Will the Us Shut Down Again
Omicron volition surge despite Biden's new plan, scientists say.
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Fifty-fifty as President Biden on Tuesday outlined new plans for battling the highly contagious Omicron variant, public health experts warned that the measures would non be sufficient to prevent a ascent in infections and hospitalizations over the adjacent few weeks.
The administration'southward strategy includes doubling down on vaccination campaigns and propping up hospitals as they confront a large influx of patients. Federal officials will direct resources, including Regular army doctors, to support health care systems and distribute rapid tests to Americans.
Simply Mr. Biden explicitly ruled out lockdowns and other harsh measures of the kind put in place equally the pandemic first unfolded in early 2020. In interviews on Tuesday, some scientists argued that the variant's rapid spread requires more vigorous mitigation measures.
Some expressed frustration and alert about what they described as a timid public health response, and bemoaned the apparent lack of will among politicians and social club at large for more than ambitious steps.
The crisis is brewing just as Americans prepare to travel to holiday gatherings, higher students render dwelling house for vacation, and young and old converge for New Year's parties or set off on trips that may further spread the virus.
Federal health officials asked health care providers on Mon to advise their patients to conduct rapid home tests for Covid before holiday gatherings, and ask their guests to do the same. Merely while the tests are sold over the counter, prices get-go at $14 for a two-pack, and many stores are sold out.
And in precipitous contrast with the communication given out concluding year, Mr. Biden encouraged people to gather and celebrate the holidays, so long as they were vaccinated and took standard precautions.
At the aforementioned time, he warned that the variant was spreading at unprecedented speed, and said in that location would exist Omicron infections among the vaccinated, apparently resigned to the fact that even those who have received boosters may get infected with the highly contagious variant.
"I however can't quite wrap my caput effectually how quickly this is moving," said Joseph Fauver, a genomic epidemiologist at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. "I think it'southward going to be actually bad. I don't know how else to put it."
It is non yet clear whether the variant causes milder disease than earlier variants. But there is a concern amid some scientists that the notion has gained broad circulation and that the pandemic-weary public has permit down its baby-sit.
"This is an incredibly contagious pathogen, and we don't know yet its impact on severity and expiry," said Galit Change, an immunologist and virologist affiliated with the Ragon Institute of Massachusetts General Hospital, Grand.I.T. and Harvard.
"Nosotros have to reestablish the importance and rigor of the first wave," she added. "Nosotros are back in 'flatten the curve' fashion."
Biden steps up the U.S. pandemic response with help for hospitals and expanded testing.
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Biden Outlines Plan to Fight Omicron as Cases Surge
President Biden announced additional steps his assistants will have to combat the Omicron variant, including gratuitous at-home Covid tests and increased support for overwhelmed hospitals.
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We should all be concerned about Omicron, merely not panicked. If you're fully vaccinated and especially if you lot got your booster shot, yous are highly protected. And no, this is not March of 2020 — 200 one thousand thousand people are fully vaccinated. In the by 2 weeks, we've seen the highest vaccination rates since last spring. And we aren't as vaccinated as a country as we should be, though. That'southward why we take added 10,000 new vaccination sites on top of the 80,000 sites that nosotros already had in place. The federal government will purchase one-half billion — that's not one thousand thousand, billion with a 'B' — additional at-habitation rapid tests with delivery starting in January. In addition, I take directed the Pentagon to mobilize an additional 1,000 troops to be deployed to help staff local hospitals and expand capacity. That'due south 1,000 armed services doctors, nurses and medics.
President Biden accelerated his administration'southward coronavirus response on Tuesday as the country faced a surge in cases from a highly contagious new variant, telling broken-hearted Americans that "nosotros should all be concerned about Omicron, merely not panicked."
In a White House address delivered against the backdrop of a new global struggle to cope with the two-year-former pandemic, Mr. Biden said the government will buy a half-billion rapid coronavirus tests and distribute them free to Americans; create new vaccination and testing sites; and ship 1,000 war machine medical professionals to help hospitals nationwide.
"I know you're tired, actually, and I know you're frustrated," Mr. Biden said, adding that vaccinated Americans should feel comfortable jubilant with their friends and family for the upcoming holidays. "We all want this to be over, but nosotros're nonetheless in it."
The president said military troops volition begin arriving in Wisconsin and Indiana this calendar week to aid wellness care workers at hospitals. He said the first of the new testing sites will open in New York within days. And he promised to use the Defense Product Act to help manufacturers better meet the demand for testing.
Mr. Biden acknowledged the political division in the country and the violent opposition to vaccine requirements among some people, saying his administration has put some mandates in place "non to control your life, but to save your life and the lives of others." And he pleaded with Americans who remained unvaccinated to go shots to protect themselves and the people around them from infection.
Some of Mr. Biden'southward announcements — including the distribution of new at-habitation tests — are not intended to be implemented for weeks, if non longer, raising doubts about how much they will help in the short term. And most are incremental steps that many public health experts say fall far brusque of the kind of aggressive actions required.
The president is not moving to mandate testing or vaccination for travelers on domestic flights, and he flatly ruled out on Tuesday returning to the kinds of restrictions that some European nations take once again imposed in an effort to slow the spread of the new variant, which doctors say is even more highly contagious than previous iterations of the virus.
"That'south what I keep getting asked," Mr. Biden said. "The reply is absolutely no. No."
In Israel, people over 60 and medical workers will receive 4th vaccine doses.
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JERUSALEM — Israel, which late last yr was an early on trailblazer in its efforts to administer a first coronavirus vaccine dose to its citizens, now plans to offer quaternary doses in a bid to curb the rapid spread of the Omicron variant, officials said on Tuesday.
