Four of the six coronavirus vaccine mega-sites have opened up throughout New Jersey to serve as vaccinations hubs.
The four locations currently open are the Moorestown Mall in Burlington County, Rowan College of South Jersey in Gloucester County, the New Jersey Convention and Exposition Center in Middlesex County and Rockaway Townsquare in Morris County. Two additional sites will open later in East Rutherford and Atlantic City.
Each site is currently offering the shot only to priority groups, including healthcare professionals, EMS teams, police officers and firefighters, people over age 65, those with chronic health conditions and smokers. State officials have said each location will eventually have the capacity to vaccinate thousands of people per week, but doesnt currently because the federal government is not providing enough doses.
Many vaccine sites throughout the state do not show availability due to supply not meeting demand. State officials have said more appointments will become available as New Jersey receives additional vaccines.
Heres how to get an appointment at each site.
The Moorestown site, which launched on Friday, was chosen due to its proximity to Camden County. Anyone in the region can set up an appointment. However, walk-ins are not allowed.
To schedule an appointment, visit Virtua.org/vaccine and complete the form. You will then receive either a text or email that will contain a link to schedule your appointment.
You should bring a health insurance card if you have one, a federal, state or local identification card and employer-issued identification.
Information on the second-dose appointment will be provided in-person at the initial appointment.
Answers to frequently asked questions about the site can be found here.
The 30,000-square-foot facility in Sewell opened on Jan. 8 and will be able to handle more than 2,000 people a day once vaccines are widely available in New Jersey.
Registration is required to receive the two doses, according to the colleges website. A link to pre-register with the state can be found at RCSJ.edu/vaccine.
Vaccination hours will be 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., 7 days a week.
Those with appointments can enter the campus at 1400 Tanyard Road though either North Campus Drive or West Campus Drive and park in Lot E, then follow cones to the Instructional Center.
The Edison site, located at 97 Sunfield Avenue, is equipped with 20 vaccination stations and will be open weekdays from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. It opened on Friday.
The Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines will be administered at the site, but people registering cannot choose which vaccine they want.
Qualified individuals can complete a vaccine registration form on RWJ BarnabasHealths website here. You will then receive an email or text to schedule an appointment through a link to a scheduling app.
Due to the high volume of requests, you will not get the link immediately, according to the website. You will be entered into a queue to receive the scheduling link based on the number of people who requested a vaccine before you.
The Rockaway site opened Jan. 11 in the shuttered, 30,000 square-foot Sears department store at the Rockaway Townsquare shopping center on Mt. Hope Avenue. The vaccination center is on the lower level of the building.
Reservations must be made using an on-line registration form on Atlantic Health Systems website, found here.
According to their website, there are currently no appointments available, but you can sign up for appointment alerts. Scroll to the bottom of the page to opt in for alerts.
Appointments for second doses will be made on-site when the first dose is administered.
If you are a healthcare worker or work on the front lines and qualify for the vaccine but havent been able to secure an appointment, wed like to hear from you. Tell us your stories on our COVID tip line.
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Avalon Zoppo may be reached at azoppo2@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @AvalonZoppo.
More than 360,000 people in Ohio have been vaccinated against COVID-19, Gov. Mike DeWine announced Thursday, Jan. 14.
That number represents about 72% of the vaccines the state has received from the federal government.
"We do not have enough vaccines in Ohio right now, but we hope our allotment will increase in the future," he added.
Those 80 years and older will be added to front line health care workers and congregate care staff and residents as Ohioans permitted to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. DeWine warned, however, that with more than 400,000 residents in that age bracket and only 100,000 vaccines available, the supply will be insufficient.
"The big picture on vaccines is that we do not have enough," the governor said.
Those in the eligible demographic must register with one of the state's 750 providers which will be made public by county health departments this week, DeWine said.
Although there is no plan yet for a centralized state site to register to get the vaccine, Ohio plans to post information about the local providers on the health department site starting Friday.
The Ohio Health Department reported 7,654 new COVID-19 cases, 109 fatalities and 340 new hospitalizations, with 37 of those people admitted to an intensive care unit for Thursday. All of those reported indicators are above the 21-day average.
New coronavirus cases statewide have also increased since last week from an average of 657 positive cases per 100,000 population to 740 positive cases per 100,000 population.
"We are not seeing a dramatic surge after Christmas and New Year, but there is a bit of an upswing in cases," DeWine said.
Lt. Jon Husted also announced that General Motors committed to invest $12 million as part of an agreement that includes the company refunding $28 million in tax credits to the state.
General Motors received tax credits for an assembly plant in Lordstown and then shuttered the facility in 2019.
