Month: January 2021

The U.S. continues its run at the top of the list as the country with the most COVID-19 infections, the disease caused by the coronavirus.  Early Sunday, the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported the U.S. has 20.4 million of the world’s 84.3 million COVID infections.  India, the country with the second-largest number of cases has about half as many cases as the U.S. with 10.3 million.  Public health officials warn, however, that India’s caseload may be undercounted. The U.S. has recorded more than 350,000 deaths related to the coronavirus. Funeral homes across the country are finding it difficult to keep up with the demand for their services.   A surge of cases in the coming weeks is expected, following the holiday season, public health officials say. The CDC Data Tracker says more…

The news came during a hopeful time on the largest Native American reservation.Daily coronavirus cases were in the single digits, down from a springtime peak of 238 that made the Navajo Nation a U.S. hot spot. The tribe, wanting to ensure a COVID-19 vaccine would be effective for its people, said it would welcome Pfizer clinical trials on its reservation spanning Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.Right away, tribal members accused their government of allowing them to be guinea pigs, pointing to painful times in the past when Native Americans didn’t consent to medical testing or weren’t fully informed about procedures.A Navajo Nation review board gave the study quicker approval than normal after researchers with Johns Hopkins University’s Center for American Indian Health made the case for diversity. Without Native volunteers,…

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 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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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 -…

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…

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…