This post was originally published on this site
The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus-borne illness COVID-19 climbed above 520,000 on Friday, as Dr. Anthony Fauci became the latest health expert to slam state officials for prematurely dropping restrictions on movement at a time when their case numbers remain high and their vaccine programs are making slow progress.
“I don’t know why they’re doing it but it’s certainly, from a public health standpoint, ill-advised,” Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN’s Erin Burnett.
Fauci said the decision by Texas and Mississippi to drop precautions, including in the case of Texas, its statewide face mask mandate, is “inexplicable.”
Past instances where declining case numbers also encouraged states to move too quickly to reopen, “and we know what happened next. What we don’t need right now is another surge.”
Fauci’s comments echoed those of the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over the past week. Dr. Rochelle Walensky has repeatedly warned that declining case numbers have stalled at a high level, and urged Americans to stick with the recommended safeguards — frequent hand washing, social distancing and wearing a face mask in public — until it’s their turn to be vaccinated.
See also: California lawmakers OK $6.6 billion plan with incentives for schools to reopen
Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine and professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, told MSNBC the good news right now is that the vaccines are working.
“The best news I can offer is we are going to vaccinate our way out of this, because we have new information now that these vaccines are not only stopping symptomatic illness, which we knew from the clinical trials, but data coming out of Israel that shows that two doses –this was a study published in the New England Journal (of Medicine) last week — that the vaccine is actually helping asymptomatic transmission.
“So we’re going to prevent people from becoming PCR positive. That means we can vaccinate our way out of this epidemic if the other vaccines perform that way. The hard part right now is about preventing people form dying before we have enough vaccine available.”
Hotez also addressed the challenges facing long-haulers, those patients who continue to suffer sometimes severe symptoms for months after testing positive. He said low-income and minority communities were being hit especially hard as they don’t have the same access to therapies and clinics as wealthier communities.
The CDC’s vaccine tracker is showing that as of 6 a.m. ET Thursday, 109.9 million doses had been delivered to states, 82.6 million doses had been administered and 54 million people had received one or more doses, equal to 16.3% of the population.
President Joe Biden said this week vaccine supply would be greatly boosted by the news that Merck MRK, +0.08% will help produce rival Johnson & Johnson’s JNJ, +0.78% newly authorized one-shot vaccine, likening the partnership between the two drug companies to the spirit of national cooperation during World War II.
The White House is expecting to take delivery of enough coronavirus vaccine for all adults by the end of May—two months earlier than anticipated, because of the Merck deal.
A Gallup survey published Friday found that Americans have become much more optimistic about their views of the trajectory of the pandemic and worries about access to testing, medical supplies and services have eased. A full 60% of those polled said they believe the crisis is getting better, while 26% said it’s staying the same and 14% said it’s getting worse.
“This record-high optimism likely reflects the steep decline in new COVID-19 cases in the U.S. in late January and early February,” said the authors of the survey.
The U.S. added at least 67,415 new COVID cases on Thursday, according to a New York Times tracker, and at least 1,949 people died. The U.S. has averaged 62,924 cases a day for the past week, down 14% from the average two weeks ago.
The U.S. continues to lead the world by case numbers and deaths, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. has 28.8 million confirmed cases of COVID, or about 25% of the global total, and 520,367 fatalities, or about a fifth of the global toll.
In other news:
• Moderna Inc. MRNA, -6.36% is pursuing approval for its COVID-19 vaccine in Japan in partnership with Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. 4502, -0.58%, MarketWatch’s Jaimy Lee reported. Takeda submitted the new drug application and will be tasked with importing and distributing the vaccine from the Cambridge, Mass.-based company. Takeda is also conducting the Phase 1/2 trial of the vaccine in adults who are at least 20 years old there; enrollment ended in February. If approved, Takeda will distribute 50 million doses of Moderna’s two-dose vaccine in Japan in the first half of 2021.
Alerts and web-browser tools can help you book a Covid-19 vaccine appointment. WSJ’s Joanna Stern met up with Kris Slevens, an IT guy who has booked over 300 appointments for New Jersey seniors, to learn the best tricks to compete in the vaccine-booking Hunger Games. Photo illustration: Emil Lendof for The Wall Street Journal
• The National Institutes of Health said Thursday that it stopped enrollment in two clinical trials evaluating experimental COVID-19 therapies after discovering they likely do not provide a benefit to hospitalized patients. The treatment candidates are GlaxoSmithKline PLC GSK, +1.20% GSK, +1.13% and Vir Biotechnology Inc.’s VIR, +4.59% monoclonal antibody therapy and the privately held Brii Biosciences Inc.’s monoclonal antibody cocktail. Vir told investors on Thursday that the NIH had notified the company about stopping the trial. There were no safety concerns for either therapy.