Per the settlement, Youngstown State University will receive $5 million for a workforce development program and funding for the university's Energy Storage Innovation and Training Center. The village of Lordstown is set to receive $3 million for a new water tower. The Eastgate Regional council government will get $2.5 million for infrastructure projects, and $1.5 million will go to support the Mahoning Valley Manufacturers Coalition.
The incoming president, Joseph R. Biden Jr., has said he will reassert a federal strategy to bring the virus under control, including a call for everyone to wear masks over the next 100 days and a coordinated plan to widen the delivery of vaccines. We will manage the hell out of this operation, Mr. Biden said on Friday. Our administration will lead with science and scientists.
The strategy signals a shift from the past year, during which the Trump administration largely delegated responsibility for controlling the virus and reopening the economy to 50 governors, fracturing the nations response. Interviews with more than 100 health, political and community leaders around the country and a review of emails and other state government records offer a fuller picture of all that went wrong:
The severity of the current outbreak can be traced to the rush to reopen last spring. Many governors moved quickly, sometimes acting over the objections of their advisers. The reopenings nationally led to a surge of new infections that grew over time: Never again would the countrys average drop below 20,000 new cases a day.
Science was sidelined at every level of government. More than 100 state and local health officials have been fired or have resigned since the beginning of the pandemic. In Florida, leading scientists offered their expertise to the governors office but were marginalized, while Gov. Ron DeSantis turned to Dr. Scott W. Atlas, a Trump adviser, and others whose views were embraced in conservative circles but rejected by scores of scientists.
While the president publicly downplayed the need for masks, White House officials were privately recommending that certain states with worsening outbreaks require face coverings in public spaces. But records show that at least 26 states ignored recommendations from the White House on masks and other health issues. In South Dakota, Gov. Kristi Noem, boasted to political allies about not requiring masks even as her state was in the midst of an outbreak that became one of the worst in the nation.
Gov. Jared Polis of Colorado said states had faced difficult choices in balancing the virus often hearing competing voices on how to do it best and said Mr. Trump had left them without the political support they needed as they urged the public to accept masks and social distancing. The single biggest thing that would have made a difference was the clarity of message from the person at the top, Mr. Polis said in an interview.
The pandemic indeed came with significant challenges, including record unemployment and a dynamic disease that continued to circle the globe. Without a national strategy from the White House, it is unlikely that any state could have fully stopped the pandemics spread.
But the majority of deaths in the United States have come since the strategies needed to contain it were clear to state leaders, who had a range of options, from mask orders to targeted shutdowns and increased testing. Disparities have emerged between states that took restrictions seriously and those that did not.
America now makes up 4 percent of the worlds population but accounts for about 20 percent of global deaths. While Australia, Japan and South Korea showed it was possible to keep deaths low, the United States armed with wealth, scientific prowess and global power became the world leader: it now has one of the highest concentrations of deaths, with nearly twice as many reported fatalities as any other country.
Spring
The country once had a chance to set itself on a path to defeat the virus.
There had been many early missteps. The United States failed to create a vast testing and contact tracing network in January and February, which could have identified the earliest cases and perhaps held back the crisis. Then, cases silently exploded in New York, while Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio waited crucial days to close schools and businesses.
Thousands of lives might have been saved in the New York metropolitan area alone if measures had been in place even a week earlier, researchers found. Driven by the spring surge, New York and New Jersey to this day have the worst death rates in the nation.
Its not yet clear if Michigans recent plateau in COVID-19 cases will lead to further decline in virus spread or another increase as testing and reporting routines return to normal following the winter holiday season.
But what is clear is Michigan avoided a significant and immediate surge linked to holiday celebrations.
We dodged anything that was sudden and fierce like we saw in other states, said Dr. Emily Toth Martin, an epidemiologist and associate professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health.
One of the really challenging things around the holidays is testing habits change and reporting cadence changes so we have to wait for it to stabilize a little bit and to have the data backfill a little bit. But we havent seen the explosion, so thats good news.
Michigan started the week of Christmas averaging 3,631 COVID-19 cases and 111 deaths per day. The positive test rate was at 13%, and hospitals were caring for 3,175 patients with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19.
By Friday, Jan. 15, those averages were down to 2,461 cases and 81 deaths per day, Michigan was averaging a positive test rate of 8.8%, and hospitals were treating 2,222 such patients.
Throughout the holidays, the state health department had several days where it didnt report coronavirus data. Additionally, daily testing dropped off between Dec. 19 and Jan. 6, making it more difficult to rely on the data.
Much of that data can be backfilled, with the exception of testing. As daily testing totals begin to climb back toward pre-holiday totals, infectious disease experts are able to better understand the spread of coronavirus in the community.
You cant replace tests that werent performed but thats where we tend to watch test positivity, Martin said. With it fluctuating as much the last few weeks, its still an open question where were going.
