At Least 400 Million People Have Had Covid Now
In a sign of how quickly the pandemic is moving, the number of total cases was 300 million just one month ago, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. Meanwhile, there are more deaths in the U.S. caused by covid than ever before in the pandemic, despite the milder infections of omicron.
The New York Times:
The World Surpasses 400 Million Known Coronavirus Cases And Confronts How To Live With Covid
The world surpassed 400 million known coronavirus cases on Tuesday, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, just one month after reaching 300 million. It is a staggering increase driven by the highly transmissible Omicron variant as governments and individuals worldwide wrestle with how to confront the next stage of the pandemic. (Astor, 2/9)
USA Today:
COVID: US Cases, Deaths Compared To Other Countries Amid Omicron
Although the omicron variant of the coronavirus appears less likely to cause severe disease compared to previous dominating strains, the U.S. is still experiencing more COVID-19 death than at any other point in the pandemic. The country surpassed 900,000 deaths over the weekend and may reach a million by April, according to a USA TODAY analysis of Johns Hopkins data, with about 2,400 deaths reported each day. Omicron’s increased transmissibility may be partly to blame for a rise in COVID deaths, health experts say, but data showing the U.S. case fatality rate is one of the highest in the world suggests there’s more to the story. (Rodriguez, 2/9)
CNBC:
WHO Says New Omicron BA.2 Subvariant Will Rise Globally
The World Health Organization expects a more transmissible version of omicron to increase in circulation around the world, though it’s not yet clear if the subvariant can reinfect people who caught an earlier version of the omicron strain. Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s Covid-19 technical lead, said Tuesday the global health agency is tracking four different versions of omicron. Van Kerkhove said the BA.2 subvariant, which is more contagious than the currently dominant BA.1 version, will likely become more common. (Kimball, 2/8)
The Washington Post:
The CDC’s Do-Not-Travel List Now Encompasses More Than Half The World’s Destinations
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has moved seven more countries to its highest-risk category for travel — a list that has grown to include 134 destinations, with many added since the World Health Organization declared omicron a “variant of concern” on Nov. 26. The CDC on Monday gave the Democratic Republic of Congo, Oman, Libya, Japan, Israel, Cuba and Armenia a “Level 4″ warning, which means it is recommending that Americans avoid traveling there, even if vaccinated. (Timsit, 2/8)
In other covid news from around the globe —
AP:
Sweden Ends COVID-19 Testing As Pandemic Restrictions Lifted
Sweden has halted wide-scale testing for COVID-19 even among people showing symptoms of an infection, putting an end to the mobile city-square tent sites, drive-in swab centers and home-delivered tests that became ubiquitous during the pandemic and provided essential data for tracking its spread. The move puts the Scandinavian nation at odds with most of Europe, but some experts say it could become the norm as costly testing yields fewer benefits with the easily transmissible but milder omicron variant and as governments begin to consider treating COVID-19 like they do other endemic illnesses. (Keyton, 2/9)
The New York Times:
Denmark, Overflowing With Virus Cases, Embraces a ‘Bring It On’ Attitude
Aboard a ferry heading to Denmark’s second-largest city on Friday, Allan Hjorth stood out. He was one of just a few passengers to wear a mask, while hundreds of others left their faces uncovered, enjoying the end of Covid-19 restrictions announced a few days earlier. “The mere fact of wearing a mask makes people feel that something is wrong,” Mr. Hjorth said. He took his own off after a few seconds, and added, “And we, in Denmark, want to believe that we are going back to normal.” (Peltier, 2/8)
Bloomberg:
Chinese City Turns Traffic Lights Red To Prevent Covid Omicron Spread
An omicron outbreak in southern China led officials to switch traffic lights to red in several counties, as local governments strive to limit people’s movements to meet Beijing’s strategy of eliminating Covid-19 despite the virus’s growing infectiousness. A sudden Covid-19 resurgence in the southwestern province of Guangxi during the recent Lunar New Year Holiday prompted a snap lockdown on Monday of Baise, a city of 3.6 million bordering Vietnam, after nearly 100 infections were detected. Soon after, local authorities in five sub-districts in the city turned the lights red to reinforce the stay-at-home order, though it granted exceptions for essential travel related to medical care, deliveries and the Covid response. (2/9)
Bloomberg:
WHO Asks Richer Countries To Pay $16 Billion For Pandemic Plan
The World Health Organization is calling on wealthier nations to donate $16 billion to a program aimed at providing access to Covid-19 vaccines, treatments and tests in low- and middle-income countries. Under the WHO proposal, higher-income nations would donate in proportion to their contribution to world trade, while middle-income countries would need to self-finance $6.5 billion additional costs, the United Nations agency said Wednesday. The organization’s financing plan came after a muted response to its appeal in October to raise $23.4 billion for the ACT-Accelerator plan. Of the $16 billion requested to fund the main program, the WHO raised only $800 million. (Mulier, 2/9)
AP:
COVID-19 Protests Threaten Border Trade Between Canada, US
Canadian lawmakers expressed increasing worry Tuesday about the economic effects of disruptive demonstrations after the busiest border crossing between the U.S. and Canada became partially blocked by truckers protesting vaccine mandates and other COVID-19 restrictions. The blockade at the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, prevented traffic from entering Canada while some U.S.-bound traffic was still moving, Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino said, calling the bridge “one of the most important border crossings in the world." It carries 25% of all trade between Canada and the United States. (Gillies and Lindeman, 2/8)
Also —
The Washington Post:
Canadian Doctors Can Now Prescribe National Park Passes To Patients
A trip to the doctor can yield any number of recommendations, including bed rest and medicine. But as of late January, Canadian patients can be sent home with a more novel note: a prescription for a national parks pass. “There’s almost no medical condition that nature doesn’t make better,” said Melissa Lem, a family physician and director of the PaRx initiative, which partnered with Parks Canada to help distribute the initial batch of 100 passes. While similar programs elsewhere have offered regional or local park visits, Lem says this is the first such initiative with a national annual pass. (Root, 2/7)
