The United States is exiting “the full-blown pandemic phase” of the coronavirus crisis, Anthony S. Fauci, President Biden’s top medical adviser, told the Financial Times as World Health Organization officials said half a million covid-19 deaths have been tallied around the globe since the omicron variant was first detected in November.
Fauci said decisions on coronavirus restrictions will be increasingly made on a local level, “as we get out of the full-blown pandemic phase of covid-19, which we are certainly heading out of,” Fauci told the newspaper. “There will also be more people making their own decisions on how they want to deal with the virus.”
In the United States, covid cases declined 44 percent in the past week compared to the previous seven days, according to a Washington Post tracker, and hospitalizations related to covid-19 also declined over the same period. However, the seven-day average of deaths during the omicron surge has reached 2,600 in recent days, the highest level the country has seen in a year.
Worldwide, coronavirus deaths rose for the fifth consecutive week, with the 68,000 fatalities reported last week representing a 7 percent jump from the previous week. About 100,000 of the global deaths since omicron was detected have occurred in the United States, WHO incident manager Abdi Mahamud said Tuesday in an online Q&A session. He called the death toll “tragic” in a country with plentiful supply of effective vaccines.
Here’s what to know
- Global coronavirus deaths increased for the fifth week in a row, with the number of fatalities increasing by 7 percent last week. World Health Organization officials called the trend tragic at a time of effective vaccinations.
- Hawaii is in discussions about eliminating all restrictions on travel in the coming months — barring any more covid surges. Currently, travelers have to quarantine for five days unless they provide proof of vaccination or a negative test result.
- The public health officials responsible for crafting the United States’ covid-19 response will brief the public at 11 a.m. local time from the White House.
MORE ON THE OMICRON VARIANT
An author dove into loneliness and resurfaced with lessons for a pandemic
For generations of future researchers, the coronavirus pandemic will provide rich material on the social and physiological effects of isolation and loneliness. But science writer Florence Williams got a head start on the subject before the pandemic began, when her husband of 25 years abruptly left her in 2017. She almost immediately noticed changes in her body, and decided to explore what they meant.
Her investigation took her from her home in the District, across the United States and to Europe as she dug into the role intimate relationships play in human and animal health and longevity. Williams’s midlife dating misadventures, her discussions with neuroscientists and psychologists, and her therapist-assisted magic mushroom and ecstasy trip are all chronicled in “Heartbreak: A Personal and Scientific Journey,” published Feb. 1 by Norton.
“We’re not only social, we’re hypersocial, we find safety in numbers, and our brains are very much built to find strong attractions,” said Williams, now 54, in an interview. “We’re hypersensitive to social cues and very aware of how people treat us … so when your primary attraction figure tells you that he wants to go find his soul mate, it’s devastating.”
Key coronavirus updates from around the world
By News Services and Staff Reports7:01 a.m.
Here’s what to know about the top coronavirus stories around the globe from news service reports.
- Citizens of Saudi Arabia starting Wednesday will have to have received their booster dose of a coronavirus vaccine to travel outside the country, according to state media.
- The European Union hopes to secure a global treaty to prevent future pandemics, and negotiators are set to meet Wednesday for the first time, Reuters reports.
- Lawmakers in South Korea are exploring ways to allow people who have covid-19 to vote in next month’s presidential election.
- Hong Kong health authorities said Wednesday that a chronically ill elderly man who tested positive for the coronavirus in hospital has died. If confirmed as linked to covid-19, the death would be the city’s first in five months, as it battles an omicron-fueled rise in cases.
- In New Zealand’s capital, Wellington, a demonstration against vaccine mandates entered its second day as similar protests, inspired by truckers in Canada, spread around the world.
Thousands in Hong Kong line up for coronavirus tests as officials struggle to maintain ‘zero-covid’
Hong Kong is fighting its toughest battle against the coronavirus since it was first detected more than two years ago, pushing the government’s pandemic strategy of “zero-covid” to the breaking point amid the spread of the omicron variant.
Isolation centers are filling up, and lockdowns are proving ineffective as the number of new coronavirus cases climbs. More than 1,200 new infections were recorded Monday and Tuesday. Almost 4,000 people were quarantined in government-run centers across the city on Monday.
On Tuesday, Hong Kong authorities further tightened social distancing rules, limiting outdoor gatherings to two people and closing more venues, including religious sites and hair salons. For the first time, restrictions will also cover private property, with a maximum of two families allowed to gather in a residence at one time.
As many Hong Kong residents stay home, mandatory testing sites across the city are the only packed venues amid the worry over soaring coronavirus cases.
Singapore’s defense minister shares experience with covid-19 on Facebook to reassure population
When Singapore made the transition from a strict policy aimed at eradicating covid to one of mass vaccination and learning to live with the virus, residents were nervous. Many still saw testing positive as a personal failure and something to be ashamed of. Citizens obsessed over rising case numbers, especially as the more transmissible omicron variant spread.
Government ministers are now trying to reassure the population that there’s nothing to be afraid of (as long as people are vaccinated and boosted), using their own experiences with the virus.
On Tuesday, Singapore’s defense minister, Ng Eng Hen, 63, posted on Facebook that he had tested positive several days ago. It would be hard to avoid the omicron variant, he wrote, “unless one became a recluse.” He chronicled the evolution of his illness from the onset to day five, when the line indicating he was positive on rapid antigen tests began to fade. His symptoms were mostly in the throat, with a low fever, he said.
“The vaccine and booster have turned a potentially life-threatening disease to a mild one — a bad sore throat. Just like many other thousands of Singaporeans, we did not have to take up precious and limited resources in our hospitals that other vulnerable patients needed more,” he wrote.
