Greater than 90% of New York Metropolis’s workers have been vaccinated and half of the remainder have utilized for exemptions, Mayor Invoice de Blasio mentioned Monday.
The mayor’s vaccine mandate requires that any of the town’s 300,000 employees who have not had their first dose be positioned on unpaid go away at the moment. The exemption requests are nonetheless being processed, de Blasio mentioned.
“A overwhelming majority of metropolis employees, 91%, stepped as much as put the well being and security of their metropolis first and bought vaccinated,” de Blasio tweeted early Monday. The quantity had been 83% Friday evening.
The police division, which employs about 36,000 officers and 19,000 civilian workers, reported an 84% vaccination fee as of Sunday morning. The fireplace division mentioned later Sunday that 80% of its workers have been vaccinated – 75% of firefighters, 87% of EMTS and 90% of civilian workers.
The fireplace division has mentioned it was ready to shut as much as 20% of fireside firms and have 20% fewer ambulances in service. Greater than 2,000 of the town’s 11,000 firefighters have taken sick days prior to now week, however Hearth Commissioner Daniel Nigro mentioned no firehouses have closed regardless of “irresponsible bogus sick go away by a few of our members (that) is making a hazard for New Yorkers and their fellow firefighters.”
Additionally within the information:
►All adults who’re usually in colleges and little one care facilities within the District of Columbia have to be vaccinated efficient at the moment. Additionally, college students 12 and older have to be totally vaccinated to take part in school-based extracurricular athletics. Non secular and medical exemptions can be found. Mayor Muriel Bowser beforehand had required metropolis workers to be vaccinated.
►South Dakota has joined Missouri, Nebraska, Alaska, Arkansas, Iowa, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota and Wyoming in a lawsuit in opposition to President Biden’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for federal contractors.
►Seven members of the Sharks and coach Bob Boughner have been positioned within the NHL’s COVID-19 protocol on Saturday, delaying the beginning of San Jose’s recreation in opposition to the Winnipeg Jets.
►Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s vaccine mandate for metropolis employees survived one other problem – this one from the Metropolis Council, which voted down a proposal pushed by a few of its members to repeal it.
📈 Right now’s numbers: The U.S. has recorded 45.9 million confirmed COVID-19 instances and greater than 745,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data. International totals: Greater than 246 million instances and 5 million deaths. Greater than 192 million People – 58% of the inhabitants – are totally vaccinated, according to the CDC.
📘 What we’re studying:The rush is on: With vaccine orders positioned, medical doctors and pharmacies are getting ready for a flood of younger kids.
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China’s Shanghai Disneyland shuts down, 33,000 examined for virus
Shanghai Disneyland and Disneytown will remain shut Monday and Tuesday “to be able to observe the requirement of pandemic prevention and management,” Shanghai Disney Resort mentioned on its web site Monday. For hours on Sunday evening, tens of hundreds of households and guests have been caught within the park as they waited for a destructive check end result that might permit them to go away.The case which will have prompted Disneyland’s actions concerned one particular person whose sickness was found within the close by metropolis of Hangzhou and had visited the theme park on Saturday, native media reported.
The town introduced Monday morning that every one 33,863 individuals who had been on the park over the weekend had examined destructive for COVID-19. They are going to be requested to get examined once more and their well being can be monitored.
International deaths surpass 5 million
The devastating human toll from the coronavirus reached one other main milestone when the worldwide dying tally surpassed 5 million, in response to Johns Hopkins University data. Nowhere else within the globe has the associated fee in lives been greater than in the US, regardless of the nation’s abundance of vaccines. Even via a decline in infections in current weeks, the U.S. continues to expertise about 1,400 each day deaths from COVID-19, which has killed almost 746,000 People.
The U.S. dying rely has surpassed the estimated 675,000 People who died within the 1918 flu pandemic, and the emergence of vaccines towards the tip of 2020 solely slowed the COVID-19 pandemic’s tempo. The U.S. produces and freely administers three COVID-19 vaccines – Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson – which might be extremely efficient at defending individuals from extreme sickness, hospitalization and dying. However about 60 million eligible individuals on this nation stay unvaccinated, giving the virus loads of victims to contaminate and kill.
Childhood infections boomed after colleges reopened
Nationwide, instances in kids grew by 129% within the six weeks after colleges opened in contrast with the identical interval earlier than lessons began, in response to a USA TODAY evaluation of information from the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention.
