vaccine supplies reach Australia as scheduled, the likelihood of death and hospitalization will continue to go down because more people will be protected by vaccines. And then, as the prime minister announced today, everyone will have been offered a vaccine, and life will start to return to some semblance of normal. Well probably still have to get a Covid test before traveling internationally, but hey, at least well be traveling.
Is it all too slow? Yes. Is that rage-inducing? Absolutely, and even more so if youve been paying attention. People like Mr. Collignon and Mr. Holden, for example, warned months ago that this winter would be bad if the vaccine rollout wasnt up to speed. And they were right.
But at the same time, finally, there is an endpoint in sight a horizon, as government officials have called it. And so that anger might as well be leavened with longing and hope.
MOSCOWRussia is adopting increasingly coercive measures to convince Russians to be vaccinated, as authorities try to reboot a flailing vaccination campaign and race to beat back a surge in Covid-19 cases caused by the more infectious Delta variant.
Local authorities in some areas of Russia have made vaccination compulsory for service-sector employees, meaning that millions of workers, ranging from hairdressers to bank tellers, face the threat of unpaid leave if they dont get inoculated.
Restaurants and shops could be closed for months if they dont have 60% vaccinated staff by mid-July. And as of late June, only the inoculated, those who have recovered in the past six months or who have a negative test can enter Moscow restaurants and coffee shops.
Russians can take any one of four homegrown vaccines for free. The country doesnt offer any of the Western shots.
The push has sparked backlash in the face of widespread vaccine skepticism in Russia and has led to a proliferation of fake inoculation certificates online, according to authorities. It comes as Covid-19 cases have surged to over 20,000 a day; deaths have hit a record. Over 90% of new cases involve the Delta variant. Authorities are also advising those vaccinated more than six months ago to get a booster shot.
Right now, anyone rolling up their sleeve for a COVID-19 vaccine in the United States is supposed to get a long information sheet. The document informs them that, even though the vaccine can prevent COVID-19, its technically not yet approved in the country.
Instead, people are getting the shot under an emergency use authorization (EUA) a designation that let the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) sign off on the lifesaving immunizations without going through the long, onerous licensing process. The shots still went through a rigorous safety review, and theres ample evidence that theyre highly effective.
But for some people, the emergency tag and the fact that the shots are still unapproved is a reason to avoid getting vaccinated. New polling from the Kaiser Family Foundation released Wednesday shows that around a third of unvaccinated adults in the United States would be more likely to get vaccinated when the FDA gives a full approval to the shots. About 35 percent of adults in the United States are currently unvaccinated a third of that group would be around 10 percent of US adults.
A 10 percent bump in the number of US adults who are vaccinated would be significant, especially as the Delta variant of the coronavirus takes hold across the country. The variant is highly contagious, and it is easily burning through communities where most people arent vaccinated. In Missouri, for example, counties with low vaccination rates are seeing spikes in COVID-19 hospital admissions.
Experts cautioned last summer that the emergency use of a COVID-19 vaccine, even if it was the best way to beat back the pandemic, could lead to some vaccine hesitancy. The limited data they had back then looked bad only around 8 percent of people said in 2009 theyd take a hypothetical emergency H1N1 vaccine. People proved far less reluctant to take an emergency COVID-19 vaccine, but some clearly still have reservations. And each person who avoids the COVID-19 vaccine is a weakness in the US protection against the virus.
The FDA is currently reviewing applications for full approval of both the Moderna and Pfizer / BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines, but its not clear when the final license for either might be released. While we wait, public health officials are still using every tool at their disposal to encourage more people to get vaccinated, like lotteries and convenient mobile clinics. Full approval will likely be a big boost for vaccination numbers, but Delta is here already and theres no time to waste.
Heres what else happened this week.