If a resident was exposed to coronavirus during a New Years Day gathering, they would likely have already been ill within the first week or two, Martin explained. Sometimes, it takes longer to see the domino effect of those individuals infecting others.
Factors that may have contributed to the avoidance of a major surge might have had to do with the proactive restrictions put in place prior to and throughout the holiday season, Martin said.
Michigans state health department tightened its gathering restrictions in mid-November and kept them in place through December, which ran along the same timeline as the decrease in new daily coronavirus cases.
I think people are also definitely getting used to the importance of masking indoors and of other mitigation indoors, she said. Im entirely speculating, but people might be coming in with higher levels of caution.
While dodging a surge is good news, Martin said its important not to lose sight of the fact that coronavirus is still active in the community.
Weve leveled out but we need to get the water line lower, she said. Its nice to see things plateauing but these numbers are so high, they would have terrified me in the fall. Theres still a lot of disease in the community and were not that far removed from the time when our hospitals were in trouble.
Back in September, if you would have told Martin that positive test rates were going to be consistently above 10%, she wouldnt have believed you. Yet thats where Michigan was regularly from Nov. 2 through Dec. 15.
On Thursday, the positivity rate was 6.33% -- the lowest since Oct. 24.
The epidemiologist said she wouldnt be surprised to see cases and positive rates rise again in the coming weeks as college students return to campuses and many K-12 students return to face-to-face learning.
Any time you have that much movement you run the risk of surging and forming hot spots, she said.
To find a testing site near you, check out the states online test finder, here, send an email to COVID19@michigan.gov, or call 888-535-6136 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays.
Read more on MLive:
Michigan considers itself a leader in COVID-19 vaccination effort despite CDC ranking
4% of Michigan adults vaccinated so far; see numbers in your county
Newest vaccine timeline pushes lower priority groups further into 2021
Pfizers ramped up vaccine production results in delivery reduction in Europe
A new, more contagious variant of the coronavirus has been found in Louisiana, state health officials said Saturday.
State leaders and health experts warn that could make an already-troubling surge in infections, hospitalizations and deaths even worse. They say it's even more important now for people to limit their exposure to others and take other precautions.
SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7., which is often referred to as the "U.K. variant" because of its prevalence in the United Kingdom, spreads more easily than other viral strains in the country, health experts said.
Ochsner Health System, Louisiana's largest, said it will delay vaccine appointments for thousands of patients after receiving zero new doses i
The Louisiana Department of Health said the new variant had been found in the Greater New Orleans area. The departmentconducted an investigation to identify those in close contact with the infected person, who reportedly has a history of travel outside of the state.
The variant strain, which officials say is likely circulating more broadly in Louisiana, has been detected in at least 15 other states.
"It is urgent that everyone double down on the mitigation measures that we know are effective in reducing the spread of the virus," Gov. John Bel Edwards said in a statement. "There is no such thing as taking this too seriously."
LDH has been working with the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions national SARS-CoV-2 Strain Surveillance Program in preparation for this variant strain, sending bi-weekly samples for sequencing since November 2020.
A spokesperson for New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell said the administration is staying in close contact with federal and state health officials to monitor developments.
"The confirmation comes as we were starting to see a gradual decrease in COVID-19 cases over the past week, which made us cautiously optimistic that we were starting to flatten the curve once again," the statement said.
The U.K. variant has not been shown to cause more severe disease, officials said. Health experts believe that current COVID-19 vaccines are effective against this strain.
However, this not a reason for people to let down their guard when it comes to safety precautions, according to Dr. Catherine O'Neal, chief medical officer for Our Lady of the Lake and infectious disease physician.
In England, O'Neal said people following normal mitigation efforts such as distancing at a coffee shop or wearing masks in a group meeting proved ineffective with this strain of the virus. With the new variant, even small gatherings with one or two people outside of your household could be dangerous.
"The things we thought were safe may not be safe anymore because this virus is more transmissible," O'Neal said. "That is why just doubling down on what weve been hearing for this last year may not be enough."
O'Neal encouraged people to stick strictly to their close personal "bubble" to avoid transmission, even if they have managed to remain virus-free for months using less-stringent mitigation measures. That false sense of security is dangerous, she said.
"Before we let this thing get too far out of the bag, our best bet is to stop it in its tracks while its still fairly early...and really do a great job staying away from each other," O'Neal said. "Everybody has to participate in doing it."
Cases have risen throughout the winter months and following major holidays, but now experts fear the rapid spread will be exacerbated even further by this more contagious strain.
Dr. Susanne Straif-Bourgeois, associate professor of epidemiology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans, underscored the importance of getting the new vaccine if possible. In the meantime, she said Louisiana residents should temper their expectations for upcoming celebrations like Mardi Gras and St. Patrick's Day.
