The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned European countries against becoming complacent in their efforts to put an end to the coronavirus pandemic.
Across the continent, governments have been increasingly easing pandemic-related restrictions as new case numbers in the region continue their downward trend. More social gatherings, sports events and travel across borders are also being permitted.
But concerns are growing that the appearance of the highly transmissible variant nicknamed "delta,"first detected in India, could contribute to a resurgence of the virus.
"The fact that there's a fast spread of the Delta variant means that the virus still has the upper hand," Hans Kluge, WHO's regional director for Europe, told DW on Thursday.
"So, we have to be very careful about large, mass gathering events, particularly if it's with people without masks, which still remains a hazard," he said.
For now, the situation in Europe had improved, he said, pointing to falling numbers of new infections, hospitalizations and deaths. "But we're not out of the woods," Kluge stressed.
"I do understand that no one wants to give up another summer, but we should not pay for it with another re-locked winter."
The Delta variant of the coronavirus, first detected in India, is classified asa "variant of concern" by the WHO owing to evidence of increased transmissibility.
Variants of concern are those considered more dangerous than the original form of the virus first seen in China in late 2019
Studies have showed that Delta is more transmissible and resistant to vaccines than other variants of SARS-CoV-2.
Nevertheless, there is also evidence vaccines retain important effectiveness against the variant after two doses.
With regard to opening up and lifting all restrictions, Kluge said doing it in an uncontrolled manner was never a good approach. Instead, he recommended a gradual and cautious opening up of economic and social activities, while putting in place effective public health measures to prevent another resurgence of the virus.
He also pointed out that appropriate measures needed to be put in place to ensure safe travel and prevent the spread of infections.
"Safe travel advisory measures remain very very important, particularly at the main points of entry. It doesn't mean people cannot travel, but travel safely. We know what helps, what needs to be done. What we need is that the vaccines are spreading faster than the mutants are spreading."
On May 19, restaurants, hotels, theaters, and sport facilities are set to reopen, admitting visitors who show proof of a negative COVID test. These reopening plans will coincide with the elimination of quarantine rules for arriving tourists, enabling vaccinated and tested visitors to enter the country, as well as those who have recovered from COVID-19.
In order to fly to Switzerland, you will need a negative test, but this does not apply to arrivals by land. Only visitors arriving from high-risk areas are required to self-quarantine. Hotels are open, as are museums, stores, theaters and amusement parks. Restaurants are allowed to serve guests outdoors. Maximum occupancy numbers, social-distancing and mask-wearing rules apply everywhere.
In Greece, the outside areas of restaurants are allowed to open again but are required to close by 10:45 p.m., and a curfew is in place starting at 11:00 p.m. Vacationers who want to enter the country are obligated to submit their personal data online and they must show proof of a negative PCR test or that they are fully vaccinated. They dont't need to self-quarantine.
Italy is gradually lifting its restrictions. In areas with lower incidence rates, restaurants are allowed to serve guests outdoors even in the evening, but a curfew is in place starting at 10:00 p.m. Museums and movie theaters in yellow zones are open again. Italy aims to officially start its summer season on June 2, but the applicable restrictions for visitors have yet to be drawn up.
France is gradually opening up. Residents are now allowed to go beyond ten kilometers from their homes without a valid reason, and trips within the country are permitted again. A curfew is in place starting at 7 p.m. but is set to be pushed back to 9 p.m. starting on the May 19. Restaurants will then be allowed to serve guests outdoors, and stores and cultural establishments will open again.
The situation in Spain has eased up considerably, with many restrictions already lifted, but several regions plan to maintain their curfews for the time being. Masks will also continue to be mandatory outdoors. Arrivals from EU and Schengen countries are allowed, but those coming from high-risk areas are still required to show a negative test.