• New research indicates that ivermectin, a type of treatment for parasitic worms, does not help patients with mild COVID-19 recover any faster. The peer-reviewed study, published Thursday in JAMA, examined the findings of a double-blind, randomized trial conducted in Cali, Colombia, in roughly 475 people with mild symptoms of COVID-19. Researchers concluded “the findings do not support the use of ivermectin for treatment of mild COVID-19, although larger trials may be needed to understand the effects of ivermectin on other clinically relevant outcomes.” The drug first caught the attention of clinicians in the early days of the pandemic after an in-vitro preprint study said the drug can inhibit replication of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. However, the Food and Drug Administration and others said that trials needed to be conducted before the drug should be prescribed to COVID-19 patients.
• The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers, healthcare providers and others that improper use of the thermal imaging systems may provide inaccurate temperature readings and warned against companies that are illegally offering them for sale. The regulator has sent warning letters to certain companies that are offering unapproved, uncleared and unauthorized systems for sale. “While thermal imaging is not an effective diagnostic device for COVID-19, it can determine if someone has an elevated temperature, which can be an important risk management tool during the pandemic when used properly,” said William Maisel, M.D., M.P.H., Chief Medical Officer and director of the Office of Product Evaluation and Quality in FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health. “But improper use and marketing of thermal imaging systems may lead to inaccurate temperature readings and pose a potential danger to public health.
See now: Italy’s ban on AstraZeneca exports to Australia raises fears of vaccine nationalism
• The World Health Organization said that it has now delivered more than 11 million vaccine doses to 11 countries in Africa through its Covax program, which aims to ensure poorer countries get vaccines and that richer countries don’t end up hogging them all.
Latest tallies
The global tally for confirmed cases of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 climbed above 115.6 million Friday, the Johns Hopkins data shows, and the death toll climbed above 2.56 million.
At least 65 million people have recovered from COVID.
Brazil has the second highest death toll at 260,970 and is third by cases at 10.8 million.
India is second worldwide in cases with 11.2 million, and fourth in deaths at 157,548.
Mexico has the third highest death toll at 188,866 and 13th highest case tally at 2.1 million.
The U.K. has 4.2 million cases and 124,259 deaths, the highest in Europe and fifth highest in the world.
China, where the virus was first discovered late last year, has had 101,066 confirmed cases and 4,837 deaths, according to its official numbers.
What’s the economy saying?
The U.S. created 379,000 new jobs in February—the biggest gain in four months—in what’s likely to be a preview of a surge in hiring in the months ahead as most people get vaccinated and the economy fully reopens, MarketWatch’s Jeffry Bartash reported.
The increase in hiring last month was concentrated at businesses such as restaurants, retailers, hotels and entertainment venues as states eased restrictions on customer limits and public gatherings. Most other industries also added workers.
Hiring was also much stronger in January than initially reported.
See: A visual look at how an unfair pandemic has reshaped work and home
The official unemployment rate, meanwhile, slipped to 6.2% from 6.3%, although economists widely believe the real rate is much higher.
Federal Reserve officials peg the jobless rate at closer to 10% after adjusting the data for distortions caused by the pandemic.
The rebound in job creation in February is likely the start of a major new cycle of hiring. Warmer weather, falling coronavirus cases, rising vaccinations and another massive increase in federal stimulus are likely to act as jet fuel for the economy in the spring and summer, Wall Street pros and Fed officials say.
Read: Inflation worries are back. Should you worry?
The increase in new jobs easily exceeded Wall Street expectations. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal had forecast 210,000 new jobs.
“With vaccine distribution continuing to accelerate and with the economy in the initial stages of a reopening, the coming months should see robust gains,” said chief economist Curt Long of the National Association of Federally Insured Credit Unions.
Don’t miss: ‘Green shoots of recovery’- economists react to January U.S. jobs report
Also: U.S. trade deficit widens in January
The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.04% and the S&P 500 SPX, -0.34% were both higher Friday.