"I know everyone is tired," Straif-Bourgeois said. "Im really concerned that people will say, 'Okay, its over, were in 2021!' But its not over yet. As soon as you go outside, you have to be prepared that you might get exposed."
If the U.K. variant is mixed with the holiday-related cases from the tail end of 2020, the state "will likely see a boom in cases," O'Neal said. And Straif-Bourgeois added that the trickledown effect of these cases will mean more hospitalizations and more deaths.
"At this rate of transmission as a state, the added gasoline on a fire of a hyper-transmissibility of a new strain will give us an outlook that is very bad for the next couple of months," O'Neal said.
The CDC said Friday that the U.K. variant could become the predominant strain in the U.S. by March. Health experts continue to advise people to wash their hands, wear masks, social distance, isolate and quarantine to prevent the spread of this more contagious variant.
"We are not out of the woods yet," Straif-Bourgeois said. "We think the number of cases is going up because we are in the winter season...and now we have this more infectious strain. Dont let your guard down."
Kirtiraj Rana grew up in Rajamunda, a village of fewer than a thousand people in the northeastern Indian state of Odisha, which faces the Bay of Bengal. A migrant worker, he dropped out of school when he was in tenth grade to help support his familyhis parents, a brother who also dropped out, and a sister who received only a fifth-grade education. Odishas farming revolves around its brief rainy season. Unable to find work in the off months, Rana travelled with his brother to Mumbai in December of 2019. They were hired as construction workers. After buying food and clothes, they managed to send half of their wagesabout five hundred rupees a day, or seven U.S. dollars, eachback home.
Rana first heard that the coronavirus was spreading in India in early March. We didnt know what it was, how it looked, he said. We just knew that people were dying in Mumbai. We were very scared. A few days later, Narendra Modi, the Indian Prime Minister, announced one of the worlds largest and strictest lockdowns. Modi delivered his speech at 8 P.M. on March 24th; restrictions started at midnight. Millions of migrant workers were stranded without wages, food, or shelter. All forms of public transportationby air, rail, and roadwere suspended. Police arrested, and sometimes beat, people who remained out for nonessential activities. The lockdown, initially scheduled to last three weeks, was extended again, and again, and again, through the end of May.
The contractor whom Rana worked for offered migrants a month of rations. After that, Rana and his brother were on their own. They tried to wait it out. We thought it had to end at some point, Rana said. They asked their father to send money, but in early May, after theyd exhausted their savings, the brothers bought bicycles and, along with several friends, set out for Odishasome fourteen hundred kilometres from Mumbai. They began their journey at 2 A.M., carrying rice, utensils, medications, pots, and pans; in ninety-degree weather, they cycled to Nashik, a town in northern Maharashtra, the Indian state with the highest number of COVID cases, where they were forced to spend twenty-four hours at a quarantine center, along with some three hundred people. The next day, petrified of catching the virus while detained, Rana pleaded with the police to let them go.
It took Rana and his brother seven days and nights to get to Odisha on their bicycles. When they arrived, they were quarantined near their village for a month before being allowed back home. Since then, Rana has had trouble finding work, both because of pandemic-related restrictions and because of the stigma attached to those returning from Maharashtra. When we spoke, five months after his return home, none of the men with whom hed made his journey had managed to find work in the village.
Rana is one of roughly a hundred million migrant workers in India. The sudden lockdown, by forcing their reverse migration from urban centers to rural areas, almost certainly contributed to the spread of the coronavirus; it also created a humanitarian crisis, reminiscent of Partition, in 1947, when the subcontinent was divided into India and Pakistan and millions were forced to trek on foot from one to the other. Five weeks after Modis first announcement, the Indian government began operating Shramik Specialslabor trainsto transport migrants to their home states. Crowds gathered in congested stations, and packed trains ran with little regard for social distancing; still, millions of migrants remain stranded, and since March hundreds have died of starvation, exhaustion, suicide, and accidents. In one video, a toddler on a train platform tries to wake his dead mother, tugging at the cloth covering her lifeless body.
Many migrant homecomings have been sullied by prejudice against those seen as carrying the virus from one place to another. At times, this stigma has been applied to physicians; some doctors, particularly women, have suffered physical and verbal abuse. According to the World Health Organization, India has only eight doctors for every ten thousand people. (The U.S. has twenty-six, and Germany forty-two.) Even before the pandemic, India had fewer than twenty per cent of the critical-care doctors required for its ordinary needs. The situation is worse in rural areas, where sixty-five per cent of the population lives but only twenty per cent of the countrys doctors work. For much of September, India recorded more than ninety thousand COVID-19 cases a day; while daily cases have since decreased, the country still ranks third, behind the U.S. and Brazil, for most COVID deaths in the world. Many believe that, because of its poor testing-and-reporting infrastructure, the deaths are significantly undercounted. Tested or not, the virus continues to spread: according to some reports, more than half of those in Mumbais slums and a third of the people in Delhi have been infected.
