Daily Archives: July 12, 2021

People relax at the Georgetown Waterfront Park on Monday in Washington, D.C. While pandemic restrictions have been lifted for much of the country, the Delta variant of COVID-19 is hospitalizing thousands of people in the U.S. who have so far not gotten a vaccine. Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images hide caption

People relax at the Georgetown Waterfront Park on Monday in Washington, D.C. While pandemic restrictions have been lifted for much of the country, the Delta variant of COVID-19 is hospitalizing thousands of people in the U.S. who have so far not gotten a vaccine.

In many ways, American life is returning to normalcy: Masks are no longer required in many locations, schools and universities are slated to re-open, and the days of social distancing begin to fade as concerts and sporting events bring spectators back.

In the U.S., we're now averaging 154 deaths a day from COVID-19 a tiny fraction compared to the pandemic's peak -- and there are still some safety measures and restrictions in place. Late pandemic American life hasn't quite returned to the status quo, but it feels much closer to normal than it did six months ago.

But while we may long for authorities to give an all-clear and say the pandemic is history, the crisis isn't over, in the U.S. or abroad.

The question of when the crisis will actually be over is a layered one with different answers from a local, national and global perspective.

The U.S. declared COVID-19 a national emergency on March 13, 2020.

After many months in which the U.S. led the world in coronavirus cases, the virus is now under much better control, due to wide availability of COVID-19 vaccines.

That federal emergency status is still in effect it has been renewed several times, most recently in April. It can be extended by the Secretary of Health and Human Services for as long as the emergency is deemed to exist.

Healthcare workers, first responders and essential workers are honored for their service during the COVID-19 pandemic at the "Hometown Heroes" ticker tape parade in Manhattan on Wednesday. Newsday LLC/Newsday via Getty Images hide caption

Healthcare workers, first responders and essential workers are honored for their service during the COVID-19 pandemic at the "Hometown Heroes" ticker tape parade in Manhattan on Wednesday.

It's not clear whether the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will issue any sort of all-clear. The CDC did not respond to NPR on the matter.

Ali Mokdad, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington, hopes that the CDC will eventually give Americans that go-ahead sign. He previously served in numerous roles over nearly 20 years at the CDC.

When the time comes, Mokdad tells NPR, "It's very important for our own CDC ... to say 'We're out of danger right now. We should move on with our lives.' "

He says there aren't set-in-stone metrics to determine when a pandemic is over, because the situation is dynamic and changing so fast. And the virus itself is evolving, too.

"When you look at the genetic makeup and sequencing of the virus ... and how it has been changing, there's still a lot of room for it to mutate. It's not at the end of the mutation cycle that it can do. So that virus could still carry a lot of surprises," he says.

The Foo Fighters reopened Madison Square Garden last month in New York City. The concert, with all attendees vaccinated, was the first in a New York arena to be held at full capacity since March 2020. Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for FF hide caption

The Foo Fighters reopened Madison Square Garden last month in New York City. The concert, with all attendees vaccinated, was the first in a New York arena to be held at full capacity since March 2020.

The World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11 last year the same day that life began to change dramatically in much of the U.S.

So when the virus eventually is under control, will WHO declare the pandemic over?

Basically, yes.

When the worldwide spread of COVID-19 stops, it will no longer be considered a pandemic. "In general, if the worldwide spread of a disease is brought under control to a localized area, we can say that it is no longer a pandemic but instead, an epidemic," WHO tells NPR.

But it emphasized that the characterization of the outbreak as a pandemic has no formal meaning under international law.

What does have a formal meaning is a "public health emergency of international concern" a status assigned to COVID-19 at the end of January 2020. That's the highest level of health alarm under international law.

WHO convenes an international committee every three months to determine if an outbreak should still be considered such a global health emergency. When it's over, WHO says it's over. That's what it did last summer regarding an Ebola outbreak in Africa.

But it will most likely be a while before that happens.

As WHO's Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus frequently states: none of us will be safe until everyone is safe.

The Delta variant has spread just as fast through the U.S. as epidemiologists feared it would. It now accounts for more than half the cases in the U.S., and far more than that in certain states.

Lynn Goldman, an epidemiologist and dean of the school of public health at George Washington University, says the U.S. has certain things working for it, and some against it.

The good news is we've shown the ability to lower rates of transmission and deaths from the virus. And of course, Americans have widespread access to COVID-19 vaccines.

The bad news is there's resistance to the two main ways to prevent transmission getting vaccinated and wearing a mask.

