India said Sunday it has given final approval for the emergency use of two coronavirus vaccines. One of the vaccines was developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University. Bharat Biotech, an Indian company, developed the other vaccine. Both vaccines are being produced in India.“It would make every Indian proud that the two vaccines that have been given emergency use approval are made in India!” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi posted on Twitter.The news of the approvals comes as India is poised to launch one of the world’s largest coronavirus vaccination programs. Nationwide drills, ahead of the launch, were staged Saturday.India’s approval of the British-developed vaccine follows Britain’s recent approval of the vaccine.India’s Drugs Controller General V.G. Somani said Sunday that the efficacy of the British-developed AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine is 70.42%.Somani, however, described the Indian-developed vaccine as “safe and provides a robust immune response.” He added that the Indian vaccine was approved “in public interest as an abundant precaution, in clinical trial mode, to have more options for vaccinations, especially in case of infection by mutant strains.”Only the United States surpasses India in the number of COVID-19 cases. The U.S. has 20.4 million infections, while India has 10.3 million.In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Saturday said the country had administered more than 4.2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines nationwide and had distributed more than 13 million doses.The U.S. continues to lead the world with more than 350,000 COVID-19 deaths and 20 million infections, about one-fourth of the 84.5 million COVID-19 cases globally, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.In Russia, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said that more than 800,000 people had received the domestically produced Sputnik V vaccine and that 1.5 million doses had been distributed throughout the country of 147 million.The Kremlin is pinning its hopes on mass vaccinations, not nationwide restrictions, to stop the spread of the virus and save its struggling economy from the hit of another lockdown.Officials in Brazil, home to the third-highest number of cases globally at 7.7 million, recently told the Associated Press it was at least three weeks away from launching any formal immunization campaign.European Union leaders on Saturday offered to help any drug companies expand vaccine production and improve “distribution bottlenecks.””The bottleneck at the moment is … the worldwide shortage of production capacity,” said EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides, adding the bloc would help drug companies develop candidate vaccines.New strainBritish health officials Saturday reported another infection record — more than 57,700 in a single day. It was the fifth day in a row that new infections exceeded 50,000 cases as the country struggles with the spread of a more infectious variant of the virus.A spokesperson for Britain’s National Health Service said health workers were preparing to reopen London’s Nightingale hospitals, according to the Reuters news agency. The temporary Nightingale hospitals were set up by the military around the city and have remained on standby after receiving little use during the first wave of the pandemic.The new strain has led to renewed lockdowns in Britain as well as global restrictions on travelers from Britain.The New York Times reported Friday that at least 33 countries had detected the new coronavirus variant and more than 40 countries had barred travelers arriving from Britain. Florida on Friday was the third U.S. state to detect the new variant, after Colorado and California.On Friday, Turkey began banning Britons from entering the country after detecting 15 cases of the new coronavirus variant. Turkey said all those affected were recent arrivals from Britain.Ban on US travelers, tighter lockdownsThe Philippines said it would prohibit the entry of foreign travelers from the United States until at least Jan. 15 after the new coronavirus variant was detected.In Bangkok, Thai officials shuttered the city’s nightlife with a ban on bar, nightclub and restaurant alcohol sales, among a raft of restrictions aimed at curbing the kingdom’s rising coronavirus toll. In Tokyo, the city’s governor on Saturday asked Japan’s government to declare a new state of emergency as the country battles a third wave of infections, with record numbers of new cases.France, which recently lengthened an overnight curfew by two hours in parts of the country, has the highest COVID-19 case count in Western Europe with more than 2.7 million, according to Johns Hopkins.France deployed more than 100,000 police to stop end-of-the-year celebrations, but partygoers in northwestern France, near Rennes, staged a massive illegal rave, leading to hundreds of arrests.Spanish police broke up another gathering Saturday near Barcelona, where 300 people had been partying for more than 40 hours.Ireland on Saturday reported 3,394 cases of COVID-19, nearly doubling its record for a single day. Irish officials Friday said they had underreported coronavirus cases in recent days by more than 9,000, as its reporting system came under strain.Italy, which has the highest coronavirus death toll in Europe at nearly 75,000, Saturday reported 364 more people had died from the virus, a drop compared with Friday’s total of 462. The Guardian reported that new cases had also decreased, from 22,211 to 11,831.Norway, with one of the lowest infection rates in Europe, Saturday began requiring COVID-19 tests upon arrival into the country, after finding five cases of the British variant of the virus. Denmark discovered 86 cases of that new, more contagious strain.Greece has extended until Jan. 10 its strict two-month lockdown measures, ending an easing of the restrictions for the holidays.In Zimbabwe, where recorded cases have almost doubled since the beginning of November, government officials ordered a new containment Saturday evening. The country has recorded nearly 14,500 cases to date, including 377 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.In South Africa, government-backed security forces stepped up a “zero-tolerance approach” to enforcing a mask mandate, and President Cyril Ramaphosa banned alcohol sales, calling it a root cause of accidents and violence that strain hospital resources.The coronavirus has killed more than 1.8 million people globally since emerging in China in December 2019, according to Johns Hopkins.But experts fear the worst is yet to come, predicting a sharp rise in cases and deaths after weeks of holiday gatherings.
