March 31 coronavirus news

Peru will enter a total lockdown starting Thursday through Easter Sunday to try curb the spread of the pandemic, the Peruvian government announced Wednesday.

The total lockdown includes a 24-hour curfew, ban on the use of private vehicles, and only one person per household is allowed to leave home for essential shopping, according to a statement from the Peruvian Council of Ministers.

Domestic flights and inter-city public transport will also stop, the statement read.

The announcement comes as Peru is experiencing a resurgence in Covid-19 cases just days ahead of the first round of presidential elections, scheduled for April 11. 

Peru has reported at least 1,533,121 Covid-19 cases and at least 51,635 Covid-related deaths, according to data collected by John Hopkins University.

Massachusetts will be receiving more than 100,000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine when nationwide shipments resume next week, Gov. Charlie Baker said Wednesday.

“I can’t tell you how important that is,” Baker said. “And as I’ve said before, thank God Pfizer and Moderna were there when they were there, but the difference between two doses and one dose is not just convenience, it’s also capacity.”

“I think for many of us, this is a big sign, a big statement, and we have heard many times that it’s coming, but it’s coming. This is a big sign that things are actually starting to get here,” the governor added.

Baker said it would be up to the state to absorb the growing federal supply and make sure doses get into people’s arms.

Drugmaker Johnson & Johnson said Wednesday it had found a quality problem at a Baltimore plant helping manufacture its coronavirus vaccine under contract.

The New York Times reported Wednesday that workers at Emergent, the Baltimore plant that has been making Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine, accidentally mixed up some of the ingredients, ruining as many as 15 million potential doses of vaccine and delaying US Food and Drug Administration authorization of the plant. 

Johnson & Johnson said in a statement to CNN Wednesday that the quality control process at the plant identified “one batch” of drug substance that did not meet quality standards. The batch in question was a part of test run and quality check. The site is not yet authorized by the FDA to make the drug substance used in the vaccine.

“This batch was never advanced to the filling and finishing stages of our manufacturing process,” the emailed statement from the company said.

None of the lost doses impact the company’s goal of delivering 20 million Covid-19 vaccine doses in March. For that, the company said Wednesday, it is on track.

“This is an example of the rigorous quality control applied to each batch of drug substance. The issue was identified and addressed with Emergent and shared with the United States Food & Drug Administration (FDA),” the statement said.

“Quality and safety continue to be our top priority. Therefore, as we continue to work with FDA and Emergent toward the Emergency Use Authorization of the Emergent Bayview Facility, Johnson & Johnson is providing additional experts in manufacturing, technical operations and quality to be on-site at Emergent to supervise, direct and support all manufacturing of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine. In coordination with the US Department of Health & Human Services, these steps will enable us to safely deliver an additional 24 million single-shot vaccine doses through April,” the statement added.

The FDA told CNN it is “aware of the situation, but we are unable to comment further” and referred CNN back to Johnson & Johnson. The manufacturer, Emergent, also referred CNN back to Johnson & Johnson.  

Last week: The Biden administration expressed some doubts the company could meet its self-imposed deadline, but by Friday, the administration seemed more confident that Johnson & Johnson would meet its goal, as White House coronavirus coordinator Jeffrey Zients said, “they appear on track to meet that goal with at least 11 million doses delivered next week.”

The FDA authorized Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose Covid-19 vaccine in late February, but the company had struggled to ramp up production and failed to meet earlier production timelines that had been laid out in its contract with the federal government.

The Biden administration has worked with all three authorized vaccine manufacturers to ramp up the supply of the Covid-19 vaccines. President Biden used the Defense Production Act to acquire new materials and equipment and brokered a rare partnership between Johnson & Johnson and pharmaceutical rival Merck & Co., to make more vaccines. That vaccine supply won’t be available until later in the year.

In February, Johnson & Johnson also said it had been working to expand its own manufacturing capacity and was expanding the number of third-party vaccine manufacturers with which it was working.

The Covid-19 pandemic had a significant and negative impact on pregnant women and their infants, according to a global review of studies that examined the collateral impact of the pandemic on pregnancy outcomes.

The study published Wednesday in the journal the Lancet, found that stillbirths and maternal deaths increased by nearly a third, according to pooled data from 40 studies that covered 17 countries. 

The number of women who needed surgery for an ectopic pregnancy - when the fertilized egg grows outside a woman’s uterus that, left untreated, can cause life-threating bleeding - increased almost six-fold between January of 2020 and January 2021.

The researchers from St. George’s University of London determined that many of these problems may stem from the lack of access women had to medical care during the pandemic. Hospitals were overburdened with Covid-19 patients and some women may have been reluctant to go to the doctor, concerned about exposure to Covid-19. 

The number of women who reported symptoms of depression also increased, according to six of the 10 studies the researchers evaluated. Rates of maternal anxiety were also higher. 

More context: Globally, the one rate that didn’t change much is the number of pre-term births. Pooled data from higher-income countries, though, showed a 10% reduction in preterm births. It’s unclear why. The rate stayed the same in low- and middle-income countries.

“It is clear from our study and others that the disruption caused by the pandemic has led to the avoidable deaths of both mothers and babies, especially in low- and middle-income countries,” said lead author Dr. Asma Khalil, a professor of obstetrics at St. George’s University of London. “We urge policymakers and health care leaders to prioritize safe, accessible, and equitable maternity care within the strategic response to the pandemic and aftermath, to reduce adverse pregnancy outcomes worldwide.”