"And unfortunately, those two attributes tend to coincide within the same people and within the same population subgroups," Goldman says. In other words, many of the same people who don't want to get a vaccine also don't want to wear a mask.

Graduates participated in a USC commencement ceremony at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in May. Al Seib/Los Angeles Times via Getty Imag hide caption

Graduates participated in a USC commencement ceremony at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in May.

As a result, Goldman says, we're likely to see continued transmission of the virus in the U.S., concentrated in the areas with lowest rates of vaccination.

The current vaccines are highly effective against COVID-19, including the Delta variant. That means vastly different outcomes for those who are vaccinated and those who aren't. Last month, for example, 92 people died of COVID-19 in the state of Maryland. All of them were unvaccinated.

The most precise indicators of progress or problems are very local.

National and even state-level metrics for infection or vaccination rates can be misleading, Mokdad says. A state's overall vaccination rate can disguise much lower numbers in certain pockets that remain highly vulnerable to outbreaks.

Low vaccination rates make it easier for fast-spreading variants to take hold.

While there are many ways to track progress (or not) in controlling the virus, Mokdad says one especially useful metric is hospitalizations.

"There is no way to make a mistake or underreport hospitalization for COVID-19, because everybody who goes to a hospital right now is being tested for COVID-19," says Mokdad.

That's in contrast to cases, which can go uncounted due to a lack of testing, and the number of deaths, which can spike weeks behind other indicators when an outbreak hits.

Accompanied by his family, a student gets vaccinated at a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination clinic on Tuesday in Winnetka, Calif. Mario Tama/Getty Images hide caption

Accompanied by his family, a student gets vaccinated at a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination clinic on Tuesday in Winnetka, Calif.

Even though U.S. cases are much improved from the peak, unvaccinated people will continue to die from COVID-19 until we successfully control transmission.

Experts say the next big challenge will come this winter. Another wave is expected as people move inside during colder months. There will likely be some outbreaks as students go back to school children under 12 are not yet eligible for the vaccines.

How dangerous the virus continues to be will depend on vaccination levels of the population and the lethality of the variant circulating when winter comes. How quickly a state or local government is willing to go back into restrictive measures like wearing masks indoors will play a role, too.

"For the short term, it will be seasonal, like what we see with the flu, simply because we don't have enough vaccine to vaccinate everybody in the world," Mokdad says.

If we do the right things like increasing production of the vaccine, he says, it's possible we eventually won't have to worry about COVID-19 anymore.

Goldman sees two possible scenarios for the U.S. in the near future.

One is that the virus evolves to more readily evade the vaccines that have been administered.

If that happens, she says, "then we'll have to go into a whole other round of re-vaccinating everybody." Drugmakers are already working on booster shots in case they become necessary.

On the other hand, that might not happen, and the current vaccines will continue to be highly effective.

In that case, Goldman believes that within the next several months "we'll see near elimination of the pandemic, certainly in the United States and Europe, other wealthy countries, Japan, Taiwan," while efforts will continue to immunize people in the rest of the world.

It's very likely, Goldman says, that even when we can say the pandemic is over, transmission will continue in parts of the country that have low rates of vaccination.

But one thing is clear. No matter what happens, the effects of the pandemic including long COVID, mental health issues, and economic fallout won't end when the official emergency does.

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How We'll Know When The COVID-19 Crisis Is Over - NPR

The Lambda variant has become the dominant version of the Covid-19 coronavirus in Peru. Here a poll ... [+] worker sanitizes a polling station in Lima on April 10, 2021. (Photo by ERNESTO BENAVIDES/AFP via Getty Images)

Compared to all the attention that the Alpha and then Delta variants have been getting, theres been relative silence of the Lambda until now.

The Lambda variant of the Covid-19 coronavirus is not to be confused with the lambada, which is the forbidden dance. But this variant has been progressively dancing its way around the globe. Its already become the dominant strain in Peru, which has had the highest Covid-19 case fatality rate and deaths per capita in the world. It has also spread to at least 29 countries in five different World Health Organization (WHO) regions. So the question is: will this version of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV2) Lambda the world into even more trouble?

Its hard to say right now. Much to learn about the Lambda variant there is, as Yoda would say. Currently, the Lambda variant is like your dad wearing a one-legged cat suit thats way too tight for the first time. You can see some disturbing signs but you cant quite see or figure out everything thats going on yet.