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The United States has passed the milestone of 350,000 COVID-19 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data, even as vaccinations against the coronavirus-caused disease get off to a slow start.As countries around the world tighten lockdowns, impose curfews, ban large get-togethers and even halt alcohol sales to tackle a surge in coronavirus cases, officials in India and the U.S. announced some progress toward expanded immunization campaigns as infections rates continued to climb on multiple continents.New Delhi staged nationwide drills Saturday to launch one of the world’s biggest coronavirus vaccination programs as the country’s drug regulator approved two vaccines — one developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, the other by Bharat Biotech and the state-run Indian Council of Medical Research — for emergency use.India, the world’s second most populous country, has more than 10.3 million confirmed COVID-19 infections, second only to the United States. Reuters reported Friday that little was known about the clinical trials that informed the emergency use authorization and that Indian officials said approval of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine was “subject to multiple regulatory conditionalities,” without providing details.In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Saturday said the country had administered more than 4.2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines nationwide and had distributed more than 13 million doses.The U.S. continues to lead the world with more than 20 million infections, about one-fourth of the 84.5 million COVID-19 cases globally, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, which also reported a total of more than 350,000 deaths since the pandemic began.In Russia, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said that more than 800,000 people had received the domestically produced Sputnik V vaccine and that 1.5 million doses had been distributed throughout the country of 147 million.The Kremlin is pinning its hopes on mass vaccinations, not nationwide restrictions, to stop the spread of the virus and save its struggling economy from the hit of another lockdown.Officials in Brazil, home to the third-highest number of cases globally (7.7 million), recently told The Associated Press it was at least three weeks away from launching any formal immunization campaign.European Union leaders on Saturday offered to help any drug companies expand vaccine production and improve “distribution bottlenecks.””The bottleneck at the moment is … the worldwide shortage of production capacity,” said EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides, adding the bloc would help drug companies develop candidate vaccines.New strainBritish health officials Saturday reported another infection record — more than 57,700 in a single day. It was the fifth day in a row that new infections exceeded 50,000 cases as the country struggles with the spread of a more infectious variant of the virus.A spokesperson for Britain’s National Health Service said health workers were preparing to reopen London’s Nightingale hospitals, according to the Reuters news agency. The temporary Nightingale hospitals were set up by the military around the city and have remained on standby after receiving little use during the first wave of the pandemic.The new strain has led to renewed lockdowns in Britain as well as global travel restrictions on travelers from Britain.The New York Times reported Friday that at least 33 countries had detected the new coronavirus variant and more than 40 countries had barred travelers arriving from Britain. Florida on Friday was the third U.S. state to detect the new variant, after Colorado and California.On Friday, Turkey began banning Britons from entering the country after detecting 15 cases of the new coronavirus variant. Turkey said all those affected were recent arrivals from Britain.Ban on US travelers, tighter lockdownsThe Philippines said it would prohibit the entry of foreign travelers from the United States until at least Jan. 15 after the new coronavirus variant was detected.In Bangkok, Thai officials shuttered the city’s nightlife with a ban on bar, nightclub and restaurant alcohol sales, among a raft of restrictions aimed at curbing the kingdom’s rising coronavirus toll. In Tokyo, the city’s governor on Saturday asked Japan’s government to declare a new state of emergency as the country battles a third wave of infections, with record numbers of new cases.France, which recently lengthened an overnight curfew by two hours in parts of the country, has the highest COVID-19 case count in Western Europe with more than 2.7 million, according to Johns Hopkins.France deployed more than 100,000 police to stop end-of-the-year celebrations, but partygoers in northwestern France, near Rennes, staged a massive illegal rave, leading to hundreds of arrests.Spanish police broke up another gathering Saturday near Barcelona, where 300 people had been partying for more than 40 hours.Ireland on Saturday reported 3,394 cases of COVID-19, nearly doubling its record for a single day. Irish officials Friday said they had underreported coronavirus cases in recent days by more than 9,000, as its reporting system came under strain.Italy, which has the highest coronavirus death toll in Europe at nearly 75,000, Saturday reported 364 more people had died from the virus, a drop compared with Friday’s total of 462. The Guardian reported that new cases had also decreased, from 22,211 to 11,831.Norway, with one of the lowest infection rates in Europe, Saturday began requiring COVID-19 tests upon arrival into the country, after finding five cases of the British variant of the virus. Denmark discovered 86 cases of that new, more contagious strain.Greece has extended until Jan. 10 its strict two-month lockdown measures, ending an easing of the restrictions for the holidays.But in Australia, the finishing touches were being put on a glitzy show at the Sydney Opera House on Saturday, as the venue prepared to host an opera crowd for the first time since March.In Zimbabwe, where recorded cases have almost doubled since the beginning of November, government officials ordered a new containment Saturday evening. The southern African country has recorded nearly 14,500 cases to date, including 377 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.In South Africa, government-backed security forces stepped up a “zero-tolerance approach” to enforcing a mask mandate, and President Cyril Ramaphosa banned alcohol sales, calling it a root cause of accidents and violence that strain hospital resources.The coronavirus has killed more than 1.8 million people globally since emerging in China in December 2019, according to Johns Hopkins.But experts fear the worst is yet to come, predicting a sharp rise in cases and deaths after weeks of holiday gatherings.The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters contributed to this report.
