President-elect Joe Biden rolled up his sleeve and received his second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine Monday at Christiana Hospital in Newark, Delaware, to complete his inoculation against the deadly disease. The process was livestreamed to reassure Americans the vaccines are safe. Global cases of the coronavirus have topped 90 million, as the number of deaths approaches 1.9 million. In the United States, more than 375,000 people have died from the virus. The number of cases is now more than 22 million, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.   The president-elect, who responded to questions after his inoculation, said the increasing number of deaths is “wrong, and we can do a lot to change it.” Vaccinations across the United States have been uneven and have not gone according to the Trump administration’s plans. Biden’s transition team plans to vaccinate as many people as possible with their first shot, rather than save the vaccine for second doses.  This, his team believes, will give some protection against the virus to people who would otherwise not have any. Experts have advised, however, against this approach, citing inadequate data on holding back second doses. FILE – A vial contains doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.In response, Biden’s team said plans are in place to ensure second doses are produced and delivered to Americans on time. Two vaccines now in circulation require a second dose for optimum efficacy. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine requires a second shot about three weeks after the first, while Moderna’s has a four-week interval. There are currently no one-shot vaccines approved for use in the U.S. Biden, who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, said he is optimistic his administration will be able to inoculate as many Americans as possible once he is sworn in office January 20. The incoming administration has promised to distribute 100 million vaccinations in its first 100 days in office. “My No. 1 priority is getting the vaccine in people’s arms … as rapidly as we can, and we’re working on that program now,” Biden said, adding he would have an announcement on Thursday. Biden admitted it will not be easy to bring the virus under control but is hopeful measures such as wearing masks, social distancing and frequent handwashing, coupled with rapid vaccination, will help. He chided Republican lawmakers who were seen without masks during the mob attack on the U.S. Capitol last week. Democratic Congresswoman Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware distributed face masks to lawmakers during the siege, but many Republican lawmakers refused them. “The Republican colleagues wouldn’t take the mask. Irresponsible,” Biden said.  “And so, we all have to make sure it’s not a political issue. It’s an issue of public safety. And it’s going to get worse before it gets better.”  
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U.S. Pharmaceutical company Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech announced Monday plans to boost production of its COVID-19 vaccine by 50% percent — 2 million doses — this year to meet the global demand.  
 
BioNTech announced the increased supply as part of a presentation at a health care conference. The company said a new production site in Marburg, Germany, expected to become operational by the end of next month, will be able to make as many as 750 million doses per year. That means a total of six facilities will be producing the vaccine — three in Germany, and three operated by Pfizer in the United States.  
 
The partners have already committed 1 billion doses for delivery. Last week, the European Union announced a deal for an additional 300 million doses of the vaccine, doubling their supply.
 
The World Health Organization (WHO) said last week it is continuing negotiations with the companies about securing doses for the vaccine cooperative COVAX, organized by the agency to provide vaccines for low-income nations. No agreement has been reached.
 
Last week, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressed concern about wealthy nations buying up the supply of vaccines and leaving none for the developing world. He has argued that the COVID-19 pandemic cannot be defeated unless vaccines are distributed equitably.
  
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India will roll out an ambitious nationwide vaccination drive against COVID-19 on Saturday, aiming to inoculate 300 million people, or nearly one quarter of the population, by July.
 
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Monday that with the upcoming immunization drive, which would be the world’s largest such program, the country is entering into a “decisive phase” in the fight against the pandemic.
 
In the first phase, 30 million health care and frontline workers such as police personnel will be vaccinated. The vaccines will then be administered to about 270 million people above the age of 50 and younger people with serious health problems, according to the Health Ministry.
 
Modi underlined India’s two major advantages – the two vaccines that have been approved for emergency use are being manufactured domestically, giving it access to millions of doses.   
 
“This is a matter of pride for us,” said the prime minister.   
 
In an interaction with chief ministers on the vaccination drive, Modi also noted Indian vaccines are more cost effective than others in the world.
 