After about five and half months, a state of emergency was lifted Portugal on May 1. Restaurants, cultural and recreational establishments are thus now allowed to stay open until 10:30 p.m. In addition, the border with Spain is open again. Tourists from countries with a 14-day incidence rate exceeding 150, however, are still barred from entering Portugal.
In Croatia, hotels are allowed to receive guests and restaurants can open for outdoor dining provided they adhere to certain conditions. In order to enter the country, visitors must show proof of a negative PCR or antibody test, confirmation that they have recovered from COVID-19, or proof that they have been fully vaccinated.
Stores have been reopened, but in order to dine indoors, guests are required to use an app to show they have tested negative, been fully vaccinated, or have recovered from COVID. Fully vaccinated arrivals from EU and Schengen countries are allowed to enter Denmark without a valid reason provided that their country is classified as "orange" or better, meaning with a lower COVID risk.
Hotels are allowed to welcome guests again at 50% capacity. Outdoor dining will be allowed as well starting on May 15 and indoor dining as of May 29. Visitors are required to self-quarantine for ten days upon arrival unless they show proof of a negative test. Fully vaccinated people and those who have recovered from COVID are likewise exempted from the quarantine requirement.
Author: Elisabeth Yorck von Wartenburg
On the issue of vaccinations, he said there was too much inequity in access to vaccines and that "no one is safe until everyone is safe."
"We need 11 billion doses in the next 12 months, which would cost $150 million a day, while the pandemic every day costs 100 times more. So, we need strong leadership and thank you to Germany for a very strong contribution to the COVAX facility," he said.
Asked about when things could return to normal, Kluge said "it's tricky to put a figure."
"But our experts in the European region have the benchmark of 80%. If you have 30% of your population vaccinated, you start to stabilize. If you have 60%, at that moment, you really protect, and at 80%, we can get out of it," he explained.
"So, it's very important for the people, it's your turn, please show up and take the two doses."
(WXYZ) Michiganders may be able to return to their normal pre-COVID interactions sooner rather than later, as Gov. Whitmer hinted Wednesday that restrictions may be rolled back before July 1 as initially expected.
The state has been moving toward getting at least 70 percent of the population vaccinated before taking a major step in lifting several COVID-19 restrictions, such as required face masks indoors for unvaccinated people and capacity limits at restaurants and bars.
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On Wednesday, during a news conference in Grand Rapids, Gov. Whitmer was asked by WOOD-TV reporter Rick Albin about the possibility of lifting restrictions prior to July 1. Whitmer responded saying, "I think it's very possible."
She added that although the state still has a goal of getting 70 percent of Michiganders vaccinated before moving forward with this next step in the "MI Vacc to Normal" plan, she says that she's also trying to "meet people where they are."
"Each of these changes requires a lot of preparation and a lot of legal work and so we are assessing," Gov. Whitmer told Albin of WOOD-TV. "We had a modeling call, which we have every Tuesday night, we had that last night (and it showed) the numbers are good, really good, Whitmer said. Of course, we wanted to be at 70% (of the population vaccinated) Our work is still continuing but were trying to meet people where they are. Thats not unique to Michigan. Its happening all across the country. But weve got all these factors going into that and I would anticipate, whether its MIOSHA or the next step in returning to normal, I would probably have something talk about in the coming days and make some announcements soon.
Back on May 10, Michigan hit the first milestone of its reopening plan after reaching 55 percent of vaccinated people in the state. Currently, the state is at 60.6 percent vaccinated, according to the COVID-19 vaccine dashboard.
And although the state is short of its 70 percent vaccination goal, COVID numbers have continued to drop over the last several weeks, showing a change in a positive direction toward moving back to some form of normalcy.
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Felix Marquardt, a former global schmoozer and current author of The New Nomads, explains why attempting to solve the worlds problems up a Magic Mountain in Switzerland over the course of a few short days, is a quick fix that does more harm than good.