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As countries around the world tighten lockdowns, impose curfews, ban large get-togethers and even halt alcohol sales to tackle a surge in coronavirus cases, officials in India and the U.S. announced some progress toward expanded immunization campaigns as infections rates continued to climb on multiple continents.New Delhi staged nationwide drills Saturday to launch one of the world’s biggest coronavirus vaccination programs as the country’s drug regulator approved two vaccines — one developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, the other by Bharat Biotech and the state-run Indian Council of Medical Research — for emergency use.India, the world’s second most populous country, has more than 10.3 million confirmed COVID-19 infections, second only to the United States. Reuters reported Friday that little was known about the clinical trials that informed the emergency use authorization and that Indian officials said approval of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine was “subject to multiple regulatory conditionalities,” without providing details.In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Saturday said the country had administered more than 4.2 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines nationwide and had distributed more than 13 million doses.The U.S. continues to lead the world with more than 20 million infections, about one-fourth of the 84.5 million COVID-19 cases globally, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, which also reported a total of nearly 350,000 deaths since the pandemic began.In Russia, Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said that more than 800,000 people had received the domestically produced Sputnik V vaccine and that 1.5 million doses had been distributed throughout the country of 147 million.The Kremlin is pinning its hopes on mass vaccinations, not nationwide restrictions, to stop the spread of the virus and save its struggling economy from the hit of another lockdown.Officials in Brazil, home to the third-highest number of cases globally (7.7 million), recently told The Associated Press it was at least three weeks away from launching any formal immunization campaign.European Union leaders on Saturday offered to help any drug companies expand vaccine production and improve “distribution bottlenecks.””The bottleneck at the moment is … the worldwide shortage of production capacity,” said EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides, adding the bloc would help drug companies develop candidate vaccines.New strainBritish health officials Saturday reported another infection record — more than 57,700 in a single day. It was the fifth day in a row that new infections exceeded 50,000 cases as the country struggles with the spread of a more infectious variant of the virus.A spokesperson for Britain’s National Health Service said health workers were preparing to reopen London’s Nightingale hospitals, according to the Reuters news agency. The temporary Nightingale hospitals were set up by the military around the city and have remained on standby after receiving little use during the first wave of the pandemic.The new strain has led to renewed lockdowns in Britain as well as global travel restrictions on travelers from Britain.The New York Times reported Friday that at least 33 countries had detected the new coronavirus variant and more than 40 countries had barred travelers arriving from Britain. Florida on Friday was the third U.S. state to detect the new variant, after Colorado and California.On Friday, Turkey began banning Britons from entering the country after detecting 15 cases of the new coronavirus variant. Turkey said all those affected were recent arrivals from Britain.Ban on US travelers, tighter lockdownsThe Philippines said it would prohibit the entry of foreign travelers from the United States until at least Jan. 15 after the new coronavirus variant was detected.In Bangkok, Thai officials shuttered the city’s nightlife with a ban on bar, nightclub and restaurant alcohol sales, among a raft of restrictions aimed at curbing the kingdom’s rising coronavirus toll. In Tokyo, the city’s governor on Saturday asked Japan’s government to declare a new state of emergency as the country battles a third wave of infections, with record numbers of new cases.France, which recently lengthened an overnight curfew by two hours in parts of the country, has the highest COVID-19 case count in Western Europe with more than 2.7 million, according to Johns Hopkins.France deployed more than 100,000 police to stop end-of-the-year celebrations, but partygoers in northwestern France, near Rennes, staged a massive illegal rave, leading to hundreds of arrests.Spanish police broke up another gathering Saturday near Barcelona, where 300 people had been partying for more than 40 hours.Ireland on Saturday reported 3,394 cases of COVID-19, nearly doubling its record for a single day. Irish officials Friday said they had underreported coronavirus cases in recent days by more than 9,000, as its reporting system came under strain.Italy, which has the highest coronavirus death toll in Europe at nearly 75,000, Saturday reported 364 more people had died from the virus, a drop compared with Friday’s total of 462. The Guardian reported that new cases had also decreased, from 22,211 to 11,831.Norway, with one of the lowest infection rates in Europe, Saturday began requiring COVID-19 tests upon arrival into the country, after finding five cases of the British variant of the