Pfizer and Moderna Vaccines Are Likely to Produce Long-Lasting Immunity, Study SuggestsResearchers checked the lymph nodes of people who had been vaccinated with mRNA vaccines to see how immunity developed. The findings suggest that people could be protected from COVID-19 for years. (Apoorva Mandavilli / The New York Times)
Why No One Is Sure If Delta Is DeadlierThe Delta variant of the coronavirus clearly spreads faster and is more contagious, but its hard to pin down any changes in how sick it can make people. (Katherine Wu / The Atlantic)
Three Studies, One Result: Vaccines Point the Way Out of the PandemicA set of new studies on the COVID-19 vaccines underscore their efficacy, and indicate that people may not need boosters if the virus doesnt continue to change. (Apoorva Mandavilli, Carl Zimmer, and Rebecca Robbins / The New York Times)
Modernas COVID-19 vaccine shows promise against Delta variant in lab studyAntibodies produced by the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine could still neutralize the Delta coronavirus variant in blood samples, a good sign that the shots can still handle that form of the virus. (Reuters)
Mix-and-match COVID vaccines: the case is growing, but questions remainCombining one shot of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine with a second Pfizer / BioNTech jab might give better protection than a two-dose series of the same brand, research indicates. There needs to be more research on potential side effects of mixing shots. (Dyani Lewis / Nature)
As the national government doled out limited amounts of oxygen, officials in Delhi grew increasingly worried. Its hospitals had built only one small oxygen-generating plant because there had previously been little need, said Manish Sisodia, Delhis deputy chief minister. And Delhi could store only about one days worth of its pandemic needs at its hospitals and in a city-owned tank.
a New York Times report traced the cascade of failures that lead to oxygen supplies running out at hospitals in India
To the people who have received the 3.1 billion vaccine doses distributed so far thank you.
To the more than 182,420,108 people worldwide who have tested positive, may your road to recovery be smooth.
To the families and friends of the 3,950,309 people who have died worldwide 604,935 of those in the US your loved ones are not forgotten.
Stay safe, everyone.
Enlarge / A deserted walk-in COVID-19 mass vaccination site at the Convention Center in downtown Washington, DC, on June 1, 2021. Covid-19 CoverageView more stories
The United States is expected to miss the Biden administration's target of having 70 percent of adults vaccinated with at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by July 4. Instead, the country will fall shy of the goal by just a few percentage points.
Currently, about 66.5 percent of adults have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. To reach the target of 70 percent, around 9 million unvaccinated adultsthose ages 18 and overwould need to get a vaccine dose over the next three days. Though the number of daily vaccinations has risen slightly in the past week, only around 1.37 million vaccine doses were administered on June 30, bringing the seven-day average of daily doses administered up to about 945,000. And that number includes second doses and doses given to those between the ages of 12 and 17, who are not included in President Joe Biden's target.
Though we'll only just miss the vaccine goal, new polling data highlights just how hard it is becoming to get those small slivers of the population vaccinated going forward.
While about 65 percent of polled adults say they've already gotten their COVID-19 vaccine, only 3 percent say they still plan to get vaccinated as soon as possible. The rest responded that they would "wait and see" (10 percent), only get vaccinated if required (6 percent), or would "definitely not" get vaccinated (14 percent).
The proportion of the "definitely not" crowd has largely gone unchanged throughout the survey, which began last December and is run monthly by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Throughout the survey, between 13 percent and 15 percent of polled adults have fallen into the "definitely not" category. Likewise, the "only if required" proportion has fluctuated between 6 percent and 7 percent since January.
Meanwhile, the "wait and see" proportion has dwindled considerably, shrinking from 39 percent in December to the current 10 percent in the June data. However, the remaining 10 percent may be harder than ever to sway. Of those remaining wait-and-see adults, 61 percent said they worry that current vaccines won't be effective against variants. (Mounting data continues to show that current vaccines are effective against all of the concerning variants circulating in the US). And 43 percent said the number of cases is so low that there is "no need for more people to get the vaccine."
Overall, the country's current lowered rates of cases, hospitalizations, and deathsmainly attributable to highly effective vaccines and successful vaccination effortsappears to be acting as a deterrent for further vaccinations. Among all unvaccinated people polled, 50 percent said the low case numbers mean there is no more need for people to get vaccinated. And among just the people who said they would "definitely not" get vaccinated, 67 percent said the low case counts make vaccination unnecessary.
In the meantime, experts are raising alarms over the looming risk of COVID-19 outbreaks and surges in areas with low vaccination rates. In a White House press briefing Thursday,Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, noted that around 1,000 counties, primarily in the Southeast and Midwest, have vaccination coverage of less than 30 percent. "These communities... are our most vulnerable,"Dr. Walensky said. "In some of these areas, we are already seeing increasing rates of disease. As the Delta variant continues to spread across the country, we expect to see increased transmission in these communities unless we can vaccinate more people now."
