President Biden plans to call on global leaders to make new commitments to fight the coronavirus pandemic, including fully vaccinating 70 percent of the world’s population by next September, according to a list of targets obtained by The Washington Post. While many wealthy countries have reached or will soon reach that target, the rest of the world is very far behind.
Roughly one-third of people globally are fully vaccinated, according to Our World in Data. Covax, the World Health Organization’s campaign to distribute vaccines to the world, said last week that “only 20% of people in low- and lower-middle-income countries have received a first dose of vaccine compared to 80% in high- and upper-middle income countries.”
Here’s just how unequal the global coronavirus vaccine rollout has been
Adding to the challenges that Biden is sure to face as the White House convenes a virtual summit next week, Covax has also warned that it would not be able to vaccinate as much of the world as it wants because wealthy countries bought much of the early supply, and because of obstacles such as “export bans” and “delays in filing for regulatory approval.”
Here’s what to know
Hurricane Nicholas is disrupting some states’ pandemic responses. Harris County, Tex., shut down all its coronavirus testing and vaccine facilities Tuesday, as did parts of Louisiana.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said Monday that cities and counties in the state could face millions of dollars in fines for implementing vaccine mandates.
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WHO: Africa has been ‘left behind’ in immunization effort
By Meryl Kornfield12:30 p.m.
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A health worker shows off a syringe containing a vaccine before administering it during the launch of the South African leg of a global Phase III trial of Sinovac’s coronavirus vaccine in children and adolescents, in Pretoria, South Africa, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters)
A health worker shows off a syringe containing a vaccine before administering it during the launch of the South African leg of a global Phase III trial of Sinovac’s coronavirus vaccine in children and adolescents, in Pretoria, South Africa, on Sept. 10, 2021. (Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters)
Wealthy countries and vaccine manufacturers have not done enough to aid in vaccinating people in Africa, officials at a World Health Organization briefing Tuesday said, sharing dismal numbers on the progress of the effort.
About 3.5 percent of eligible Africans are fully immunized, a lagging rate that indicates the continent won’t reach a goal of 60 percent until February, according to officials.
After pleading last week that wealthy countries hold off on offering booster shots until other countries are able to catch up with offering first and second doses, WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus once again echoed that call. He reiterated the global health consequences of leaving a large swath of the world unprotected against the coronavirus.
“I may sound like a broken record,” he said. “I don’t care. I will continue to call for vaccine equity until we get it.”
Tedros said a WHO-backed initiative to offer global access to vaccines, COVAX, has faced several challenges, including many high-income countries tying up the global supply of vaccines.
But the officials speaking at the roundtable also pointed fingers at manufacturers, which they said could do more to make the technology behind the vaccines more accessible.
Their calls come as Reuters reported Tuesday that an African base to replicate Moderna’s shot has faltered as the company won’t come to the table to offer information about how African countries could copy their mRNA vaccine.
“The talks have not yielded any results,” Martin Friede, WHO Initiative for Vaccine Research coordinator, told Reuters.
Officials at the WHO briefing were not specifically asked about the progress of those conversations with Moderna, but they said intellectual property rights on the vaccines should be waived, saying they would bring that request to a virtual summit the Biden administration will convene next week.
“It was a great miracle to have these vaccines,” said Strive Masiyiwa, an African Union envoy for the African Vaccine Acquisition Task Team. “Now let this miracle be available to all mankind.”
Speakers at DeSantis news conference promoted false vaccine claims while governor stood by
After Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said Monday that cities and counties in the state could face millions of dollars in fines for requiring their employees to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, he stood silently next to a Gainesville city employee who spread misinformation about the vaccines.
“The vaccine changes your RNA, so for me that’s a problem,” said Darris Friend, a 22-year city employee who is the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit against the Gainesville government over its vaccine requirements for all municipal employees. “We don’t want to have the vaccine. It’s about our freedom and liberty.”
DeSantis, who looked to the ground and appeared uncomfortable with the employee’s false claim at the news conference, did not correct Friend’s vaccine misinformation, which an infectious-disease expert described to the Tampa Bay Times as “false and wrong.”