A few weeks ago, the World Economic Forum (WEF) pulled the plug on its gathering in Singapore in August. The reasons invoked by the organisers for this third cancellation (plans for an alternative, exceptional meeting in Lucerne in May were also scrapped earlier this year) centred around health concerns and logistics.
The truth is more complex and the malaise runs deeper. The pandemic has exposed the contradictions of the WEF as a project and its terminal lack of legitimacy and credibility in the post-Covid era.
My inkling as an addict in recovery, is that the organisers are unable to come to terms with this because, just like others in the throes of active addiction, they are in denial.
I used to be a senior adviser to a number of global leaders and a Davos cheerleader. I also used to do a lot of drugs. I had my last drink and drug seven years ago.
At the height of my substance abuse, I thought I couldnt possibly be an alcoholic or an addict. Addicts were people shooting up on park benches or sucking on glass pipes in crack houses. I was flying around the world in business class, living in five star palaces, working for heads of state (including dictators), people running for office (including aspiring dictators) and CEOs of some of the worlds largest multinationals.
A few years into recovery, I came to a different realisation: I had flourished in Davos and in other global circles of power not in spite of my being an addict, but in no small part because I was one. The high which proximity with power, fame and wealth fuelled in me wasnt that different from the high I felt when I did drugs.
So what do my experiences say about others in the WEF circus?
The pandemic has sparked a global existential crisis in many of us, including pillars of the Davos establishment. It has been about recognising, belatedly, that weve been calling normal is a form of civilisational suicide.
Many of us are coming to terms with the fact that we dont know how to decorrelate greenhouse gas emissions from economic growth and that the phrase green growth is, for now and the foreseeable future, an oxymoron. In a world where about 50 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions are produced by the 10 per cent wealthiest humans those of us who earned not millions but $38,000 or more in 2015 the climate crisis is fundamentally an inequality crisis.
Yet from its inception, the WEF has hence been engaged in an exercise of contortion to not have a meaningful conversation on growth. It has since then been paid hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars (governed by Swiss law, the finances of the WEF are frighteningly opaque) by entities whose shareholders are eager to avoid it.
If we have indeed become addicted to carbon, growth and extraction, the techno-utopian verbiage which has become the lingua franca of Davos has become a liability.
The author Lewis Hyde once wrote that the spread of alcoholism happens when a culture is dying. A healthy, functioning culture turns its children into grown-ups. Addicts in contrast are defined by Jungs characterisation of the puer aeternus.
That prism of addiction helps explain our cultures childish solutionism. Like addicts in recovery who get a daily reprieve but are never cured, what we are dealing with are predicaments not problems. Problems, like the equations schoolchildren are asked to solve, have solutions. In contrast, you can respond to predicaments in a more or less constructive and healthy way but they cannot be solved. You have to live with them.
The current, dominant, feelgood approach mirrors that of an addict, in recovery but secretly hoping that they will one day be able to manage their substance use. The Davos crowd seek quick fixes, takeaways, action points and deliverables, rather than dwelling on the thoroughly uncomfortable reality of our condition, for fear of going into depression or becoming paralysed by inertia. The sooner that is ditched, the better. The highest form of hope, the French author George Bernanos once wrote, is despair overcome. But to overcome it, you first need to go through the despair. You need to hit rock bottom.
I am convinced the WEF was founded with the best of intentions. The time has come to move on.
An encouraging number of business and political leaders worldwide are busy trying to figure out how to convince their respective audiences that their corporation, their institution, their political party or their government have understood that going back to normal is not an option. Its far from clear for many of them how they will prove that they have gotten the proverbial memo. But there is a very simple way to show that they havent. And that would be to go back to Davos.
In a world in which the most accurate predictor of the carbon footprint of an individual, household, company or country is how much money they spend, we have become a civilisation led by affluent smooth talkers. What we deserve is to be led by wise elders (and who possibly have made a vow of poverty), a kind of Jedi council of people chosen for their willingness to self-sacrifice, for their commitment to be of service to others and above all, for walking their talk.