virus. Denmark discovered 86 cases of that new, more contagious strain.Greece has extended until Jan. 10 its strict two-month lockdown measures, ending an easing of the restrictions for the holidays.But in Australia, the finishing touches were being put on a glitzy show at the Sydney Opera House on Saturday, as the venue prepared to host an opera crowd for the first time since March.In Zimbabwe, where recorded cases have almost doubled since the beginning of November, government officials ordered a new containment Saturday evening. The southern African country has recorded nearly 14,500 cases to date, including 377 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.In South Africa, government-backed security forces stepped up a “zero-tolerance approach” to enforcing a mask mandate, and President Cyril Ramaphosa banned alcohol sales, calling it a root cause of accidents and violence that strain hospital resources.The coronavirus has killed more than 1.8 million people globally since emerging in China in December 2019, according to Johns Hopkins.But experts fear the worst is yet to come, predicting a sharp rise in cases and deaths after weeks of holiday gatherings.The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters contributed to this report.
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As communities across the U.S. feel the pain of a surge in coronavirus cases, funeral homes in the hot spot of Southern California say they must turn away grieving families as they run out of space for bodies.The head of the state funeral directors association says mortuaries are being inundated as the United States nears a grim tally of 350,000 COVID-19 deaths. More than 20 million people in the country have been infected, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.”I’ve been in the funeral industry for 40 years and never in my life did I think that this could happen, that I’d have to tell a family, ‘No, we can’t take your family member,'” said Magda Maldonado, owner of Continental Funeral Home in Los Angeles.Continental is averaging about 30 body removals a day — six times its normal rate. Mortuary owners are calling one another to see whether anyone can handle overflow, and the answer is always the same: They’re full, too.In order to keep up with the flood of bodies, Maldonado has rented extra 15-meter refrigerators for two of the four facilities she runs in Los Angeles and surrounding counties. Continental has also been delaying pickups at hospitals for a day or two while they take care of residential clients.Bob Achermann, executive director of the California Funeral Directors Association, said that the whole process of burying and cremating bodies has slowed, including embalming bodies and obtaining death certificates. During normal times, cremation might happen within a day or two; now it takes at least a week or longer.Achermann said that in the southern part of the state, “every funeral home I talk to says, ‘We’re paddling as fast as we can.'””The volume is just incredible, and they fear that they won’t be able to keep up,” he said. “And the worst of the surge could still be ahead of us.”Los Angeles County, the epicenter of the crisis in California, has surpassed 10,000 COVID-19 deaths alone. Hospitals in the area are overwhelmed and are struggling to keep up with basics such as oxygen as they treat an unprecedented number of patients with respiratory issues. On Saturday, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers crews arrived to update some hospitals’ oxygen delivery systems.Post-holiday surge possibleNationally, an average of just more than 2,500 people a day have died of COVID-19 in the past seven days, according to Johns Hopkins data. The number of daily newly reported cases in that period has averaged close to 195,000, a decline from two weeks earlier.It’s feared that holiday gatherings could fuel yet another rise in cases.In the southern state of Arkansas, officials reported a record of more than 4,300 new COVID-19 cases Friday. Gov. Asa Hutchinson tweeted that the state is “certainly in the surge after Christmas travel and gatherings” and added, “As we enter this new year, our first resolution should be to follow guidelines.”Also in the South, the state of North Carolina officials reported a record 9,527 confirmed cases New Year’s Day. That’s more than 1,000 cases above the previous daily high.And in Louisiana, a funeral was being held Saturday for a congressman-elect who died of COVID-19 complications. Republican Luke Letlow died Tuesday at age 41. His swearing-in had been scheduled Sunday. He leaves behind his wife, Julia Letlow, and two children, ages 1 and 3.In Texas, state officials say they have only 580 intensive care beds available as staff treat more than 12,480 hospitalized coronavirus patients, a number that has risen steadily since September and has set record highs this past week.In Window Rock, Arizona, the Navajo Nation remained in a weekend lockdown to try to slow the rate of infection. The tribe late Friday reported another seven deaths, bringing its totals since the pandemic began to 23,429 cases and 813 deaths. The reservation includes parts of the southwestern states of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.The number of infections is thought to be far higher than reported because many people have not been tested, and studies suggest people can be infected with the virus without feeling sick.Arizona on Saturday reported 18,943 new cases Friday and Saturday, a record for the state in any two-day period. It also reported 46 new deaths Saturday.