Its been a year since the novel coronavirus emerged, in Wuhan, China. Since then, it has reached every continent on the planet, infecting more than ninety million people and causing two million deaths. The global economy has shrunk by more than four per centthe largest contraction since the Second World Waras governments the world over have tried, with varying degrees of success, to contend with the pandemics staggering damage, closing borders, banning gatherings, enforcing lockdowns, and, to varying degrees, providing financial support and investing in testing and tracing programs. In every country, people have criticized their governments. Even the best leaders have struggled to balance public-health imperatives against a host of country-specific factors: government rules, political polarization, economic stability, health-system capacity, public opinion, institutional trust, and the states history of the use and abuse of power. Government surveillance feels different in Rwanda than in Canada; individual freedom dominates Americans self-image but not that of South Koreans; Germanys health-care system can withstand a deluge of COVID-19 patients in a way that Indias cannot.
Adam Oliver, a professor at the London School of Economics, is one of many researchers who have tracked how different countries have responded to the pandemic. Oliver thinks that our usual back-of-the-envelope way of comparing countries, using a snapshot of COVID cases and deaths, is of limited value. We have to think about the non-health implications of pandemic response, too, he told me. Those are much more difficult to gauge at the moment. When you lock down businesses and citizens, there are many downstream consequences. Theres an economic impact. Theres social damage. Theres loss of freedomwhich, especially in countries already bordering on authoritarianism, could be hard to roll back. If you consider these broader implications, I dont think well know the best path for years, if ever.
Oliver classifies pandemic responses into three broad, sometimes overlapping categories: the quick approach, the soft approach, and the hard approach. Countries that took the quick approach used swift action to tamp down viral spread, and were generally able to avoid prolonged lockdowns. Taiwan, for example, acted early and aggressively through closed borders, universal mask wearing, robust contact tracing, and quarantines enforced with mobile-phone tracking. In a population of twenty-three million, it has had fewer than nine hundred cases; for two hundred and fifty-three consecutive days, between mid-April and the end of December, it did not record a single locally transmitted infection. Many Asian countries recognized very early that this was going to be much deadlier than the flu, Oliver said. Some of their speed and effectiveness came from their experience with SARS. They had their public-health infrastructuretrack-and-trace programs, quarantine protocols, communication strategiespretty much ready to go.
The second strategythe soft approachrelies on recommendations instead of requirements. Many nations have taken this route after failing to act quickly, or because they are unwilling or unable to pass mandates; instead they recommend, but do not enforce, mask usage, closures, and quarantines. Sweden is the most widely cited and widely criticized example of such a country; while its COVID-19 death toll is much higher than its Scandinavian neighbors, it is on a par with that of many other Western democracies. Other countries have adopted the soft strategy. In Japan, the constitution imposes some limits on the governments ability to mandate behavior, and so the country has relied on peer pressure and financial incentives, with surprising success. Brazil, because of its Presidents cavalier attitude to the virusWe need to stop being a country of sissies, he has saidhas also de facto employed the soft approach.
Britain seemed to flirt with the soft option early on. Ultimately, though, it went with the third strategythe hard approachwhich is characterized by more aggressive government action. This approach has been adopted by most countries at one point or another, and is familiar to most of us here in the United States. As cases increase and hospitals fill, the government mandates masks, imposes curfews, prohibits large gatherings, and orders lockdowns until numbers improve. In the U.S., individual states have experimented with the soft versus the hard approach, and have often alternated between them. Most of Europe started hard, went soft in the summer, and then was forced to go hard again as infections surged in the fall. Some countries have to take the hard approach because their health-care systems are stretched at baseline and they cant afford a surge of cases, Oliver said. Others have simply concluded that its the only way to prevent unnecessary death and suffering. Such decisions are abstract, made at a high level, and yet they have human consequences. Around the world, billions of people have been affected by the virus. There are more pandemic stories than well ever know.
Michalis Kavadias was born and raised in Greece but moved to Germany in 2009. He works as a graphic designer, but much of his time is spent managing a dive bar in Neukllna vibrant neighborhood in Berlin, full of artists and young professionals. Kavadiass bar, Du Beast, is cozy and low-key. It serves reasonably priced craft cocktails and locally brewed beers. Before the pandemic, it regularly featured standup comics, open-mike poetry nights, and d.j. sets.