The Lambda variant has been around for while. It was first detected in Peru back in August 2020 and has steadily grown in presence there. Eventually, the Lambda variant became the alpha or the top dog of Covid-19 coronavirus strains in Peru. Since April 2021, sequencing of Covid-19 coronavirus cases in the country has found the Lambda variant in over 80% of the samples. The Covid-19 pandemic has hit Peru particularly hard too. As of July 9, Peru has had a total of 2,074,186 reported Covid-19 cases with 193,909 of those resulting in death, yielding a 9.3% case fatality ratio and a 596.45 deaths per 100,000 people in the population, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Those numbers have made Peru number one globally in both categories. And in this case, being number one is not good.

Peru has had the highest per capita Covid-19 death toll in the world. (Photo by Raul Sifuentes/Getty ... [+] Images)

A June 15 WHO report noted elevated prevalence of the Lambda variant in multiple other South American countries as well, including Chile, Ecuador, and Argentina. According to a Public Health England report, as of June 24, 2021, this variant has appeared in 525 samples from the U.S., 87 in Germany, 86 in Argentina, 57 in Mexico, 43 in Spain, 19 in Israel, 15 in Colombia, 13 in France, eight in Egypt, seven in Switzerland, six in the United Kingdom, five in Italy, three in Brazil, and three in Canada as well as in single samples from the Netherlands, Aruba, Portugal, Denmark, Czech Republic, Turkey, Australia, Curacao, and Zimbabwe.

This version of the virus, otherwise known as the C.37 variant, made the WHOs Variants of Interest (VOI) list on June 14, 2021, joining other variants like the Eta, Iota, and Kappa ones. These Greek lettered names all may sound like fraternities or sororities but if someone asks you to rush the Lambda variant, its better to say, get the heck away from me. In this case, interest doesnt mean oh, that would be cool like a statue of Ariana Grande made out of hot dogs. Instead, interest here means that public health officials should watch the variant very closely because it could become a major threat. A VOI is a version of the virus that, in the words of the WHO, has genetic changes that are predicted or known to affect virus characteristics such as transmissibility, disease severity, immune escape, diagnostic or therapeutic escape and that is spreading so that it may be an emerging risk to global public health.

A VOI is one step below a Variant of Concern (VOC). The Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Gamma variants have already made the VOC list. The Lambda variant doesnt qualify as a VOC at this moment because studies have not yet confirmed that it is more transmissible, causes worse illness, or better able to get past the Covid-19 vaccines or treatments than other versions of the virus.

The key words here are have not yet confirmed. There just havent been enough studies so far to draw any strong conclusions about the Lambda variant. The situation in Peru does raise concerns that the Lambda variant may be more transmissible and more likely to result in worse Covid-19 outcomes. However, other factors can affect the spread of the virus and resulting death rates such as access to health care and the presence or lack of control measures such as social distancing and face mask use. Therefore, Perus higher death rates may not be solely due to the characteristics of the virus. The spread of this variant to so many other countries does lend more support, though, to the possibility that it is indeed more transmissible.

Of course, every time a new variant emerges, a big question is how well currently available Covid-19 vaccines may protect against the variant. Early indications are that the Covid-19 mRNA vaccines may still offer good protection, as you can see by this tweet from Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine and Professor of Pediatrics and Molecular Virology and Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine:

Hotez cited a pre-print thats been uploaded on to the bioRxiv website. This pre-print describes a study that took antibodies from the blood of people who had had Covid-19 previously or had received the Covid-19 mRNA vaccines and determined whether these antibodies were able to neutralize the Lambda variant of the Covid-19 coronavirus. The not so good news is that the Lambda variant was able to infect cells more readily than the original version of the virus. The good news is that the antibodies seemed to neutralize the Lambda variant. This provided evidence that the currently available Covid-19 mRNA vaccines may offer good protection against the Lambda variant and that the Regeneron monoclonal antibody therapy cocktail would remain effective against this version.

Keep in mind though that a pre-print is not the same as a peer-reviewed publication in a respectable scientific journal. All you need to upload a pre-print is a computer, Internet access, and someone besides a hamster to press the right keys on the keyboard. Hamsters are not always great with keyboards because they can end up typing out expletives. They also may trade dogecoin if they can access your computer. More studies are needed to determine whether the Lambda variant is actually more transmissible and more likely to cause more severe Covid-19 and whether it can get around the protection offered by currently available Covid-19 vaccines.