Some will argue that such a council is bound to appear illegitimate, that you need to have skin in the game to be credible and audible. Yet we would be much better led and served by rotating committees of old-timers and trusted servants than by the present mix of plutocracy and kakistocracy of people-pleasers willing to say anything and to go to any length to stay in power.
Theres also the sense that Davos and other gatherings represent a quick fix. They last only a few days, producing an Inch Deep, Mile Wide approach with outcomes the equivalent of an Ayahuasca initiation consumed by non-indigenous folks without adequate preparation and follow-up: incredibly powerful, but with no lasting effect. Anyone who has felt the high and the renewed hope from taking part in a great conference and then wondered a week later where that feeling has gone knows what Im talking about.
What we require today is a Mile Deep, Inch Wide approach. Instead of meeting once a year in huge numbers at the top of the Magic Mountain, let us take part in ongoing, regular virtual processes in relatively small numbers over years, punctuated here and there with in-person gatherings down in the plains. Let us bring together people from all around the world and society with widely different Weltanschauungs but with a genuine commitment to the slow, painstaking process of getting well.
The Twitter account @FacesofCOVID, says creator Alex Goldstein, helps people mourn. And as long as COVID-19 persists, he plans on running the account. Michele Abercrombie/NPR hide caption
The Twitter account @FacesofCOVID, says creator Alex Goldstein, helps people mourn. And as long as COVID-19 persists, he plans on running the account.
Alex Goldstein started the Twitter account @FacesofCOVID in March of 2020 to help him make sense of grief.
The account has been his way to honor some of the nearly 600,000 people who have died in the U.S.
Even back in March 2020, Goldstein knew something was wrong. The communications specialist's home city of Boston was hit early and harshly from virus. As the death toll climbed and businesses shut down, he started to feel overwhelmed. How could a virus kill so many and yet he knew so few of its victims? Who were the people who had passed away from COVID, and what were their stories?
He created FacesofCOVID to learn those answers. He has posted over 5,000 virtual obituaries from newspapers and families of those who have died.
"I think that the story at the beginning of the pandemic was largely a data story. We were getting thrown all these numbers thrown at us hospitalizations and cases and deaths," Goldstein tells Morning Edition. "I found it really hard to process and I felt like, we were missing the human element of that story."
One of the things that made this pandemic especially difficult was the lack of mourning rituals. Families saw their loved ones one last time from iPads in isolation wards. Many funeral homes did not let more than 10 mourners at a time attend a service due to regulations. In a time of immense grief, people couldn't mourn in familiar ways.
"It's a place where they can share their loved one's story and see people from all over the country and all over the world saying, 'Your loved one meant something, and even if I didn't know them, we are all less because they're not here anymore, and we all share in your sadness,' " Goldstein says.
As long as COVID-19 continues to exist and take lives, Goldstein plans on running the account.
"I don't want us to immediately lose sight just because things are reopening," he says. "There's a lot of pain out there, and if FacesofCOVID can help people slow down a little bit on their impulse to change the channel, I think that can be a good thing."
Tori Dominguez is an intern at Morning Edition.
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Last year, as the coronavirus killed hundreds inside Texas lockups and sickened tens of thousands more, prisoner rights advocates unsuccessfully pleaded for state officials to more quickly release the thousands of people in prison who had already been approved for parole.
Now, a new report shows delays in release have been deadly.
In the first year of the pandemic, 18 people who had already been granted parole died with COVID-19 before they could walk out of prison, according to a report released Thursday from the University of Texas at Austins Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. At least another two dozen parole grantees died in prison from reasons unrelated to the coronavirus in the same period, largely due to chronic health issues.
While COVID has dramatically exacerbated this problem, the data also tells us that this phenomenon is not unique to the pandemic era, the report stated.
At least 26 people died in prison in 2019 after having been granted parole, according to the report.