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From his newsstand at the bottom of two hilly streets in Rome, Armando Alviti has been dispensing newspapers, magazines and good cheer to locals from before dawn till after dusk nearly every day for more than a half-century.“Ciao, Armando,” his customers greet him as part of their daily routine. “Ciao, amore (love)” he calls back. Alviti chuckled as he recalled how, when he was a young boy, newspaper deliverers would drop off the day’s stacks at his parents’ newsstand, sit him in the emptied baskets of their motorbikes and take him for a spin.Since he turned 18, Alviti has operated the newsstand seven days a week, with a wool tweed cap to protect him from the Italian capital’s winter dampness and a tabletop fan to cool him during its torrid summers. A mighty battle therefore ensued when the coronavirus reached Italy and his two grown sons insisted that Alviti, who is 71 and diabetic, stay home while they took turns juggling their own jobs to keep the newsstand open.“They were afraid I would die. I know they love me crazy,” Alviti said.The world’s second-oldest populationThroughout the pandemic, health authorities around the world have stressed the need to protect the people most at risk of complications from COVID-19, a group which infection and mortality data quickly revealed included older adults. With 23% of its population age 65 or older, Italy has the world’s second-oldest population, after Japan, with 28%.The average age of Italy’s COVID-19 dead has hovered around 80, many of them people with previous medical conditions like diabetes or heart disease. Some politicians advocated limiting how much time elders spent outside of their homes to avoid lockdowns of the general population that were costly to the economy.Among them was the governor of Italy’s northwestern coastal region of Liguria, where 28.5 percent of the population is age 65 or older. Gov. Giovanni Toti, who is 52, argued for such an age-specific strategy when a second surge of infections struck Italy in the fall.Older people are “for the most part in retirement, not indispensable to the productive effort” of Italy’s economy, Toti said.To the news vendor in Rome, those were fighting words. Alviti said Toti’s remarks “disgusted me. They made me very angry.”“Older persons are the life of this country. They’re the memory of this country,” he said. Self-employed older adults like him especially “can’t be kept under a bell jar,” he said.’Ageism is so accepted’The pandemic’s heavy toll on older people, particularly those in nursing homes, might have served to reinforce ageism, or prejudice against the segment of population generally referred to as “elderly.”The label “old” means “40, 50 years of life being lumped in one category,” said Nancy Morrow-Howell, a professor of social work at Washington University in St. Louis who specializes in gerontology. She noted that these days, people in their 60s often are caring for parents in their 90s.“Ageism is so accepted … it’s not questioned,” Morrow-Howell said in a telephone interview. One form it takes is “compassionate ageism,” Morrow-Howell said, the idea that “we need to protect older adults. We need to treat them as children.”Alviti’s family won the first round, keeping him away from work until May. His sons implored him to stay home again when the coronavirus rebounded in the fall.He struck a compromise. One of his sons opens the newsstand at 6 a.m. and Alviti takes over two hours later, limiting his exposure to the public during the morning rush.Fausto Alviti said he’s afraid for his father, “but I also realize for him to stay home, it would have been worse, psychologically. He needs to be with people.”In the open-air food market in the Trullo neighborhood of Rome, produce vendor Domenico Zoccoli, 80, also scoffs at the belief that people past retirement age “don’t produce (and) must be protected.”Before dawn broke on a recent rainy day, Zoccoli had transformed his stall into a cheerful array of colors: boxes of red and green cabbages, radicchio, purple carrots, leafy beet tops, and cauliflower in shades of white, violet and orange, all harvested from his farm some 30 kilometers away.“Old people must do what they feel. If they can’t walk, then they don’t walk. If I feel like running, I run,” Zoccoli said. After packing up his stall at 1:30 p.m., he said he would work several hours more in his field, skipping lunch.Childcare providersMarco Trabucchi, a psychiatrist based in the northern Italian city of Brescia who specializes in the behavior of older adults, thinks the pandemic has gotten people to reconsider their attitudes for the better.“Little attention was given to the individuality of the old. They were like an indistinct category, all equal, with all the same problems, all suffering,” Trabucchi said.In Italy, with childcare centers chronically scarce, legions of older adults, some decades beyond retirement, effectively double as essential workers by caring for their grandchildren.According to Eurostat, the European Union’s statistics bureau, 35% of Italians older than 65 look after grandchildren several times a week.Felice Santini, 79, and his wife, Rita Cintio, 76, are such a couple. They take care of the two youngest of their four grandchildren multiple times per week.“If we didn’t care for them, their parents couldn’t work,” said Santini. “We’re helping them (a son and daughter-in-law) stay in the productive work force.”Santini still works himself, a half-day as a mechanic at an auto repair shop. Then, when he comes home, his hands keep busy in the kitchen: stuffing homemade cannelloni with sausage, making meat sauce and baking orange-flavored Bundt cakes for his grandkids.Cintio finds it painful not being able to hug and kiss her grandchildren. But she embraced 9-year-old Gaia Santini when the girl ran joyfully toward her after her grandmother navigated Rome’s narrow streets to pick her up at school. Cintio will take Gaia home for a break, before next accompanying her to an ice-skating lesson.Worried about COVID-19’s second surge, the couple’s son, Cristiano Santini, said he tried to limit the frequency with which his parents watch the children, but to little avail.“They’re afraid (of infection), but they are more afraid of not living much longer” due to their ages and missing previous time with their grandchildren, he said.
