Also over the weekend, several countries announced plans to shut their borders to Britain as news of a highly contagious new variant of the coronavirus led the British government to backtrack on plans to let families mix over Christmas. The U.K. is locking down London and other areas in southern England where infections by the Covid mutation are heavily concentrated.
The U.S. is recording at least 215,700 new Covid-19 cases and at least 2,600 virus-related deaths each day, based on a seven-day average calculated by CNBC using Johns Hopkins University data.
The following data was compiled by Johns Hopkins University:
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The World Health Organization (W.H.O) last week warned that a new variant of the coronavirus was spreading in the UK. The highly contagious strain has caused fresh panic with most countries in Europe barring travel in and out of Britain.
The new strain is considered 70 percent more transmissible than the Covid-19 and has already been detected in Denmark, the Netherlands, Australia and most recently, Italy.
Experts are optimistic that the new vaccines will work against the new strain due to the genetic similarity with the original Covid-19 virus.
“There is a strong belief here that the vaccine, as it exists today … will have effectiveness in warding off infection from this new strain in England, in addition to the old strain that we’ve been contending with for months now,” said affiliate assistant professor from the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, Vin Gupta.
New COVID-19 Strain Won t Impact Vaccine s Effectiveness, Reveal Experts indiatimes.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from indiatimes.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
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Dec 21, 2020 9:54 AM
FILE PHOTO: Bob Atighechi administers the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccination to Margaret Dubois, 87, a resident at The Reservoir nursing facility, in West Hartford, Connecticut, U.S., December 18, 2020. Stephen Dunn/Pool via REUTERS
NEW YORK (Reuters) -The U.S. government and two of the nation’s largest pharmacy chains kick off a nationwide campaign to vaccinate nursing home residents against COVID-19 on Monday, a week after the first vaccines authorized in the country began being administered to healthcare workers.
The program is the latest effort to control a pandemic that has killed more than 300,000 people in the country and is straining the capacity of healthcare systems in some states.
Will The COVID Vaccine Work On New Strains? What You Need To Know
12/21/20 AT 9:23 AM
As a new version of the coronavirus was identified in the U.K. and concerns about the spread of the mutation intensify, medical experts have shown optimism about the effectiveness of the existing COVID-19 vaccines against the strain.
COVID-19 vaccines developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, as well as Moderna, have been reported to have an efficacy of more than 90% and have already begun the rollout for emergency use in the U.S. But concerns have now risen about virus mutations. Several countries have already issued a travel ban from the U.K after the country reported identifying a strain of the virus on Dec. 19.