Anyone who understands the science of coronavirus replications and mutation will understand that variants will be a continuing threat until enough people are vaccinated and public health officials get the pandemic under control. Variants are not a scare campaign as the following tweet suggests:

The media isnt rolling out these variants, its viral replication thats doing this. Again, this is science. Continuing to overlook the science will continue to extend the current situation:

The emergence and spread of the Lambda variant is a reminder that the Covid-19 coronavirus is not going to stay the same. The virus is not like that adult who peaked in high school and still insists that beer funneling and giving people atomic wedgies are cool. Instead, the Covid-19 coronavirus is more like Madonna in that it continues to evolve and adapt to the times. Like a drunk person trying make photocopies of his or her butt, every time the virus replicates or makes more copies of itself, it can make mistakes. These mistakes result in mutations in the genetic codes of the resulting copies of the virus. Such mutants are in effect new variants.

Thats why its so important to slow the spread of the virus as much as possible at least until enough people can be vaccinated to break the chains of transmission. As long as the Covid-19 coronavirus remains so widespread, unvaccinated people can serve as variant factories. In other words, when you dont protect yourself against the virus, your body serve as a cheap motel. The viruses can essentially say, your body is a wonderland, I'll use my spike proteins. This isnt exactly what John Mayer has sung about because he is not a gigantic virus. But its close. Getting vaccinated wont completely protect you against getting infected, since the vaccine is not like a impenetrable concrete full-body condom. However, the vaccines do offer very good protection and may make the virus effectively say, Damn, baby, you frustrate me.

If you arent vaccinated, its best to maintain other Covid-19 precautions like wearing face masks and social distancing. This not only will protect you but also protect the rest of society by slowing the emergence of variants. Not slowing the emergence of variants could prolong the pandemic and get us to a point where we have fewer and fewer Greek letter to name the new variants.

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Lambda Variant Of Covid-19 Coronavirus Is Spreading, What You Need To Know - Forbes

A single change in a key viral protein may have helped the coronavirus behind COVID-19 make the jump from animals to people, setting the virus on its way to becoming the scourge it is today.

That mutation appears to help the virus spike protein strongly latch onto the human version of a host protein called ACE2 that the virus uses to enter and infect cells, researchers report July 6 in Cell. That ability to lock onto the human cells was stronger with the mutated virus than with other coronaviruses lacking the change. Whats more, the mutated virus better replicates in laboratory-grown human lung cells than previous versions of the virus do.

Without this mutation, I dont think the pandemic would have happened like it has, says James Weger-Lucarelli, a virologist at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. The coronaviruss global spread might have been less likely, he says.

Where exactly the coronavirus came from is still a mystery that researchers are trying to unravel (SN: 3/18/21). But figuring out how an animal virus gained the ability to infect people could help researchers develop ways to prevent it from happening again, such as with antivirals or vaccines, Weger-Lucarelli says.

The new findings hint that the mutation is important, but its potentially one of multiple changes that made the jump from animals to people possible, says Andrew Doxey, a computational biologist at the University of Waterloo in Canada who was not involved in the study. Its not necessarily the only mutation.

Virologist Ramn Lorenzo Redondo agrees. The researchers employed an approach that is not typically used for viruses, says Redondo, of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. That means the method may have overlooked other important mutations.

In the study, Weger-Lucarelli and colleagues analyzed more than 182,000 genetic blueprints of the coronavirus, looking for signs of mutations that might have helped the virus adapt to and spread among humans. The team compared changes in the building blocks, or amino acids, of the virus spike protein with four coronaviruses from bats or pangolins that dont infect people. The scientists pinpointed one swap that replaced the amino acid threonine that is found in the animal viruses with the amino acid alanine that is found in the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

The researchers predict that the mutation, named T372A, removes some sugars that coat the spike protein. Those sugars might be getting in the way, Weger-Lucarelli says, so removing them gives the virus better access to ACE2 to break into cells.

Experiments suggest thats true. Once a virus with an alanine gets into laboratory-grown human lung cells, it replicates more than versions with threonine, the team found. In the future, the researchers plan to explore the role other mutations might have played to help an animal virus adapt to humans.

Its unclear when the virus acquired the T372A mutation, says Arinjay Banerjee, a virologist with the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, who was not involved in the study. A bat coronavirus with a threonine at that spot may have infected people first and then rapidly adopted an alanine, helping the virus transmit more efficiently among people. Or its possible that the alanine appeared in bats or in another animal before making the jump.

Those questions, I think, are still outstanding, Banerjee says.