Information technology is believed to exist the first state to offer a fourth circular of doses. And as with its earlier inoculation efforts, countries effectually the world will be looking to State of israel for clues near how their own campaigns might fare.
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett hailed the move as "wonderful news that volition assist us in getting through the Omicron wave that is engulfing the earth." He added, "The land of State of israel is continuing to stand at the forefront of the global effort to deal with the pandemic."
At to the lowest degree one person in the country is confirmed to accept died from the Omicron variant — an older man who had received two vaccine doses only not a 3rd one, wellness officials said on Tuesday.
The United States has also reported at to the lowest degree i death from the variant. Health officials in Texas said that an unvaccinated Houston-expanse man who died on Monday had Omicron. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in Oct that some adults with compromised immune systems would be eligible for a fourth shot of the vaccines made by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech.
Israel was one of the first nations to return its society to a semblance of normality after rolling out a beginning dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine far faster than nigh other countries.
Mr. Bennett, who succeeded Benjamin Netanyahu in June, was then amid the kickoff world leaders to corroborate 3rd vaccine doses this summer. He too allowed for the vaccination of children anile v and up last month, and held a "war game" in which the authorities tested out possible state responses to a hypothetical new virus variant.
On Tuesday, he said that medical teams would begin giving quaternary vaccine doses to people over 60 and to medical workers. Mr. Bennett did not cite whatsoever scientific evidence in support of administering 4th shots to a broad population.
His other efforts to slow the rise of Omicron have included enforcing more stringent entry requirements for incoming travelers, banning the entry of all foreigners without a special exemption and disallowment Israelis from traveling without special permission to 58 countries, including the United States, Canada and Britain.
The number of Omicron cases in Israel doubled on Tuesday to 340, the health ministry said, while the total number of coronavirus cases rose to one,306 — the highest daily figure in virtually ii months, though still proportionally lower than in many developed countries.
Mr. Bennett has said that Israel is at the beginning of a fifth virus wave, and has called on people in the country to vaccinate themselves and their children, to work from home and to increase their wearing of masks.
Hospitals are scrambling as antibody treatments neglect against Omicron.
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Hospitals, drug companies and Biden administration officials are racing to address one of the Omicron variant'due south biggest threats: Two of the three monoclonal antibody treatments that doctors accept depended on to proceed Covid-19 patients from becoming seriously ill do not appear to thwart the latest version of the coronavirus.
The 1 such treatment that is still likely to piece of work against Omicron is now and so scarce that many doctors and hospitals have already run through their supplies.
Monoclonal antibodies take get a mainstay of Covid treatment, shown to be highly effective in keeping loftier-take chances patients from being hospitalized. But even equally infections surge and Omicron becomes the dominant class of new cases in the United States, some hospitals have begun scaling back the treatments, fearing they take go of a sudden useless.
In New York, hospital administrators at NewYork-Presbyterian, Due north.Y.U. Langone and Mountain Sinai all said in recent days that they would terminate giving patients the two almost commonly used antibody treatments, fabricated past Eli Lilly and Regeneron, co-ordinate to memos obtained by The Times and officials at the health systems.
"This is a dramatic change just in the last week or so," said Dr. Daniel Griffin, an infectious disease specialist at Columbia Academy in New York. "And I retrieve it makes sense."
Federal health officials programme to assess at the end of this week whether to pause shipments of the Eli Lilly and Regeneron products to individual states, based on how ascendant Omicron becomes in different regions of the country, according to a senior administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The i monoclonal antibody handling that has performed well against Omicron in laboratory experiments is likewise the most recently authorized: sotrovimab, made by GlaxoSmithKline and Vir Biotechnology and cleared in May.
N.H.50. players will skip the 2022 Beijing Olympics.
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National Hockey League players are not expected to participate in the 2022 Beijing Olympics, reversing plans announced in September and signaling fears that rising numbers of coronavirus cases and virus-related postponements will injure the league'south power to consummate its own flavour on schedule.
The decision about the Olympics is expected to be appear on Wednesday, people familiar with the deliberations said. They spoke on condition of anonymity considering the N.H.Fifty. and its players' spousal relationship had not publicly disclosed their intentions, even as they had telegraphed them for weeks.
The North.H.L., which has had dozens of its games postponed this flavour, said on Monday that it would interruption its flavour for several days later a swelling number of players were ruled out of games after inbound the league's wellness and safety protocols.
The decision that Due north.H.L. players would non become to Beijing, however, reflected spiraling concerns amidst the league, its teams and their players almost the possible effects of the pandemic on the residual of the season. The North.H.L.'southward retreat came but weeks earlier the Games's opening ceremony on Feb. 4, and less than iv months later the league announced a program to load the men'due south tournament rosters in Beijing with the sport's biggest stars.
The decision could give the league boosted flexibility every bit it tries to reschedule games even equally information technology braces for more postponements, since a three-week interruption planned to adjust the Games can now potentially exist used to brand upwardly N.H.L. postponements instead.
Merely the absence of the sport'south best players will undercut the dazzle of the Olympic tournament, which at present will virtually likely feature minor leaguers and overseas-based professionals instead of commanding figures similar the N.H.L. All-Stars Auston Matthews and Connor McDavid.
Organizers of the Beijing Olympics accept vowed that the festivities will proceed as planned, but the N.H.L.'s conclusion to opt out injected a new flare-up of dubiousness into the Games.
Eric Adams, New York'southward incoming mayor, postpones his inauguration ceremony amid the city's Omicron surge.
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It was billed as an inauguration ritual steeped in symbolism: Eric Adams, the second Black man to be elected mayor of New York, would be sworn in at Kings Theater, a lavishly restored cultural icon in Brooklyn, whose residents, he said, chose "1 of their own" to lead the urban center's recovery.