In March, as the coronavirus spread across Europe and into Germany, Kavadias closed the bar, several days ahead of a government-mandated lockdownthe hard approach. It was starting to get really scary, he said. For much of Aprilthe dark month, he called itthe bar remained shut. Kavadias learned that his aunt, who lived in Italy and was previously healthy, was ill with COVID-19. After weeks in the hospital, she died. The pandemic became very real for me, he said. I really think the Italians saved our asses. They got hit so hard. It was a wake-up call for all of Europe.
As the weather warmed and people ventured out of their homes, Kavadias devised schemes to generate revenue, so that he could keep his employees on the payroll. I had to find a way to pay them, Kavadias told me. These people are my friends. He designed T-shirtsone, which he was wearing when we spoke, over Zoom, read Du Beast or Not Du Beast. He sold two hundred to local residents, which helped cover salaries, at least for a time. He offered cocktails to go; people who used to frequent the bar would stop by, mostly in an effort to keep it afloat. The neighborhood was incredibly supportive, Kavadias said. It really came together. One day, a man in his sixties who, prior to the pandemic, had dropped by for a beer almost every day after workFor him, it was like a cup of teaordered a drink to go and left a two-hundred-euro tip.
As spring turned to summer, the bar reopened with outdoor seating, and patrons flooded back. It might have been the best summer weve ever had, Kavadias said. Everyone was so ready to socialize again. Theres a reason people live in Berlin: they want to have fun. This isnt Munich or Frankfurt. Upon entering the bar, people were required to write down their names and e-mail addresses, but many hesitated. Privacy is a big issue in Germany, Kavadias said. I said, Write Mickey Mouse as your name if you want. But I need a way to get in touch with you if someone ends up getting COVID here. Around that time, surveys showed that nearly ninety per cent of Germans thought that their country was doing a good job of handling the pandemic; seven in ten said that the response had made them prouder of their country. Germany was seen, rightfully, as an exemplar of how to respond to the pandemic, and its policies enjoyed high levels of public support.
Like the United States, Germany has a federalist political system: in addition to the central government, there are sixteen regional governments and hundreds of public-health offices. But, unlike in the U.S., decentralization didnt prevent the country from mounting a cordinated early response. Angela Merkel, who used to be a quantum chemist, regularly met with regional governors to develop and announce COVID-19 regulations; she has consistently employed science-based messaging in press conferences, interviews, and her weekly podcast. Shes very effective at helping people understand whats going on, Kavadias said. When she explained this R thingR-naught, the viruss reproduction number, a marker of how many people an average infected person infectsit was, like, Wow, this is the first time I understand what this means. That was really powerful. Scientists like Christian Drosten, a Berlin-based virologist, have become among the most trusted voices in the pandemic; Drostens podcast, Das Coronavirus-Update, has millions of listeners.
As the pandemic began, Germany benefitted from unparalleled execution of the fundamentals: clear communication, widespread testing, and robust contact tracing. Germanys strategy has been to make a team of five contact tracers available for every twenty thousand citizens, and the system includes thousands of German soldiers who can provide urgent backup when needed. A government app sends COVID-19 alerts and monitors users potential coronavirus exposures; officials estimate that its used by at least sixteen million peopleabout a fifth of the German population. Given Germanys past history with surveillance, the apps adoption was not without controversy: after some early debate, developers opted not to collect GPS data, which tracks location and can leak user-identifying details, but to employ a Bluetooth system that registers only whether, and for how long, a person has been in close proximity with someone who has tests positive for the coronavirus. (If the other person has the app, too, the two phones exchange encrypted codes; if either of them later changes his status to virus-positive, the other gets notified.) Rather than send these details to a central server, the app stores them on individuals cell phones only, and for a limited time. The Chaos Computer Club, the largest European association of hackers, has praised the app as posing a relatively low risk for user privacy.
PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) In a new record, theVirginia Department of Healthreported its highest daily increase of COVID-19 cases so far with nearly 10,000 new coronavirus cases along with 23 new COVID-19 deaths for Sunday.
As of Sunday morning, January 17, Virginia has an overall number of 439,305 coronavirus cases since the start of the outbreak. Of the overall cases reported, 357,345 have been confirmed by testing. 81,960 are probable cases, in which a patient who shows symptoms is diagnosed without testing.
Statewide numbers
Virginians, we have to keep doing what we know works and follow public health guidelines: Wear a mask Wash your hands Avoid large gatherings Practice physical distancing Stay home if you dont need to be out
On Thursday, Virginia health officials said they are moving people 65 and up and those with co-morbid conditions into phase 1b for COVID-19 vaccinations, after new federal guidance.
Though its still unclear where everyone will go to get those vaccines, but Virginia is in the process of creating large scale vaccination sites.
One hasalready opened at the Virginia Beach Convention Center, but officials said there were not doing COVID-19 shots on Friday, Jan. 15. The Hampton Convention Center could be one after Hampton Mayor Donnie Tuck reached out to state officials.