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One mutation may have set the coronavirus up to become a global menace - Science News Magazine

TOKYO, July 12 (Reuters) - Olympic host city Tokyo entered a new state of emergency on Monday, less than two weeks before the Games begin amid worries about whether the measures can stem a rise in COVID-19 cases.

Organisers last week announced that spectators would be banned from nearly all venues. Spectators from abroad were already banned months ago, and officials are now asking residents to watch the Games on TV to keep the movement of people, which could spread contagion, to a minimum.

Opinion polls have consistently shown the Japanese public is concerned about going ahead with the Games during the pandemic.

Prime Mininster Yoshihide Suga's handling of the pandemic - including an initially slow vaccination rollout - has eroded his support. The issue is especially sensitive ahead of a national election and a ruling party leadership race due later this year.

"We would ask people to support athletes from home," Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said on a Sunday TV programme.

The Games, postponed from last year because of the pandemic, run from July 23 to August 8, while the state of emergency - the capital's fourth - lasts until August 22, shortly before the Paralympics begin.

The government and organisers had long seen the Games as a chance to display Japan's recovery from a devastating 2011 earthquake and nuclear crisis.

On Saturday, the governor of Fukushima prefecture, site of the nuclear disaster, said spectators would also be banned from softball and baseball games there, reversing an earlier decision. read more

RISING TOKYO INFECTIONS

World No. 1 tennis player Novak Djokovic said on Sunday he was "50-50" about competing at the Tokyo Olympics following the organisers' decision to ban fans from attending and limits on the number of people he can take to the Games. read more

A lightening is seen over the giant Olympic rings and the Rainbow Bridge from the waterfront area of Odaiba Marine Park, ahead of the opening of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, that have been postponed to 2021 due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Tokyo, Japan July 11, 2021. Mandatory credit Kyodo/via REUTERS

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Some of the sport's biggest names, including Rafa Nadal, Dominic Thiem, Stan Wawrinka, Nick Kyrgios, Serena Williams and Simona Halep have already said that they will skip the Games.

Japan has recorded more than 815,440 COVID-19 cases and nearly 15,000 deaths.

Recent rises in Tokyo have been particularly worrisome amid a vaccination rollout that got off to a slow start and has faced supply glitches after speeding up. Only about 28% of the population has received at least one shot of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Tokyo recorded 502 new cases on Sunday, the 23rd straight day of week-on-week gains, and experts worry that the public has grown weary of restrictions, mostly voluntary, on activities.

The coronavirus curbs include asking restaurants to close early and to stop serving alcohol in exchange for a government subsidy, measures that have hit the eateries hard and caused many to complain of unfairness as the Games are set to go ahead.

Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who is also in charge of the pandemic response, sparked outrage when he suggested late on Thursday he would ask banks to put pressure on eateries that do not comply with the stricter measures.

In an about-face, the government's top spokesperson Kato said on Friday it had decided banks would not be asked to press restaurants and bars that do not follow the government request to stop serving alcohol under the emergency restrictions.

On Monday, "Anyone but LDP or Komeito" was trending on Twitter, a reference to voting for political parties other than Suga's ruling Liberal Democratic Party or its junior coalition partner, the Komeito, in the coming parliamentary election.

"I'm not a restaurateur, but this administration that couldn't come up with effective anti-coronavirus steps despite having a year to get ready for the Olympics... is no good," said one angry Twitter user.

(This story fixes advisory line to remove reference to home town; no changes to text of story)

Reporting by Linda Sieg; Editing by Michael Perry and Gareth Jones

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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State of emergency begins in host city Tokyo as Games near - Reuters

Strict lockdowns in New Zealand last year appear to have contributed to a recent outbreak in children of respiratory syncytial virus, or R.S.V., a highly contagious, flulike illness whose symptoms include a runny nose, coughing, sneezing and fever.

Children in New Zealand were mostly stuck indoors amid lockdowns last autumn, which runs from March to May in the Southern Hemisphere. After the country reopened last winter, health officials say, few of them contracted seasonal viruses and infections, probably because they had been underexposed to germs.

In a typical year, New Zealand sees a peak of cases of respiratory infections from June to September. But in 2020, the country experienced the complete absence of an annual winter influenza epidemic, with a 99.9 percent reduction in flu cases and a 98 percent reduction in R.S.V., according to a study published in Nature in February.

This year, however, the same children have been more vulnerable than usual to those same ailments.

