Category: Covid-19

BERLIN, Sept 17 (Reuters) - The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics will have tight COVID-19 countermeasures in place to ensure the safety of all participants, the International Olympic Committee said on Friday.

Just over a month after the closing ceremony of the Tokyo 2020 Games, IOC President Thomas Bach said in an open letter that next year's Winter Games would also require strict measures amid the ongoing pandemic.

"While the pandemic is far from over, I would like to reassure you that together with our Chinese partners and friends, we are sparing no effort to make these Olympic Winter Games safe and secure for everyone," Bach said.

The Beijing Winter Olympics will be held from Feb. 4-20.

"As we did in Tokyo, we are putting in place rigorous COVID-19 countermeasures to ensure the health and safety of all Olympic participants in Beijing," the IOC president said, urging teams to get vaccinated and offering support in this process.

The vast majority of athletes and participants at the Tokyo Olympics were vaccinated.

Athletes were confined to the venues and the athletes' village while other stakeholders were also monitored in their movements, as polls had showed the majority of Japanese wanted the Games postponed or cancelled for fear of becoming a superspreader event.

The Tokyo Games had been delayed by a year and were eventually held in a state of emergency and without spectators or international visitors as Japan struggled with rising cases.

"The excellent cooperation that we are enjoying with our Chinese partners and friends, as well as the relevant Chinese health authorities, gives us all great confidence that we will again have safe and secure Olympic Games," Bach said.

Beijing will become the first city to host both Winter and Summer Olympics, after staging the 2008 Summer edition.

Reporting by Karolos GrohmannEditing by Toby Davis

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Beijing 2022 Games to have rigorous COVID-19 measures-IOC - Reuters

Just as children return to classrooms, our country, unfortunately, finds itself in the midst of a COVID-19 resurgence that is heightening anxiety and leading many school communities to revisit their health and safety plans. As they do, it is essential that school leaders, teachers, and families are equipped with accurate information on the risk to themselves and their children.

It is easy to panic upon hearing of a teenager who suddenly died from COVID-19, or of an intensive care unit caring for multiple COVID-infected children on ventilators. But overreactions to these rare events can lead to interventions that might only divide communities further. What is needed now is transparency on what the data on children and COVID-19 are showing. That story is more reassuring.

It is true that with more than 65% of adults in the U.S. fully vaccinated, a greater number of children are becoming infected during this resurgence than before. However, this should not be surprising as children were out and about more this summer than last, often without masks, and are now attending after-school activities, participating in larger gatherings, and traveling more with their families. Were also facing a delta variant that is more contagious, a challenge compounded by stalled vaccination efforts across the country.

READ MORE: Many teens struggle with COVID-19 anxiety and depression. Which therapy is best? | Expert Opinion

Still, it is important to understand that while pediatric COVID-19 cases are numerically increasing, the disease has not become more serious in children. While more children have been hospitalized in this wave than prior ones, the overall numbers nationwide remain low. While nearly 100,000 adults in the U.S. are currently hospitalized for COVID-19, the pediatric hospital census (patient count) has remained near 1,500 children. The American Academy of Pediatrics weekly report from Sept. 2 on COVID-19 and children notes that the proportion of children hospitalized among all those infected remains at 0.9%, unchanged over the last year.

Given the uneven uptake of vaccines nationwide, it isnt surprising that most of these pediatric hospitalizations (nearly 70%) have been in the South. Just two states, Florida and Texas, accounted for nearly 30% of all children hospitalized last week, where the pediatric census reached 175 and 260 children, respectively. Areas throughout Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Tennessee have some of the lowest vaccination rates and have also been beset with similarly increasing pediatric hospitalizations, but at lower absolute numbers given these states smaller populations.

There is also a growing narrative that childrens hospitals are experiencing capacity constraints. This has been true for some childrens hospitals in the South, particularly those that provide care for large regions, but for most childrens hospitals in the country, current capacity constraints are not driven by COVID-19.

Non-COVID-19 viral illnesses are rapidly reemerging among children as they increasingly mingle. Furthermore, more youth are coming to childrens hospitals with psychiatric emergencies, signs that the youth behavioral health crisis that began before the pandemic has been exacerbated by the prolonged social isolation children have had to endure.

READ MORE: Philly parent: Schools need more input from families when making critical decisions | Opinion

The risk of hospitalization from COVID-related complications is high enough for us to strongly recommend that families immunize their older children and that we move as quickly as possible to approve vaccines for children under 12 years of age. But it is not sufficient to alter guidance to families about risk to their children.