The price for the first 100 million doses of the British developed AstraZeneca vaccine will be manufactured by an Indian company and is expected to be around $ 2.75 per dose for the government.  The vaccine cost will be much higher when it is made available in the private market.
 
India is hoping its experience in running huge vaccination drives will come in handy as it gears up to launch the COVID-19 immunization program.  Every year the government inoculates nearly 55 million infants and pregnant women against diseases such as polio and measles.A health worker pretends to administer a shot of a COVID-19 vaccine to a volunteer during a mock vaccination drill at a school in Dharmsala, India, Jan. 11, 2021.But health experts warn that reaching a far bigger adult population poses much greater challenges — India will need to administer 600 million shots to meet its target of reaching 300 million people over the coming months.
 
Authorities have trained thousands of health care workers to administer the vaccines, ramped up cold storage equipment such as freezers and refrigerators and set up vaccination centers through the country.   
 
Most of the initial inoculations are expected to be of the AstraZeneca vaccine that is being produced by the Serum Institute of India.
 
Covaxin, the second vaccine approved for emergency use, has been developed by a domestic company, Bharat Biotech. It will be administered in “clinical trial mode,” as the final results of trials are still awaited.
 
Some experts have raised concerns about clearing that vaccine without lack of data showing its efficacy, but the drug regulator has said it is “safe.”
 
Both vaccines will be given in two doses and can be stored at temperatures of two to eight degrees Celsius.
 
With 10.5 million infections, India is the world’s second worst hit nation, but its daily count of new cases has fallen to less than 20,000 in recent weeks compared to about 95,000 in September, when infections peaked.   
 
There is optimism that the declining number of infections and the vaccination program will not just bring the pandemic under control but also revive an economy reeling under its worst contraction in 40 years.
 
“With India about to roll out its vaccination program, the accruals of the economic benefits would be significant, especially to sectors such as hospitality, transportation, entertainment, which were hit hard during the pandemic,” according to Deepak Sood, secretary general of the Associated Chambers of Commerce of India.
 
India’s economy, one of the worst hit by the pandemic, is expected to shrink by 7.5% this financial year which ends in March.
 