Another city employee, Christine Damm, suggested at the DeSantis event, without evidence, that she would die if she got vaccinated.
Here’s what to know about the top coronavirus stories around the globe from news service reports.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is self-isolating because of possible exposure to someone with covid-19, the Kremlin said, which also denied that he had the disease.
India’s covid-19 wave is receding. Now the world wants it to get back to exporting vaccines.
In China, an outbreak of the coronavirus in the southeast continues to spread: Health authorities in Fujian province reported 59 new cases Monday, up from 22 on Sunday.
Just ahead of the annual meeting of the U.N. General Assembly that opens Tuesday, leaders of the Gates and Rockefeller Foundations are warning that without larger government and philanthropic investments in the manufacture and delivery of vaccines to people in poor nations, the pandemic could set back global progress on education, public health and gender equality for years.
In Israel, a prominent anti-vaccine activist died of covid-19. Before his death, he accused the Jerusalem police of trying to poison him, the Jerusalem Post reported.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention added nine countries to its highest-risk category for travel amid the pandemic: Afghanistan, Albania, Serbia, Belize, Lithuania, Grenada, St. Kitts and Nevis, Slovenia and Mauritius.
British government to start booster shots for vulnerable populations next week
By Karla Adam and William Booth9:25 a.m.
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LONDON — The British government announced Tuesday that it will be offering booster shots to 30 million people in the country to protect front-line health workers, those over 50 and any other medically vulnerable people.
The news that booster jabs are coming follows the announcement Monday night that the government would offer vaccines to all healthy children and teens ages 12 to 15.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid said the booster program would begin next week in England, with the rest of the country expected to follow suit.
The government also announced its Plan A and Plan B for getting through the challenging autumn and winter months in the face of a stubborn pandemic.
Trump advisers privately warned of ‘critical mistakes’ as pandemic loomed
By Dan Diamond8:31 a.m.
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Senior advisers to President Trump in February 2020 privately discussed the government’s “critical mistakes” in preparing for the pandemic, countering the former president’s optimistic claims in public, according to emails obtained by the House’s select subcommittee on the pandemic.
“In truth we do not have a clue how many are infected in the USA. We are expecting the first wave to spread in the U.S. within the next 7 days,” adviser Steven Hatfill wrote to Peter Navarro, Trump’s trade director, on Feb. 29, 2020. “This will be accompanied by a massive loss of credibility and the Democratic accusations are just now beginning. This must be countered with frank honesty about the situation and decisive direct actions that are being taken and can be seen in the broadcast news.”
Hatfill, a virologist who began advising the Trump White House in February 2020, blamed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for rolling out flawed coronavirus tests and urged Navarro to begin purchasing additional tests and deploy. His warning to Navarro came hours after then-president Trump boasted of his administration’s “pretty amazing” response to coronavirus. “We have 15 people [infected] in this massive country, and because of the fact that we went early, we went early, we could have had a lot more than that,” Trump said at a political rally in South Carolina, where he charged that Democrats were “politicizing the coronavirus … this is their new hoax.”
After receiving Hatfill’s warning, Navarro privately warned Trump in a March 1, 2020 memo that the government’s response was “NOT fast enough” and that a “very serious public health emergency” was looming, but Trump continued to downplay the virus’s risks in public.
Using personal email accounts, Navarro and Hatfill also strategized on White House memos about virus preparations and discussed plans to scale up the U.S. health system’s coronavirus response in March 2020.
“These exchanges add to the growing body of evidence that the Trump Administration knew the significant risk posed by the coronavirus but failed to execute an effective strategy to reduce the loss of American lives,” Rep. James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.) said in a letter to Navarro on Tuesday that was shared with The Washington Post ahead of publication. Clyburn is requesting all documents in Navarro’s possession related to the government’s response last year and details on Trump officials’ use of personal email accounts.