Dr. Denise Jamieson called the results of this study “concerning.” Jamieson did not work on the study but is the James Robert McCord Chair in Gynecology and Obstetrics at Emory University and a member of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ Covid OB Expert Work Group.

“Overall, this provides compelling evidence that the effects of the pandemic go well beyond the effects of Covid infection,” Jamieson said. “It shows that there are far-reaching adverse effects on maternal and infant health that may last long beyond the pandemic.”

Jamieson said scientists saw a similar pattern of problems in countries that were impacted by the Ebola epidemic that started in 2013. 

“This is a pattern we’ve seen before,” Jamieson said. “When you have an infectious disease that consumes a lot of healthcare resources and affects large segments of the population, maternal and infant health suffer.”

The Italian government has made the coronavirus vaccine mandatory for all health care and pharmacy workers, according to a new decree passed on Wednesday. 

In a statement, the government said the measure was introduced to protect medical staff, patients and vulnerable people who are at a risk of infection.

Health Minister Roberto Speranza said there was “great satisfaction” on the decree’s passing, adding that winning the “health battle is a prerequisite for a real restart of the country.” 

Health care workers who refuse the vaccine will be reassigned where possible to not be in contact with patients. However, sanctions can include not being paid, according to Labour Minister Andrea Orlando who provided details at the end of a cabinet meeting on Wednesday night.

The decree also protects those who administer the vaccine by excluding them of criminal liability as long as the inoculation has been carried out in accordance with instructions set by the health ministry. 

The Italian government has also extended coronavirus restrictions until the end of April. The only exception will be for students up to 14 years old who will have to return to school even if they are in a “red zone,” the strictest three-tier system Italy has adopted to curb the spread of the virus.

According to the latest data from the Italian health ministry there has been an increase of at least 23,904 coronavirus cases on Wednesday and at least 467 deaths over a 24-hour period. 

This brings the total number of cases to at least 3,584,899 since the start of the pandemic. 

Mounting evidence suggests the more contagious coronavirus variant first identified in the UK, which experts believe is partly driving an uptick of cases in places like Michigan, may already be dominant across the US.

“I think we are there,” said William Lee, vice president of science at Helix, a company whose tests have identified a large share of variant cases across the country. “But at the end of the day, it’s hard to say for sure,” given gaps and delays in the data.

Lee is one of the authors of a study published Tuesday in the journal Cell estimating that the variant, known as B.1.1.7, would cause the majority of Covid-19 cases in the US by March 19. 

According to that study, B.1.1.7 cases are expected to double every week and a half as a percentage of the country’s total coronavirus cases. The study also concluded the variant was introduced several different times to the US, as early as late November. The study’s conclusions were based on testing data through February.

Lee said that there’s strong evidence the variant is already responsible for a majority of cases in states like Florida, Michigan and Georgia — with a number of others close on their heels, like Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Texas and Southern California. However, Helix’s data does not include robust samples from a number of other states, particularly in the Northeast and Midwest regions.

While officials with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention won’t yet say whether the variant is dominant, its scientists previously predicted this would be the case by now. 

In January, a CDC study predicted that the variant would exhibit “rapid growth in early 2021, becoming the predominant variant in March.” At the time, the variant was assumed to account for less than 0.5% of cases. 

“B.1.1.7, we know from our most recent data, is about 26% of circulating virus right now,” CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said at a briefing Wednesday. This appears to be based on preliminary data of samples collected in the two weeks leading up to March 13, according to CDC’s website. “It is starting to become the predominant variant in many US regions,” she added.

A CDC spokesperson told CNN Wednesday that “national prevalence estimates are inherently delayed by a few weeks.” While the present-day picture of the variant is “unclear,” they said the agency expects to share its projections “in the near future,” based on mathematical modeling that’s currently underway.

Nearly 12,000 cases of the variant have been identified in 49 states, Puerto Rico and Washington, DC, per the CDC. The agency said this does not represent the total number of such cases circulating in the US, but rather just those that have been found by analyzing positive samples.

Florida and Michigan lead the country in these raw numbers. 

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear announced the state will be moving up opening Covid-19 vaccine eligibility to Kentuckians 16 and older from April 12 to April 5.

Beshear said the state decided to move up its vaccination schedule because a number of other states are seeing increasing Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations, and because Kentucky is seeing open vaccine appointments across the state that it wants to fill

“So, starting on Monday, if you’re 16 and up, you qualify to get this vaccine, no other limitations out there. So, make sure you make your plan to get your shot of hope,” the governor said Wednesday.

Beshear also announced that Kentucky’s Department of Corrections is now scheduled to receive extra Johnson & Johnson vaccines on either April 2 or April 5, which will cover all interested inmates as soon as next week. He noted that the Kentucky State Penitentiary and Western Kentucky Correctional Complex will hold off on vaccines for the moment, as they are currently recovering from an outbreak.

Nursing homes have seen a 96% decline in new Covid-19 cases since vaccines started rolling out in late December, according to a new analysis from the American Health Care Association and the National Center for Assisted Living (AHCA/NCAL).

By March 7, the country saw the lowest number of weekly cases and deaths since Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has been tracking them, according to the report published Tuesday. With 547 deaths the week of March 7, deaths were down 91% since December.

Since December, nursing home cases have been declining at a much faster rate than community cases, the group’s analysis showed.

