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Virus Deaths Rising in 30 States 01/19 06:08
NEW YORK (AP) -- Coronavirus deaths are rising in nearly two-thirds of
American states as a winter surge pushes the overall toll toward 400,000 amid
warnings that a new, highly contagious variant is taking hold.
As Americans observed a national holiday Monday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo
pleaded with federal authorities to curtail travel from countries where new
variants are spreading.
Referring to new versions detected in Britain, South Africa and Brazil,
Cuomo said: "Stop those people from coming here.... Why are you allowing people
to fly into this country and then it's too late?"
The U.S. government has already curbed travel from some of the places where
the new variants are spreading --- such as Britain and Brazil --- and recently
it announced that it would require proof of a negative COVID-19 test for anyone
flying into the country.
But the new variant seen in Britain is already spreading in the U.S., and
the Centers for Disease Control and Protection has warned that it will probably
become the dominant version in the country by March. The CDC said the variant
is about 50% more contagious than the virus that is causing the bulk of cases
in the U.S.
While the variant does not cause more severe illness, it can cause more
hospitalizations and deaths simply because it spreads more easily. In Britain,
it has aggravated a severe outbreak that has swamped hospitals, and it has been
blamed for sharp leaps in cases in some other European countries.
As things stand, many U.S. states are already under tremendous strain. The
seven-day rolling average of daily deaths is rising in 30 states and the
District of Columbia, and on Monday the U.S. death toll surpassed 398,000,
according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University --- by far the highest
recorded death toll of any country in the world.
Ellie Murray, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Boston
University School of Public Health, said cases have proliferated in part
because of gatherings for Christmas and New Year --- and compounded previous
surges from Thanksgiving and the return of students to schools and universities
in the fall.
The pace of any further spread will depend on whether those who did gather
with family and friends quarantined afterward or went back to school or work in
person, she said.
One of the states hardest hit during the recent surge is Arizona, where the
rolling average has risen over the past two weeks from about 90 deaths per day
to about 160 per day on Jan. 17.
"It's kind of hard to imagine it getting a lot faster than it is right now,
because it is transmitting really fast right now," said Dr. Joshua LaBaer,
director of the Biodesign Institute research center at Arizona State
University. "But there is some evidence that Thanksgiving didn't help things."
Rural Yuma County --- known as the winter lettuce capital of the U.S. --- is
now one of the state's hot spots. Exhausted nurses there are now regularly
sending COVID-19 patients on a long helicopter ride to hospitals in Phoenix
when they don't have enough staff. The county has lagged on coronavirus testing
in heavily Hispanic neighborhoods and just ran out of vaccines.
But some support is coming from military nurses and a new wave of free tests
for farmworkers and the elderly in Yuma County.
Amid the rise in cases, a vast effort is underway to get Americans
vaccinated --- what Cuomo called "a footrace" between the vaccination rate and
the infection rate. But the campaign is off to an uneven start. According to
the latest federal data, about 31.2 million doses of vaccine have been
distributed, but only about 10.6 million people have received at least one dose.
In some cases, vaccine supplies thus far do not meet demand. More than
172,000 people in Missouri's St. Louis County have registered for the vaccine,
but the local health department so far has only received 975 doses, said County
Executive Sam Page.
In California, the most populous state, counties are pleading for more
vaccine as the state tries to reduce a high rate of infection that has led to
record numbers of hospitalizations and deaths.
Although the state last week said anyone age 65 and older can start
receiving the vaccine, Los Angeles County and some others have said they don't
have enough to immunize so many people. They are concentrating on protecting
health care workers and the most vulnerable elderly in care homes first.
On Monday, the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District
sent a letter asking for state and county authorization to provide vaccinations
at schools for staff, local community members --- and for students once a
vaccine for children has been approved.
The death rate from COVID-19 in Los Angeles County --- an epicenter of the
U.S. pandemic --- works out to about one person every six minutes. On Sunday,
the South Coast Air Quality Management District suspended some
pollution-control limits on the number of cremations for at least 10 days in
order to deal with a backlog of bodies at hospitals and funeral homes.
In other areas of the country, officials are working to ensure that people
take the vaccine once they're offered it amid concerns that many people are
hesitant. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, in a livestreamed event on Martin Luther
King Jr. Day, received a shot, and urged other Marylanders to do likewise.
"We're all looking forward to the day we can take off and throw away our
masks," Hogan said. "The only way we are going to return to a sense of normalcy
is by these COVID-19 vaccines."
But challenges to the vaccine campaign are surfacing worldwide.
The World Health Organization chief on Monday lambasted drugmakers' profits
and vaccine inequalities, saying it's "not right" that younger, healthier
adults in some wealthy countries get vaccinated against COVID-19 before older
people or health care workers in poorer countries.
Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus lamented that one country
received a mere 25 doses while over 39 million doses have been administered in
nearly 50 richer nations.
"Just 25 doses have been given in one lowest income country --- not 25
million, not 25,000 --- just 25. I need to be blunt: The world is on the brink
of a catastrophic moral failure," Tedros said. He did not specify the country,
but a WHO spokeswoman identified it as Guinea.
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