A physician’s exam room in New York City
Good morning. This is Jonathan Spira reporting. Here now the news of the pandemic from across the globe on the 1,176th day of the pandemic as well as National Speak in Complete Sentences Day. However, National Grammar Day is March 4th, because it is the only day that is a complete sentence.
OP-ED ON WEDNESDAY
Is the world just one big infection after another? It’s not just Covid, of course, and never has been. It’s influenza, SARS, MERS, Monkeypox (also called mpox), Marburg Virus Disease, and the measles among others.
Earlier in May we saw simultaneous outbreaks of the Marburg Virus Disease in the African countries of Equatorial Guinea and Tanzania. Scientists are warning of a Monkeypox recurrence this summer although those who have been vaccinated against that pox will probably not contract it. There have been measles outbreaks in the United States, a very rare occurrence, and who knows what else hasn’t even been reported because patients didn’t seek medical attention.
I should point out that Marburg Virus Disease is very dangerous and extremely transmissible. It requires the highest biosafety levels and is a severe to fatal disease in humans, for which there are no available vaccines or treatments.
One reason we are seeing more such outbreaks is because many people got out of the habit of going to their GP during the pandemic unless absolutely necessary. By not getting medical attention as soon as you or a member of your family is stricken with any sort of disease outside of perhaps the common cold (which of course is a type of coronavirus, I should point out just to frighten readers), illness goes untreated and spreads throughout a community.
Meanwhile, the rate of vaccination for childhood diseases fell during the pandemic for the same reason. Both the World Health Organization and UNICEF sounded the alarm as data showed global vaccination coverage continuing to decline. Some 25 million infants have so far missed out on lifesaving vaccines.
We learnt from the early days of the pandemic the benefits of hand washing, how masking helps prevent contracting various viruses including the flu, staying home from work when sick so as not to infect colleagues, and how important life-saving vaccines can be.
Let’s not forget these lessons so easily. The current coronavirus pandemic is far from an isolated instance: 100 years ago, over 50 million people died from the H1N1 virus, over seven times the number of people who have thus far died from SARS-CoV-2.
Continue to wash your hands, mask when sick or in a large group, stay home if ill, and keep your and family member inoculations up to date.
In other news we cover today, elevated cholesterol may be an underrecognized Long Covid consequence, international travel by Chinese citizens has yet to recover, and Boris Johnson is yielding to the inquiry investigating early government actions regarding the pandemic and submitting his text messages.
LONG COVID
New-onset cholesterol problems may be an under-recognized but fairly common result of having had SARS-CoV-2.
A study published in the January 2023 issue of the journal Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, Dr. Zihad Al-Aly and colleagues examined the health records of more than 150,000 users of the VA Saint Louis Health System. The researchers found that non-vaccinated people who had been infected with SARS-CoV-2 were significantly more likely to develop high cholesterol and other unhealthy levels of blood lipids than people who had not been infected.
UNITED STATES
In Connecticut, a former state representative and West Haven city official was sentenced to 27 months in prison for stealing federal coronavirus pandemic funds.
Michael DiMassa pleaded guilty to stealing more than $1.2 million of the funds from the City of West Haven.
Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., as debt ceiling negotiations continue, Republican and White House negotiators agreed to claw back approximately $27 billion in funding to federal agencies originally intended to be used to combat the coronavirus pandemic.
GLOBAL
In the United Kingdom, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he had provided his WhatsApp messages as well as his notebooks to the government for review by the inquiry board chaired by former judge Heather Hallett that is investigating the government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis. The move came after Hallett gave ministers two additional days to hand over former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s WhatsApp messages and diaries.
Johnson’s spokesman said the Cabinet Office had had “access to this material for several months” and the former PM would disclose the information directly to the inquiry if asked.
“While Mr. Johnson understands the government’s position, and does not seek to contradict it, he is perfectly happy for the inquiry to have access to this material in whatever form it requires,” he added.
Chinese citizens are making visa requests well below pre-pandemic levels, data form a visa application company shows. Current levels are just at 35% of those prior to January 2020. The number may be reflective of the decreased number of international flights that operate to and from the country.
TODAY’S STATISTICS
Now here are the daily statistics for Wednesday, May 31.