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The World Health Organization is sending a team of international experts to China this week to investigate the origins of the coronavirus.It was not immediately clear, however, if the experts, scheduled to arrive Thursday, will be allowed to travel to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the virus originally emerged in late 2019.“It’s very important that as the WHO is in the lead in fighting the pandemic, that it also has a leading role in trying to look back at the roots of this pandemic so we can be better prepared for the next one,” United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric said about the team’s travel to China.China’s announcement Monday about the WHO team’s imminent arrival came on the same day China announced 103 new COVID-19 cases, the country’s biggest jump in infections in more than five months.China Completes First Round of COVID Testing in Locked-down CityAggressive approach used in Shijiazhuang is being adopted in other Asian-Pacific countriesThe rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine in the United States has been fraught with problems, according to an Associated Press report.Gianfranco Pezzino, who was the public health officer in Shawnee County, Kansas, until his recent retirement, told AP, “The recurring theme is the lack of a national strategy and the attempt to pass the buck down the line, lower and lower, until the poor people at the receiving end have nobody else that they can send the buck to.”US Vaccine Rollout Hits Snag as Health Workers Balk at ShotsExperts say are fears of side effects from vaccines that were developed at record speed are unfounded The British variant of the COVID-19 virus, thought by scientists to be much more contagious, has been found in France and Russia, according to news reports Sunday.Russia, which has recorded more than 3 million cases of the virus, had already suspended flights from Britain until January 13 and is mandating a two-week isolation period for those traveling from Britain.Meanwhile, Britain continues to grapple with high numbers of cases and deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, with many hospitals at capacity while lockdowns are in effect.“The stark reality is that we will run out of beds for patients in the next couple of weeks unless the spread of the virus slows down drastically,” London Mayor Sadiq Khan said over the weekend.The British variant of the virus has been found in 45 countries and at least eight states in the U.S. Another variant of the virus discovered in South Africa was found in some positive cases in Ireland Sunday.Yet a third new variant has been found in Japan in travelers from Brazil.  The Brazil variant is different from the British and South African variants, but the three share a common mutation.British, South African COVID Variants Spreading Around GlobeThe British strain was found in France and Russia, while Ireland recorded a case of the South African versionWhile the variants are worrisome, they are not unexpected. The coronavirus has made thousands of tiny modifications since it was first discovered, researchers say. The African continent confirmed a total of 3 million cases of the virus on Sunday, as many countries are beginning to mark a second wave of infections and impose restrictions. On Sunday, Algeria registered Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine against the coronavirus for use, the first African country to do so, Russia’s RDIF sovereign wealth fund said.  Algeria’s president was flown to Germany on Sunday for treatment of complications from COVID-19. Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center said early Monday that there are more than 90 million global COVID-19 cases.  The U.S. has the most with 22.4 million, followed by India with 10.4 million and Brazil with 8.1 million.  Worldwide, nearly two million people have died.
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Britain’s hospitals are on the brink of being overwhelmed by COVID-19 patients and the country’s National Health Service is facing its “worst crisis in living memory,” a senior government official warned Sunday.  The blunt warning from England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, came as members of the government’s main advisory panel, the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, warned that nationwide lockdown measures introduced after Christmas were too lax and, being flouted too often by people meeting friends in parks and congregating at supermarkets.  They are urging the closure of nurseries and the end of “support bubbles” that allow for two households to mix. Ministers say they are not planning to tighten up the measures more but will start enforcing lockdown rules strictly and have ordered police to be forward-leaning and issue fines.    People queue for COVID-19 testing at a mass screening centre at Charlton Athletic Football Club as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues in London, Britain, Jan. 3, 2021.Some medical workers say the breaking point has already been reached in London and parts of southern England. British coronavirus deaths Sunday surpassed 80,000 for the pandemic, 10,000 more than the civilian death tally during World War II. The country has seen four consecutive daily increases of more than 1,000 deaths.  