“We are not out of the woods yet, but these numbers are incredibly encouraging and a major morale booster for frontline caregivers who have been working tirelessly for more than a year to protect our residents,” Mark Parkinson, president and CEO of AHCA/NCAL, said in a statement. “This trend shows that when long term care is prioritized, as with the national vaccine rollout, we can protect our vulnerable elderly population.”

AHCA/NCAL represents more than 14,000 nursing homes and long-term care facilities around the country. The facilities provide care for about five million people a year. 

The clinical trial for Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine designed to protect against the B.1.351 variant, first identified in South Africa, has begun, the US National Institutes of Health said Wednesday.

First shots have been administered as part of Phase 1 of the trial that is taking place in the Atlanta, Cincinnati, Nashville, and Seattle areas.

The trial aims to enroll around 210 participants.

According to Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, current available vaccines should be “adequate” against the variant, but NIAID is continuing its work with Moderna on this trial “out of an abundance of caution.”

The variant-specific vaccine is also an mRNA vaccine that targets spike proteins, like Moderna’s original vaccine, but the targeting takes into account the mutations that distinguish the B.1.351 variant. 

The trial will be enrolling people who have already received Moderna’s initial vaccine as well as people who are so far unvaccinated. Participants will be split into eight different vaccine cohorts that will test different dosages and combinations. Some participants will receive only the variant-specific vaccine or the general vaccine, while some will be testing a combination regimen of the two. 

Johnson & Johnson told CNN that it has met its goal to deliver 20 million Covid-19 vaccine doses to the US government by the end of March. 

Last week, the Biden administration expressed some doubts the company could meet its self-imposed deadline, but by Friday, the administration seemed more confident that J&J would meet its goal, as White House coronavirus coordinator Jeffrey Zients said, “they appear on track to meet that goal with at least 11 million doses delivered next week.”

The US Food and Drug Administration authorized J&J’s single-dose Covid-19 vaccine in late February, but the company had struggled to ramp up production and failed to meet earlier production timelines that had been laid out in its contract with the federal government. 

The Biden administration has worked with all three authorized vaccine manufacturers to ramp up the supply of the Covid-19 vaccines.

President Biden used the Defense Production Act to acquire new materials and equipment, and brokered a rare partnership between J&J and pharmaceutical rival Merck & Co., to make more vaccines. That vaccine supply won’t be available until later in the year. 

In February, J&J also said it had been working to expand its own manufacturing capacity and was expanding the number of third-party vaccine manufacturers with which it was working.

Grand River Aseptic Manufacturing (GRAM), the company that is doing some of the fill and finish work for the Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Covid-19 vaccine in the US, was given the certification it needs to provide commercial services to the European market, the company said Wednesday.

The Grand Rapids, Michigan-based company was recently audited by the Dutch Health and Youth Care Inspectorate and was issued a European Union Good Manufacturing Practices certificate. That’s the last official piece of paper it needs to work in Europe. 

However, J&J would not confirm if it will work with GRAM in Europe. J&J announced Monday that it will supply Europe with 200 million Covid-19 vaccines this year.

Fill and finish are the last two steps in the manufacturing and packaging process for vaccines. The first J&J doses that went out immediately after the US Food and Drug Administration authorized the vaccine in February came from the GRAM plant. 

Last year, the company expanded and added a new 60,000 square foot facility with new rapid vial filling equipment. 

In August, GRAM signed a $160 million deal with the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Health and Human Services to expand the US capacity for manufacturing and the distribution of vaccines and therapeutics in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. GRAM got the emergency authorization to do the fill and finish work on the J&J Covid-19 vaccine in the US in February.

GRAM said it will continue its expansion and open a new finishing center sometime later this spring.  

The University of Pittsburgh is implementing a shelter-in-place for its main campus for 9:00 p.m. Wednesday, according to an official university email sent to students, faculty and staff.

“This action is being taken to respond to a consistent increase in positive cases among students,” the email said. “With the presence of the U.K. variant, B 1.1.7., on campus and in Allegheny County, the COVID-19 Medical Response Office (CMRO) is concerned that this trend will continue. Of significant concern is that the increase in positive cases since the end of last week is now among our residence hall students.”

The news comes on the heels of a Tuesday report that there are confirmed positive Covid-19 cases in 13 of the university’s residence halls, along with 30 new positive cases between students and staff. A March 26 release confirmed 50 new cases the week before, 42 of which were detected in students.

The shelter-in-place will remain effect “until the CMRO advises that it is safe to lift,” the memo said. Students are being advised to leave their rooms only to “attend classes, labs, or clinical in person; pick up food; exercise safely; work when necessary; and shop for essentials and medical needs,” and on-campus dining will be available to students through takeout options.

An ensemble forecast published Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now projects there will be 565,000 to 585,000 coronavirus deaths in the United States by April 24.

The agency’s forecast has shown a general decline in projected deaths in the past weeks.

The current forecast projects up to 566,617 deaths by April 10. That’s about 7,000 fewer deaths than expected by that date, based on a projection from two and a half weeks ago.

The lower estimate in the current forecast projects around 4,100 new deaths per week between now and April 24, while the upper limit of the forecast projects 9,900 new deaths per week over that time frame.

The US has seen 6,960 new deaths in the last seven days. 

More than 150 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine have been administered in the US, according to data published Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

The CDC reported that at least 150,273,292 total doses have been administered, about 77% of the 195,581,725 doses delivered. 

That’s about 2.7 million more doses reported administered since yesterday, for a new record seven-day average of more than 2.8 million doses per day. 