As of Wednesday morning, the world has recorded 689.6 million Covid-19 cases, an increase of less than 0.1 million from the previous day, and 6.88 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, over 661.9 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus, an increase of less than 0.1 million from the previous day.
The reader should note that infrequent reporting from some sources may appear as spikes in new case figures or death tolls.
Worldwide, the number of active coronavirus cases as of Wednesday at press time is 20,677,363, an increase of 7,000. Out of that figure, 99.8%, or 20,639,291, are considered mild, and 0.2%, or 38,072, are listed as critical. The percentage of cases considered critical has not changed over the past eight months.
The United States reported 72,136 new cases in the period May 4 through May 10, a figure that is down 26% over the same period one week earlier, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The test positivity rate for the week ending May 20 was 7.77%, down from 7.96% in the prior week, according to data from the CDC Respiratory Virus Laboratory Emergency Department Network Surveillance, or RESP-LENS. By comparison, the test positive rate for influenza was 1.95% and, for RSV, that figure was 0.34%.
The death toll from Covid is down 1.3% in week ending May 20, 2023, and the trend in Covid-19 deaths is down 13.3% over the same period.
Finally, the number of hospital admissions from over the past week Covid was 8,256 as of May 23, a figure that is down 11% over the preceding 7-day period.
Starting on March 25, 2023, the Morning News Brief began to update case data as well as death tolls on a weekly basis. In addition, starting on May 15, 2023, the Morning News Brief has pressed pause on certain data sets as we assess the update of changes in reporting by U.S. health authorities at the CDC.
Since the start of the pandemic the United States has, as of Wednesday, recorded 107.1 million cases, a higher figure than any other country, and a death toll of over 1.16 million. India has the world’s second highest number of officially recorded cases, just under 45 million, and a reported death toll of 531,870.
The newest data from Russia’s Rosstat state statistics service showed that, at the end of July 2022, the number of Covid or Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic there in April 2020 is now 823,623, giving the country the world’s second highest pandemic-related death toll, behind the United States. Rosstat last reported that 3,284 people died from the coronavirus or related causes in July 2022, down from 5,023 in June, 7,008 in May and 11,583 in April.
Meanwhile, France is the country with the third highest number of cases, with just under 40.1 million, and Germany is in the number four slot, with 38.4 million total cases.
Brazil, which has recorded the third highest number of deaths as a result of the virus, 702,907, has recorded 37.6 million cases, placing it in the number five slot.
The other five countries with total case figures over the 20 million mark are Japan, with 33.8 million cases, South Korea, with just under 31.7 million cases, placing it in the number seven slot, and Italy, with just over 25.8 million, as number eight, as well as the United Kingdom, with 24.6 million, and Russia, with 22.9 million.
VACCINATION SPOTLIGHT
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that, as of May 11, over 270.2 million people in the United States – or 81.4% – have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine. Of that population, 69.5%, or 230.6 million people, have received two doses of vaccine, and the total number of doses that have been dispensed in the United States is now over 676.7 million. Breaking this down further, 92.23% of the population over the age of 18 – or 238.2 million people – has received at least a first inoculation and 79.1% of the same group – or 204.3 million people – is fully vaccinated. In addition, 20.5% of the same population, or 53 million people, has already received an updated or bivalent booster dose of vaccine, while 23.7 million people over the age of 65, or 43.3% of that population have also received the bivalent booster.
Starting on June 13, 2022, the CDC began to update vaccine data on a weekly basis and publish the updated information on Thursdays by 8 p.m. EDT, a statement on the agency’s website said. Starting on May 11, 2023, the CDC pressed pause on reporting new vaccine data, a hiatus it said would end on June 15 of this year.
Some 70% of the world population has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine by Wednesday, according to Our World in Data, an online scientific publication that tracks such information. So far, 13.39 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered on a global basis and 66,122 doses are now administered each day.
Meanwhile, only 30% of people in low-income countries have received one dose, while in countries such as Canada, China, Denmark, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, at least 75% of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
Only a handful of the world’s poorest countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia and Nepal – have reached the 70% mark in vaccinations. Many countries, however, are under 20% and, in countries such as Haiti, Senegal, and Tanzania, for example, vaccination rates remain at or below 10%.
In addition, with the start of vaccinations in North Korea in late September, Eritrea remains the only country in the world that has not administered vaccines.
Anna Breuer contributed reporting to this story.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