Merely the event will now serve as a less welcome symbol, reflecting the rise concerns about the rampant spread of the Omicron variant.
Mr. Adams, who takes office on Jan. 1, canceled the ceremony on Tuesday, one of several developments that underscored how the latest wave of coronavirus cases has thrown New York City's recovery into doubt and shifted priorities as the year ends.
The number of reported cases in the city has surged in recent days to more than fifteen,000 on Mon, the highest level since at least Jan and about iv times the number of cases recorded only 1 week earlier.
Covid-xix hospitalizations in the urban center have been rising over the past month just are however at less than one-half the level of last winter's superlative, reaching near 270 new admissions a mean solar day on Monday, according to New York Country figures.
Northwell Wellness officials say that their 53 urgent care facilities in the New York City area are seeing unprecedented volume. Nigh 4,000 to 5,000 patients are coming into those facilities daily, upwards from 2,000 normally, and about are seeking testing, said John D'Angelo, Northwell Health's master of integrated operations. Positivity rates of those tests have gone from seven pct a week ago to 14 percentage now.
"I would expect that if that is going to interpret to a steeper trajectory on the inpatient side, we should be seeing that in the next calendar week or so," Mr. D'Angelo said. "So we'll meet."
The Omicron variant made up 37 percent of cases in New York State over the last 2 weeks, co-ordinate to state data, and 92 percent of new cases in a larger area that includes New York and New Jersey, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate released Monday. Now Mayor Bill de Blasio and his successor, Mr. Adams, face up painful decisions well-nigh how to handle the next phase of the pandemic.
Will schools fully reopen in January? Will a New year's Eve political party in Times Square be canceled? How can the city avoid some other wide shutdown or a shortage of hospital beds?
Already, Broadway shows have canceled performances, a handful of schools and some classrooms have airtight, sporting events have been postponed and holiday travel plans accept been abased. Some elected officials are calling for setting up a mass testing site at Javits Center in Manhattan, which served equally a temporary hospital during the summit of the pandemic.
Holiday travel in the U.South. is expected to jump, even as Omicron spreads.
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Millions of U.Southward. travelers are forging ahead with their vacation plans, despite a national surge in coronavirus cases fueled by the highly transmissible Omicron variant.
More than 109 million Americans are expected to travel between Dec. 23 and Jan. 2, a 34 percent increase from last year, according to AAA. The number of airline passengers alone is projected to rise 184 percentage from concluding year.
And drome personnel are bracing for trouble. At Miami International Airport, which is expecting a tape number of passengers for the holiday season, two men were arrested on Mon after the authorities said they clashed with police officers.
The men — Mayfrer Gregorio Serranopaca, 30, of Kissimmee, Fla., and Alberto YanezSuarez, 32, of Odessa, Texas — were each charged with battery on a law enforcement officer, according to the Miami-Dade Police Department, which is investigating the episode. Mr. Serranopaca also faces boosted charges, including resisting an officer with violence and inciting a riot.
"Like airports beyond the land, MIA is seeing tape-high passenger numbers this winter travel season," Ralph Cutié, the airport's director and chief executive officer, said in a argument.
The Miami drome said it expected almost 2.6 million travelers — an average of virtually 156,000 per day — to laissez passer through its gates from Tuesday through Jan. 6, an increase of 6 percent over the same menstruation in 2019.
"Unfortunately, that passenger growth has come with a record-loftier increase nationwide in bad behavior likewise," Mr. Cutié said, noting the altercation at the drome on Monday.
Disruptive passengers could face arrest, civil penalties upwards to $37,000, being barred from flying and possible federal prosecution, Mr. Cutié said.
He urged people to travel responsibly "by getting to the drome extra early, being patient, complying with the federal mask law and airport staff, limiting your booze consumption and notifying police at the outset sign of bad behavior by calling 911."
An unvaccinated Texas human's decease may be the outset in the U.S. attributed to Omicron.
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Health officials in Texas said that an unvaccinated Houston-area man who died on Monday afternoon had the Omicron variant.
The death appeared to be among the first in the United States to exist publicly attributed to Omicron. However, but a pocket-size percentage of coronavirus samples across the country are checked to determine which variant is involved, and experts say that there are gaps and time lags in the reporting of Covid deaths, so other Omicron deaths may simply have not withal been announced.
The regime in Harris County, the third largest in the United States and home to Houston, said that the man was in his 50s and had previously been infected with the coronavirus, but had not been vaccinated. "The individual was at college adventure of severe complications from Covid-19 due to his unvaccinated condition and had underlying health atmospheric condition," the canton public wellness section said in a statement.
The highly contagious Omicron variant, first identified less than a month agone in southern Africa, has spread and so fast that information technology is already the dominant source of new infections in the United States. What has been less clear so far is how the severity and deadliness of disease acquired by Omicron compares with earlier variants.
7–day average
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These are days with a reporting anomaly .
Source: Land and local health agencies. Daily cases are the number of new cases reported each mean solar day. The vii-mean solar day average is the average of the about recent seven days of data.
The proclamation came as Judge Lina Hidalgo, the peak public official in Harris County, raised the county'south coronavirus threat level to "significant" because of the rapid spread of Omicron variant. Unvaccinated residents are told to minimize contact with others and avoid gatherings of more than a few people.
The county is at present averaging more than 2,000 new cases a twenty-four hours, more than than five times the average from two weeks ago, according to a New York Times database. About 59 percent of adults in the county are fully vaccinated.
"Omicron is producing quantum infections," Ms. Hidalgo said at a news briefing on Monday. "So folks with the vaccine are getting it. That does not mean the vaccine doesn't piece of work. On the contrary, the prove shows the vaccine is going to continue y'all out of the hospital. But we are seeing an increase in breakthrough cases."