While we tend to focus on school safety plans as the primary way to protect children against COVID-19 transmission, the best intervention is to surround them with vaccinated adults and ensure every adult they might encounter is also vaccinated. Texas where, per data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, only 57% of adults were fully vaccinated by mid-August during the height of the summer resurgence has seen some of the highest numbers of children hospitalized. Approximately 10% of all U.S. children live in Texas, yet more than 20% of all hospitalized children were in Texas hospital beds last week. In contrast, California where 67% of adults were fully vaccinated by mid-August and 12% of the countrys children live saw a peak census of only 8% of all children nationally. In our own area, Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia did not surpass a census of 10 children with COVID-19 throughout July and August, part of a broader Northeastern trend where hospital census has plateaued at 70 children in the entire region during the last two weeks before Labor Day.

During this uncertain time, scary anecdotes can do more harm than good. A more data-driven assessment of the COVID-19 risk to children as they return to school can better guide communities toward practical local solutions for navigating this year.

It is critically important that communities make their decisions locally with unbiased, tempered information on the true risk, alongside a frank discussion about those interventions namely adult vaccination that can best protect children outside of school walls.

David Rubin is the director of PolicyLab at Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Susan Coffin is a faculty member at PolicyLab and a professor in the division of infectious diseases at CHOP.

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Fear is our worst enemy when it comes to COVID-19 and children | Opinion - The Philadelphia Inquirer

BRIDGEWATER (CBS) In its weekly report of COVID-19 data, Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education revealed that 1,230 Massachusetts kids had tested positive for COVID-19 in just three days time, from September 13 through September 15.

That represents only about 0.13 percent of the student population, most of which isnt eligible to be vaccinated yet.

I think this really needs to be a warning to many that were not back to business as usual, Dr. Mark Siedner, epidemiologist at Mass General told WBZ. I think this really does reinforce that mask mandates in school are going to be necessary until this wave is behind us or kids can be vaccinated.

Different school districts are finding ways to combat small outbreaks. In Bridgewater, 13 kids and two staff members tested positive in one fourth grade classroom at the Williams Intermediate School.

The entire class is now quarantined.

In an email to parents, the Superintendent wrote, [We] believe this cluster is only related to this classroom, however, we will continue to monitor this situation and work closely with local and state officials.

Parents of fourth graders who are not quarantined are concerned. I dont understand, Amy Harding of Bridgewater told WBZ. They all eat in the same cafeteria, like I dont know how its just that one classroom.

In addition to the 1,230 kids who tested positive for COVID-19 in the three-day span, 190 staff members statewide did, too, representing about 0.14 percent of the population.

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More Than 1,200 Mass. Kids Test Positive For COVID-19 This Week - CBS Boston

The West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR) reports as of September 16, 2021, there have been 3,644,765 total confirmatory laboratory results received for COVID-19, with 217,119 total cases and 3,313 deaths.

DHHR has confirmed the deaths of a 53-year old female from Mercer County, an 84-year old male from Wood County, a 65-year old male from Wood County, a 52-year old male from Ritchie County, a 79-year old female from Raleigh County, a 91-year old female from Preston County, a 56-year old female from Wetzel County, a 70-year old male from Kanawha County, a 52-year old male from Kanawha County, a 45-year old male from Greenbrier County, an 89-year old male from Wetzel County, a 77-year old male from Marion County, a 67-year old female from Preston County, a 46-year old male from Kanawha County, an 89-year old female from Raleigh County, a 33-year old female from Kanawha County, and a 56-year old female from Harrison County.

We are thankful for all the healthcare workers who are treating West Virginians battling COVID-19 and send our sympathies to these families, said Bill J. Crouch, DHHR Cabinet Secretary. I urge everyone to get vaccinated to prevent further loss of life.