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The United States topped 20 million coronavirus cases Friday as it began the New Year, according to data from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.The United States continued to surpass other countries in COVID-19 cases and accounts for nearly a quarter of the worldwide total, which now stands at more than 83.8 million. The country also leads the world in coronavirus deaths, totaling more than 347,000.The increasing numbers come as U.S. health officials struggle to vaccinate the population. The outgoing administration of President Donald Trump predicted in December that 20 million people would be inoculated by year’s end. However, health officials say only 2.8 million Americans have received their first dose of the vaccine.As of Wednesday, just 12.4 million doses had been distributed nationally, according to the country’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah on Friday sharply criticized the pace of the vaccinations and said more federal oversight of the process was necessary.”That comprehensive vaccination plans have not been developed at the federal level and sent to the states as models is as incomprehensible as it is inexcusable,” Romney said in a statement.The 2012 Republican presidential nominee called for the government to assemble a large number of medical workers to administer the vaccine, including retired medical professionals, veterinarians, combat medics, medical students and first responders.He also recommended using sites that are largely empty because of the pandemic, such as schools, to administer the vaccine and called for a clear order in which Americans would be vaccinated.Grim record in CaliforniaThe United States has begun vaccinations of frontline health care workers and high-risk populations, such as those living in nursing homes, using two vaccines given emergency use authorization.The CDC has recommended the vaccines next be made available to frontline workers and people 75 and older. But some states have set up different criteria for the order in which they will vaccinate residents.In another development Friday, California reported a record 585 coronavirus deaths in a single day. The state also reported more than 47,189 new confirmed COVID-19 cases, bringing its total to nearly 2.3 million.Nearly 26,000 people have died from the virus in California, behind only the U.S. states of New York and Texas, according to data from Johns Hopkins.The surge in cases in California has led some hospitals to scramble to provide oxygen for the critically ill.The office of California Governor Gavin Newsom announced Friday that the state would begin collaborating with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to improve the oxygen delivery systems at six Los Angeles-area hospitals.Also Friday, California’s San Diego County said it had confirmed a total of four cases of a coronavirus variant that was first identified in Britain and that appears to be more contagious. The virus variant has also been confirmed in the U.S. states of Colorado and Florida.In Oregon, officials said Friday a health care worker was hospitalized after having a severe allergic reaction to the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. Officials say an employee at Wallowa Memorial Hospital experienced anaphylaxis after receiving a first dose of the vaccine this week.Health officials say in rare cases, people can develop a severe allergic reaction to the COVID-19 vaccines; however, most people experience mild or moderate side effects.Health officials in the Midwestern state of Wisconsin expressed their shock at one worker’s actions at a hospital outside the state’s biggest city, Milwaukee. An unnamed pharmacist, officials said, admitted deliberately spoiling more than 500 doses of coronavirus vaccine by removing them from a pharmacy refrigerator. He was arrested Thursday.Hospital workers administered the spoiled doses before realizing the pharmacist had tampered with them. Hospital officials say the 57 people who received the ruined vaccines have been notified. They say they have consulted with Moderna, the vaccine manufacturer, and have been assured the people who received the corrupted vaccines will not be harmed by shots they received.Trump has said little about the issue of vaccinations in recent weeks, focusing mainly on unsupported claims that he was defrauded of a second term in the White House. But he did address the slow pace of vaccinations on Twitter, saying, “The Federal Government has distributed the vaccines to the states. Now it is up to the states to administer. Get moving!”The Federal Government has distributed the vaccines to the states. Now it is up to the states to administer. Get moving!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 30, 2020Numerous problems have emerged with the vaccination efforts in the U.S., including a shortage of funding for administering the shots and publicizing their availability in some communities. Each state is deciding on its own who should get vaccinated first, although health care workers and elderly people living in nursing homes have been at the head of the line in most places.  