Mayor Sylvester Turner of Houston — who is vaccinated and boosted — has said that he has tested positive for the coronavirus and has mild symptoms. Mr. Turner is 67.
"The time to get your booster shot is now," Ms. Hidalgo said. "As we approach Christmas and New Year's, give yourself, give your family the souvenir of health. Go your booster, especially if y'all're 65 and older."
Omicron's path: Equally U.S. caseloads ascent, Massachusetts turns to its National Guard for hospital help.
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With the holiday travel flavour underway, new coronavirus cases are surging in the The states, prompting governors and mayors to once again wrestle with how far to become to tackle the virus as federal officials said that the Omicron variant had become by far the dominant cause of new cases in the land.
In New York State, reports of new cases shot upward more than lxxx percent over 2 weeks. In Washington, D.C., where the mayor reinstated an indoor mask mandate on Mon, more than iii times every bit many infections are being identified each twenty-four hour period as at the get-go of December.
On Tuesday, Gov. Charlie Baker of Massachusetts announced steps to aid his state'southward straining hospitals. He ordered that up to 500 National Baby-sit troops exist sent to aid hospitals with nonmedical tasks like nutrient service and transportation, and that starting next Monday, all nonessential procedures that were likely to involve a patient admission had to exist postponed, among other measures.
Mayor Michelle Wu of Boston, where cases are surging, said on Monday that proof of vaccination would exist required for certain indoor settings like gyms and restaurants.
"We all remember the gravity and uncertainty as those early on weeks turned into months," the mayor said of the grim spring of 2020, though she noted that there was a key deviation between and then and now. "Today," she said, "vaccines are available for every developed and even children as young equally 5 years one-time."
In Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot's office ordered that everyone aged 5 and up would demand to show proof of vaccination to enter public indoor spaces, similar restaurants and gyms, equally of Jan. three, and that those 16 and over would take to bear witness IDs that friction match their vaccinations cards.
The Centers for Illness Control and Prevention reported on Mon that Omicron, which accounted for less than 1 percent of new Covid-19 cases in the United States as December began, now accounts for nearly 3-quarters of new cases.
Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, a Democrat, appear that he, his wife and his ninth-grade son had tested positive for the virus, and that all were quantum infections. Mr. Walz said he and his wife had too had booster shots.
Minnesotans, I want to share that yesterday, my 9th grade son tested positive for COVID-xix. Gwen and I were both tested that same day, and afterward initially testing negative in the morning, last dark we received positive COVID-xix tests. pic.twitter.com/j2BhAiT5mN
— Governor Tim Walz (@GovTimWalz) December 21, 2021
Maryland'south governor, Larry Hogan, a Republican, said on Monday that he had tested positive, even though he had received a booster shot. On Sunday, ii Democratic senators made like announcements: Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Cory Booker of New Jersey.
Though the country'due south alarming example numbers may repeat earlier waves of the pandemic, there is preliminary evidence from South Africa that the Omicron variant may cause less astringent affliction. Epidemiologists warn that the variant may bear differently in areas where fewer people have immunity through either vaccination or prior infection.
Although quantum Omicron infections are common, scientists believe that the vaccines will provide protection against the worst outcomes. Notwithstanding, some researchers worry that the dangerous infectiousness of Omicron poses a threat to the nation'due south already strained health system.
What are the symptoms of Omicron, the new coronavirus variant?
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With cases of Omicron rising throughout the United States, Americans are scrambling to distinguish the symptoms of this new variant from those of other coronavirus variants, including Delta.
Most P.C.R. and rapid antigen tests can detect Omicron — the Food and Drug Administration has noted there are only a few tests that don't — but results practice not indicate to the user which variant they are infected with, leaving people to guess.
Some symptom differences have emerged from preliminary data, just experts are non sure they are meaningful. Data released last week from South Africa's largest private wellness insurer, for instance, advise that South Africans with Omicron ofttimes develop a scratchy or sore throat along with nasal congestion, a dry cough and muscle pain, especially low dorsum pain.
But these are all symptoms of Delta and of the original coronavirus, besides, said Ashley Z. Ritter, a nurse practitioner at the Academy of Pennsylvania. Given that Omicron has only been circulating for simply near three weeks, she added, "it's still also early on to say that in that location'south whatsoever difference in symptoms betwixt the Omicron variant and previous versions."
Information technology'due south likely that the symptoms of Omicron volition resemble Delta's more than than they differ.
"In that location's probably a huge amount of overlap between Omicron and the prior variants, because they are substantially doing the same matter," said Dr. Otto O. Yang, an infectious affliction physician at the University of California, Los Angeles, David Geffen Schoolhouse of Medicine. "If in that location are differences, they're probably fairly subtle."
Justice Section says inmates confined at habitation can stay there afterward Covid emergency ends.
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The Justice Department moved on Tuesday to let federal inmates to remain on home solitude subsequently the authorities declares an end to the Covid emergency, reversing a Trump-era legal opinion that said the Bureau of Prisons would have to recall them to federal facilities.
The shift was a rare case in which Chaser General Merrick B. Garland reversed a high-profile decision fabricated under the previous administration, and a victory for criminal justice advocates who had been pressuring the Justice Department on the issue.
"Thousands of people on home confinement have reconnected with their families, accept plant gainful employment and have followed the rules," Mr. Garland said in a argument.
Congress gave the Bureau of Prisons the say-so to release thousands of federal inmates to domicile confinement as part of the Coronavirus Help, Relief and Economic Security Deed, which passed in jump 2020 to accost the myriad threats posed by the coronavirus pandemic, including the take chances to people living and working in overcrowded prisons.
Only in January, five days earlier President Biden took role, the Justice Department'south Office of Legal Counsel determined that virtually all those people would need to return to prison once the regime said the pandemic no longer constituted an emergency.