CASES PER COUNTY: Barbour (2,217), Berkeley (15,581), Boone (2,840), Braxton (1,574), Brooke (2,675), Cabell (12,343), Calhoun (741), Clay (953), Doddridge (918), Fayette (4,831), Gilmer (1,106), Grant (1,727), Greenbrier (3,992), Hampshire (2,500), Hancock (3,370), Hardy (2,026), Harrison (8,205), Jackson (2,961), Jefferson (5,765), Kanawha (20,112), Lewis (2,187), Lincoln (2,187), Logan (4,422), Marion (6,035), Marshall (4,528), Mason (2,930), McDowell (2,223), Mercer (6,959), Mineral (3,763), Mingo (3,722), Monongalia (11,012), Monroe (1,792), Morgan (1,653), Nicholas (2,751), Ohio (5,297), Pendleton (966), Pleasants (1,193), Pocahontas (919), Preston (3,800), Putnam (7,062), Raleigh (9,388), Randolph (4,239), Ritchie (1,112), Roane (1,034), Summers (1,150), Taylor (1,747), Tucker (819), Tyler (1,119), Upshur (3,228), Wayne (4,404), Webster (851), Wetzel (2,055), Wirt (637), Wood (10,556), Wyoming (2,942).

Delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from the local health department to DHHR. As case surveillance continues at the local health department level, it may reveal that those tested in a certain county may not be a resident of that county, or even the state as an individual in question may have crossed the state border to be tested. Please visit http://www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more detailed information.

West Virginians 12 years and older are eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine. To learn more about the vaccine, or to find a vaccine site near you, visit vaccinate.wv.gov or call 1-833-734-0965. West Virginians ages 12 and older who have had at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine can register for the second Do it for Babydog: Save a life, Change your life vaccine sweepstakes by visiting doitforbabydog.wv.gov.

Free pop-up COVID-19 testing is available today in Barbour, Berkeley, Boone, Cabell, Doddridge, Fayette, Greenbrier, Hampshire, Hancock, Hardy, Jefferson, Lincoln, Logan, Mineral, Mingo, Monongalia, Monroe, Ohio, Pendleton, Preston, Randolph, Taylor, Tyler/Wetzel, and Wood counties.

Barbour County

9:00 AM 12:00 PM, Barbour County Health Department, 109 Wabash Avenue, Philippi, WV

3:00 PM 7:00 PM, Junior Volunteer Fire Department, 331 Row Avenue, Junior, WV

Berkeley County

10:00 AM 5:00 PM, 891 Auto Parts Place, Martinsburg, WV

1:00 PM 5:00 PM, Shenandoah Community Health, 99 Tavern Road, Martinsburg, WV

4:30 PM 8:00 PM, Dorothy McCormack Building, 2000 Foundation Way, Martinsburg, WV

Boone County

12:00 PM 4:00 PM, Boone County Health Department, 213 Kenmore Drive, Danville, WV

Cabell County

8:00 AM 4:00 PM, Cabell Huntington Health Department, 1801 6th Avenue, Huntington, WV

Doddridge County

10:00 AM 3:00 PM, Doddridge County Park, The Barn, 1252 Snowbird Road South, West Union, WV

Fayette County

10:00 AM 2:00 PM, Fayette County Health Department, 5485 Maple Lane, Fayetteville, WV

3:00 PM 6:00 PM, Gateway Center, 1 Greyhound Lane, Smithers, WV

Greenbrier County

10:00 AM 3:00 PM, State Fair of WV Campground, 891 Maplewood Avenue, Lewisburg, WV

Hampshire County

10:00 AM 5:00 PM, Hampshire Memorial Hospital, 63 Sunrise Boulevard, Romney, WV

Hancock County

1:30 PM 3:30 PM, Lot beside of Hancock County Magistrate Office (under tent), 900 N. Chester Street, New Cumberland, WV

Hardy County

9:00 AM 12:00 PM, Hardy County Emergency Ambulance Authority, 17940 SR 55, Baker, WV

5:00 PM 8:00 PM, Moorefield High School, 401 North High Street, Moorefield, WV

Jefferson County

10:00 AM 6:00 PM, Hollywood Casino, 750 Hollywood Drive, Charles Town, WV

Lincoln County

9:00 AM 3:00 PM, Lincoln County Health Department, 8008 Court Avenue, Hamlin, WV (optional pre-registration: https://wv.getmycovidresult.com/)

Logan County

12:00 PM 5:00 PM, Old 84 Lumber Building, 100 Recovery Road, Peach Creek, WV (optional pre-registration: https://wv.getmycovidresult.com/)

Mineral County

10:00 AM 4:00 PM, Mineral County Health Department, 541 Harley O. Staggers Drive, Keyser, WV

Mingo County

10:00 AM 2:00 PM, Seven Eleven, 11 West 2nd Avenue, Williamson, WV

Monongalia County

8:00 AM 12:00 PM, WVU Recreation Center (lower level), 2001 Rec Center Drive, Morgantown, WV