Local casesAccomack: 2,140 cases, 144 hospitalized, 31 deaths (+15 cases)Chesapeake: 12,297 cases, 672 hospitalized, 113 deaths (+330 cases, +1 hospitalized)Franklin: 761 cases, 39 hospitalized, 18 deaths (+20 cases, +1 hospitalized)Gloucester: 1217 cases, 36 hospitalized, 14 deaths (+19 cases)Hampton: 5,705 cases, 213 hospitalized, 57 deaths (+134 cases)Isle of Wight: 1,860 cases, 90 hospitalized, 33 deaths (+27 cases)James City County: 2,685 cases, 105 hospitalized, 33 deaths (+105 cases, +1 hospitalized)Mathews: 384 cases, 16 hospitalized, 4 deaths(no changes)Newport News: 7795 cases, 227 hospitalized, 76 deaths (+202 cases, +2 hospitalized)Norfolk: 11,075 cases, 625 hospitalized, 123 deaths (+206 cases)Northampton: 557 cases, 60 hospitalized, 32 deaths (+18 cases, +1 death)Poquoson: 465 cases, 15 hospitalized, 7 deaths (+10 cases)Portsmouth: 5716 cases, 473 hospitalized, 94 deaths (+71 cases)Southampton: 1,576 cases, 37 hospitalized, 44 deaths (+19 cases)Suffolk: 4890 cases, 268 hospitalized, 100 deaths (+90 cases)Virginia Beach: 22,393 cases, 906 hospitalized, 177 deaths (+380 cases)Williamsburg: 411 cases, 22 hospitalized, 8 deaths (+ 6 cases) York: 2,040 cases, 38 hospitalized, 13 deaths (+41 cases)
Overall, Hampton Roads and the Tidewater region reported a total of 1,693 cases Saturday, which is 17% of the daily increase statewide.
Key local metrics
Local Vaccine Update: (Fully vaccinated only)
Accomack: 66Chesapeake: 130Franklin: 5Gloucester: 145Hampton: 156Isle of Wight: 40James City County: 220Mathews: 45Newport News: 414Norfolk: 143Northampton: 35Poquoson: 45Portsmouth: 25Southampton: 3Suffolk: 56Virginia Beach: 212Williamsburg: 0York: 203
According to theVirginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, 3,058 residents in Virginia are currently hospitalized due to the virus. That number is a combination of confirmed positive COVID-19 patients and hospitalized patients whose COVID-19 test results are still pending.
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Another four Mainers have died as health officials on Sunday reported 340 more coronavirus cases across the state.
Sundays report brings the total number of coronavirus cases in Maine to 33,559, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Thats up from 33,219 on Saturday.
Of those, 27,511 have been confirmed positive, while 6,048 were classified as probable cases, the Maine CDC reported.
Two Cumberland County residents, a Somerset County resident and a York County resident have succumbed to the virus, bringing the statewide toll to 511. Nearly all deaths have been in Mainers over age 60.
Sunday marked the lowest number of new cases reported since Monday, when Maine saw 313. It followed a week that saw four days with new cases above 700 including three above 800, as well as a new single-day record high of 824. New cases slipped to 438 on Saturday.
That follows a trend of lower cases reported over the weekend. The previous weekend Maine saw new cases slip into the 200s. Such weekend slumps have been followed by a return of higher new daily cases during the week.
Maines seven-day average for new coronavirus cases is 610.9, up from 601.7 a day ago, up from 529.7 a week ago and up from 433.4 a month ago. Before this surge began in late October, Maines seven-day average was hovering in the 30s.
The Maine CDC continues to report widespread high levels of community transmission, defined as a case rate of 16 or more per 10,000 people, even in counties once largely spared the worst of the pandemic.
So far, 1,244 Mainers have been hospitalized at some point with COVID-19, the illness caused by the new coronavirus. Of those, 205 people are currently hospitalized, with 66 in critical care and 26 on ventilators.
Maine CDC spokesperson Robert Long said Sunday that 66,314 Mainers have been vaccinated against the virus, with 11,720 who have received two doses.
A majority of the cases 19,972 have been in Mainers under age 50, while more cases have been reported in women than men, according to the Maine CDC.
As of Friday, there have been 1,328,905 negative test results out of 1,368,816 overall. Nearly 2.9 percent of all tests have come back positive, the most recently available Maine CDC data show.
The coronavirus has hit hardest in Cumberland County, where 9,794 cases have been reported and where the bulk of virus deaths 126 have been concentrated. Other cases have been reported in Androscoggin (3,612), Aroostook (1,024), Franklin (564), Hancock (683), Kennebec (2,606), Knox (485), Lincoln (393), Oxford (1,560), Penobscot (2,894), Piscataquis (163), Sagadahoc (614), Somerset (942), Waldo (428), Washington (494) and York (7,296) counties. Information about where an additional three cases were reported wasnt immediately available.