Germany, Sweden, Portugal and Scotland impose new restrictions as Omicron surges across Europe.
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Deutschland, Sweden, Portugal and Scotland on Tuesday ordered tighter restrictions on gatherings every bit the Omicron variant continued its march across Europe, and Swedish officials warned that a surge of infections driven by the variant would keep rise until mid-Jan.
Sweden's public health agency also released new forecasts that suggested that, under a worst-case scenario, in which vaccinations beget the least protection against being infected with Omicron, the country could see 15,000 daily infections in mid-January, far college than previous peaks.
In Frg, state governors and Chancellor Olaf Scholz met to talk over, among other things, keeping critical infrastructure — including the constabulary, firefighters and medical services — operation in the face up of a probable Omicron urge.
Sweden's new rules include a cap of l people for private gatherings and instructions that most people should piece of work from habitation. In announcing them, Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said that the country, which had thrown off nearly all restrictions over the summer, "must adapt to the new reality."
"I sympathize that many are tired of this — so am I — but we now take a new virus variant, which ways nosotros are in a new situation," she said.
Days earlier Christmas, many European nations are imposing new social restrictions, mask mandates and travel rules as Omicron drives the continent's infection rates to their highest levels of the pandemic. An boilerplate of 51 daily cases are being recorded per 100,000 people in Europe, the most of any continent.
Kingdom of denmark announced on Tuesday that it had recorded 13,558 cases in the previous 24 hours, a daily record. The wellness minister, Magnus Heunicke, said on Twitter that Omicron was now the ascendant variant in the state "and continues to grow."
The regime of Portugal said on Tuesday that it was reintroducing of a raft of lockdown restrictions to reply to another surge in coronavirus cases, almost half of which are now of the Omicron variant.
The measures include the closure of all nightclubs and the obligation to work from domicile. Residents will besides have to nowadays a negative test result to enter establishments like theaters and sports venues, while such a test event volition also accept to exist shown to enter a eating place on the special days of the winter vacation flavour, including Christmas and New Year's Eve.
The government said the measures would come into strength on Saturday. Portugal is facing a rise in cases even as it is among the countries that has the most advanced vaccination rollout, with 87 percent of its population vaccinated to date.
Scotland announced limits on crowds at large events for 3 weeks, beginning the day after Christmas, and ordered confined and restaurants just to serve seated patrons in order to limit social contact. The rules in effect mean that professional sporting events will take place without spectators, following a similar declaration made by the government of Wales.
"The obligation of government is to take difficult decisions to keep the country as rubber as possible, no matter how unpopular they might be," said Scotland'south showtime minister, Nicola Sturgeon.
Omicron is now the ascendant variant in Scotland, just as it is in London, the epicenter of the virus surge in Great britain, where daily case totals have set records.
German authorities agreed to ban gatherings bigger than 10 — whether indoors or outdoors — every bit well every bit reducing audiences for sports and cultural events and closing all clubs and discothèques.
Other rules, such as restrictions keeping unvaccinated people out of all merely the nigh essential businesses, volition remain in place. The daily number of infections in Germany has been decreasing in contempo days, as the state is overcoming the worst of its fourth pandemic wave.
"This pandemic is wearing us all out," Mr. Scholz said at a news conference after his meeting with the governors. "We are all worn down and tired of the pandemic. But that can't be helped. Once again, nosotros have to stand together and, in many cases, continue our distance."
Noting that last Christmas and Easter did not actually increment infections, Mr. Scholz said the measures would only get into effect after Christmas, but asked people to accept themselves tested before meeting loved ones.
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East.U. Sets Covid Travel Passes to Expire After ix Months
The European Union moved to change coronavirus vaccine certificates next twelvemonth, so that people must have received booster shots or been fully vaccinated inside the previous nine months to travel freely inside the bloc.
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It harmonizes the acceptance period of Eastward.U. digital Covid certificates of vaccination, certificates specifically at 270 days. This will be applicable equally of the 1st of February. This means that equally of the 1st of February, member states will have to accept vaccination certificates up to 270 days following the stop of the primary vaccination wheel. They tin can neither prolong this flow, nor shorten this menstruum. Then this is a straight harmonization. This volition give a lot of certainty to citizens so you can know for how long y'all tin can use the vaccination certificate following the outset dose, or the first and second dose, depending on the vaccine that y'all utilize for your primary vaccination.
Likewise on Tuesday, the European Spousal relationship said that from side by side year, people would be immune to travel freely within the bloc only if they had received booster shots or had been fully vaccinated within the previous ix months.
The new rules, which are set to come into forcefulness on February. 1, aim to standardize travel across the bloc by setting an expiration date on Covid passes, which first came into effect in July and show the holders' vaccination status. But even with the rules, individual countries tin still make up one's mind whether to require visitors to quarantine or testify proof of a negative test upon entry. The change as well does not affect domestic passes that some countries require for entry into public places similar bars and restaurants.
The pandemic is a factor in a almost halt of U.S. population growth.
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The United States population grew past just i-10th of 1 percent from July 2020 to July 2021, the lowest charge per unit since the nation's founding, co-ordinate to data released on Tuesday by the Census Bureau. The bureau noted that the coronavirus pandemic had caused hundreds of thousands more than deaths in the country than would take been expected, had slowed clearing and had prompted parents to put off having children.
"Population growth has been slowing for years because of lower nascence rates and decreasing cyberspace international migration, all while mortality rates are rising due to the aging of the nation'south population," said Kristie Wilder, a demographer at the Census Agency. "Now, with the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, this combination has resulted in an historically slow pace of growth."