Dr. Zudin Puthucheary, a critical care consultant, told Sky News the NHS is “breaking in front of us.” He said he was “scared and angry.” The majority of hospitals in Britain’s capital have already reportedly reached over-capacity. London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, declared Friday a “major incident.” In a statement, he said, “The threat this virus poses to our city is at crisis point. The number of cases in London has increased rapidly with more than a third more patients being treated in our hospitals now compared to the peak of the pandemic last April,” he added. Puthucheary, who works at the Royal London Hospital, said there’s a shortage of critical care nursing staff and warned intensive care units “are full beyond bursting.” He also said, “We’ve cannibalized staff from all around the hospital — volunteers are pouring in to try and look after these patients and deliver the best care we can. Staff are breaking themselves to make this happen and keep our patients safe — and it’s not going to be enough.” FILE – Britain’s Health Secretary Matt Hancock speaks at a press conference inside 10 Downing Street on further restrictions to be put in place due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic in London, Dec. 23, 2020.Speaking on the BBC, Health Secretary Matt Hancock declined to speculate on whether the government would introduce stricter rules “because the most important message is not whether the government will further strengthen the rules. The most important thing is that people stay at home and follow the rules that we have got.” Almost 60,000 new coronavirus cases were reported in Britain Saturday. Ministers say they are in a vaccine race against the virus and plan to open seven mass vaccination centers this week, with more in the pipeline. Neil Ferguson, a government adviser and professor at London’s Imperial College, predicted the number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 would soar by another 20 percent. “It will be quite difficult to avoid another 20,000 deaths,” he told reporters. But with one in 30 Britons having the virus, he said the country could be through the pandemic within nine months, as a consequence of the vaccination program and the development of herd immunity. “I think we will see growth rates slow,” Ferguson said. “We may see a decline, and that may be slightly aided by the fact that there is quite a lot of herd immunity in places like London,” he added. Paramedics are also reporting they are being forced to treat patients in ambulances for hours at a time because no beds are available. Many hospital managers have ordered staff not to speak to the media unless they have prior clearance to do so and unlike last year, television crews are finding it hard to get permission to film wards. Some doctors have written anonymously of their experiences in hospitals and paint a grim picture of patients being treated in corridors because intensive care units (ICU) are full.  “We have several patients who are not ‘fit’ for ICU in the current climate,” wrote one consultant  for the new site Unherd.com. “Before COVID, they most likely would have been given a chance, but not now. When we think that these patients have suffered enough, and are unlikely to ever recover, we start talking about making them comfortable. It’s partly that we need the beds for patients with a better chance, and partly that we feel it is cruel to keep these people suffering when their chances of survival are slim. It’s difficult to work out which of those is your true motivation.” Governments across Europe say their hospitals are also stretched, especially in Sweden. And they’re watching with rising anxiety developments in Britain, where transmission rates are being driven by a more contagious mutant strain that’s now being identified across the continent.  Spain’s health minister, Salvador Illa, warned at a press conference Friday the country faces “difficult weeks ahead.” With coronavirus cases surging, he warned, “The data is bad. The incidence rate, the pressure on hospitals, the positivity rate of PCR tests and the number of deaths are rising. The evolution of the pandemic is worsening.” The PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests are considered the most reliable in detecting the coronavirus.  
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Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera says he is saddened by statistics showing a recent spike in coronavirus infections in the country. In a Sunday radio address, he announced he was starting a 21-day fast to seek divine intervention into the pandemic that is on the rise again. Health experts say the situation needs more than prayers.
Malawi has recently seen a surge in coronavirus cases. Since Thursday, the country has been confirming more cases than ever recorded.   For example, on Saturday, Malawi recorded 381 cases with 12 deaths, the largest figure in a single day since it recorded its first three cases on April 2.   Chakwera noted the surge is largely because many people, including him, had ignored preventive measures. 
