A year after Wuhan lockdown, world still in crisis
Nearly a year to the day after the Chinese city of Wuhan went into lockdown to contain a virus that had already escaped, President Joe Biden began putting into effect a new war plan for fighting the outbreak in the U.S., Germany topped 50,000 deaths and Britain closed in on 100,000.
The anniversary of the lockdown Saturday comes as more contagious variants of the coronavirus spread and efforts to vaccinate people against COVID-19 have been frustrated by disarray and limited supplies in some places. The scourge has killed over 2 million people worldwide.
In the U.S., which easily has the world’s highest death toll at more than 410,000, Dr. Anthony Fauci said a lack of candor about the threat under former President Donald Trump probably cost lives.
Dr. Fauci, who was sidelined by Mr. Trump, is now the chief medical adviser to Mr. Biden in an ambitious effort to conquer the virus. He told CNN that the Trump administration delayed getting sound scientific
advice to the country.
“When you start talking about things that make no sense medically and no sense scientifically, that clearly is not helpful,” Dr. Fauci said.
Mr. Biden signed a series of executive orders Thursday to mount a more centralized attack on the virus and
has vowed to vaccinate 100 million people in his first 100 days — a number some public health experts say is not ambitious enough.
Dr. Eric Topol, head of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, said the U.S. should aim to vaccinate 2.5 million a day.
“This was already an emergency,” Dr. Topol said, but with more contagious mutations of the virus circulating, “it became an emergency to the fourth power.”
Some nations are imposing or considering new travel restrictions for the same reason. France said it will require a negative test from travelers arriving from other European Union countries starting Sunday. Canada said it may force visitors to quarantine in a hotel at their own expense upon arrival. Germany extended its lockdown this week until Feb. 14 amid concern about the mutant viruses.
In another apparent setback, AstraZeneca said it will ship fewer doses of its vaccine than anticipated to the 27-country EU because of supply chain problems.
Amid the crisis, Japan remains publicly adamant it will hold the postponed Tokyo Olympics in July. Many experts believe that to pull that off, the nation will have to vaccinate all 127 million citizens in an effort that may not even begin until late February.
The 76-day Wuhan lockdown began a year ago with a notice sent to people’s smartphones at 2 a.m., announcing the airport and the train and bus stations would shut at 10 a.m. It eventually was expanded to most of the rest of Hubei province, affecting 56 million people. But by the time of the lockdown, the virus had spread well beyond China’s borders.
Wuhan has largely returned to normal.
Meanwhile, the rollout of shots in the U.S. has been marked by delays, confusion, and, in recent days, complaints of vaccine shortages and inadequate deliveries from the federal government as states ramp up their vaccination drives to include senior citizens, teachers, police and other groups.
At the same time, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Friday that of nearly 40 million doses distributed to the states, just 19 million have been dispensed.
Why there are reports of shortages when so many doses are apparently going unused is not entirely clear. But some vaccination sites are believed to be holding back large quantities to make sure that people who got their first shot receive the required second one on schedule a few weeks later.
Mr. Biden pledged to set up Federal Emergency Management Agency mass vaccination sites, but some states said they need more doses of the vaccine, not more people or locations to administer them.