Monroe County

9:00 AM - 2:00 PM, Church of God Fellowship Hall, 96 Bud Ridge Road, Union, WV 24983

Ohio County

9:00 AM 3:30 PM, Ohio Valley Medical Center (former main entrance/turning circle), 2000 Eoff Street, Wheeling, WV

Pendleton County

11:00 AM 5:00 PM, Pendleton County Health Department, 276 Mill Road, Franklin, WV

Preston County

4:00 PM 5:30 PM, Terra Alta Community Ambulance Squad Station, 1124 East State Street, Terra Alta, WV

Randolph County

10:00 AM 6:00 PM, Davis Health Center, 812 Gorman Avenue, Elkins, WV

8:00 AM 2:00 PM, Parking Lot across from Randolph-Elkins Health Department, 32 Randolph Avenue, Elkins, WV

Taylor County

2:00 PM 4:00 PM, Grafton-Taylor County Health Department, 718 West Main Street (parking lot at Operations Trailer), Grafton, WV

Tyler/Wetzel Counties

1:00 PM 4:00 PM, Wetzel-Tyler County Health Department, 425 South Fourth Avenue, Paden City, WV

Wood County

12:00 PM - 4:00 PM, WVU Parkersburg, 300 Campus Drive, Parkersburg, WV

For additional free COVID-19 testing opportunities across the state, please visit https://dhhr.wv.gov/COVID-19/pages/testing.aspx.

Excerpt from:

COVID-19 Daily Update 9-16-2021 - West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources

A journey inside the human body as it goes to war with COVID-19  USA TODAY

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A journey inside the human body as it goes to war with COVID-19 - USA TODAY

LIHUE Thursday, the state Department of Health Kauai District Health Office announced 54 new COVID-19 cases, representing one visitor and 53 residents.

Of the 54 new cases, 14 are children and 40 are adults.

Nine of the cases are related to travel five interisland and four mainland. The remaining 45 cases are considered community-acquired. Thirty-eight of the community-acquired infections are close contacts of previously announced cases or are tied to an active cluster. The remaining seven community-acquired cases have no known source of infection, including two whom investigators have been unable to reach after repeated attempts or who have refused to provide information.

These cases bring the number of active cases to 269, with four hospitalized, and 2,005 cumulative cases.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of those who are hospitalized at this time are unvaccinated, county Managing Director Michael Dahilig said Thursday.

Earlier this week, the county identified two clusters in the last week, one in an educational setting and the other in a restaurant. The exact locations, however, were not disclosed.

Regarding cluster locations, the common feature of clusters is what people are doing, not where they are going, Kauai District Health Officier Dr. Janet Berreman said Thursday.

The high-risk behaviors that we see most often leading to clusters are large gatherings, especially indoors; unvaccinated individuals; inconsistent mask-wearing; crowding; and participating in activities while sick. Avoiding any setting where people are exhibiting these behaviors reduces your risk of being exposed and infected, she said.

Berreman said that only when the DOH cannot identify all associated close contacts will it release a specific cluster location.

However, we have a responsibility to protect the privacy for all residents as much as possible, Berreman said. If DOH is able to adequately identify and notify the close contacts, there is no need to publicly identify a location.

Today, the mobile vaccine clinic is at the Lihue Neighborhood Center, and Wainiha Country Market on Saturday, from noon to 3 p.m. each day. Hoola Lahui Hawaii representatives will be at Kekaha Neighborhood Center Saturday from 9 to 11 a.m., offering all three vaccines.

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54 new COVID-19 cases Thursday, 2 new clusters - The Garden Island

It's a sobering toll that comes as hospitals in the US are struggling to keep up with the volume of patients and more children are grappling with the virus. In hopes of managing the spread and preventing more unnecessary deaths, officials are implementing mandates for vaccinations in workplaces and masking in schools.

The country averaged more than 152,300 new Covid-19 cases each day over the past week as of Tuesday -- more than 13 times than what it was on June 22, when the average was at its lowest of 2021 (11,303 daily), according to Johns Hopkins University data.

The US averaged 1,805 new Covid-19 deaths each day over a week as of Tuesday -- significantly higher than the low average of the year (218) reached July 5, according to Johns Hopkins.

With only 54% of the population fully vaccinated, the rate of people initiating vaccinations each day (more than 341,900) is a 4% drop from last week and 28% drop from a month earlier, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

Another layer of strong protection, experts say, is masking.

