Virus cases, deaths rising across globe again, WHO states
Low vaccination rates, relaxed rules, delta variant faulted for resurgence
Covid-19 deaths and cases are on the rise again globally in a dispiriting setback that is triggering another round of restrictions and dampening hopes for an almost normal summer of fun.
The World Health Organization reported Wednesday that deaths climbed last week after nine straight weeks of decline. It recorded more than 55,000 lives lost, a 3% increase from the week before.
Cases rose 10% last week to nearly 3 million, with the highest numbers recorded in Brazil, India, Indonesia and Britain, WHO said.
The reversal has been attributed to low vaccination rates, the relaxation of mask rules and other precautions, and the swift spread of the more-contagious delta variant, which WHO said has now been identified in 111 countries and is expected to become globally dominant in the coming months.
Sarah McCool, a professor of public health at Georgia State University, said the combination amounts to a “recipe for a potential tinderbox.”
“It’s important that we recognize that covid has the potential for explosive outbreaks,” warned Dr. David Dowdy, an infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University.
Daily coronavirus deaths in Russia hit record highs this week. In Belgium, covid-19 infections, driven by the delta variant among the young, have almost doubled over the past week. Britain recorded a one-day total of more than 40,000 new cases for the first time in six months.
In Burma, crematoriums
are working morning to night. In Indonesia, which recorded almost 1,000 deaths and more than 54,000 new cases Wednesday, up from around 8,000 cases per day a month ago, people near Jakarta are pitching in to help gravediggers keep up.
Tokyo is under a fourth state of emergency ahead of the Olympic Games this month, with infections climbing fast and hospital beds filling up. Experts have said caseloads could rise above 1,000 before the Olympics and multiply to thousands during the games.
In the U.S., with one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, newly confirmed infections per day have doubled over the past two weeks to an average of about 24,000, though deaths are still on a downward trajectory at around 260 a day.
Los Angeles County, the most populous county in the U.S., reported its fifth-straight day Tuesday of more than 1,000 new cases.
Chicago announced that unvaccinated travelers from Missouri and Arkansas must either quarantine for 10 days or have negative covid-19 tests.
Connecticut lawmakers voted Wednesday to again extend Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont’s emergency declarations, despite pushback from Republicans and some Democrats who argued that it is time to get back to normal. Among other things, the move keeps in place orders requiring masks in certain settings.
WHO acknowledged that many countries are now facing “considerable pressure” to lift all remaining precautions but warned that failing to do it the right way will just give the virus more opportunity to spread.
Pressure is growing worldwide to boost vaccination rates to counter the rise.
“If you have been waiting, if you have been on the fence, sign up and get that shot as soon as possible,” New York City Health Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi pleaded.
While nearly 160 million Americans have been fully vaccinated, or more than 55% of the population, young adults have shown less interest.
Ohio is planning another prize program to encourage vaccinations, and Gov. Mike DeWine urged the government to give the vaccines full approval instead of just emergency authorization to ease people’s doubts. “The reality is we now have two Ohios,” said Bruce Vanderhoff, the state’s chief medical officer. “An Ohio that is vaccinated and protected on the one hand, and an Ohio that is unvaccinated and vulnerable to delta on the other.”
In Missouri, second only to Arkansas with the worst covid-19 diagnosis rate over the past week, political leaders in and around St. Louis have stepped up efforts to get people vaccinated through gift cards and by enlisting beauty salons and barbershops to dispense information.
ARGENTINA SITUATION
Argentina on Wednesday reported more than 100,000 deaths from covid-19 since the pandemic began, a heavy blow to a country that intermittently imposed some of the most severe lockdowns in the world, only to see erratic compliance by many people.
Some 614 people died from the disease in the past 24 hours, bringing the total death toll to 100,250, the Health Ministry said.
“I feel bad, it’s not what we thought would happen. … This is a hard, very hard statistic,” said Luis Camera, a doctor who specializes in gerontology and is an adviser on the pandemic to the government of President Alberto Fernandez.
Camera attributed the high toll to some errors during periodic lockdowns as well damage inflicted by virus variants that swept through the region.
The Argentine quarantine was prolonged on paper but not on how people behaved,” Camera said.
He was alluding to large gatherings that defied social distancing guidance and may have helped spread the virus in late 2020. There were demonstrations over the death of soccer star Diego Maradona and the approval in Congress of a law allowing abortion in most instances.
Camera added that a second wave of the coronavirus at the end of March “came earlier than it should have come,” in part “due to the misconduct of the people and with new, very aggressive variants.”
Moreover, Argentina was struggling economically even before the pandemic, and many citizens ignored quarantine regulations so they could make a living and support their families.
The vaccination effort has also been lagging.