Since the start of winter five weeks ago, during which there have been no coronavirus restrictions, childrens wards in New Zealand have seen dozens of patients, many of them infants, battling the sometimes deadly disease, while some elementary schools have reported having as many as half their students absent because of respiratory illnesses.

The country has reported 969 cases of R.S.V. in five weeks, compared with an average of 1,743 cases over the entire 29-week winter season in the five years before the pandemic, according to New Zealands Institute of Environmental Science and Research.

The recent surge has yet to reach a plateau, said Dr. Sue Huang, a virologist at the Institute of Environmental Science and Research and the lead author of the Nature study.

The exponential increase is very sharp, she said in a statement. The absence of R.S.V. last winter meant there is a young cohort of children from last year, plus a new cohort this year, who have not been exposed to the seasonal virus.

Doctors around the world have warned of the risk of immunity debt, when a decline in the number of viral and bacterial infections during lockdowns is followed by more sickness once restrictions are lifted.

In a paper published in May in the journal Infectious Diseases Now, a team of French medical researchers suggested that less exposure to microbial agents could create a lack of immune stimulation for susceptible people, particularly in children. The longer these periods of viral or bacterial low-exposure are, the greater the likelihood of future epidemics, they wrote.

New Zealand closed its borders early in the pandemic, unveiling stringent lockdown measures that were lifted last April and May and have allowed the country to all but eliminate coronavirus transmission. No community cases have been reported for more than four months.

In other developments around the world:

Hundreds of Cubans took to the streets in cities around the country on Sunday to protest food and medicine shortages brought on by the pandemic, in a remarkable eruption of discontent not seen in nearly 30 years. Hundreds of people marched through San Antonio de los Baos, southwest of Havana, with videos streaming live on Facebook for nearly an hour before they suddenly disappeared. As the afternoon wore on, other videos appeared from demonstrations elsewhere, including Palma Soriano, in the countrys southeast. Hundreds of people also gathered in Havana, where a heavy police presence preceded their arrival.

Spain is facing a further hit to its summer tourism season after Germany classified the entire country as a risk area. As of Sunday, travelers entering Germany from anywhere in Spain, including its Balearic and Canary archipelagoes, will have to provide a negative coronavirus test or proof of vaccination or recovery to avoid quarantine. The Italian government also warned on Saturday that it was considering greater restrictions on travelers from Spain as well as Portugal. Both countries have been grappling with a surge in coronavirus cases fueled by the highly contagious Delta variant, particularly among unvaccinated young people.

Raphael Minder contributed from Madrid.

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New Zealand, where Covid-19 is dormant, fights another respiratory virus, and other news from around the world. - The New York Times

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP)

Florida health officials reported an increase in COVID-19 cases and a higher positive test rate over the past week.

The number of virus cases in Florida rose by about 8,000 compared with the week before, for a total of 23,747 new cases, the state Department of Health reported Friday.

New cases of the coronavirus have been on the rise in Florida over the past month. The rate of positive tests was 7.8% last week after trending at about 4% positivity in recent weeks.

There were 172 deaths in Florida from COVID-19 last week, the health department reported.

More than 2,300 people were hospitalized in Florida with COVID-19 for the week of June 30 to July 6, according to the latest White House report. In comparison, 1,868 were hospitalized the previous week.

The state has recorded at least 2.4 million coronavirus cases and 38,901 deaths since the pandemic began, state figures show.

Officials also said the total number of Floridians who have been fully or partially vaccinated at around 11 million, or 58% of Floridians who are 12 and older.

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FLORIDA Florida reports rise in coronavirus cases over the past week WINK NEWS - Wink News

Scientists have long been interested in creating portable devices that can quickly and painlessly screen a person for disease simply by taking a whiff of their breath. But delivering on this dream has proved to be a challenge. Different diseases may cause similar breath changes. Diet can affect the chemicals someone exhales, as can smoking and alcohol consumption, potentially complicating disease detection.

Still, scientists say, advances in sensor technology and machine learning, combined with new research and investment spurred by the pandemic, mean that the moment for disease-detecting breathalyzers may have finally arrived.

Ive been working in the area of breath research for almost 20 years now, said Cristina Davis, an engineer at the University of California, Davis. And during that time, weve seen it progress from a nascent stage to really being something that I think is close to being deployed.

In May, when musicians from dozens of countries descended on Rotterdam, the Netherlands, for the Eurovision Song Contest, they had to pass a breath test before they were allowed onstage. The musicians were asked to exhale into a device the size of a water bottle called the SpiroNose, which analyzed the chemical compounds in their breath to detect signatures of a coronavirus infection. If the results came back negative, the performers were cleared to compete.