The CDC recommends people -- even those fully vaccinated -- wear masks indoors in areas with substantial or high community transmission. More than 99% of the population lives in a county with one of those designations.

In Ohio, where children's hospitals are overwhelmed with Covid-19 and respiratory cases, Gov. Mike DeWine is encouraging schools to issue mask mandates since the state legislature has told him it would overturn any mandate he issued.

"Reasonable people may disagree about a lot, but we can all agree that we must keep our children in the classroom so they don't fall behind and so their parents can go to work and not take time off to watch their kids at home," DeWine said.

The combination of masks and vaccinations is the way to keep children in school, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN Tuesday.

"If you surround the kids with vaccinated people and you have everybody wear a mask, you can get a situation where the children will be relatively safe in school," Fauci told CNN's Jake Tapper.

Fight brewing over vaccine mandates

In the effort to manage the spread of the virus, many officials and experts have promoted vaccine mandates -- but others are opposing such measures.

Because the mandate does not require health care workers to receive their first dose of the vaccine until September 27, the judge's order states the temporary restraining order "does not, as a practical matter, go into effect until that date."

A hearing is scheduled for September 28.

After the ruling, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul's press secretary, Hazel Crampton-Hays said in a statement that the governor is considering all legal options.

"Governor Hochul is doing everything in her power to protect New Yorkers and combat the Delta variant by increasing vaccine rates across the State," Crampton-Hays said.

In Los Angeles, despite a mandate that all city employees be inoculated against the virus, nearly a quarter of the police force is seeking an exemption, according to Mayor Eric Garcetti's office. Those who are not vaccinated will be required to show evidence of weekly testing and a negative Covid-19 result if regularly reporting to work.

By November 1, Nevada workers who serve "vulnerable populations" must show proof of vaccination under a new emergency regulation passed Tuesday.

New hires must have at least one dose by their start date and must follow through on the required vaccination schedule to remain employed. Workers are allowed to ask for a medical or religious exemption.

Booster meeting won't be a slam dunk

Unlike other meetings to discuss the vaccine, this one, with requests from Pfizer to authorize a third dose for most people, won't be a slam dunk.

"This will be much messier than in December," said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University. The FDA committee was quick to recommend authorization of vaccines made by Pfizer and rival Moderna last December.

When the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee meets Friday, it will be presented with dueling data, some of it suggesting there's a need for boosters, but other pieces of data suggesting there is no such need.

Three separate articles published last week in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report suggest that we don't need boosters.

On the other hand, an Israeli study found that over time, the vaccines' power to keep people from getting very sick with Covid-19 diminished. Looking at illnesses in the second half of July, that study found that those who'd received their second dose of Pfizer's vaccine in March were 70% more protected against severe disease than those who received the second shot in January.

President Joe Biden announced plans last month to begin administering booster doses next week. While she wouldn't say directly if that date would be met, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday she is hopeful about the timeline to get doses administered.

If the booster does get approved, experts will still have to wait and see how much protection is added by the third dose.

"I would hope that that would sustain us for an extended period of time, but I don't know that right now," Fauci said. "We're just going to have to do the boost, and then follow people long enough to determine what the durability of that protection is."

CNN's Ben Tinker and Deidre McPhillips, Liam Reilly, Kay Jones, Lauren Mascarenhas, Artemis Moshtaghian, Jenn Selva, Andy Rose, Elizabeth Cohen and Virginia Langmaid contributed to this report.

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1 in every 500 US residents have died of Covid-19 - CNN

In the days before COVID-19, Id often get frustrated by the response that doctors would give when I turned up at their clinics with some infection or other: Its just a virus, theyd say.

As someone whos long been fascinated by the detective work that goes into tracing the origins and history of infections, the answer always seemed too perfunctory. Which virus was it? Where and when did this strain emerge? How many other people were getting infected with this same variant this year?

Those questions arent of much relevance to most general practitioners, because the majority of viruses simply burn themselves out as part of the teeming backdrop of endemic infections that roll around the globe each year. At some point, with rising immunity from vaccinations, infections and booster shots, COVID-19 will join that club.

Early last year, the world urgently needed to raise its sense of alarm around the SARS-CoV-2 virus, and see it as the imminent threat it was rather than a more routine infection on a par with influenza. Right now, though, the vaccinated parts of the planet need to mentally send themselves in the opposite direction. Its time to remind ourselves that, for those whove been inoculated, COVID-19 is no longer a horseman of the apocalypse but instead is gradually becoming just a virus.

