Coronavirus cases rise though America boasts a vaccination rate considered to be “above [the] world average” by Johns Hopkins, calling into question the drug’s efficacy.
QUICK FACTS:
- Coronavirus cases are rising in many places just as Americans gathered for Thanksgiving and experts expect the trend to continue.
- Cases and deaths in the country are up from two weeks earlier.
- A Phoenix-area emergency physician, Dr. Nicholas Vasquez, said his hospital admitted a growing number of chronically ill people and nursing home residents with severe COVID-19 this month, The Associated Press reports. “It’s been quite a while since we needed to have COVID wards,” Vasquez said. “It’s making a clear comeback.”
- About 28,000 people with COVID were hospitalized on Tuesday and about 340 died, AP notes, and there were 36,036 new infections in the U.S. as of Thursday. 967 died on Wednesday.
- The rise in COVID infections, hospitalizations, and deaths come despite 68.7% of the population being “fully” vaccinated and 80.6% receiving at least one dose, according to Google data.
- In fact, the United States has a vaccination rate considered to be “above [the] world average” by Johns Hopkins University & Medicine.
SAME STORY IN CHINA:
- The draconian “zero-COVID” policy that China has long touted as a scientific and effective countermeasure against the global coronavirus pandemic seems to be failing, CBS News reports, as the surging caseload prompts new residential lockdowns and business shutdowns.
- Authorities reported record high COVID-19 case numbers in mainland China for the second consecutive day Friday, with 32,695 new infections recorded on Thursday, signifying the highest figure since the virus was first detected in central China’s Wuhan province at the end of 2019, according to CBS.
- But China’s population is 90.1% fully vaccinated, 92.4% receiving at least one dose, again calling into question the vaccine’s efficacy.
BACKGROUND:
- The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that “a majority of Americans dying from the coronavirus received at least the primary series of the vaccine,” noting that 58% of coronavirus deaths in August were “people who were vaccinated or boosted.” Those figures came from an analysis conducted for The Health 202 by Cynthia Cox, vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation. “We can no longer say this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated,” Cox told The Health 202.
- Dr. Anthony Fauci (81), head of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), appeared at his final White House press briefing on Tuesday, urging Americans to get updated booster shots. During the briefing, Fauci said the “final message” he had for Americans was to “get your updated Covid-19 shot as soon as you’re eligible.” “Please, for your own safety, for that of your family,” he said.
