[ad_1]
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday released research into the spread of the delta variant of COVID-19 that informed its decision earlier this week to recommend that even vaccinated people resume wearing face masks in public places in areas with high transmission rates.
The research is based on a recent investigation into a coronavirus outbreak in Provincetown, Barnstable County, Massachusetts, involving 469 cases of COVID-19. Of those, 346, or 74%, occurred in fully vaccinated individuals, while testing identified the delta variant as dominant.
He described several large public gatherings that brought people from across the United States to Barnstable County in Massachusetts from July 3 to 17. People started testing positive for COVID-19 around July 6, and many cited frequenting crowded indoor and outdoor bars, restaurants and eateries. houses. Four of the five people hospitalized in this epidemic have been vaccinated. Nobody died.
CDC chief Dr Rochelle Walensky said earlier this week that the agency had seen data which revealed that fully vaccinated people who are infected have the same viral load as unvaccinated people and can also infect other people.
“High viral loads suggest an increased risk of transmission and have raised concerns that, unlike other variants, vaccinated people infected with Delta could transmit the virus,” Walensky said in a separate statement Friday. “This finding is concerning and was a crucial finding leading to the CDC’s updated mask recommendation.”
To see: CDC chief hits the airwaves to sell change on face masks, as delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 spreads to 132 countries
Separately, an internal CDC document says health officials must “recognize that the war has changed,” with the delta spreading rapidly to the United States and the rest of the world, according to the Washington Post, which obtained a copy. .
Read: As COVID-19 cases increase and concerns about breakthrough infections increase, masks are returning and anxiety sets in
Robert Wachter, president of the Department of Medicine at the University of California at San Francisco, said on Twitter that some information was already known, but others were new and concerning.
Read: Pfizer says immunity drops to 83% in four months among people who have received its COVID-19 vaccine, further strengthening the company’s case for a recall
As Watchter explained, the document shows data estimating an R0 of 5-9 for the delta strain, compared to 2-3 for the original SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. The R number measures how COVID-19 or any other disease can spread and represents how many people a sick person can transmit the disease to, on average.
“We estimated the R0 to be ~ 6 for the delta, which is ~ 2 times more infectious than the original. Maybe it’s a little worse than that, “he said. The delta variant is” more transmissible “than MERS, SARS, Ebola, colds, seasonal flu and smallpox, and contracts as easily as chickenpox, according to the document.
Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
The document recognizes that vaccine discovery cases “may reduce public confidence in vaccines” and pose communication challenges for public health officials. Of these, “the public is convinced that vaccines no longer work / booster doses are no longer needed,” so officials should “update communications describing breakthrough cases as” rare “or as a” small percentage “of cases”.
One slide estimates 35,000 symptomatic infections per week among 162 million vaccinated Americans, although it finds a much higher risk of illness, hospitalization, and death among those unvaccinated.
The delta variant is increasing the number of cases in all 50 states and has created crisis conditions in states with low vaccination rates.
The AP has a tragic report of a family in Osage Beach, Missouri, in which 10 members have fallen ill and a 31-year-old father is fighting for his life in intensive care. The family refused to be vaccinated because “we are a strong and conservative family,” the father told the AP, apparently due to labored breathing.
See also: Biden urges state and local governments to pay newly vaccinated people $ 100 each
The CDC’s vaccine tracker shows that nearly 164 million Americans are fully vaccinated, or 49.4% of the overall population, a number that has barely budged in weeks. This means that they received two injections of the vaccines developed by Pfizer PFE,
with the German partner BioNTech BNTX,
or Moderna mRNA,
or a photo of Johnson & Johnson’s JNJ,
single dose regimen. AstraZeneca AZN,
AZN,
the vaccine that has been widely used in the UK and other places has not been licensed in the US
Of adults 18 and older, 60.3% are fully immunized and 69.4% have received at least one dose, still below President Joe Biden’s target of having 70% of the adult population get at least one dose by the July 4th vacation.
Elsewhere, the city of Nanjing in eastern China reported 13 new locally transmitted COVID-19 patients on Thursday, bringing the total to 184 since July 20, as the country’s last major outbreak caused by the Delta variant continues, Reuters reported. Thousands of Chinese are confined to fight the spread.
China is facing its most widespread Covid-19 outbreak in months with more than 200 cases linked to the city of Nanjing. Authorities have maintained strict border controls and stepped up vaccination campaigns, but the Delta variant calls into question their response to the pandemic. Photo credit: Alex Plavevski / Shutterstock
Japan has extended its state of emergency to four new areas above Tokyo, the AP reported. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga declared a state of emergency in Saitama, Kanagawa and Chiba, near Tokyo, as well as in the western city of Osaka, from Monday until August 31. Emergency measures already in place in Tokyo and the southern island of Okinawa will be extended until the end of August, after the Olympics and well before the Paralympics, which begin on August 24.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has set an ambitious goal of reopening the borders, which will only take place when 80% of the population is fully immunized, AFP reported. It comes a day after Sydney officials called on the military to help enforce a lockdown as the country’s largest city struggles to contain a worsening epidemic.
The Czech government has approved a measure to give officials two extra days of vacation if they get vaccinated, also from Reuters. The European Union country of 10.7 million people reported 10.19 million doses of the vaccine given on Thursday, with 4.74 million people fully vaccinated.
See now: As CDC overturns mask policy, Apple, Costco, Walmart and more have some soul searching to do
Related: Restaurants tell customers “No vax, no service” as delta variant spreads
Latest statements
The global coronavirus-borne disease tally topped 196.7 million on Friday, while the death toll topped 4.2 million, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University.
Data shows that 4 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered worldwide. Research from Duke University suggests that at least 11 billion doses are needed to achieve herd immunity across the world.
The United States leads the world with a total of 34.8 million cases and deaths with 612,135.
India is second by cases with 31.6 million and third by deaths with 423,217 according to its official figures, which should be underestimated.
Brazil is second in deaths with 554,497 but third in cases with 19.8 million. Mexico has the fourth highest death toll with 239,997 but has recorded just 2.8 million cases, according to its official figures.
In Europe, Russia continues to lead the UK with 155,180 deaths, while the UK has suffered 129,809, making Russia the country with the fifth highest death toll in the world and the highest from Europe.
China, where the virus was first discovered in late 2019, has recorded 104,922 confirmed cases and 4,848 deaths, according to its official figures, which are widely considered massively underreported.
[ad_2]
Source link