Thats broadly the place that some of the countries that have advanced furthest in their vaccination programs are reaching. Israel is riding out a surge in new cases without returning to lockdowns for the vaccinated, since the vast majority of infections no longer result in serious illness.

The calls from some quarters to stop publishing daily case totals may be premature for a disease thats still killing thousands of people a day. At some point, though, when COVID-19 has passed from its current pandemic status to the endemic situation it will fade into the background.

Its hard to believe but viruses through history have flipped between endemic and pandemic status with remarkable frequency.

The Russian Flu pandemic that circled the world in the late 1970s appears to have been an unremarkable seasonal flu strain from the 1940s and 1950s, possibly released to the world anew via a laboratory accident. Yellow fever, which shaped the history of the Americas for four centuries through its devastating effects on expeditionary military forces who lacked immunity, has now largely vanished from urban areas of the western hemisphere, while remaining a devastating infection in sub-Saharan Africa.

A July study in the journal Microbial Biotechnology even presented an argument that a coronavirus strain called HCoV-OC43 might have been responsible for an 1889 outbreak also known as the Russian Flu, arguably the first true modern global pandemic. That particular strain now crops up as one of the main causes of the common cold.

Were not at that stage yet. Fully vaccinated, I feel relatively sanguine about the likelihood that at some point in the years ahead I, too, will be exposed to COVID-19.

This terrible scourge will always be with us, but in a milder, less troubling form. After the trauma of the past two years, its hard to believe that well ever look upon that prospect with a sense of equanimity but thats what must ultimately happen. The moment weve beaten COVID-19 wont be when we eradicate it from the human population, but when weve reached a level of vaccinated and natural immunity where we no longer have reason to fear it. That moment will come and when it does, even this dreadful infection will be just another virus.

David Fickling is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering commodities, as well as industrial and consumer companies. 2021 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com/opinion. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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COVID is on its way to becoming just another virus ...

"I took my parents to get that second jab, and we were all so excited," said their son, Marc Ayers. "We are a family that believes in science. We believe in masks, and we believe in vaccines. We were ready to get back to normal."

But his mother, Candace Ayers, died nearly six months later following a July trip with her husband to Mississippi. Her death certificate says she died of Covid-19.

"Candace Cay (Kruger) Ayers, 66, of Springfield, passed away on September 3, 2021, at St. John's Hospital in Springfield, IL. She was preceded in death by more than 4,531,799 others infected with Covid-19. She was vaccinated but was infected by others who chose not to be. The cost was her life."

The tally represents the total global coronavirus death toll.

"This all could have been avoided," Ayers said. "This could have been prevented by a few acts of kindness. They were in a state that had one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country. Getting a vaccine and wearing a mask for others ... had this been done, she would be here today."

Full vaccination gave relatives confidence

Because Candace had an underlying condition, her family was hesitant for her to leave town.

"My mother had severe rheumatoid arthritis. We were always the most concerned about her getting it because she was immunocompromised," Ayers said. "We were wrestling with whether they should have traveled.

"But things were looking so good, and with them being fully vaccinated, we just didn't have any thoughts of them going to Mississippi. The Delta variant was just hitting the radar. Breakthrough cases were rare at that point. Our worst nightmare came true."

The Ayers family is having a tough time processing Candace's death and wanted to try to inspire others to get a vaccine and wear a mask, Marc Ayers said. Sharing daily worldwide Covid-19 death numbers in her obituary aimed to make people take pause, he said.

"This was to illustrate that this isn't just an issue contained to the US, but it has a global impact," Ayers said. "My mom was a fighter. She kept fighting and fighting and fighting. We wanted to send a point."

The family has gotten positive and negative feedback to the obituary, he said.

"It's been really wonderful to hear from friends and strangers regarding the obituary. Because of our story," Ayers said, "people have told us they are getting vaccinated.

"Of course, there are negative comments as well, but the majority has been positive."

Correction: An earlier version of this story misstated the name of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It also mischaracterized breakthrough infections.

CNN's Deidre McPhillips and Aya Elamroussi contributed to this report.

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In her obituary, a family says a mother's Covid-19 death could have been prevented if more people were vaccinated - CNN

Since the March installment in this series, many countries, including the United States, Canada, and those in Western Europe, experienced a measure of relief from the COVID-19 pandemic when some locales embarked on the second-quarter transition toward normalcy that we previously discussed. This progress was enabled by rapid vaccine rollout, with most Western European countries and Canada overcoming their slower starts during the first quarter of 2021 and passing the United States in the share of the population that is fully immunized. However, even that share has been too small for them to achieve herd immunity, because of the emergence of the more transmissible and more lethal Delta variant and the persistence of vaccine hesitancy.