The nation's population grew by just 392,665 in the period. Of that figure, 148,043 came from natural increase — births minus deaths — and 244,622 from net international migration. It was the commencement time the net number of people moving in from abroad in a twelvemonth exceeded the natural increase.
In percentage terms, Idaho, Utah and Montana were the fastest growing states, while Washington, D.C., New York and Illinois saw the largest relative declines.
The United states of america population has been growing more slowly over the final decade than at most other times in the nation's history, because of reduced immigration and a declining birthrate, which fell in 2020 for the sixth directly twelvemonth. The pandemic appears to have amplified those trends, while as well substantially raising the death rate.
Broadway grosses fall amid a virus-related wave of testify cancellations.
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The surge in coronavirus cases is starting to have a existent fiscal toll on Broadway, just as the manufacture is attempting to rebound from its lengthy shutdown.
The Broadway League, a merchandise association, said on Tuesday that its theaters brought in $22.5 million concluding calendar week. That's a 26 per centum driblet from the $30.five million in tickets sold the previous week; in the week before Christmas in 2019, full grosses were $40.1 million.
The drib in grosses is a reflection of the fact that multiple shows have canceled performances when positive coronavirus tests forced cast or crew members to quarantine and there were not enough understudies or replacement workers for the shows to continue.
Last weekend, about one-3rd of all shows canceled some performances, and this calendar week, multiple shows decided to postpone performances until after Christmas, including "Ain't Too Proud," "Aladdin," "Dear Evan Hansen," "Hadestown," "Hamilton," "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child," "The Lion Male monarch, "MJ" and "Skeleton Crew." Plus, "Tina" canceled until Christmas night; and "Jagged Piddling Pill" airtight entirely, and "Mrs. Doubtfire" canceled Tuesday dark.
Omnipresence also dropped, given the cancellations: 184,227 people saw a Broadway prove last week, downwards from 240,602 the previous week.
The resulting revenue drop is a real concern for an industry where near shows, even before the pandemic, fail financially. Only the damage is non evenly dispersed — some shows that stay open are benefiting by selling tickets to people scrambling for something to meet after their starting time-option prove canceled. This yr the Broadway League is releasing only aggregate weekly grosses rather than breaking them downward for individual productions, and so it is difficult to come across exactly how the fiscal ramifications are unfolding.
5 other shows cited the pandemic shutdown in deciding not to reopen this fall — the musicals "Frozen," "Hateful Girls" and "West Side Story" and the plays "Hangmen" and "Who'south Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Two shows cited the ongoing pandemic in deciding to close for good after starting (or restarting) performances this fall, then pausing because of positive coronavirus tests in their companies: not only "Jagged Little Pill," which announced its closing Monday night, but too the play "Chicken & Biscuits," which closed last month.
The current crisis is coming at the worst possible time for the manufacture, because the holiday flavor is traditionally the most lucrative time of year for Broadway, and many shows depend on the holidays to make up for softer periods.
Charlotte St. Martin, the president of the Broadway League, said she does not envision the industry shutting down again, no matter how many individual shows have to pause. "I do not imagine a shutdown past us, unless every show has people with Covid," she said. "We're going to keep every bit many people employed as we tin."
And New York Mayor Neb de Blasio, at a news conference on Tuesday, was similarly shutdown-averse. "No more shutdowns," he said. "We've been through them. They were devastating. Nosotros tin can't get through information technology again."
Here's how to utilize rapid home tests (once y'all notice one).
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The rapid spread of the Omicron variant has added even more dubiousness nigh how to navigate life later on vaccination. Is it safe to gather unmasked with my vaccinated friends? Can I travel for the holidays? Can my children safely see their grandparents?
But rapid habitation testing tin can lower run a risk, ease worry and allow y'all to spend time with the people you lot care about.
Testing isn't a substitute for being vaccinated or getting a booster shot. But at-home rapid tests tin tell people within minutes whether they are contagious with Covid-nineteen. It gives added assurance that no ane at a kid's birthday party, a hymeneals or a family holiday gathering is spreading the virus. If you've been traveling through airports, information technology'due south a good thought to accept a few rapid tests, days apart, to brand sure you didn't contract the virus during your travels.
I large problem is that the tests tin be hard to find. The nation'south coronavirus testing capacity is facing enormous new pressure, with holiday travelers waiting in long lines to be tested, overworked laboratories struggling to keep up and rapid at-dwelling diagnostics flying off pharmacy shelves as the Omicron variant fuels a rapid spike in Covid-19 cases.
The Biden administration has promised an investment of $1 billion in dwelling house testing. Many stores and websites do still have tests in stock, but information technology may require some effort to detect them. The assistants has said that starting in Dec, an estimated 200 million rapid tests should be bachelor to Americans each month.
No test is a 100 percent guarantee, but given that your vaccine and booster already protect you, a dwelling house test is some other layer of precaution to lower gamble. Unvaccinated people tin do good from using habitation tests also, simply they should not rely on testing as a substitute for a vaccine.
Home tests are specially useful for families with young children who aren't nonetheless eligible for vaccination and for anyone with an at-adventure family member. When my vaccinated daughter wanted to visit her eighty-year-former vaccinated grandmother in New Mexico, she was tested in New York earlier leaving, and she carried several rapid habitation tests to use when she landed and every day of the short visit.
"Testing is an data business, and that information is liberating," said Mara Aspinall, an expert in biomedical diagnostics at Arizona Land Academy who is also on the board of OraSure, which makes rapid Covid tests. "For some, it's going to be to not wear a mask at an result. For some, it's going to be to become visit not bad grandma or collaborate with the public. If your test is positive, it ways yous've got the power to protect yourself and other people."
In the United States, a boxed set of two tests can range from $fourteen to $24, making them too expensive for near people to employ often. Just home tests tin still be a helpful way to lower the adventure of indoor gatherings and spending time with extended family members.