About one in six US residents – nearly 55 million people – are fully vaccinated against Covid-19, and about 29% of the population – more than 97 million people – have received at least one dose, CDC data shows. 

Note: Data published by the CDC may be delayed, and doses may not have been given on the day reported. 

In a televised address to the nation, French President Emmanuel Macron said France risks “losing control” over the spread of Covid-19 without new national measures.

He said France would be extending the regional “reinforced slow-down” restrictions, already in place in 19 areas of the country, to all of France for four weeks.

Under the “limited lockdown,” curfews will remain in place, domestic travel will be limited and people will be asked to work from home. The new lockdown measures will start on April 3 and last through May 2.

“These rules will be extended to the entire metropolitan territory from this Saturday evening and for four weeks,” Macron said. “If we make this choice to extend them to the entire metropolitan territory, it is because no metropolitan area is now spared,” he added. 

Macron said the new UK variant has created an “epidemic within an epidemic” and it is more contagious and deadly. Almost 44% of all Covid-19 patients in intensive care units are under the age of 65 he said. France has made the “right choices” so far but in the past few weeks the vaccine has “accelerated” and “things have changed.” 

Starting Saturday all schools will be closed for three weeks. On April 26, kindergarten and primary schools can reopen. Middle schools and high schools can reopen on May 3, Macron said.

“These last weeks we are facing a new situation. We have entered a race of speed,” the French president said as the number of patients in ICUs exceeded 5,000 on Tuesday – a first since April 2020. “We must therefore set ourselves a new framework for the coming months,” he added. 

Macron said thanks to vaccinations, the country can see a way out of this crisis. “A total of 250,000 professionals are now ready to contribute to this national effort to vaccinate 7 days a week,” he added.

Yemen has received its first shipment of Covid-19 vaccines via the international COVAX facility, the World Health Organization Yemen announced today.

It comes a week after the country’s coronavirus committee urged the government to declare a public health state of emergency amid a rise in infections.

The shipment included 360,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccination, as well as 13,000 safety boxes and 1.3 million syringes. 

It is the first shipment of an expected 1.9 million doses that Yemen is set to received through COVAX during 2021. 

COVAX is an entity run by a coalition that includes the Vaccine Alliance known as Gavi and WHO. It is funded by donations from governments, multilateral institutions and foundations with a mission to buy coronavirus vaccines in bulk and send them to poorer nations that can’t compete with wealthy countries in securing contracts with major drug companies.

“The ministry of health will start targeting health workers and frontline health workers who are more exposed the virus of course,” United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund Representative Philippe Duamelle said. “Vaccines work, vaccines save lives, now let’s start getting people vaccinated”, he added.

“This shipment represents an important step in the fight against COVID-19 in Yemen. It will help save lives, including of those at highest risk of serious disease, and will help protect the health system. These safe and effective vaccines will be a gamechanger, but for the foreseeable future we must continue wearing masks, physically distance and avoid crowds,” WHO representative Dr. Adham Ismail said

Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) last week warned of a “dramatic influx of critically ill Covid-19 patients,” in Yemen, and urged for greater assistance from aid groups and donor countries.

This morning, Pfizer/BioNTech announced today its Covid-19 vaccine showed 100% efficacy in youths ages 12 to 15. Shortly after, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona is “very confident” that children will be back in school for in-person learning in the fall.

CNN’s Ryan Young was in Atlanta as parents and students grapple with a return to school.

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The European Union’s medicines regulator says there is “no scientific evidence” to support restricting AstraZeneca vaccine to certain age groups. 

The European Medicine Agency’s (EMA) executive director Emer Cooke said in a virtual press conference that independent experts have looked at the cases, alongside scientists, to determine if there was any underlying risk factor that makes people more susceptible to blood disorders. They were not able to find any specific risk factors.

This comes after German Chancellor Angela Merkel limited AstraZeneca vaccine to people over 60 on Tuesday, following reports of a rare blood clot in the brains of 31 people since having a first dose. 

“Two weeks ago on the 18th of March we gave an interim update of the assessment, and we concluded at the time that the benefits of the AstraZeneca vaccine in preventing COVID-19, with its associated risk of hospitalization and death outweigh the risks of side effects, and our position has not changed,” Cooke said.

“[The] Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee, a committee responsible for assessing the safety of medicines, continues to review all the data available and will aim to reach a scientific conclusion on the signal next week,” she continued.

Cooke added that the EMA continue to monitor all the scientific evidence available on effectiveness and safety of Covid-19 vaccines and will issue recommendations based on robust evidence.

When asked about Germany’s decision to restrict age limits, Cooke said they were asking their experts to evaluate if they can come to an age or gender based association, adding that Germany’s decision was a matter for the German government to take and not one for a regulator.  

Earlier on Wednesday, the head of the World Health Organization’s Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals reiterated the benefit-risk assessment for the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine saying it still weighs very heavily in favor of its use.

The director of the US Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, announced on Wednesday that the CDC is releasing new Covid-19 guidance for adult day service centers. 

“These centers provide important social and health services to community-dwelling adults age 65 and older, as well as to adults any age living with disability,” Walensky said during a White House coronavirus press briefing.

“We know these populations are at high risk for severe Covid-19 disease and this guidance will help center administrators and staff protect themselves and adults receiving their services by promoting and engaging in preventative behaviors that reduce Covid-19 spread and help maintain healthy operations and environments in these facilities,” she added.

