The skyline of lower Manhattan
Good morning. This is Jonathan Spira reporting. Here now the news of the pandemic from across the globe on the 822nd day of the pandemic.
In case you hadn’t noticed by the statistics you read daily in the Morning News Brief, the number of coronavirus infections worldwide has increased by 30% over the past two weeks, a figure confirmed by the World Health Organization at the end of last week.
Europe is at the center of the resurgence.
Indeed, just last week, Britain reported a 32% increase in new cases, and said that hospital admissions are climbing, with intensive-care cases spreading among older age groups
“We are seeing a much more intense wave of the disease passing through Europe again,” said Michael Ryan, the WHO’s executive director for its Health Emergencies Programme, at a media briefing Wednesday, adding that “…we will see it happen elsewhere – we are already seeing it in South East Asia and in the eastern Mediterranean region as well.”
The increase is largely being driven by the extremely contagious BA.4 and BA.5 omicron variants. The WHO also noted that it is following a new sublineage, BA2.75, which was first detected in India. This, incidentally, is the subvariant that Dr. Anthony Fauci, one of the world’s leading infectious disease doctors, had.
In general principal, the spread of Covid should fall during the summer, when people are outdoors more, but people are also traveling more and attending large group events such as concerts, which contributes to the rise.
In news we cover today, the White House believes that there are hundreds of thousands of new infections occurring each day which are going unreported, an Irish research reported a symptom unique so far to the subvariant BA.5, and Australia is dropping its remaining coronavirus travel restrictions.
Here’s a look at what has taken place over the past 24 hours.
UNITED STATES
Hospitalizations from Covid have climbed steadily and now are at a four-month high just as the positivity rate hit a five-month high, this despite the fact that new daily Covid figures have not risen nearly to that extent.
Health officials in Washington D.C. said that this is due to a severe undercount due to the prevalence of the use of home test kits, where positive results are rarely reported to local health authorities.
“There’s no question in my mind that we’re missing a vast majority of infections right now,” said White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Ashish Jha in an interview on NBC’s “Nightly News” last week. “The truth is, there are probably several hundred thousand, four or five hundred thousand, infections today happening across the country.”
New York City, which is currently experiencing a sixth wave of Covid, is now urging residents and visitors to don face masks in all indoor and busy outdoor public settings.
All five boroughs, as well as neighboring Nassau County, are at a high risk of community transmission, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, the point at which the CDC recommends the aforementioned mask protocols.
GLOBAL
One immunologist suggests that the new subvariant BA.5 could be causing a new symptom among patients.
“One extra symptom from BA.5 I saw this morning is night sweats,” said Professor Luke O’Neill from Trinity College Dublin in an interview on an Irish radio station last week.
Meanwhile, Australia has lifted its remaining coronavirus-related travel restrictions. The changes went into effect at the end of last week.
“As more and more of us travel internationally and we get more confident in managing our risk of Covid, our airports are getting busier,” said Minister for Home Affairs Clare O’Neil. “Removing these requirements will not only reduce delays in our airports but will encourage more visitors and skilled workers to choose Australia as a destination. And for Australian citizens, with the removal of these requirements, returning home will be much easier.”
T ODAY’S STATISTICS
Now here are the daily statistics for Sunday, July 10.
As of Sunday morning, the world has recorded 560.5 million Covid-19 cases, an increase of 0.5 million new cases in the preceding 24 hour period, and 6.37 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, 533.4 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus, an increase of 0.5 million.
Worldwide, the number of active coronavirus cases as of Sunday is 20,679,489, an increase of 17,000. Out of that figure, 99.8%, or 20,641,633, are considered mild, and 0.2%, or 37,856, are listed as critical. The percentage of cases considered critical is unchanged over the pat 24 hours.
The United States reported 23,586 new coronavirus infections on Sunday for the previous day, compared to 167,904 on Saturday, 124,631 on Friday, and 234,228 on Thursday, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The 7-day incidence rate continues to be over 100,000 and is now 111,987. Figures for the weekend (reported the following day) are typically 30% to 60% of those posted on weekdays due to a lower number of tests being conducted.
The average daily number of new coronavirus cases in the United States over the past 14 days is 108,652, a 2% increase, based on data from the Department of Health and Human Services, among other sources. The average daily death toll over the same period is 323, a decrease of 9% over the same period, while the average number of hospitalizations for the period was 37,020, a 20% increase.
In addition, since the start of the pandemic the United States has, as of Sunday, recorded over 90.3 million cases, a higher figure than any other country, and a death toll of 1.05 million. India has the world’s second highest number of officially recorded cases, 43.6 million, and a reported death toll of 525,428.
New data from Russia’s Rosstat state statistics service showed at the end of May that the number of Covid or Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic there in April 2020 is now 812,890, giving the country the world’s second highest pandemic-related death toll, after the United States. Rosstat reported that 11,583 people died from the coronavirus or related causes in April, down from 35,584 in March and from 43,543 in February.
Meanwhile, Brazil now has recorded the third highest number of deaths as a result of the virus, 673,554, and has recorded 32.9 million cases.
France continues to occupy the number four position in total cases with over 32.1 million cases, and Germany is in the number five slot with over 29 million. The United Kingdom, with 22.9 million cases, is now number six and is the only other country in the world with a total number of cases over the 20 million mark.
VACCINATION SPOTLIGHT
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that, as of Sunday, over 260.3 million people in the United States – or 78.4% – have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine. Of that population, 67%, or 222.5 million people, have received two doses of vaccine, and the total number of doses that have been dispensed in the United States is now 596.2 million. Breaking this down further, 89.7% of the population over the age of 18 – or 231.7 million people – has received at least a first inoculation and 76.7% of the same group – or 198.6 million people – is fully vaccinated. In addition, 51.2% of that population, or 101.7 million people, has already received a third, or booster, dose of vaccine.
Starting on June 13, 2022, the CDC began to update vaccine data on a weekly basis and publish it on Sundays by 8 p.m. EDT, a statement on the agency’s website said.
Over 66.8% of the world population has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine by Sunday, according to Our World in Data, an online scientific publication that tracks such information. So far, 12.14 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered on a global basis and 5.24 million doses are now administered each day.
Meanwhile, only 20.2% of people in low-income countries have received one dose, while in countries such as Canada, China, Denmark, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, at least 75% of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
Only a handful of the world’s poorest countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia and Nepal – have reached the 70% mark in vaccinations. Many countries, however, are under 20% and, in countries such as Haiti, Senegal, and Tanzania, for example, vaccination rates remain in the single digits, if not lower.
In addition, North Korea and Eritrea are now the only two countries in the world that have not administered vaccines.
Paul Riegler contributed to this story.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
All Rights Reserved Travel