"I think people should cover abode testing more," said Neeraj Sood, a professor and vice dean for inquiry at the University of Southern California and director of the Covid Initiative at the The statesC. Schaeffer Center. "I'm planning to go to India. I'll do the home test the moment I country to make sure I'grand not infectious before I requite a hug to my father."
Are American schools fix for the adjacent large virus surge?
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School districts in the United states of america have more often than not been reassuring families that they plan to continue in-person learning until the Christmas break and reopen equally planned in January, even though a few classrooms accept been airtight to incorporate spread of the virus.
New York Urban center, Boston and Montgomery County, Physician., in suburban Washington, are among the large school systems that have said they would not shift entirely to remote learning, or would do so merely if forced to by public health officials.
Still, the alarming spread of the virus in the weeks since the Omicron variant emerged could betrayal the rickety infrastructure that has kept schools running through well-nigh of this year. Many schools are however brusque of substitute teachers and bus drivers, and tin ill beget an outbreak that would transport fifty-fifty more than staff members domicile.
Despite the classroom closures and staffing issues, the schoolhouse year had been going relatively smoothly. Across the nation'due south 13,000 districts and 98,000 public schools this week, there are almost 600 airtight schools or districts, according to data from Burbio, a visitor that has tracked school operations through the pandemic. At that place are fewer closures in event at present than in Nov.
New York City's public schoolhouse organisation, the largest in the nation and the one currently threatened nearly by the Omicron variant, has 1,600 schools; four are currently closed because of virus cases, and 44 more are under investigation.
Nationally, the picture had been bright enough until recently that many schools were relaxing some virus restrictions. And in Missouri, the attorney general, a Republican, sent a letter to districts directing them to drop mask mandates and quarantine requirements subsequently a excursion court approximate there ruled that the measures violated the State Constitution. Several districts are resisting the directive, a sign of possible dissension to come after the holidays, when the surge could be more than severe.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention encouraged schools on Friday to reduce quarantines and closures by using a protocol known as exam-to-stay, in which shut contacts of positive cases are given frequent rapid tests. Many districts, however, practice not have a sufficient supply of the tests, nor the staff to administer them widely.
European businesses telephone call for help as Omicron'due south reach expands.
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Businesses in many parts of Europe are demanding more authorities help as new pandemic restrictions and heightened anxiety over the highly contagious Omicron variant take crushed what would normally exist a assisting fourth dimension of year.
Nowhere is this worse than in the Netherlands, where the Dutch government instituted a lockdown over the weekend, closing most shops, bars, restaurants, gyms, outdoor sports, cultural venues and schools through Jan.
Some business organisation owners fear they may never reopen.
"That is something that I ask myself every twenty-four hour period," said Omar Waseq, who owns a cheese bar and a motion picture cafe in the center of Utrecht. "I'm non 100 per centum sure."
Mr. Waseq estimated that he is losing well-nigh $50,000 each month while his cheese bar, Kaasbar Utrecht, is shuttered, and $100,000 at the cafe. Plans to rebuild a nightclub he owns that was burned in a fire in January have been put on agree.
He has had to let go most of his 80-person staff and is at present trying to make money selling mulled vino in the streets and cheese packages door-to-door.
Many Dutch business organisation owners are seeking assistance from the government. Calls to the nation's concern registry request for assistance climbed past 400 on Monday — seven times the number logged the previous Monday.
In U.k., the authorities responded Tuesday, announcing 1 billion pounds, or about $1.three billion, in assist for the hospitality industry, including one-fourth dimension grants of £6,000 and rebates for employees' ill pay.
The hope for more aid comes as a fresh wave of anxiety over the coronavirus and the economy washes over the region.
In Deutschland, businesses are pressing the government to lift new requirements that customers show proof of vaccination or recent recovery that they say accept scared away customers at what is supposed to exist their busiest — and most lucrative — time of the year.
Spain's government has scheduled an emergency coming together with regional leaders on Wednesday to hash out whether to adopt new restrictions, and Italia's government is meeting on Th.
"We are in a different phase at present where lockdown volition be potentially more costly," said Claus Vistesen, principal eurozone economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics. "Up until at present we've been used to lockdowns followed by support from the regime. I call up that volition be the case also, just support volition be more provisional, less comprehensive than earlier."
In the Netherlands, Mr. Waseq said that because he opened his businesses later the pandemic began and did not have 2019 sales to utilise equally a criterion comparing, he was not eligible for regime help.
Ron Sinnige, a spokesman for the country's national business registry, the Kamer van Koophandel, said the agency was flooded with calls from owners this week asking virtually financial assist, advice, or liquidating their operations. Some were seeking guidance on how to qualify every bit an essential business organisation — could a clothing store sell candy and soda, could a beauty salon offer post-surgical massages or listing Botox injections as a medical process.
The questions were a sign of people'due south creativity and despair, Mr. Sinnige said. "Equally opposed to previous lockdowns, people are really at the cease of their financial flexibility and emotional flexibility," he said.
French republic has banned tourists from Britain and canceled a carte of year-finish celebrations. Tougher restrictions on businesses seem unlikely at the moment, yet, peculiarly with a second circular of presidential elections coming in April.
Ireland imposed an early curfew of 8 p.m. on restaurants and confined that began on Monday, while likewise limiting attendance at events.
In Denmark, restaurants and confined must end serving alcohol after 10 p.m., while a slate of venues and upshot spaces including theaters, museums, zoos, concert halls and Tivoli, Copenhagen's landmark amusement park, have been closed.
Switzerland's restrictions that bar unvaccinated people from going to restaurants, gyms and museums are expected to last until Jan. 24.