The guidance promotes a range of preventative behaviors and facility practices in adult day services settings, including guidelines on hygiene, building operations, shared spaces and transport. 

Here’s what the guidance said: 

The White House’s senior Covid-19 response adviser, Andy Slavitt, on Wednesday urged governors, mayors and local leaders to listen to President Biden and maintain or reinstate mask mandates to “save lives.” 

“We need to keep case numbers down so we can save lives and give people the chance to get vaccinated in April, May and June so we can enter the summer on the strongest footing possible,” Slavitt said at a White House Covid-19 briefing. 

“Now in the weeks ahead, that it will take to get everyone vaccinated for all of this effort, we need a simple thing of every governor, mayor and local leader, and that is to heed what the President is asking in return, simply to maintain or to reinstate mask mandates,” he continued.

“Together we can win this race and save lives,” Slavitt said. 

On Monday, Biden called for mask mandates to be maintained or reinstated across the country in order to keep Covid-19 cases down. “Please. This is not politics,” the President said.  

Biden’s comments came after Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a virtual White House briefing on Monday that she had a feeling of “impending doom” as Covid-19 were on the rise again.

“Right now, I’m scared,” Walensky said, sounding the alarm.

Austria is likely to order one million doses of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine ”as early as next week,” the office of Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said in a statement to CNN Wednesday. 

“We are in the final metres and a Sputnik order can probably be placed as early as next week,” Kurz said in the statement, after he met with Russian Ambassador to Austria , Dmitrii Liubinski, in Vienna.

Austria is hoping to make up for shortfalls in other vaccines ordered through the European Union, particularly from Astra-Zeneca.

”I am very happy about the binding delivery commitment. If we order Sputnik, we will still receive 300,000 doses in April; 500,000 doses in May; and 200,000 doses in early June. A very prompt delivery would therefore be possible here,” Kurz said. But the two countries ”are still in the detailed coordination stage” after weeks of discussions, he added. A data room has been set up and negotiations are ongoing between Austria’s health ministry and the procurator-fiscal with the Russian side.

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is currently reviewing an application for approval of Sputnik V in the EU. 

Member states of the European Union have the authority to approve vaccines unilaterally, even if EMA has yet to authorize.

The White House on Wednesday announced the addition of three new federally-supported mass vaccination sites, which will be located in Tennessee, Wisconsin and Maryland, as part of the Biden administration’s ongoing efforts to address vaccine distribution inequity. 

“The first is in Memphis, Tennessee, at the Pipkin Building at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium. The second is in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, at the Wisconsin Center. And the third is in Greenbelt, Maryland, at the Greenbelt metro station,” White House senior Covid-19 adviser Andy Slavitt said Wednesday. 

Each site will be capable of administering 3,000 vaccine doses per day, and will open next week, per Slavitt. 

There are now 30 total federally-supported mass vaccination centers, 25 of which are now fully operational, according to Slavitt. The White House announced new sites in Missouri and Indiana earlier this week, and previously-announced sites in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Virginia and Washington state are now fully operational. 

On Wednesday, Iraq’s Ministry of Health reported at least 6,664 Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours. This is the highest number of coronavirus cases since the start of pandemic,

The total number of Covid-19 cases in Iraq is now 850,924.

The ministry reported 37 new coronavirus related deaths, bringing the total number of recorded deaths in Iraq to 14,323 since the start of the pandemic.

There are currently 77,041 Covid-19 patients hospitalized across the county, among them 468 cases in intensive care units.

Covid-19 was the third leading cause of death in the United States last year, after heart disease and cancer, according to provisional data released on Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

The CDC found the US death rate increased by 15.9% between 2019 and 2020. 

Early data showed that the top 10 leading causes of death in 2020 were:

Heart disease Cancer Covid-19 Unintentional injury Stroke Chronic lower respiratory disease Alzheimer’s disease Diabetes Influenza and pneumonia Kidney disease

Researchers at the National Center for Health Statistics analyzed death certificate data from the National Vital Statistics System, taking a close look at deaths among US residents between January and December of 2020.

“COVID-19 was the third leading underlying cause of death in 2020, replacing suicide as one of the top 10 leading causes of death,” the researchers wrote in the report. Suicide previously was the tenth leading cause of death but was bumped off the list for 2020 as deaths due to Covid-19 climbed. 

The researchers report found that about 3.36 million deaths occurred last year. Covid-19 was reported as the underlying cause or a contributing cause of death for nearly 378,000 – or about 11.3% – of those deaths. The data showed that heart disease caused 690,882 deaths and cancer caused 598,932 deaths.

The data also showed that, overall, death rates were highest among the Black and Native American or Alaska Native communities, adults aged 85 and older and men. The Covid-19 death rate specifically was highest among Hispanics, according to the CDC report.

The data is provisional – and so numbers and death rates might change as additional information is received. Since investigating causes of death takes time, final data for a given year are typically published about 11 months after the end of the calendar year.

In January, CDC statisticians shared with CNN that Covid-19 was likely the third leading cause of death in the United States for last year.

Life expectancy in the United States also dropped a full year in the first half of 2020, according to a provisional report published by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics in February. 

The report shows that US life expectancy fell to 77.8 years, back to what it was in 2006.

You can read the full report here.

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Pfizer has met its commitment to have 120 million doses of its Covid-19 vaccine released and ready for shipment to the US by the end of March, the company said on Wednesday.