Among high-income countries, cases caused by the Delta variant reversed the transition toward normalcy first in the United Kingdom, where a summertime surge of cases led authorities to delay lifting public-health restrictions, and more recently in the United States and elsewhere. The Delta variant increases the short-term burden of disease, causing more cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. Deltas high transmissibility also makes herd immunity harder to achieve: a larger fraction of a given population must be immune to keep Delta from spreading within that population (see sidebar, Understanding the Delta variant). Our own analysis supports the view of others that the Delta variant has effectively moved herd immunity out of reach in most countries for now, although some regions may come close to it.

While the vaccines used in Western countries remain highly effective at preventing severe disease due to COVID-19, recent data from Israel, the United Kingdom, and the United States have raised new questions about the ability of these vaccines to prevent infection from the Delta variant. Serial blood tests suggest that immunity may wane relatively quickly. This has prompted some high-income countries to start offering booster doses to high-risk populations or planning for their rollout. Data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also suggest that vaccinated people who become infected with the Delta variant may transmit it efficiently.

These events and findings have raised new questions about when the pandemic will end. The United Kingdoms experience nevertheless suggests that once a country has weathered a Delta-driven wave of cases, it may be able to relax public-health measures and resume the transition toward normalcy. Beyond that, a more realistic epidemiological endpoint might arrive not when herd immunity is achieved but when countries are able to control the burden of COVID-19 enough that it can be managed as an endemic disease. The biggest risk to a countrys ability to do this would likely then be the emergence of a new variant that is more transmissible, more liable to cause hospitalizations and deaths, or more capable of infecting people who have been vaccinated.

Raising vaccination rates will be essential to achieving a transition toward normalcy. Vaccine hesitancy, however, has proven to be a persistent challenge, both to preventing the spread of the Delta variant and to reaching herd immunity. The US Food and Drug Administration has now fully approved Pfizers COVID-19 vaccine, and other full approvals may follow soon, which could help increase vaccination rates. Vaccines are also likely to be made available to children in the coming months, making it possible to protect a group that comprises a significant share of the population in some countries.

In this article, we review developments since our March update, offer a perspective on the situation and evidence as of this writing, and present our scenario-based analysis of when a transition toward normalcy could occur.

We have written previously about two endpoints for the COVID-19 pandemic: a transition toward normalcy, and herd immunity. The transition would gradually normalize aspects of social and economic life, with some public-health measures remaining in effect as people gradually resume prepandemic activities. Many high-income countries did begin such a transition toward normalcy during the second quarter of this year, only to be hit with a new wave of cases caused by the Delta variant and exacerbated by vaccine hesitancy.

Indeed, our scenario analysis suggests that the United States, Canada, and many European countries would likely have reached herd immunity by now if they had faced only the ancestral SARS-CoV-2 virus and if a high percentage of those eligible to receive the vaccine had chosen to take it. But as the more infectious Delta variant becomes more prevalent within a population, more people within that population must be vaccinated before herd immunity can be achieved (Exhibit 1).

The potential levels of herd immunity across the world.

Image: Mckinsey and Company

Vaccine hesitancy makes it all the more difficult to reach the population-wide vaccination level rates that confer herd immunity. Researchers are learning more about differences among individuals attitudes, which include both cautious and unlikely to be vaccinated. Meanwhile, social tolerance for vaccination incentives and mandates appears to be growing, with more European locations adopting vaccination passes and more large employers in the United States implementing vaccine mandates.

While it now appears unlikely that large countries will reach overall herd immunity (though some areas might), developments in the United Kingdom during the past few months may help illustrate the prospects for Western countries to transition back toward normalcy. Having suffered a wave of cases caused by the Delta variant during June and the first few weeks of July, the country delayed plans to ease many public-health restrictions and eventually did so on July 19, though expansive testing and genomic surveillance remain in place. UK case counts may fluctuate and targeted public-health measures may be reinstated, but our scenario analysis suggests that the countrys renewed transition toward normalcy is likely to continue unless a significant new variant emerges.