 FILE – Malawi’s President Lazarus Chakwera in Lilongwe, Malawi, June 28, 2020.“Many of us relaxed our vigilance against the virus and now we are paying the price,” he said. “We are paying the price because many of us are back to old ways of not wearing masks. Many of us are back to old ways of not maintaining our distance from others. Many of us are back to old ways of not washing our hands regularly. When I say many of us, I am including myself.” President Chakwera has on several occasions been criticized for ignoring prevention measures during meetings.  In October, Chakwera faced public criticism for not wearing a face covering when he met with his Tanzanian counterpart, John Magufuli, during a scheduled three-day official visit to Tanzania.   This month, Chakwera was also criticized after he was seen without face coverings and shaking hands with American singer Madonna at his state residence in the capital, Lilongwe. Madonna has four adopted children from Malawi and co-founded a charity there.   But in his Sunday radio address, Chakwera said it’s now time for everyone in the country to return to following prevention measures. “The speed at which the virus has been spreading since Christmas is very disturbing,” he said.  “Sixty-six new infections were confirmed between Christmas Day and Boxing Day. And in the fortnight that has passed since, over 1,500 new infections have been confirmed, which is an average of over 120 new infections every day which is putting too much pressure in our health system and health workers; this cannot be allowed to continue.” Chakwera said he has directed the ministries of Homeland Security and Health to scale up the enforcement of COVID-19 guidelines with immediate effect. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.   President Chakwera, also former head of the Malawi Assemblies of God Church, said he has personally joined his church in a program of a 21-day fast and prayers for God’s intervention into the pandemic.   Maziko Matemba, who heads Malawi’s Health and Rights Education Program, says the prayers would only help bring deep reflection on the impact of COVID-19, but that the solution is to put measures in place to stop surging cases, especially at the community level.     Ministry of Health statistics show that more than 60 percent of confirmed cases are through local transmission.   “[in the past] The focus was much to do with case management but what has happened now, we need to give resources to our front-line community health workers, which can also be supported by the community organizations or civil society structures or community volunteers who are willing to support so that they can manage issues of gatherings and other issues that can happen at community levels,” Matemba said.FILE – Malawi returnees screened at Mwanza border upon arrival from South Africa. (Courtesy: Pasqually Zulu/Immigration Departmentment)Matemba adds that the government should also ensure that returnees escaping economic problems in South Africa are quarantined and tested before they are allowed to go to their respective communities.   The Ministry of Health says about 500 people who returned from South Africa Saturday are being kept at an isolation center in Blantyre for COVID-19 tests.  
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Pope Francis says the decision to get the COVID vaccine is a matter of ethics.“It is an ethical choice because you are gambling with your health, with your life, but you are also gambling with the lives of others,” Francis said in an interview with Italian television station Canale 5.Vatican City is set to begin its a vaccine campaign this week, and Francis said he has already “booked” an appointment.Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Sunday that there are 89.6 million global COVID cases. The U.S. has the most cases with more than 22 million, followed by India with more than 10 million and Brazil with over 8 million.Vietnamese will find it difficult, if not impossible, to return home this year for Lunar New Year celebrations because the Southeast Asian country is imposing strict travel restrictions. The stringent regulations are being imposed in an attempt to curb the spread of the coronavirus.In China, the initial round of mass testing for the coronavirus in Shijiazhuang was completed in three days after authorities locked down the city of 11 million Wednesday, after just 39 new cases of the virus surfaced, the city’s mayor said Saturday.Mayor Ma Yujun said at a news conference that a second round of testing will begin soon in the capital of the industrial Hebei province, which was sealed off as travel restrictions were imposed in the rest of the region of 76 million people that encircles Beijing.On Tuesday, Hebei authorities put the province into “wartime mode,” enabling authorities to launch a collaborative campaign involving contact tracing and distribution of medical supplies.The aggressive approach taken by Chinese authorities is being adopted in other parts of the Asia-Pacific region, in sharp contrast to the more deliberate virus containment efforts under way in the U.S. and Europe.Israel’s health ministry said Saturday four people tested positive for the novel coronavirus strain first detected in South Africa. The British variant had already been reported in the country.Health experts say both strains are potentially more infectious than other variants.Persistently high caseloads forced Israel to tighten lockdown measures Friday after imposing a nationwide lockdown last month.Under Israel’s national vaccination program, 70% of its population older than 60 have received their first dose of a vaccine. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday he reached an agreement with Pfizer-BioNTech to provide enough vaccine to have all citizens older than 16 vaccinated by the end of March.