In April, about 10,800 people held in Texas prisons had already been approved for parole, according to data from the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, accounting for 9% of the state prison population. More than a quarter of them had been granted parole at least six months earlier, and nearly 900 people had been waiting for more than a year.
The large number of parole grantees in prison is not unusual. At any given time, thousands of people are held in Texas prisons despite having a parole approval in their hands. Thats in part because the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles requires most prisoners to first undergo additional educational or rehabilitative programming before their parole release, which can last from three to 18 months.
Some of the programs are specific to the persons conviction, like addiction and sex offender treatment programs. But many prisoners are assigned to complete a more generic life-skills program that lasts three months. In 2019, less than a quarter of those granted parole were approved for release without delay.
During the pandemic, those classes and the parolees releases were often pushed back. Before March 2020, a person granted parole remained in prison an average of three to four months before being released, according to the report. That average increased to six months in the pandemic, with a typical delay ranging from five to 11 months. Eleven people who died in prison during the pandemic had been approved for parole more than a year earlier, the report found.
One explanation for the delay is that those who required programming that wasnt available at their prisons had to wait months while transfers among units were stopped to limit the virus spread. And units confirmed to have active infections were locked down, sometimes for a month or more, restricting activity within and halting movement in and out of them. Rehabilitative programming shifted from in-person interactions in a classroom setting to filling out paper packets in the prisoners dorm or cell.
The threat of the coronavirus and the limited programming inside prompted family members and prisoner advocates to call for parolees to complete any necessary programming outside of prison walls after release. But the parole board said repeatedly it would not change its parole review process during the pandemic. Gov. Greg Abbott, who oversees the board, has maintained a strong message against increased release from lockups, stating in March 2020 that releasing dangerous criminals in the streets is not the solution to the virus threat inside prisons and jails.
For those who had been approved for release on parole, the UT Austin report suggested free-world programming, noting it is already often available in the community for people sentenced to probation. The report also recommended that TDCJ provide prisoners any necessary rehabilitative programming earlier in their sentences, so as not to postpone release once parole has been granted. Michele Deitch, a senior lecturer at the LBJ School and an author of the report, said such a change would require a significant shift in practices within the parole board and TDCJ.
Theres a concept that every expert will tell you, which is that reentry starts on the day of admission to prison, she said. To adhere to that concept, it makes sense to offer that programming at the start of someones time that theyre incarcerated.
In the Legislature, the Texas House passed a bill this year to require that any necessary prerelease programs be identified by the parole board and made available to prisoners by TDCJ before they become eligible for parole. The bill died, however, after never moving in the Senate.
A spokesperson for the parole board did not respond to questions Tuesday. TDCJ spokesperson Jeremy Desel said the agency provides programming that is mandated by the parole board, and acknowledged the pandemic absolutely presented challenges to parole releases. He added that the state has a low rate of people released from prison being reincarcerated within three years.
The parole system is built to give inmates the highest possible chance to succeed in their reintegration into society, he said. And the way our parole system works and has been working in Texas is a success story.
Aside from COVID-19, most deaths of those granted parole were due to chronic health conditions, according to the UT report. It says the state pays an estimated $744,722 each day the nearly 10,800 prisoners who were approved for parole in April stay locked up. And costs are much higher for those with chronic medical conditions, as an aging prison population continues to increase prison health care costs. The report recommends immediately releasing those granted parole who are chronically ill.
Its a problem that is not only a tremendous human toll, but its got an enormous cost attached to it, Deitch said.
For Kambri Crews, any of the recommended changes in the report could have let her see her father in person before he died in prison custody in July instead of saying goodbye on a hard-fought FaceTime call. Theodore Cigo Crews, 73, died in a prison hospital after a late cancer diagnosis, 30 days after hed been granted parole. He had served 18 years of a 20-year aggravated assault sentence.