Argentina has reported more than 4.6 million coronavirus infections. Doctors say many of those who are dying are between 40 and 60 years old and were infected about two months ago, before they had the chance to get vaccinated. The longer the hospital stay, the more likely the chance of increasing health complications and death.
Argentina has a population of about 45 million. Some 20.6 million people have received a first dose of the three available types of vaccines — Sputnik, AstraZeneca and Sinopharm — and about 5.1 million have received two doses, according to official figures.
So far, 15 cases of the delta variant of the coronavirus have been identified in Argentina and were linked to “international travelers” or people related to them, according to the Ministry of Health. Nine cases were detected in the past week and came from the United States, Mexico and Paraguay.
CRUISE LINE CHALLENGE
Norwegian Cruise Line is challenging a new Florida law that prevents cruise companies from requiring passengers to show proof of vaccination against the virus.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Miami federal court, contends that the law jeopardizes safe operation of cruise ships by increasing risk of contracting the virus. Norwegian intends to restart cruises from Florida ports Aug. 15 with vaccinations required for all passengers.
Norwegian wants a judge to lift the ban by Aug. 6. The law imposes a fine of $5,000 each time a cruise line mandates that a passenger provide vaccination proof. Norwegian claims that the law violates federal law and several constitutional rights.
The company, officially known as Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings or NCLH, says it won’t be able to sail from Florida unless a judge acts to block the law.
“The result would be a devastating, unrecoverable loss for everyone — not only for NCLH’s business but also for tens of thousands of passengers, employees, and stakeholders who all benefit from NCLH resuming safe operations as planned,” the lawsuit says.
“The only way NCLH could maintain its protocols and operations as currently planned is by abandoning Florida altogether,” the lawsuit adds.
Gov. Ron DeSantis’ press secretary Christina Pushaw noted in an email that Florida recently won a lawsuit challenging several cruise industry regulations imposed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over the covid-19 pandemic. “Florida already fought and won its case so that Norwegian and all other cruise lines can invite and serve all Americans on its vessels,” Pushaw said. “But apparently Norwegian prefers the shackles of the CDC to the freedom offered by Florida.”
NYC CASES UP
Fueled by the delta variant, daily coronavirus case counts in New York City have begun climbing in recent days, even as the city seems determined to turn the page on the pandemic.
Just a few weeks ago, there were only 200 new cases a day across the city on average, the lowest level since the early days of the pandemic. But the city has now had a streak of days with 400 or more cases. And the test positivity rate has doubled: from below 0.6% on average to about 1.3%.
Those numbers are still low, but the increase has been swift, surprising some epidemiologists and public health officials who had not expected to see cases jump so quickly after remaining level throughout June.
Still, with some 64% of adults in the city fully vaccinated, epidemiologists said it was unlikely that the delta variant would create conditions anywhere near as devastating as the past two waves of covid-19.
“Alarming is not the right word” to describe the recent uptick in cases, said Denis Nash, an epidemiologist at the CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy. “I would say concerning.”
The delta variant was detected in a few cases in New York City in February during the second wave, but really made inroads over the past two months, when there was relatively little virus circulating in the city. By the end of May, it accounted for about 8% of the cases sequenced by the city, and by mid-June, more than 40%. Yet throughout June, the number of infections stayed low, at about 200 cases a day.
“The metrics to keep a close eye on are hospitalizations and deaths,” said Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr, a professor of epidemiology at Columbia University.
So far, those metrics have remained stable in New York City. The seven-day average number of daily hospitalizations this week has remained under 20. The city has recently seen four or five covid-19-related deaths a day on average.
PROOF OF SHOTS
An Alabama military base has ordered troops to show proof of vaccination in order to go without masks as the state sees an uptick in covid-19 cases — a rise attributed to low vaccination rates in the state.
The measure was put in place Tuesday at Fort Rucker, the home of the Army’s aviation program. If a soldier is not wearing a mask, base leaders can ask the soldier to show a vaccination card. In a video posted to Facebook, base officials said the measure is needed because of rising case numbers on the base and in surrounding counties.
Alabama, which has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country, is seeing an uptick in covid-19 cases. State health officer Scott Harris said is likely driven by the low vaccination rates and the spread of the contagious delta variant.
According to researchers at Johns Hopkins University, the seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in Alabama has risen over the past two weeks from 205.43 new cases per day on June 28 to 559.57 new cases per day on July 12. In Alabama only about 33% of the population is fully vaccinated compared with about 48% nationally, according to numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Clearly that’s playing a large role,” Harris said of the delta variant. “And it’s definitely because people are unvaccinated. It’s not the vaccinated people that are getting infected for the most part, and if they do for the most part they aren’t the ones getting sick in the hospital.”
Of the 529 covid-19 deaths in Alabama since April 1, only 20 people were fully vaccinated, the Alabama Department of Public Health said. Harris said those deaths were largely preventable if people had been vaccinated.