In Germany, the check-in procedure at stores, which requires stopping everyone at the door and request to see their vaccination certification and an ID, was cumbersome and kept shoppers away, the German Merchandise Association said.
Retailers surveyed by the group reported a 37 percent drib in sales compared with Christmas 2019, with an even bigger drop in the number of shoppers, threatening the future of many stores, especially smaller shops.
"After months of lockdowns, the restrictions are once over again bringing many retailers to the border of their existence," said Stefan Genth, head of the Merchandise Clan.
A court in the northern state of Lower Saxony last week threw out the vaccine verification restrictions in that location, after the Woolworth department store chain challenged them on grounds they were not fairly applied and that requiring shoppers to clothing masks provided sufficient protection against the spread of coronavirus. The ruling on Thursday raised hopes that other states would follow their lead, giving a final boost to last-minute shoppers.
"Final weekend was better, but overall the shopping season has been more than depressing," said Marker Alexander Krack, head of the Lower Saxony Trade Association. "The restaurants, theaters and cinemas all nonetheless accept restrictions and that means fewer people in the city shopping."
New Zealand and other Asia Pacific nations scramble to respond to Omicron.
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New Zealand Delays Phased Border Reopening Amid Omicron Concerns
New Zealand postponed plans to reopen its borders to citizens and international travelers until the end of February. The state will too accelerate its booster plan to slow down the Omricon variant's spread.
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All evidence so far points to Omicron existence the most transmissible variant yet, and public health advice suggests that soon every case coming in through our border into our managed isolation facilities will exist the Omicron variant. Our immediate task correct now must exist to slow information technology down, and to filibuster information technology from inbound the New Zealand community for as long as nosotros maybe tin can. Cabinet has decided to push button back the appointment for cocky-isolation for those traveling from Australia from the 17th of January to the finish of February, so that we can accelerate the rollout of that booster plan and have equally many people boosted with their vaccination before we have people isolating at abode beyond the international border. Effectually three meg New Zealanders will be due to get their booster by the end of February, and assuming nearly of this group go their booster on fourth dimension, at that indicate, we volition be far better protected from Omicron.
New Zealand said on Tuesday that it was pushing dorsum a phased opening of its borders to the end of Feb, in another indication of how countries throughout the Asia Pacific region are scrambling to respond to the threat of the Omicron variant.
New Zealand likewise postponed its plans to allow its citizens living in Australia to return without quarantining starting on Jan. 17. At present the programme will not start until the end of Feb.
New Zealand has detected 22 cases of Omicron in international arrivals, but no community cases of the variant have been reported. In the event of an outbreak, the government intends to replace lockdowns of the past with more than targeted measures, Chris Hipkins, the Covid-19 response minister, said.
"Information technology's not our intention to motion to lockdowns unless that is absolutely necessary in the outcome of a widespread outbreak, where our health organisation becomes nether considerable strain and the overall health gamble becomes too much to bear," he said.
In other measures to limit the new variant's eventual spread, the authorities said that residents would go access to a booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine sooner — at four months instead of half-dozen — after their second shot.
New Zealand is one of several countries in the region that are tightening restrictions or considering tougher quarantine rules every bit cases of the variant rise.
In Nihon, which closed its borders to all nonresident foreigners final month, an outbreak of 180 cases at an American military base has also raised fears of a resurgence. The virus was first detected at the base on the southern isle of Okinawa on Friday, the government said, adding that it was unclear how many of those people had been sickened by Omicron. The government has asked the The states to increase restrictions on and effectually the base, a height Japanese health official said on Mon.
Only a few weeks afterward reopening to foreign tourists, Thailand said on Tuesday that it was pausing its quarantine-free travel program until Jan. iv because of concern about the variant.
In Indonesia, where only 40 percent of the population is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, the government has banned entry by strange nationals from several countries in Africa and Europe. The authorities has said information technology is considering increasing the quarantine period for Indonesian citizens arriving from those countries to xiv days from 10, local news outlets reported.
And in Australia, the Omicron variant is coursing through the community and has even reached Yulara, a remote customs more than 1,000 miles south of the nearest coastal city, Darwin. Two workers who had flown in that location from Brisbane tested positive, the health authorities said on Tuesday.
Prime Government minister Scott Morrison insisted, however, that the state would not render to harsh lockdowns.
"Yeah, nosotros're going to need to continue to calibrate how nosotros manage this virus and how we live with this virus in the confront of Omicron," Mr. Morrison said on Tuesday. But, he added: "We're not going dorsum to lockdowns. Nosotros're not going dorsum to shutting downwardly people'southward lives."
As the virus shuts down holiday performances, a 'Nutcracker' is canceled.
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New York Urban center Ballet canceled a performance of "George Balanchine'south The Nutcracker" on Tuesday after several people involved in the production tested positive for the coronavirus, in the latest sign of how the surge in cases is disrupting attempts to bring back some of the city's most beloved holiday performances.
As the production, one of Urban center Ballet'south most pop, was called off at Lincoln Eye, plans to fill Carnegie Hall on Tuesday evening with the "Hallelujah" chorus were canceled when Music Sacra postponed a performance of Handel's "Messiah," citing the virus. And in that location are no more vacation kicklines at Radio City Music Hall: The remaining performances of the "Christmas Spectacular Starring the Radio Urban center Rockettes" were canceled Friday.
The cancellations came shortly after it was announced that some of Broadway's biggest hits would not resume until after Christmas, forgoing one of their nearly lucrative periods of the year amongst concerns most the spread of the Omicron variant.
It is non merely New York that is seeing vacation performances canceled. A number of performances of "A Christmas Carol" at the Center Theater Group in Los Angeles were recently canceled, with the theater proverb that information technology would not come back until after Christmas.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/12/21/world/omicron-covid-vaccine-tests
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