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President Donald Trump vetoed a bill Friday that would have gradually ended the use of large-mesh drift gillnets deployed exclusively in federal waters off the coast of California, saying such legislation would increase reliance on imported seafood and worsen a multibillion-dollar seafood trade deficit. FILE – Democratic Senator from California Dianne Feinstein, June 3, 2020.Trump also said in his veto message to the Senate that the legislation sponsored by Senators Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., “will not achieve its purported conservation benefits.”The fishing bill’s sponsors said large-mesh drift gillnets, which measure between 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) and 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) long and can extend 200 feet (60.9 meters) below the surface of the ocean, are left in the waters overnight to catch swordfish and thresher sharks.FILE – Senator Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., Oct. 25, 2020.But they said at least 60 other marine species — including whales, dolphins and sea lions — can also become entangled in the nets, where they are injured or die. It is illegal to use these nets in U.S. territorial waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico, and off the coasts of Washington state, Oregon, Alaska and Hawaii. They remain legal in federal waters off California’s coast. In 2018, California passed a four-year phase-out of large-mesh drift gillnets in state waters to protect marine life.  The bill Trump vetoed would have extended similar protections to federal waters off California’s shoreline within five years and authorized the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to help the commercial fishing industry switch to more sustainable types of gear. Trump said the West Coast drift gillnet fishery is subject to “robust legal and regulatory requirements” for environmental protection that equal or go beyond environmental protections applied to foreign fisheries.  He said Americans will import more swordfish and other species from foreign sources without this fishery. 
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Chinese supply of a COVID-19 vaccine to Indonesia and the Philippines is likely to strengthen Beijing’s image in those countries, despite current resentment of its expansion in the South China Sea, if the vaccines work, analysts say.Both countries have moved to order vaccines made by Sinovac Biotech, a Beijing-based pharmaceutical company, according to Asian media reports and the company’s website. China’s official Xinhua News Agency in October had called it “crucial” to distribute vaccines “around the world, not just the wealthy nations.”People in both countries resent Chinese expansion in the 3.5 million-square-kilometer South China Sea where sovereignty claims overlap. China, with Asia’s strongest military, has built up islands that the Philippines claims and passed ships through waters that Jakarta says fall within an Indonesian exclusive economic zone. The sea is prized for fisheries and undersea energy reserves.China, keen to be seen as a good neighbor abroad and to minimize U.S. geopolitical influence, could gain favor in Southeast Asia’s two biggest countries if the vaccines work, reach remote parts of each archipelago in due time and don’t cost too much, analysts say. Indonesia and the Philippines have a combined population of 375 million.“If it turns out to be good, effective, safe, affordable, then I guess that might change to a certain extent the perceptions here,” said Aaron Rabena, research fellow at the Asia-Pacific Pathways to Progress Foundation in Metro Manila. China, he said, wants to “make up for their distorted image.”Anti-China sentimentFilipinos, including some in the armed forces, have distrusted China since a 2012 standoff over Scarborough Shoal in the contested sea. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has sought to mend ties since he took office in 2016. He indicated last year that he would prioritize the Chinese vaccines along with possible shipments from Russia.The Philippines was aiming as of mid-December to end negotiations with Sinovac to get 25 million doses by March.For Indonesia, Sinovac has committed to supply a “bulk vaccine” so state-run vaccine maker PT Bio Farma can produce at least 40 million doses before March, the Chinese company says on its website. On December 6, Sinovac shipped 1.2 million doses to Jakarta for storage at a nearby PT Bio Farma warehouse, the Jakarta Post website reports.Indonesia has placed “firm” orders for about 160 million vaccine doses, 140 million of which are manufactured by Sinovac Biotech, the Post added.Anti-China sentiment flared up before the shipment and some Indonesians worry the vaccines will be unhealthy, said Paramita Supamijoto, an international relations lecturer at Bina Nusantara University in Jakarta.“At the beginning, there was a big debate on why we need to get [vaccines] from China, and there was big distrust among the people, and this kind of anti-China sentiment is still very strong,” she said.Indonesia’s Food and Drug Monitoring Agency plans to visit Sinovac facilities in Beijing to ensure “good manufacturing practice,” the Post says. Its report quotes PT Bio Farma officials defending an anticipated $13.57 price per dose.The Chinese state-supervised Global Times news website said in November that leaders around Southeast Asia had lauded Chinese vaccines as “accessible and affordable.”It might be the “most suitable” one for Indonesia’s condition, Supamijoto said. People there are spread across 13,000 islands.Effectiveness ratesDuterte, though, may be holding out for U.S.