The United States, Canada, and much of the European Union are now in the throes of a Delta-driven wave of cases. While each countrys situation is different, most have again enacted public-health restrictions, thus reversing their transitions toward normalcy. The trajectory of the epidemic remains uncertain, but the United Kingdoms experience and estimates of total immunity suggest that many of these countries are likely to see new cases peak late in the third quarter or early in the fourth quarter of 2021. As cases decline, our analysis suggests that the United States, Canada, and the European Union could restart the transition toward normalcy as early as the fourth quarter of 2021, provided that the vaccines used in these countries continue to be effective at preventing severe cases of COVID-19. Allowing for the risk of another new variant and the compound societal risk of a high burden of influenza, respiratory syncytial virus, and other winter respiratory diseases, the question for these countries will be whether they manage to arrive at a different epidemiological endpoint, as we discuss next.

We have previously written about herd immunity as a likely epidemiological endpoint for some countries, but the Delta variant has put this out of reach in the short term. Instead, it is most likely as of now that countries will reach an alternative epidemiological endpoint, where COVID-19 becomes endemic and societies decidemuch as they have with respect to influenza and other diseasesthat the ongoing burden of disease is low enough that COVID-19 can be managed as a constant threat rather than an exceptional one requiring society-defining interventions. One step toward this endpoint could be shifting the focus of public-health efforts from managing case counts to managing severe illnesses and deaths. Singapores government has announced that it will make this shift, and more countries may follow its lead.

Other authors have compared the burden of COVID-19 with that of other diseases, such as influenza, as a way to understand when endemicity might occur. In the United States, COVID-19 hospitalization and mortality rates in June and July were nearing the ten-year average rates for influenza but have since risen. Today, the burden of disease caused by COVID-19 in vaccinated people in the United States is similar to or lower than the average burden of influenza over the last decade, while the risks from COVID-19 to unvaccinated people are significantly higher (Exhibit 2). This comparison should be qualified, insofar as the burden of COVID-19 is dynamic, currently increasing, and uneven geographically. It nevertheless helps illustrate the relative threat posed by the two diseases.

A look at the hospitalisations and deaths due to COVID-19.

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Countries experiencing a Delta-driven wave of cases may be more likely to begin managing COVID-19 as an endemic disease after cases go into decline. The United Kingdom appears to be making this shift now (though cases there were increasing as of this writing). For the United States and the European Union, scenario analysis suggests that the shift may begin in the fourth quarter of 2021 and continue into early 2022 (Exhibit 3). As it progresses, countries would likely achieve high levels of protection against hospitalization and death as a result of further vaccination efforts (which may be accelerated by fear of the Delta variant) and natural immunity from prior infection. In addition, boosters, full approval of vaccines (rather than emergency-use authorization), authorization of vaccines for children, and a continuation of the trend toward employer and government mandates and incentives for vaccination are all likely to increase immunity.

In 2000, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance was launched at the World Economic Forum's Annual Meeting in Davos, with an initial pledge of $750 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The aim of Gavi is to make vaccines more accessible and affordable for all - wherever people live in the world.

Along with saving an estimated 10 million lives worldwide in less than 20 years,through the vaccination of nearly 700 million children, - Gavi has most recently ensured a life-saving vaccine for Ebola.

At Davos 2016, we announced Gavi's partnership with Merck to make the life-saving Ebola vaccine a reality.

The Ebola vaccine is the result of years of energy and commitment from Merck; the generosity of Canadas federal government; leadership by WHO; strong support to test the vaccine from both NGOs such as MSF and the countries affected by the West Africa outbreak; and the rapid response and dedication of the DRC Minister of Health. Without these efforts, it is unlikely this vaccine would be available for several years, if at all.

Read more about the Vaccine Alliance, and how you can contribute to the improvement of access to vaccines globally - in our Impact Story.

The potential road to normalcy.

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The authors wish to thank Xavier Azcue, Marie-Rene B-Lajoie, Andrew Doy, Bruce Jia, and Roxana Pamfil for their contributions to this article. This article was edited by Josh Rosenfield, an executive editor in the New York office.

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Written by

Sarun Charumilind, Partner, Mckinsey's Philadelphia office

Matt Craven, Partner, Mckinsey's Silicon Valley office

Jessica Lamb, Partner, Mckinsey's New Jersey office

Adam Sabow, Senior Partner, Mckinsey's Chicago office

Shubham Singhal, Senior Partner, Global Leader of Healthcare, Public & Social Sector practices, McKinsey & Company

Matt Wilson, Senior Partner, Mckinsey's New York office

This article is published in collaboration with McKinsey & Company.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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