Navarro and Hatfill did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In emails released by the subcommittee, the two men also collaborated on a planned May 2020 presentation to encourage use of hydroxychloroquine, an antimalarial drug, as a treatment for coronavirus. Officials like Anthony S. Fauci, the government’s top infectious-disease expert, resisted their efforts to promote the drug, citing the lack of evidence that it worked to fight the virus — a source of frustration for Navarro and Hatfill, who repeatedly attacked Fauci in the emails for his “outrageous bias” and other alleged mistakes.
The two men also received a July 2020 plea to help a mask manufacturer known as VPL Labs deal with scrutiny from the Federal Trade Commission, which Hatfill forwarded to a White House official. The email did not mention that the brand-new company had been the subject of a ProPublica investigation the prior month.
Nicki Minaj tweets coronavirus vaccine conspiracy, spotlighting struggle against misinformation
By Adela Suliman and Bryan Pietsch8:12 a.m.
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Nicki Minaj attends the 2019 Met Gala on May 06, 2019 in New York City.
Nicki Minaj attends the 2019 Met Gala on May 06, 2019 in New York City. (Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images)
Nicki Minaj tweeted on Monday night about her cousin’s hesitancy to get vaccinated against the coronavirus, setting off a slew of critiques that she was spreading coronavirus misinformation.
Minaj tweeted that her cousin in Trinidad, where the rapper is from, “won’t get the vaccine cuz his friend got it & became impotent. His testicles became swollen.”
Medical experts have said that claims about infertility linked to vaccinations are unsubstantiated.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said he will self-isolate after individuals close to him tested positive for the coronavirus.
The news came from the Kremlin in a transcript of a call between Putin and Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, in which Putin said he will attend a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, planned later this week in the Tajik capital of Dushanbe, virtually instead of in-person.
The Kremlin also said Putin is “absolutely healthy” and has so far not tested positive for the coronavirus.
The Russian president met in person with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad at the Kremlin on Monday. Assad said he and his wife had and recovered from covid-19 in March.
CDC adds more countries to its highest-risk category for travel
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention added nine countries to its highest-risk category for travel amid the pandemic on Monday, warning U.S. travelers to “avoid travel to these destinations.”
Afghanistan, Albania, Serbia, Belize, Lithuania, Grenada, St. Kitts and Nevis, Slovenia and Mauritius were added to the public health organization’s Level 4 list of countries and territories with “very high” covid risk.
Countries and territories fall under this category in one of two ways:
For small countries of less than 100,000 people, if they have recorded more than 500 cumulative new cases over the past 28 days, and if new cases have been on an upward trend during that time.
For larger countries of more than 100,000 people, if they have recorded more than 500 new cases per 100,000 people in the past 28 days, and if new cases have been on an upward trend during that time.
Travelers across the United States are facing roadblocks as demand for testing increases amid the delta variant surge, school requirements and workplace rules, The Washington Post’s Hannah Sampson reports. The Biden administration said Thursday that it has taken steps to expand access to testing.
Kentucky hospital has ‘no idea’ how it will manage after team of federal emergency workers departs
The head medical official at a Kentucky hospital said he has “no idea” what the facility will do Friday when it loses a team of emergency medical employees sent by the federal government, highlighting the fragile balancing act that health-care facilities across the country are facing under a surge in coronavirus cases.
“The only reason we are holding this lifeboat together is I have a federal disaster medical assistance team here, 14 people who have just been heroes to us,” William Melah, chief medical officer of St. Claire HealthCare, which operates a hospital in Morehead, Ky., said Monday on CNN.
“Unfortunately, their deployment is over on Friday,” Melah said. “I’m going to lose 14 health-care professionals, and I literally have no idea what we’re going to do on Friday.”
Kentucky has the largest portion of its population hospitalized for covid-19 in the country. Nationally, 29 of every 100,000 people are in the hospital for covid-19; in Kentucky that figure is 57, according to Washington Post data.
The team of health-care workers, which had been requested by the governor, arrived at St. Claire Regional Medical Center on Sept. 4 with a set departure date for Friday. On Sept. 4, Kentucky was averaging more than 4,200 new coronavirus cases each day. On Monday, the state was averaging more than 5,400. Hospitalizations often increase days after cases do — meaning that the situation is likely to get worse in the coming days before it gets better.