The SpiroNose, made by the Dutch company Breathomix, is just one of many breath-based coronavirus tests under development across the world. In May, Singapores health agency granted provisional authorization to two such tests, made by the domestic companies Breathonix and Silver Factory Technology. And researchers at Ohio State University say they have applied to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for an emergency authorization of their coronavirus breathalyzer.

Its clear now, I think, that you can detect this disease with a breath test, said Paul Thomas, a chemist at Loughborough University in England. This isnt science fiction.

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Breath-Based Coronavirus Tests Are Being Developed - The New York Times

Victoria's COVID-19 Commander Jeroen Weimar says two people who returned from New South Wales on red zone permits have since tested positive for COVID-19.

Both of those people, who are members of a family of four based in the Hume local government area, were isolating after returning from the neighbouring state.

The Victorian government has also revealed a person from Sydney with COVID-19 travelled to Victoria and South Australia while infectious last week.

The man was a member of a three-person moving crew.

They arrived in Melbourne on July 8, delivered one set of furniture to a house in Craigieburn in the City of Hume, collected some goods at a home in the City ofMaribyrnong and then left to go to Adelaide, arriving there on July 9.

A member of the crew was contacted by NSW Health on July 9 and told he was a primary close contact of another case. He was tested on July 10 after returning toNSW and a positive result came back yesterday.

The Age: Jason South

A second crew member has since tested positive as well.

Mr Weimaralso revealed that of the four family members who had travelled back from NSW to their home inthe City of Hume, three had returned to Victoria by air on July 4 and the fourth returned by car on July 8.

"They all tested negative initially," he said.

"This highlights the importance of the red zone permit system."

They all travelled on appropriate red zone permits, tested negative and continuedto isolate for the full 14 days.

Authorities have said thetwo family members who tested positive to COVID-19 after returning from NSW will be counted in Victoria's figures on Tuesday.

Health Minister Martin Foleysaid authorities wouldinvestigate whether the removalist had the correct permits to enter Victoria.

"This looks like the third such incursion as a result of this NSW outbreak. By the time we add it to the Sandringham cluster ... and the Virgin airline case," he said.

Details are still emerging about the journey taken by two peopleworking as removalists across multiple stateslast week who have since tested positive to COVID-19.

"These are precisely the reasons our public health team have taken the strong steps as they have to set the tougher border restrictions."

South Australian officials said thefamily that was being moved in their statewas in contact with the men for about five hours.

None of them have tested positive.

The news comes as Victoria has recorded its 12th straight day ofnonew local COVID-19 cases.

The effective closure of the border with New South Wales and the ACT also cameinto effect last night.

There were 19,239test results received yesterday, and 12,005doses of vaccine were administered at state-run sites.

Yesterday, Victoria's Acting Chief Health Officer announced all of New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory would become a red zone under the state's travel permit system.

The changes came into effect from11:59pm on Sunday.

It means the Victorian border is effectively closed to New South Wales and the ACT except for Victorian residents returning on a red zone permit for 14 days of quarantine and for people with exemptions.

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The Chief Minister of the ACT, Andrew Barr, said he was frustrated by Victoria's decision to shut its border to Canberrans.

Canberra has not recordeda local COVID-19 case in a year.

Mr Barr has called for all states to remove restrictions on the ACT as soon as possible.

"At this time, there is very little justification to consider the ACT as a COVID affected jurisdiction that requires the highest level of travel restrictions," he said.

Mr Foley said the ACT didn't have a sophisticated permit system like Victoria and was surrounded by regional New South Wales, leaving it vulnerable to people travelling through.

ABC News: Danielle Bonica

Deakin University epidemiologist Catherine Bennettsaid health authorities were right to wait before making a decision on closing the border.

"It probably would have been too pre-emptive if you closed the borders when you don't have any signal that you've got even exposure sites outside of Sydney, let alone potential cases," she said.

"The case numbers were still lower than they are in these last couple of days where they've really spiked up to 77 cases a day."

Deputy Premier James Merlino fired a shot at the federal government over financial support for businesses affected by the lockdown in New South Wales.

Mr Merlino said it was good that people in NSW were getting the help that they needed, but it shouldn't have been so hard for Victoria when it was in a similar situation.

He described the the federal government's position on financial support at the time as "disgraceful".