Singapore has moved away from a policy of isolating every positive covid case, though its path toward living with the virus has come in fits and starts. Borders tightened again after the global omicron surge, but restrictions have eased again. Cases are spiking, but 99.7 percent of local infections are mild or asymptomatic, according to the Health Ministry.
“I’m glad I caught the infection in Singapore. I’m thankful and grateful that we have a good system that all of us put into place with our collective efforts and responsibility,” Ng added.
Business leaders, academics warn of long-term economic impacts of Japan’s border closure
TOKYO — Business leaders and academics are urging Japan to reopen its borders to business travelers and students, arguing that the prolonged closure is creating an undue burden on the country’s economy and cultural influence that will outlast the pandemic.
Japan has banned nonresident foreigners from entering the country for nearly two years, which has left hundreds of thousands of students, families and business travelers in limbo as they wait for the country’s reopening. The restrictions are in place at least through February, and business lobbies and academics are increasingly sounding the alarm about long-term impacts of the country’s isolation.
During a news conference Wednesday, representatives of American and European business lobbies said the closure has deterred foreign investments in Japan and imposed significant burdens on foreign companies operating here. They argued that neighboring countries are gaining economic advantages as their groups’ member companies downsize operations in Japan because they are unable to bring in the workers they need. Last month, Japan’s largest business lobby called on the government to lift the entry ban.
“Quite frankly, the current travel restrictions on nonresidents can only create doubt about Japan as a reliable long-term partner for foreign business,” said Christopher LaFleur, special adviser to the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan.
About 150,000 international students have remained in limbo for two years or attended classes remotely during U.S. or European overnight hours. That number is shrinking, though, as students give up hope and desert their plans to enter Japan, said Matthew J. Wilson, dean and president of Temple University’s Japan campus. Many have decided to study in South Korea, Taiwan, Europe and now Australia and New Zealand, which have announced reopening plans after two years of closure, Wilson said.
“On a long-term basis, the continuing restrictions … [have] eliminated tens of thousands of future contributors, supporters and advocates of Japan, by deflecting international students to other destinations or causing them to simply give up,” Wilson said.
Japan’s omicron variant infections have been surging, but serious cases and deaths have remained low. The vast majority in the country have received two vaccine doses, though the rollout of boosters lags behind the government’s timeline. Polls show the border closure remains politically popular in Japan.
500,000 deaths reported globally since omicron was detected, WHO says
A half-million deaths have been reported since the omicron variant of the coronavirus was first detected, the World Health Organization said Tuesday, calling the death toll tragic in the age of effective vaccines.
About 100,000 of those deaths occurred in the United States, WHO incident manager Abdi Mahamud said during an online Q&A session. He said it was “tragic, beyond tragic” to witness in a country where vaccines are available free, noting that millions of people in the United States are resistant to being vaccinated.
Worldwide, coronavirus deaths rose for the fifth consecutive week, with the 68,000 fatalities reported last week, representing a 7 percent jump from the previous week. Although cases are declining in the United States, WHO officials said many countries have not hit the peak of omicron. They called for people to continue masking and maintaining distance to help drive down transmission.
“You will not need to wear a mask forever,” WHO epidemiologist Maria Van Kerkhove said. “We will not need to physically distance forever. But for now, it’s really important that we be careful.”
Analysis: Canada’s Trumpian trucker protests show the global radicalization of anti-vaxxers
In Canada — yes, Canada — the confederacy of anti-vaxxers came out of the shadows for “Freedom Convoy 2022,” a protest of angry truckers that snowballed in the Ottawa winter to include a wider class of the governmentally aggrieved. At their worst, demonstrators have urinated on the National War Memorial and danced on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. But despite the lack of widespread violence, the diverse alliance of outraged citizens — from Confederate flag wavers to dancing libertarian hipsters — appear to share common purpose: shutting down the Canadian capital on a quest to end vaccine mandates.
In the United States, Republican glee at the spreading, city-paralyzing protests in “liberal Canada” came under fire from Canadian officials, who insist they won’t budge on the spark that lit the demonstrations — a vaccination mandate for truckers transiting the U.S.-Canadian border. But as the convoy gains international traction — from social media to European and Australian streets — Canada is becoming an unlikely symbol of the radicalization of the anti-vaccination movement in the West that shares more than a few similarities with the militancy of Trump Republicans.
The seemingly endless pandemic has brought together diverse civic forces furious over perceived government overreach. They’ve protested mandates and lockdowns as well as vaguer notions of encroachment into public life. But the scope, nature and tactics of such protests are escalating, becoming increasingly uncivil and more aggressive around the world. They include outbursts of anger and violent threats against specific politicians, far-right imagery at demonstrations, violent melees with police and, in the surprising case of Canada, the shutting down of entire cities.
Hawaii in talks to drop covid travel restrictions by spring
Hawaii’s strict travel program for domestic visitors may be a piece of pandemic history by the spring, the state’s lieutenant governor said Tuesday.
Lt. Gov. Josh Green (D) said in a phone interview that discussions are ongoing about eliminating all restrictions on travel in the coming months — barring any more covid surges.
“I would expect those restrictions to begin to fall away in the spring,” he said. “But one thing we’ve learned about covid is it does sometimes throw one a curveball. People didn’t really predict a highly, highly contagious omicron variant; otherwise we would have already been there.”
To fly to Hawaii today — as more than 23,000 people did on Saturday — travelers must show proof of vaccination or a negative test if they want to avoid a five-day quarantine. Officials in Hawaii said last year that once the state was 70 percent vaccinated, restrictions on travel would be lifted. The surge from the highly contagious omicron variant foiled that plan.