The Kentucky hospital is one of many across the country that have had teams of medical workers deployed by the federal government as facilities have struggled to keep up with the surge in coronavirus cases fueled by the delta variant.
Over the past month, Hawaii has received more than 500 “health-care surge staff” deployed with funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Last week, the U.S. Army said it had deployed three 20-person teams of military medical personnel to Idaho, Arkansas and Alabama to support hospitals treating covid-19 patients. They join six other teams already working in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. An Army representative and a spokesperson for the governor of Hawaii did not immediately respond to requests for comment about how long the deployments would last.
The Army’s announcement came on the same day Idaho officials moved to start rationing medical care at hospitals in the northern part of the state amid a surge of coronavirus patients that had pushed the facilities beyond their limits.
Yes, you can get a covid booster and a flu shot together. Here’s what you need to know.
With flu season swiftly approaching in a country already battling a resurgence of the coronavirus, experts are urging Americans to avail themselves of any and all vaccines they are eligible for — whether it’s their first coronavirus vaccination, a booster vaccine dose to combat waning immunity or a flu shot.
“It’s terribly important” to get both the flu and coronavirus vaccines, said William Schaffner, medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. “They are both very nasty respiratory viruses that can make many people very, very sick.”
And because the coronavirus and flu vaccines “train your immune system to protect you against completely different viruses,” getting a shot that protects you against one virus will not offer any protection against the other, said Kelly Moore, president and CEO of the Immunization Action Coalition.
India is facing growing pressure to lift its ban on exporting coronavirus vaccines, months after curbs were imposed to tackle a massive domestic outbreak that has since relented.
The world’s second-most populous country — and also one of its biggest vaccine manufacturers — imposed the ban this spring as India raced to raise its immunization rate. Now, officials in the United States and with Covax, the United Nations-backed coronavirus vaccine distribution initiative that had counted on India to supply around a billion shots this year, hope a more stable health situation will persuade the country to resume exports. The pressure comes as wealthy nations, including the United States, move to offer booster shots to their own vaccinated residents.
But Indian officials have not committed to a firm date. Instead, mixed messaging has clouded production forecasts, even as President Biden plans to call on global leaders to make new commitments to fight the pandemic, including fully vaccinating 70 percent of the world’s population by next September.
Hospitalizations up in Washington region as patients seek treatment for coronavirus, delayed care
Ballad Health’s Johnston Memorial Hospital in Southwest Virginia is among those that have paused elective surgeries because of an increased workload directly and indirectly related to covid-19.
Hospitalizations — directly and indirectly related to the coronavirus — are up across the region, especially in Virginia, stressing staffing and prompting some hospitals to pause elective surgeries for the first time since cases spiked last winter.
Ballad Health, which serves Southwest Virginia and northeast Tennessee, and two hospitals in Maryland have delayed elective surgeries because of the increased workload.
Other hospitals find themselves tackling myriad issues all at once: an increase in covid-19 patients, care for those who put off treatment or who developed new issues during the pandemic, and transfers from places with fewer clinical resources.
Experts worry other vaccine requirements could be swept up in GOP condemnation of Biden covid mandate
By Felicia Sonmez, Marianna Sotomayor and Mariana Alfaro4:07 a.m.
Republicans’ sweeping denunciations of President Biden’s plan to force more people to get vaccinated against the coronavirus are raising concerns among public health experts that this heated criticism could help fuel a broader rejection of other vaccine requirements, including those put in place by schools and the military, as the issue of inoculations becomes increasingly political.
Over the weekend, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) declared on Twitter that there should be “NO VACCINE MANDATES.” More than a dozen other prominent Republicans in Congress and in the states have made similarly defiant statements in recent days, often using inflammatory rhetoric.
Many of these elected officials have declined to elaborate on their views about vaccine requirements and whether they object only to Biden’s federal plan or also think other mandates put in place by school districts, the military and private employers should be rethought or banned. The sharp rhetoric and failure to clarify their broader views on vaccines are worrying some public health experts.