"We had to fight so damn hard in Victoria, both myself, the Treasurer, our officials talking to the Commonwealth to get a response," Mr Merlino said.

"They [the Commonwealth] initially refused to give any support at all. We got some marginal support and we welcomed it."

ABC News: Danielle Bonica

Meanwhile, Victorians are being offered an incentive to register their Myki public transport cards to help contact tracers.

From today, the first 60,000 people to register their Myki card will receive a $10 credit.

Public Transport Victoria said it could take up to 40 days for the credit to appear in accounts.

Victoria's Minister for Transport and Infrastructure,Jacinta Allan, said the state government was also close to establishing a QR code system for public transport.

QR codes were made compulsory for all businesses at the end of May, but Ms Allan was forced to defend why it had taken so long for them to be introduced on public transport.

"It's about making sure we get the rollout right as well," she said.

"It might look simple popping a QR code on a train station but there is some complexity about making sure the right QR code is on the right location and on the right tram.

"We're absolutely pedalling really hard now to get those QR codes rolled out. They're already at 440 priority locations across the state. We're rolling them out across tram stops, trains, trams and buses.

"There's tens of thousands of individual rolling stock that they need to be applied to. It's an important priority."

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Two Victorians in isolation test positive to coronavirus after returning from NSW - ABC News

Confirmed cases of COVID-19 have passed 185.5 million globally, according to Johns Hopkins University. The number of confirmed deaths stands at more than 4.01 million. More than 3.32 billion vaccination doses have been administered globally, according to Our World in Data.

US COVID-19 cases are up around 11% over the previous week, almost entirely among people who have not been vaccinated, officials said on Thursday, as the highly infectious Delta variant becomes the dominant COVID-19 strain in the country.

Viet Nam is aiming to vaccinate 50% of residents aged 18 or older by the end of this year and 70% by the end of March 2022, the health ministry said on Friday. It comes as tighter coronavirus curbs were imposed in more cities.

On Thursday, Indonesia reported a new daily record of 38,391 COVID-19 infections, plus 852 new fatalities, its second-highest daily death toll, official data showed.

Cumulative confirmed COVID-19 deaths globally and in selected countries.

Image: Our World in Data

Africa has seen its worst pandemic week ever, as it passed the second-wave peak during the seven days ending on 4 July 2021. More than 251,000 new COVID-19 cases recorded on the continent.

Sixteen African countries are now in resurgence - with Malawi and Senegal added this week. The Delta variant has been detected in 10 of these countries.

Africa has just marked the continents most dire pandemic week ever. But the worst is yet to come as the fast-moving third wave continues to gain speed and new ground, said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Director for Africa.

The global vaccine distribution scheme COVAX aims to deliver 520 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to Africa this year, its managing director said, with supplies ramping up from September after delays caused by Indian export restrictions.

In a news conference on Thursday organized by the World Health Organization's Africa region, Aurelia Nguyen, managing director of COVAX, said that the scheme had delivered around 25 million doses to 44 African countries so far, but she was not happy with the progress.

By the end of the first quarter of 2022, COVAX aims to supply nearly 850 million vaccine doses to the African continent, which has some of the lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates worldwide.

COVID-19 vaccine doses administered by continent

Image: Our World in Data

As part of work identifying promising technology use cases to combat COVID, The Boston Consulting Group recently used contextual AI to analyze more than 150 million English language media articles from 30 countries published between December 2019 to May 2020.

The result is a compendium of hundreds of technology use cases. It more than triples the number of solutions, providing better visibility into the diverse uses of technology for the COVID-19 response.

To see a full list of 200+ exciting technology use cases during COVID please follow this link.

The Olympics will take place without spectators in host city Tokyo, organisers said on Thursday, as a resurgent coronavirus forced Japan to declare a state of emergency in the capital that will run throughout the Games.

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said it was essential to prevent Tokyo, where the highly contagious Delta variant of COVID-19 variant was spreading, from becoming a flashpoint of new infections.

People will also be asked not to gather for events on public roads, such as the triathlon, though officials said some venues outside the greater Tokyo metropolitan area would allow small numbers of spectators.

"It is regrettable that we are delivering the Games in a very limited format, facing the spread of coronavirus infections," Tokyo 2020 President Seiko Hashimoto said, following talks between government officials, Tokyo organisers and Olympic and Paralympic representatives.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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COVID-19: What you need to know about the coronavirus pandemic on 9 July - World Economic Forum