Some states seem to have reopened colleges extra safely than others, based mostly on little one hospitalization information – pediatric hospitalization charges have been usually far decrease in states with excessive numbers of vaccinated kids. And the rise in childhood instances tended to be extra pronounced in locations that banned colleges from imposing masks mandates or gave districts the power to decide on.
“Simply having a mandate did not imply masks have been worn or truly enforced,” mentioned Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins College who research international well being safety coverage. “For this reason individuals have referred to as for medical trials to be accomplished. However even mentioning that makes individuals wish to struggle.”
– Erin Richards, Alia Wong and Aleszu Bajak
Vaccine for teenagers: All the things you should know
Mother and father keen to vaccinate their youngsters are ready as federal companies evaluate information from trials displaying Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine is safe and effective for children. The vaccine is already totally accredited for individuals 16 and older, and it is approved beneath emergency use for kids 12 to fifteen years outdated.
On Tuesday, an advisory committee to the Meals and Drug Administration voted to advocate the vaccine to youngsters ages 5 to 11. The vaccine is prone to be accessible to eligible kids throughout the nation by the center of subsequent week. Nonetheless, there are a couple of hurdles left and plenty of dad and mom nonetheless have questions.
Here is every thing well being specialists need dad and mom to know about the vaccine.
– Adrianna Rodriguez, USA TODAY
White Home press secretary Jen Psaki checks constructive for COVID
White Home press secretary Jen Psaki tested positive for COVID-19, she disclosed Sunday in a assertion that additionally mentioned she has not been in shut contact with the president or senior members of the White Home workers since Wednesday. Psaki mentioned she final noticed President Joe Biden on Tuesday, “after we sat outdoors greater than six-feet aside and wore masks.”
Biden left Thursday for Europe and isn’t scheduled to return till Wednesday. Psaki, who was alleged to accompany Biden, stayed again after members of her family examined constructive. On the time, the White Home introduced Psaki was not going due to a household emergency. She mentioned she has been quarantined since then and examined destructive on daily basis till Sunday.
– Maureen Groppe, USA TODAY
Maryland man faces 20 years for scheme involving pretend Moderna web site
A Maryland man pleaded responsible to federal wire fraud conspiracy after authorities mentioned he participated in a scheme that tried to sell COVID-19 vaccines. Odunayo Oluwalade, a 25-year-old man from Windsor Mill, Maryland, faces as much as 20 years in federal jail after coming into the responsible plea on Friday, in response to the Justice Division. He and two different males have been arrested in February for involvement within the fraud.
The scheme consisted of the group creating the web site “Modernatx.store,” just like the corporate’s precise area “Modernatx.com”. The web site additionally included the usage of the corporate’s logos, colours and markings.
Whereas Moderna’s precise web site lists of how individuals can get hold of the vaccine, the pretend web site included a hyperlink that mentioned, “You could possibly purchase a COVID-19 vaccine forward of time,” together with a hyperlink to “contact us,” in response to the plea settlement.
The scheme was dropped at a halt after an undercover Homeland Safety agent bought in contact with a quantity listed on the pretend web site. Inside hours of first connecting with the quantity, the agent acquired an bill from the e-mail “gross sales@modernatx.store” for 200 doses of the vaccine, which mentioned value $30 every.
– Jordan Mendoza, USA TODAY
US intelligence will not seemingly decide COVID-19 origins, report says
Barring an unexpected breakthrough, intelligence companies won’t be able to conclude whether or not COVID-19 unfold by animal-to-human transmission or leaked from a lab, officers mentioned Friday in releasing a fuller model of their evaluate into the origins of the pandemic.
The paper issued by the Director of Nationwide Intelligence elaborates on findings launched in August of a 90-day evaluate ordered by President Joe Biden. That evaluate mentioned that U.S. intelligence companies have been divided on the origins of the virus however that analysts don’t consider the virus was developed as a bioweapon and that the majority companies consider the virus was not genetically engineered.
China has resisted international stress to cooperate totally with investigations into the pandemic or present entry to genetic sequences of coronaviruses saved on the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which stays a topic of hypothesis for its analysis and reported security issues. Biden launched the evaluate amid rising momentum for the idea –initially broadly dismissed by specialists – that the virus leaked from the Wuhan lab.
Contributing: The Related Press