The company confirms it remains on track for its May and July goals as well.

At the end of February, Pfizer’s Chief Business Officer John Young’s written testimony to the United States House Committee on Energy and Commerce Oversight and Investigations said:

“We are on track to make 120 million doses available for shipment by the end of March and an additional 80 million doses by the end of May. And, we anticipate all 300 million contracted doses will be made available for shipment by the end of July, enabling the vaccination of up to 150 million Americans.” 

So far, Pfizer says it has shipped more than 100 million doses to the US.

As of Wednesday, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data showed that more than 75 million doses of Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine have been administered in the US and more than 95 million doses have been delivered.

New York City has surpassed 4 million Covid-19 vaccination doses administered, Mayor Bill de Blasio said. That’s more than the entire population of Los Angeles, he added.

“Because we’re New Yorkers sometimes we hear big numbers and it kinda just goes right by us because we’re so used to doing everything big around here, think about that though, as many doses given as the total population of LA,” the mayor said.

De Blasio said “everything’s clicking,” with more vaccination sites coming online constantly. However he cautioned that the city still needed vaccine supply to make it all work.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued sweeping new recommendations to multiple government agencies Wednesday in a push for greater transparency and access to pandemic-related data.

GAO calls on the Department of Health and Human Services and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to collect specific data on vaccinations in nursing homes and make the data publicly available. The report also recommends HHS require nursing homes offer Covid vaccines to residents and staff and called for the agency to centralize its pandemic data on a single website. 

CNN is reaching out to the department for comment.  

“We want the government’s pandemic relief programs to be as effective and transparent as possible, and implementing our recommendations can greatly improve the federal response,” Gene L. Dodaro, Comptroller General of the United States and head of the GAO, said in a statement. “Our recommendations are focused on improving public health and economic recovery efforts and reducing fraud and overpayments.”

The watchdog further recommends that HHS work to ensure “more complete” reporting of race and ethnicity information for Covid vaccine recipients, pointing to how HHS found that data collected from states on race and ethnicity were missing for nearly half of those who were vaccinated.

“Without complete information on the race and ethnicity of persons who have received COVID-19 vaccines, HHS may have difficulty determining whether vaccines are distributed equitably to communities of color who have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19,” the report warns.

The new report also advises the Small Business Administration to address potential fraud risks in its programs. This comes after the Justice Department announced last week that federal investigators have identified more than half a billion dollars in fraud and charged 474 people with crimes related to theft of money from US Covid relief programs.

Other recommendations include calling on the Department of Education to collect information on school districts’ finances related to their use of federal Covid-relief funds, as well as instructing the Agriculture Department to provide additional context for its data on federal nutrition assistance programs.

Cuba’s health ministry reported 1,051 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday, a record high number for the island nation.

The newly reported numbers bring the total number of coronavirus cases in Cuba to 74,212 since the pandemic began.

The ministry also reported three Covid-19 deaths, bringing the total number of deaths to 421.

In March, Cuba increased vaccinations with its homegrown vaccine candidates to try and bring transmission under control.

For much of 2020, Cuba was able to keep the spread of the pandemic under control but a bungled reopening to international travelers in December led to a surge in cases.

The German city state of Hamburg has ordered further restrictions in an attempt to bring the coronavirus spread under control.

Hamburg Mayor Peter Tschentscher announced a curfew from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. local time, starting Friday. Shops need to close by 9 p.m. local, he said.

Schools will partly keep in-school education open. However, kindergartens will once again only be open for those with urgent social needs, for example parents who are key workers or those who have a home situation which requires children to be at kindergarten, as well as for single parents.

Delta Air Lines says it will offer for sale every seat on its flights starting May 1. The new announcement marks the end of pandemic-era social distancing precautions on board major US airlines. Delta was the last major carrier to cap capacity on its flights.

In a statement, Delta says it feels empowered to officially end its policy because of more people getting vaccinated against coronavirus.

Delta CEO Ed Bastian said 65% of those who flew on the airline in 2019 anticipate having at least dose of the vaccine by May 1.  

Other major US airlines that had blocked middle seats have already done away with the practice:

The announcement means the airline will let the policy expire on April 30 as scheduled. It had previously repeatedly extended the policy for months-long increments during the pandemic. 

The benefit-risk assessment for the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine still weighs very heavily in favor of its use, the head of the World Health Organization’s Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals, reiterated on Wednesday.

Speaking during a news briefing on the biannual meeting of the World Health Organization (WHO) Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE), Kate O’Brien said “it is a safe vaccine” when asked about Germany’s decision on who to administer the vaccine to.

On Tuesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the country will only administer the AstraZeneca vaccine to people age 60 and above. The move followed reports of rare blood clots in the brains of 31 people following the first dose since the shots started being administered in the country. 

“With the broad use of this, we anticipated that there might have been rare events that would be identified that may be associated with the vaccine,” she added.

O’Brien said WHO supports decisions that any individual country may take, and that each country should “chart a cours” about how they will use the products available to them to fight Covid-19.

“At this point, the major source of vaccine is the AstraZeneca vaccine. And what we’re seeing from countries, remember there are over 190 countries or economies that are in the COVAX facility, is high demand for the AstraZeneca product and deploying that product,” she said.

The chair of WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on Immunization, Alejandro Cravioto, added the safety systems in place were working well. 

“What we have asked every country is to have a system in place to be able to detect these problems, there should be a system in place to be able to follow up any of these adverse effects. And so the idea of bringing them up, publicly, is precisely so that everybody is aware that these are signals.”