We went through a whole roller coaster of emotions, Kambri Crews said, between learning he was approved for parole and his death. From elation and fear because of the COVID concerns, and also this crushing feeling of helplessness in knowing that we were going to be caught in the apathetic bureaucracy.
Her father was first required to take a drug and alcohol program, she said, but she didnt understand why he couldnt have taken classes any other time in his nearly two decades behind bars, or take them outside with her had he been released.
Hes a prime example of someone who needed therapy and [Alcoholics Anonymous] and domestic violence training before he got released, she acknowledged. But hed been in prison for 18 years, so what was that time for?
Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribunes journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
The deafening roar will have been music to the ears of football fans around the world. Empty or only partly full stadiums have become the norm during the pandemic, often creating a sterile atmosphere for players and viewers alike.
But the Hungarian government has bucked the trend, allowing a full-capacity crowd at the newly built arena, at the behest of football-mad prime minister Viktor Orban.
The populist Orban, in power since 2010 but facing a unified opposition in tough elections next April, has relaxed social distancing regulations to allow fans to sit side-by-side.
Whatever the reasons, though, it made for a raucous atmosphere and gave a definite lift to the home side against their more fancied opponents, the reigning European champions.
Fans were able to gain entry to the stadium if they showed certification that they had been vaccinated against the virus, while entry times at the gates were staggered to try to keep large groups apart outside the venue.
The Indian authorities launched an investigation after an internal government report concluded that some private agencies responsible for coronavirus testing on pilgrims at a sprawling Hindu festival forged at least 100,000 results.
The festival, Kumbh Mela, which ran throughout April, is widely believed to be responsible for a coronavirus surge in many parts of India, as the pilgrims returning from the festival tested positive days after returning to their villages.
The festival drew millions of faithful to the town of Haridwar on the banks of the river Ganges in the northern state of Uttarakhand.
We have constituted a four-members committee that will submit its report in two weeks, Dr. Arjun Singh Sengar, a Haridwar health officer who was in charge of testing for Kumbh Mela, said in an interview. Initial investigations are pointing toward lapses and fake results.
Dr. Sengar said that out of 251,000 tests in his district, only 2,273 were positive.
But health experts questioned those numbers, saying the state government underreported positive cases. That suggested it was safe to take part in the pilgrimage, despite evidence that the largely unmasked crowds provided an ideal environment for the virus to spread.
According to a sprawling government report on the lab that conducted rapid antigen tests during the festival, at least 100,000 test results out of 400,000 were fake.
Despite warnings by public health experts and doctors, the regional government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modis party advertised the festival in newspapers, inviting pilgrims from across the country.
Before the event, Uttarakhands top elected official, Tirath Singh Rawat, mingled with huge crowds of pilgrims, without a mask. When questioned during one of his three visits to the holy site, Mr. Rawat said, Faith in God will overcome the fear of the virus.
He tested positive for the coronavirus two days after his last visit to the Ganges.
Officials in Uttarakhand began investigating the test results after a man in the neighboring state of Punjab received a negative test from the health department in Uttarakhand, even though he had not visited the state. He filed a complaint with the Indian Council of Medical Research, a top government body.
Officials alerted the state government, which is now leading the investigation and has stopped payments to dozens of private laboratories and agencies involved in testing.
Testing scams have been a persistent problem in India.
Some, according to a report by the state, have simply filled log books with fake names and addresses, then charged the state government for the service.
In Haridwar, the report found that some sample collectors listed for the festival had never even visited the town.
The authorities said they found phone numbers used multiple times to register pilgrims who were tested, and private agencies carrying out the tests wrote fictional addresses for people who were supposedly tested on their arrival for a dip in the holy waters.
When officials called the numbers in the logs, they found they were false.
Memorials hang from the front gate of Greenwood Cemetery in New York City during an event organized by Naming the Lost Memorials to remember and celebrate those who died during the COVID-19 pandemic. Spencer Platt/Getty Images hide caption
Memorials hang from the front gate of Greenwood Cemetery in New York City during an event organized by Naming the Lost Memorials to remember and celebrate those who died during the COVID-19 pandemic.