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The initial round of mass testing for the coronavirus has been completed in Shijiazhuang, a city of 11 million that was locked down Wednesday after 39 new cases of the virus surfaced, the city’s mayor said Saturday.Mayor Ma Yujun said at a news conference that a second round of testing would begin soon in the capital of Hebei province, which was sealed off as travel restrictions were imposed in the rest of the region of 76 million people that encircles Beijing.On Tuesday, Hebei authorities put the province into “wartime mode,” enabling authorities to launch a collaborative campaign involving contact tracing and distribution of medical supplies.The aggressive approach taken by Chinese authorities is being adopted in other parts of the Asia-Pacific region, in sharp contrast to the more deliberate virus containment efforts under way in the U.S. and Europe.The United States had more cases Saturday than anyplace else, with more than 22 million of the world’s nearly 90 million infections, according to Johns Hopkins University. India was second with more than 10.4 million cases.The U.S. reported more than 300,000 new COVID cases Friday, close to its January 2 record.FILE – People arrive at Jackson Memorial Hospital to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in Miami, Jan. 6, 2021.Vaccine releaseWith the virus surging in some U.S. states, President-elect Joe Biden said he backed the rapid release of COVID vaccines so that whoever wants it will have access to it. Biden’s office said Friday that it would limit the Trump administration’s practice of increasing inventories of vaccine doses to guarantee that people get the booster shot several weeks after the first inoculation.Infectious-disease expert Anthony Fauci said earlier this week he was hopeful that when Biden is in office, the U.S. will be able to deliver to the public “1 million vaccinations per day, as the president-elect has mentioned.”A surprising development, however, has emerged in some implausible locations. The Associated Press reports that some health care workers in hospitals and nursing homes are hesitant about being vaccinated. The AP said its investigation uncovered that in some places as much as 80% of the medical staff has declined the vaccinations.One doctor told the wire service he wanted to wait a few months to “see what the data show.” He said, “I don’t think anyone wants to be a guinea pig.”A nurse said she was delaying her vaccination because of the vaccine’s “unknown side effects.”Some medical personnel, however, are reversing their hesitancy. One medical director told AP that “the biggest thing that helped us to gain confidence in our staff was watching other staff members get vaccinated, be OK, walk out of the room, you know, not grow a third ear, and so that really is like an avalanche,” causing staff members to rethink how they view the inoculations.People line up to enter a grocery store before an impending lockdown due to an outbreak of the coronavirus disease in Brisbane, Australia, Jan. 8, 2021.Using cautionSome countries are also taking a wait-and-see attitude toward vaccines. The British newspaper The Guardian said Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Japan and South Korea were among the countries that had decided to see what is happening in the rest of the world with the inoculations.Jennifer Martin, an Australian physician who is also on the advisory committee of the sole purchaser for pharmaceuticals in New Zealand, said, “Why would you put people at risk when if you wait a bit longer, you can get more information?”The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Friday urged the manufacturers of COVID-19 vaccines and the wealthier countries to make them available to poorer countries. He said most of the 42 countries rolling out coronavirus vaccines were high-income nations and a few were middle-income countries.Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has banned imports of COVID-19 vaccines from America’s Pfizer-BioNTech and Britain’s AstraZeneca, citing a mistrust of Western countries.“I really do not trust them,” Khamenei said Friday in a televised speech. “Sometimes they seek to try out their vaccines on other nations to see if it works or not,” he said. “I am not optimistic [about] France, either.”Khamenei said he continued to allow the import of vaccines from other “safe” places and still supported his country’s efforts to produce its own vaccine.Iran began human trials with its vaccines in December and officials hope they will be available in the country in a few months.Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz gets a dose of a coronavirus disease vaccine in Neom, Saudi Arabia, Jan. 8, 2021.Saudi king vaccinatedIn Saudi Arabia, the country’s 82-year-old monarch, King Salman, received a coronavirus vaccination, according to video published by state media Friday. Saudi health officials recorded just 97 new cases of the virus Friday and four deaths as infections in the country continued to decline.Israel’s health ministry said Saturday that four people had tested positive for the novel coronavirus strain first detected in South Africa. The British variant had already been reported in the country.Health experts say both strains are potentially more infectious than other variants.Persistently high caseloads forced Israel to tighten lockdown measures Friday after imposing a nationwide lockdown last month.Under Israel’s national vaccination program, 70% of its population older than 60 received initial vaccinations. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday that he’d reached an agreement with Pfizer-BioNTech to provide enough vaccine to have all citizens older than 16 be vaccinated by the end of March.India said Saturday that it had recorded 18,222 new COVID cases in the past 24 hours. The health ministry also said it had recorded 90 cases of the British variant of the virus.