Spain’s Health Minister Carolina Darias announced the country is seeing a slow increase in the number of Covid-19 cases, highlighting the presence of the UK variant in Spain’s regions. 

“We are seeing an increasing trend in 12 regions while four report descending number of cases and three remain stable,” she said during a news conference in Valladolid where she was visiting the regional health department chief.

“This context is concerning as we have seen the spread of the UK variant,” she said.

“On national average we estimate the prevalence of this variant is from 60 to 70%, but in some regions it can reach above 80%” 

But Darias did share some good news: The country is expecting arrival of more than one million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine Thursday. 

“We are at a crucial moment, we see a slow increase with an important prevalence of the British variant,” Darias added.

Pfizer is planning to produce a new formulation of its Covid-19 vaccine that will no longer require a diluent in the second half of 2021, says Mike McDermott, Pfizer’s president of global supply.

Currently, Pfizer’s vaccine comes in a concentrated formula that requires the addition of a saline diluent before it is administered. The new formulation would eliminate this step.

“It’s an improvement that we’ve made along the way that we think will help out for administration of the vaccine,” McDermott told CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Pfizer will be required to submit an amendment of its current emergency use authorization to the US Food and Drug Administration before it is able to begin manufacturing this new formulation.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said on CNN’s New Day on Wednesday that one of the reasons for the high Covid-19 case numbers in the state is that Michigan has a high proportion of variants.

Michigan has the second highest number of reported variants cases in the United States, with 1,237 cases of the B.1.1.7 variant first identified in the United Kingdom and five cases of the B.1.351 variant first identified in South Africa.

Whitmer told CNN’s Alisyn Camerota that the state is watching the trends closely and that there are a lot of factors behind the trends.

“Number one, we’ve got a high proportion of variants, and that means coronavirus spreads faster,” Whitmer said. “These are much more contagious and we’re seeing that whether it is at youth sports or it is the reengagement of some of our restaurants etc.” 

“More activity means more spread,” she said, saying that this was the reason Michigan, unlike some other states, had continued with measures such as mask mandates and capacity restriction on bars, restaurants and gyms.

“We haven’t abandoned our protocols, it’s just that we’ve got a higher proportion of variants,” she said. “And part of that is people getting tired, there’s fatigue, and there’s variants and there’s more travel and that’s some of what the story is here.”

Overall, at least 12,053 cases of coronavirus variants first spotted in the UK, South Africa and Brazil have been reported in the US, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

Most of these cases, 11,569, are the more contagious variant known as B.1.1.7, which was originally detected in the UK. This variant has been found in 49 states, Puerto Rico and Washington, DC.

In addition, there are 312 reported cases of a variant first identified in South Africa, called B.1.351, which has been detected in 30 states and Washington, DC, and then 172 reported cases of the P.1 variant first identified in Brazil have been discovered in 22 states.

According to CDC data, three states — California, Florida and Michigan — have the highest total numbers of variant cases. Florida leads with 2,351 reported cases of the B.1.1.7 variant, 49 cases of P.1 and 15 cases of B.1.351.  

Michigan has the second highest number of reported variants cases, with 1,237 cases of B.1.1.7 and five cases of B.1.351 and California has reported 822 cases of the B.1.1.7 variant, 33 cases of P.1 and 10 cases of B.1.351.

Note on the data: CDC says this does not represent the total number of such cases circulating in the US, but rather just those that have been found by analyzing positive samples. The agency cautions that its numbers may not immediately match those of state and local health departments.

As coronavirus cases in more than 20 states in the US are rising, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that Americans still need to be vigilant about the virus.

“We’re still at war with this virus,” Psaki told CNN’s Alisyn Camerota. “… People need to be vigilant now. We know people are frustrated. They’re tired of sacrificing. We get that completely here. But we need to keep at it.”

The administration’s focus is on getting vaccines out to states, she said. 

Psaki said that states rolling back mask mandates and reopening fully are not abiding by public health guidelines. 

“We’re conveying that clearly to governors, but we’re also conveying clearly that to businesses, to local leaders. Even in states where governors have rolled back these requirements … there are businesses, there are mayors, there are local leaders who are keeping them in place because they know it will save lives, that it will help return the communities to normal,” she said. 

After Pfizer/BioNTech announced today its Covid-19 vaccine showed 100% efficacy in youths ages 12 to 15, Psaki said that Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona is “very confident” that children will be back in school for in-person learning in the fall.

While the US Food and Drug Administration needs to do its own analysis of the data, Psaki said the news makes parents “feel even more confident about your kids potentially being back in the classroom soon.”

Michigan leads the US with the highest number of Covid-19 cases per capita, and some experts say the rising case count in the state is a third surge.

“I think we are in the third surge in Michigan,” Dr. Joneigh Khaldun, chief medical executive of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, told CNN on Sunday, with cases increasing the most in people between the ages of 10 and 19.

Khaldun attributed the rise in cases to a number of factors, including increased gatherings, reopenings and outbreaks in some prisons and schools.

Outbreaks related to sports and student gatherings are a particular concern, with 315 outbreaks linked to student sports teams or recreational clubs in the first two months of 2021. Michigan is now testing more in schools and it will be mandatory for those playing sports.

“Anyone age 13 to 19 whose playing organized sports, they have to get tested at least weekly,” Khaldun said.

She added: “If they have symptoms, they can’t play at all.”

