The global number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus-borne disease COVID-19 soared above 81 million on Monday, while the number of cases in the US exceeded 19 million, and experts warned that the coming weeks will be difficult after millions of Americans during the have traveled Christmas holidays. .
“We are really at a very critical point,” he said. “If you put more pressure on the system by what could be a post-season push because of traveling and probably getting people together for, you know, the good, warm purposes of being together on vacation, it’s very difficult for people not to do that. ”
The latest Transportation Security Administration data showed that 1.13 million passengers were screened at US airports on Saturday, the highest number in a single day since mid-March. From the past 10 days, five saw more than 1 million passengers passing through US airports.
Fauci said he supports the decision to require negative COVID-19 testing before people from the UK enter the US, which comes after a new strain of the virus has been discovered there.
The variant is something “to follow very carefully” and “we are now looking very closely at it,” he said.
‘Does it make someone sicker? Is it a more serious virus in the sense of virulence? And the answer is, it doesn’t seem to be. “
British officials say it looks like the vaccines being rolled out will be strong enough to handle the new variant, but, Fauci said, “we’re going to do the studies ourselves.”
Read now: How Many People Need To Get Vaccinated Against COVID-19 To Achieve Herd Immunity? “The sooner we do it, the sooner we come back to life.”
According to a New York Times tracker, the US counted at least 152,102 new cases and at least 1,230 people died on Sunday. In the past week, there was an average of 184,951 cases per day in the US, 12% less than two weeks earlier.
There are currently 118,720 COVID-19 patients in U.S. hospitals, according to the COVID Tracking Project, below the December 23 record of 119,463, but still worryingly high.
Fauci said the US is in a critical phase of the pandemic, with the worst probably still ahead. He predicted that the general population would be widely immunized in late March or early April – outside of the frontline workers, the elderly, and certain other segments of the public who line up first.
According to data collected by Johns Hopkins University, the US remains the world leader in cases, 19.2 million, and deaths with 333,394, or about a fifth of the global number for each.
For many, there was relief when President Donald Trump signed a $ 900 billion pandemic relief package late on Sunday, after days of refusing to do so. The package provides much-needed cash to businesses and individuals and prevents a federal government shutdown, as the Associated Press reported.
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The massive piece of legislation includes $ 1.4 trillion to fund government agencies through September and includes other priorities at the end of the session, such as increasing the benefits of food stamps. The move sparked a massive stock rally that yielded leading indexes including the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA,
and S&P 500 SPX,
to record highlights.
In other news:
• Novavax Inc. NVAX,
is entering a late stage trial of its vaccine candidate COVID-19 with plans to enroll up to 30,000 volunteers at approximately 115 sites in the US and Mexico. The trial is supported by partners of “Operation Warp Speed,” the federal government program that aims to rapidly develop vaccines and therapies, including the Department of Defense and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the National Institutes of Health, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, of Barda, part of the US Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response. Barda is providing up to $ 1.6 billion to fund the trial under an agreement from the Department of Defense. The trial will be randomized, placebo-controlled and evaluating the efficacy of the treatment, called NVX-CoV2373, in patients 18 years of age and older.
Also see: AstraZeneca believes its coronavirus vaccine will be effective against a new strain
• Russian officials admitted on Monday that their death toll is more than three times as high as previously reported, driving it to the country with the third highest number of fatalities, AFP reported. The statistics agency Rosstat said the number of all-cause deaths rose by 229,700 in the period from January to November, with more than 81%, or about 186,000 Russians, said to have died from COVID. Russia has had more than 3 million infections since the start of the pandemic, the fourth highest in the world.
• The European Union started its vaccination program on Sunday by dosing doctors, nurses and the elderly with the vaccine developed by Pfizer Inc. PFE,
and German partner BioNTech SE BNTX,
reported the AP. The first jabs were coordinated across the trading bloc in a show of solidarity. The vaccine arrived on Friday in super cold containers in EU hospitals from a factory in Belgium. Each country only received a fraction of the doses needed – less than 10,000 in the first batches for some countries – and the larger rollout is expected in January when more vaccines become available. All those who receive an injection on Sunday should come back for a second dose within three weeks. Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, said that with additional vaccines in development, the EU will have more injections this year than it needs and could share its surplus with the Western Balkans and Africa. “Europe is well positioned,” she insisted.
• China jailed a 37-year-old citizen journalist for four years who reported on the spread of the virus in Wuhan in late 2019, Reuters reported. Her lawyer said the verdict was for “arguing and causing trouble”. Zhang Zhan is the first person known to have been tried, and was among a handful of people whose reports from overcrowded hospitals and empty streets painted a grimmer picture of the pandemic than official reports.
• Indonesia will ban all foreign travelers for two weeks from January 1, the Guardian reported. The news was announced by Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi citing concerns about transmission. The new rule will apply to all foreign visitors, with the exception of senior government officials.
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There are now 81 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide, data from Johns Hopkins shows, and at least 1.77 million people have died. Almost 46 million people have recovered.
Brazil has the second highest death toll with 191,139 and is in third place with 7.5 million cases.
India ranks second worldwide with 10.2 million and third in deaths with 147,901.
Mexico has the fourth highest death toll at 122,426 and the 13th highest number of cases at 1.4 million.
Italy has 72,370 fatalities, the highest number in Europe, and 2 million cases. The UK has 2.3 million cases, the most in Europe, and 71,217 deaths, the second highest in Europe and the sixth highest in the world.
China, where the virus was first discovered late last year, has had 95,693 confirmed cases and 4,773 deaths, according to official figures.