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The desperately awaited vaccination drive against the coronavirus in the U.S. is running into resistance from an unlikely quarter: Surprising numbers of health care workers who have seen firsthand the death and misery inflicted by COVID-19 are refusing shots.It is happening in nursing homes and, to a lesser degree, in hospitals, with employees expressing what experts say are unfounded fears of side effects from vaccines that were developed at record speed. More than three weeks into the campaign, some places are seeing as much as 80% of the staff holding back.“I don’t think anyone wants to be a guinea pig,” said Dr. Stephen Noble, a 42-year-old cardiothoracic surgeon in Portland, Oregon, who is postponing getting vaccinated. “At the end of the day, as a man of science, I just want to see what the data show. And give me the full data.”Alarmed by the phenomenon, some administrators have dangled everything from free breakfasts at Waffle House to a raffle for a car to get employees to roll up their sleeves.Some states have threatened to let other people cut ahead of health care workers in the line for shots.“It’s far too low. It’s alarmingly low,” said Neil Pruitt, CEO of PruittHealth, which runs about 100 long-term care homes in the South, where fewer than 3 in 10 workers offered the vaccine so far have accepted it.Workers at Queen Anne Healthcare, a skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility in Seattle, Washington, wait in a hallway to receive shots of the Pfizer vaccination for COVID-19, Jan. 8, 2021.Many medical facilities from Florida to Washington state have boasted of near-universal acceptance of the shots, and workers have proudly plastered pictures of themselves on social media receiving the vaccine. Elsewhere, though, the drive has stumbled.While the federal government has released no data on how many people offered the vaccines have taken them, glimpses of resistance have emerged around the country.In Illinois, a big divide has opened at state-run veterans homes between residents and staff. The discrepancy was worst at the veterans home in Manteno, where 90% of residents were vaccinated but only 18% of the staff members.In rural Ashland, Alabama, about 90 of some 200 workers at Clay County Hospital have yet to agree to get vaccinated, even with the place so overrun with COVID-19 patients that oxygen is running low and beds have been added to the intensive care unit, divided by plastic sheeting.The pushback comes amid the most lethal phase in the outbreak yet, with the death toll at more than 350,000, and it could hinder the government’s effort to vaccinate somewhere between 70% and 85% of the U.S. population to achieve “herd immunity.”Administrators and public health officials have expressed hope that more health workers will opt to be vaccinated as they see their colleagues take the shots without problems.Oregon doctor Noble said he will wait until April or May to get the shots. He said it is vital for public health authorities not to overstate what they know about the vaccines.That is particularly important, he said, for Black people like him who are distrustful of government medical guidance because of past failures and abuses, such as the infamous Tuskegee experiment, in which medical treatment was withheld from Black syphilis patients in the U.S. so that researchers could track the progression of the disease.Medical journals have published extensive data on the vaccines, and the Food and Drug Administration has made its analysis public. But misinformation about the shots has spread wildly online, including falsehoods that they cause fertility problems.A worker at Queen Anne Healthcare, a skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility in Seattle, Washington, wears a celebratory sticker after receiving the Pfizer vaccination for COVID-19, Jan. 8, 2021.Stormy Tatom, 30, a hospital ICU nurse in Beaumont, Texas, said she decided against getting vaccinated for now “because of the unknown long-term side effects.”“I would say at least half of my coworkers feel the same way,” Tatom said.There have been no signs of widespread severe side effects from the vaccines, and scientists say the drugs have been rigorously tested on tens of thousands and vetted by independent experts.States have begun turning up the pressure. South Carolina’s governor gave health care workers until Jan. 15 to get a shot or “move to the back of the line.” Georgia’s top health official has allowed some vaccines to be diverted to other front-line workers, including firefighters and police, out of frustration with the slow uptake.“There’s vaccine available but it’s literally sitting in freezers,” said Public Health Commissioner Dr. Kathleen Toomey. “That’s unacceptable. We have lives to save.”Nursing homes were among the institutions given priority for the shots because the virus has cut a terrible swath through them. Long-term care residents and staff account for about 38% of the nation’s COVID-19 fatalities.In West Virginia, only about 55% of nursing home workers agreed to the shots when they were first offered last month, according to Martin Wright, who leads the West Virginia Health Care Association.“It’s a race against social media,” Wright said of battling falsehoods about the vaccines.Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine said only 40% of the state’s nursing home workers have gotten shots. North Carolina’s top public health official estimated more than half were refusing the vaccine there.SavaSeniorCare has offered cash to the 169 long-term care homes in its 20-state network to pay for gift cards, socially distanced parties or other incentives. But so far, data from about a third of its homes shows that 55% of workers have refused the vaccine.Chain pharmacies CVS and Walgreens, which have been contracted by a majority of U.S. nursing homes to administer COVID-19 vaccinations, have not released specifics on the acceptance rate. CVS said that residents have agreed to be immunized at an “encouragingly high” rate but that “initial uptake among staff is low,” partly because of efforts to stagger when employees receive their shots.Some facilities have vaccinated workers in stages so that the staff is not sidelined all at once if they suffer minor side effects, which can include fever and aches.The hesitation isn’t surprising, given the mixed message from political leaders and misinformation online, said Dr. Wilbur Chen, a professor at the University of Maryland who specializes in the science of vaccines.He noted that health care workers represent a broad range of jobs and backgrounds and said they are not necessarily more informed than the general public.