More than 15 months since the first confirmed death due to COVID-19 in the U.S., the coronavirus pandemic has claimed more than 600,000 lives across the country.
But that trend has slowed from thousands to hundreds per day in recent weeks, thanks largely to the ready availability of vaccines.
Over the winter, the nation was adding about 100,000 deaths each month. But as more and more people were vaccinated particularly older Americans the death rate fell precipitously. There are now about 375 deaths per day on average down from more than 3,000 per day in January.
Worldwide, the U.S. still is reporting the greatest total deaths, followed by Brazil, India and Mexico. The total global death toll stands at 3.8 million.
The U.S. death toll, according to Johns Hopkins University, stood at 600,012 on Tuesday afternoon.
Even so, the cumulative number of deaths in the country clearly shows the recent positive impact of vaccines: Barely a month passed between 400,000 and a half-million deaths, but it has taken nearly four times as long to reach the 600,000 mark. At the same time, the trend in the number of new infections, which has closely mirrored deaths, reached a peak in January of more than 300,000 in a single day. Now the U.S. is hovering around an average of fewer than 15,000 confirmed infections, according to Johns Hopkins.
The positive trends have led many states to lift their coronavirus restrictions with some dropping mask mandates altogether for vaccinated individuals and eliminating other social distancing requirements.
At the same time, however, many Americans have shown a reluctance to get vaccinated, with just over half of U.S. adults fully immunized. In parts of the Midwest and South, in particular, vaccine rates per 100,000 people still remain relatively low compared with the Northeast and parts of the West Coast, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The divide has been particularly marked between rural and urban areas of the country.
Tuesday's figures follow a study this week showing that a new vaccine, one made by Novavax, is 100% effective against the original strain of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, and 93% effective against other variants.
The next step is for the company to seek regulatory approval from the Food and Drug Administration, which has issued emergency authorizations for three other vaccines ones made by Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson.
Minnesota recorded another hopeful milestone in its pandemic battle Tuesday when just 95 new cases of coronavirus were reported the lowest in one day since April 2020.
For more than 400 straight days, Minnesota had reported 100 or more COVID-19 cases per day. For a stretch of more than 160 days last fall and winter, daily new cases were in the thousands.
The record low doesnt include holidays, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas and Memorial Day, when the state Department of Health did not report new data.
The rate of COVID-19 deaths has also slowed. Minnesotas seven-day rolling average for deaths is about six per day.
There was one additional fatality reported Tuesday, a Hennepin County resident in their 90s.
Minnesota has recorded 603,966 cases of coronavirus since the pandemic began. There have been 7,518 deaths, including 4,457 in long-term care.
The state has screened more than 10 million samples from 4.4 million residents since March 2020. The cumulative test-positivity rate is about 6 percent and the current average of positive tests is about 1.2 percent.
Of those whove tested positive, 595,183, or 98.5 percent, have recovered enough they no longer need to be isolated.
About 88 percent of Minnesotas COVID-19 fatalities have been seniors, but deaths have begun to trend younger after close to 90 percent of seniors have been vaccinated.
Hospitalizations have also fallen to their lowest levels in more than a year. There were 147 patients hospitalized, including 49 in critical condition.
Hospitalizations have also continued to trend younger.
Health officials say thats due, in part, to more contagious variants of the coronavirus being responsible for most new cases. Some emerging strains of COVID-19 are also suspected to cause more severe disease.
Vaccines have proven very effective against both the original strain of coronavirus and the new variants. Health officials say more than 99.9 percent of new COVID-19 cases are in people who are not vaccinated.
Minnesota has administered 5.5 million doses of vaccine and nearly 3 million residents have gotten at least one dose. Almost 66 percent of the population 16 and older have gotten their first shot.
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