As of Sunday morning, the coronavirus had sickened 23,775,293 people in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as caused 395,896 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University of Medicine.
In a study published in Science today, Berger and her colleagues pull several of these strands together and use NLP to predict mutations that allow viruses to avoid being detected by antibodies in the human immune system, a process known as viral immune escape. The basic idea is that the interpretation of a virus by an immune system is analogous to the interpretation of a sentence by a human.
Its a neat paper, building off the momentum of previous work, says Ali Madani, a scientist at Salesforce, who is using NLP to predict protein sequences.
Bergers team uses two different linguistic concepts: grammar and semantics (or meaning). The genetic or evolutionary fitness of a viruscharacteristics such as how good it is at infecting a hostcan be interpreted in terms of grammatical correctness. A successful, infectious virus is grammatically correct; an unsuccessful one is not.
Similarly, mutations of a virus can be interpreted in terms of semantics. Mutations that make a virus appear different to things in its environmentsuch as changes in its surface proteins that make it invisible to certain antibodieshave altered its meaning. Viruses with different mutations can have different meanings, and a virus with a different meaning may need different antibodies to read it.
To model these properties, the researchers usedan LSTM, a type of neural network that predates the transformer-based ones used by large language models like GPT-3. These older networks can be trained on far less data than transformers and still perform well for many applications.
Instead of millions of sentences, they trained the NLP model on thousands of genetic sequences taken from three different viruses: 45,000 unique sequences for a strain of influenza, 60,000 for a strain of HIV, and between 3,000 and 4,000 for a strain of Sars-Cov-2, the virus that causes covid-19. Theres less data for the coronavirus because theres been less surveillance, says Brian Hie, a graduate student at MIT, who built the models.
NLP models work by encoding words in a mathematical space in such a way that words with similar meanings are closer together than words with different meanings. This is known as an embedding. For viruses, the embedding of the genetic sequences grouped viruses according to how similar their mutations were.
The overall aim of the approach is to identify mutations that might let a virus escape an immune system without making it less infectiousthat is, mutations that change a viruss meaning without making it grammatically incorrect.
Take a language example. Changing just one word in the sentence "wine growers revel in good season" can produce the sentences "wine growers revel in strong season" or "wine growers revel in flu season." Both share the same grammatical structure but one has changed its meaning more than the other. The tool looks for similar changes in a virus, flagging those that change its meaning most.
To test their approach, the team used a common metric for assessing predictions made by machine-learning models that scores accuracy on a scale between 0.5 (no better than chance) and 1 (perfect). In this case, they took the top mutations identified by the tool and, using real viruses in a lab, checked how many of them were actual escape mutations. Their results ranged from 0.69 for HIV to 0.85 for one coronavirus strain. This is better than results from other state-of-the-art models, they say.
Knowing what mutations might be coming could make it easier for hospitals and public health authorities to plan ahead. For example, asking the model to tell you how much a flu strain has changed its meaning since last year would give you a sense of how well the antibodies that people have already developed are going to work this year.
Still, this work is more about breaking new ground than making a real impact on public healthfor now. Since doing the work published in Science, the team has been running models on new variants of the coronavirus, including the so-called UK mutation, the mink mutation from Denmark, and variants taken from South Africa, Singapore and Malaysia.
They have found a high potential for immune escape in all of themalthough this hasnt yet been tested in the wild. But the model did miss another change in the South Africa variant that has raised concerns because it may allow it to escape vaccines. They are trying to understand why that is."It consists of multiple mutations and we believe a combinatorial effect is coming into play," says Berger.
Using NLP accelerates a slow process. Previously, the genome of the virus taken from a covid-19 patient in hospital could be sequenced and its mutations re-created and studied in a lab. But that can take weeks, says Bryan Bryson, a biologist at MIT, who also works on the project. The NLP model predicts potential mutations straight away, which focuses the lab work and speeds it up.
Other locations designated as vaccine hubs in the Houston area include:
According to the state health departments website, you must be one of the following in order to qualify for a vaccine from one of the hub providers:
Texas will receive 333,650 first does of the COVID-19 vaccine next week, according to the state health department. Health officials have instructed the CDC to ship the doses to 260 providers across the state, including 79 hubs focused largely on community vaccination efforts and 181 additional providers.
This week, Texas became the first state to give 1 million does of the vaccine. The state health department said the vaccine has been given to residents in all of Texas 254 counties.
The DSHS is ordering about 500,000 doses intended to be the second dose for those who received their first round of the COVID-19 vaccine a few weeks ago.
For more information on coronavirus vaccines in Texas, click here.