“They don’t know what to believe either,” Chen said. But he said he expects the hesitancy to subside as more people are vaccinated and public health officials get their message across.Some places have already seen turnarounds, such as Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.“The biggest thing that helped us to gain confidence in our staff was watching other staff members get vaccinated, be OK, walk out of the room, you know, not grow a third ear, and so that really is like an avalanche,” said Dr. Catherine O’Neal, chief medical officer.“The first few hundred that we had created another 300 that wanted the vaccine.”
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The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Saturday that there are nearly 90 million global COVID-19 cases.The United States has more cases than anyplace else with almost 22 million infections. India comes in second with about half the infections of the U.S. — nearly 10.5 million cases.The U.S. reported more than 300,000 new COVID-19 cases Friday, a record-breaking number.With the virus surging in some U.S. states, President-elect Joe Biden says he believes in the rapid release of the COVID-19 vaccines so whoever wants it will have access to it. The second dose of the vaccine is given weeks later.Infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci said earlier this week he is hopeful that when Biden is in office, the U.S. will be able to deliver to the U.S. public “1 million vaccinations per day, as the president-elect has mentioned.”A surprising development, however, has emerged in some implausible locations. The Associated Press reports that some health care workers in hospitals and nursing homes are hesitant about being vaccinated. The AP said its investigation uncovered that in some places as much as 80% of the medical staff has declined the vaccinations.One doctor told the wire service he wanted to wait a few months to “see what the data show.” He said, “I don’t think anyone wants to be a guinea pig.”A nurse said she was delaying her vaccination because of the vaccine’s “unknown side effects.”A pedestrian wearing a face mask as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus walks through a road in New Delhi on Jan. 9, 2021.Some medical personnel, however, are reversing their hesitancy. One medical director told AP that “The biggest thing that helped us to gain confidence in our staff was watching other staff members get vaccinated, be OK, walk out of the room, you know, not grow a third ear, and so that really is like an avalanche,” causing staff members to rethink how they view the inoculations.Some countries are also taking a wait-and-see attitude when it comes to vaccines. The British newspaper The Guardian reported that Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Japan and South Korea are among the countries that have decided to see what is happening in the rest of the world with the inoculations.Jennifer Martin, an Australian physician who is also on the advisory committee of the sole purchaser for pharmaceuticals in New Zealand, said, “Why would you put people at risk when if you wait a bit longer, you can get more information?”The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Friday urged the manufacturers of COVID-19 vaccines and the wealthier countries to make them available to poorer countries. He said of the 42 countries that are rolling out coronavirus vaccines, most of them are high-income nations and a few are middle-income countries.Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has banned imports of COVID-19 vaccines from America’s Pfizer-BioNTech and Britain’s AstraZeneca, citing a mistrust of Western countries.“I really do not trust them,” Khamenei said Friday in a televised speech. “Sometimes they seek to try out their vaccines on other nations to see if it works or not,” he said. “I am not optimistic [about] France, either.”Khamenei said he continues to allow the import of vaccines from other “safe” places and still supports his country’s efforts to produce its own vaccine.Iran began human trials with its vaccines in December and officials hope they will be available in the country in a few months.In Saudi Arabia, the country’s 82-year-old monarch, King Salman, received the coronavirus vaccination, according to video published by state media Friday. Saudi health officials recorded just 97 new cases of the virus Friday and four deaths as infections in the country continue to decline.India said Saturday it has recorded 18,222 new COVID cases in the past 24 hours. The health ministry also said it has now recorded 90 cases of the British variant of the virus.
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A nightly gathering of thousands of birds called a “murmuration” has captured the attention of entertainment-starved people in Northern California. Matt Dibble has a look.
Camera: Matt Dibble                   Producer: Matt Dibble
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