-made Pfizer Inc. vaccines in case Sinovac’s remedy only prevents COVID-19 half the time, said Eduardo Araral, associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s public policy school. Research in Brazil showed last month that Sinovac’s product was at least 50% effective. Pfizer said in November its vaccine candidate was found to be more than 90% effective.“I think Duterte is hedging that with a 50-50 rate, why would anyone choose the Sinovac if the Pfizer vaccine is also coming?” Araral said.Duterte threatened late last month to go ahead with a long-threatened cancellation of the U.S. Visiting Forces Agreement — which gives U.S. troops access to the Philippines with few restrictions — if the United States can’t deliver at least 20 million vaccine doses, the PhilStar.com news website said Dec. 27.His government said about a year ago it would cancel the 21-year-old pact, although that process has been suspended twice and analysts say Duterte wants to renegotiate the broader defense relationship with more focus on quelling armed rebel groups. The Philippines has looked to the United States as a key defense ally since the 1950s.Although coronavirus caseloads in the Philippines have fallen since a peak in August, discovery of a virus variant from Britain prompted quarantine orders in Metro Manila and nine other parts of the country through Jan. 30. The Philippines has recorded about 474,000 Cases and more than 9,244 deaths.Indonesia’s COVID-19 cases are still growing steadily. The country with Southeast Asia’s largest population reports around 743,000 cases and more than 22,000 deaths. Indonesia is also looking for vaccine sources outside China.
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The World Health Organization on Thursday approved the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine for emergency use, a move aimed at helping the developing world gain access to the vaccine sooner.The WHO set up its emergency use process to help countries without their own regulatory resources to approve vaccines, clearing the way for their use.”This is a very positive step towards ensuring global access to COVID-19 vaccines,” said Mariangela Simao, the WHO’s access to medicines program leader.However, the super-cold temperature the vaccine must be kept at — minus 70 degrees Celsius — makes shipping and storing it a challenge for developing countries.COVAX, a global effort backed by the WHO to buy and distribute vaccines to poorer countries, has commitments for 2 billion doses of vaccine so far and is in talks with Pfizer-BioNTech to buy some of its vaccine, which is 95% effective after two doses.FILE – A box for a COVID-19 vaccine is displayed at an exhibit by Chinese pharmaceutical firm Sinopharm at the China International Fair for Trade in Services in Beijing, China, Sept. 5, 2020.Another COVID-19 vaccine, this one developed by a Chinese drugmaker, on Thursday became the first to be granted official approval by China’s government.China’s National Medical Products Administration announced the conditional approval of a vaccine developed by Beijing Biological Products Institute, a subsidiary of state-owned Sinopharm. The regulatory agency granted the approval a day after Sinopharm said the vaccine had an efficacy rate of 79.3% against the coronavirus in a final large-scale clinical trial.However, outside experts have questioned Sinopharm’s claims because it has not provided necessary data for it to be independently verified.The newly approved vaccine is one of five developed by Chinese companies that have been administered under its emergency use program while still undergoing phase 3 trials. More than 4.5 million doses have been administered since July to essential workers and people considered high risk, including 3 million since mid-December.The Sinopharm vaccine joins other potential coronavirus vaccines to receive approval from governments around the world.People wait to receive a COVID-19 vaccine at the London Bridge vaccination center, amidst the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in London, Dec. 30, 2020.Britain’s medical regulatory agency announced Wednesday that it has granted emergency authorization of a coronavirus vaccine developed jointly by British-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca and Oxford University.Late-stage clinical trials of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine revealed it to be 70% effective against COVID-19. The vaccine had a 62% efficacy rate for participants given a full two doses, but tests of a smaller sub-group revealed it to be 90% effective when given a half-dose followed by a full dose weeks later.The new vaccines are coming as a more contagious strain of COVID-19 first detected several days ago in Britain has been identified at various points on the globe.Brazil’s Sao Paulo state Governor Joao Doria and state Health Secretary Jean Gorinchteyn hold boxes of the China’s Sinovac vaccines against the coronavirus disease near a refrigerated container at Sao Paulo International Airport, Dec. 30, 2020.A Brazilian lab said Thursday it has found two cases of the British variant, prompting researchers at its Tropical Medicine Institute to urge a redoubling of quarantine measures. Brazil has reported more than 55,000 new cases and nearly 1,200 deaths in the past 24 hours, according to Johns Hopkins University. Brazil, with nearly 195,000 deaths, is second only to the U.S., and with more than 7.6 million cases ranks third in the world.Officials in California on Wednesday announced the variant has surfaced in the southern city of San Diego. The Western state of Colorado was the first in the United States to report the new strain earlier this week.A different variant of the coronavirus has been detected in South Africa.
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