Russia has registered the world’s first animal vaccine against Covid-19, Russian state media TASS reported Wednesday quoting Konstantin Savenkov, the deputy head of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor).

“Carnivak-Cov, a sorbate inactivated vaccine against the coronavirus infection (COVID-19) for carnivorous animals, developed by Rosselkhoznadzor’s Federal Center for Animal Health, has been registered in Russia. So far, it is the world’s first and only product for preventing COVID-19 in animals,” Konstantin Savenkov said.

The vaccine will likely go into mass production as early as April, according to the TASS report.

Clinical trials of Carnivak-Cov began last October, Savenkov said. The research involved dogs, cats, foxes, Arctic foxes, minks and other animals.

“The outcome of the research gives us grounds to conclude that the vaccine is safe and has strong immunogenic effect, because all vaccinated animals developed antibodies to novel coronavirus in 100%” Savenkov said, according to TASS.

The report said that the effect of the vaccine “is estimated to last no less than six months,” quoting Savenkov.

“According to Russian scientists, the use of the vaccine can prevent further mutations of the virus,” the Russian official said, adding that multiple firms from Greece, Poland and Austria plan to buy the vaccine. 

Savenkov added that companies from the United States, Canada and Singapore have also “demonstrated interest”. 

In May last year, Denmark culled 17 million minks over concerns the animals were spreading a mutated form of coronavirus.

Results from Pfizer/BioNTech’s Covid-19 clinical trial in 12 to 15 year olds mean that age group in the US could receive vaccines as soon as the fall, Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children’s Hospital, told CNN.

The vaccine was 100% effective in preventing symptomatic Covid-19, the companies said, and was well tolerated.

He added that “by the fall I think there’s a good possibility we’ll be vaccinating teenagers, 12 and up.”

“And for middle schools, junior high schools, high schools, it’s really good news in the United States for both teachers and staff. We’ll have teachers and staff vaccinated, we’ll have the students vaccinated in those middle schools and high schools.”

Pfizer/BioNTech plan to submit the data to the US Food and Drug Administration as soon as possible for expanded emergency use authorization of the two-dose vaccine.

The trial included 2,260 participants, and while Hotez said this was a relatively small study, he said he thought it was enough to move ahead with.

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00:54 - Source: cnn

French President Emmanuel Macron is expected to tighten coronavirus restrictions on Wednesday as case numbers and admissions to intensive care units soar across France, where the government has been resisting a third nationwide lockdown.

Macron will address the nation at 8 p.m. (2 p.m. ET) as he faces growing criticism over his approach to the current Covid-19 surge. His administration has favored regional restrictions over the strict national lockdowns imposed in other European nations, against the advice of France’s scientific council.

A nationwide 7 p.m. curfew is in place, while non-essential businesses are closed and movement restricted in 19 of the 96 departments on mainland France, but there are few other measures to slow the rapid pace of infection across the country.

Macron, who is up for reelection next year, has justified the strategy by saying the country needed to consider the impacts on mental health and the economy in devising a balanced response to the third wave.

But today, more than 28,000 people are being treated in hospital for Covid-19 in France, including 5,072 in intensive care units (ICU), according to French health ministry data. It’s the first time since April last year that ICU patient numbers have surpassed 5,000.

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French President Emmanuel Macron looks on as he waits to welcome the president of Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region prior to a working lunch at the Elysee Palace in Paris on March 30, 2021. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP) (Photo by LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images)

Related article French President Macron under pressure to lock down as Covid-19 hospitalizations soar

Hungary announced a record number of daily coronavirus deaths on Wednesday, just five days after Prime Minister Viktor Orban boasted that the country’s vaccine program would allow for a “free summer.”

The government announced 302 deaths Wednesday, the largest in a single day, bringing the country’s pandemic death toll to 20,737. The government statement said most of those who died were elderly or chronically ill.

Government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs told CNN the reason for the record number of deaths was the “British mutation” of the virus, referring to the B117 variant first identified in the UK. He said the variant was causing “relatively more hospitalizations and fatalities.”

Hungary has the world’s second-highest coronavirus death rate per capita – 209 deaths per 100,000 people, according to data tracked by CNN. Among countries with significant population sizes, only the Czech Republic has a higher rate of coronavirus deaths.

Hungary’s high death rate comes despite its not having a particularly high rate of coronavirus cases – its 6,609 cases per 100,000 people puts it in the middle third of European Union countries – and the second-highest vaccination rate in the EU, behind the small Mediterranean nation of Malta.

Clinical trial results of Pfizer/BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine showed its efficacy is 100% and it is well tolerated in youths ages 12 to 15, the companies said Wednesday.

Pfizer/BioNTech plan to submit the data to the US Food and Drug Administration as soon as possible for expanded emergency use authorization of the two-dose vaccine. 

In a Phase 3 trial of 2,260 participants ages 12 to 15 years in the US, the vaccine elicited strong antibody responses one month after the second dose, exceeding those demonstrated in people ages 16 to 25 in previous trials, Pfizer/BioNTech reported. The vaccine is currently authorized in the US for emergency use in people ages 16 and older.  

Researchers observed 18 Covid-19 cases among the 1,129 participants who were given a placebo, and none among the 1,131 participants who were given the vaccine. The data has yet to be peer reviewed. 

Pfizer/BioNTech added that the side effects observed in people ages 12 to 15 were similar to those seen in 16 to 25-year-olds. The participants will be monitored for protection and safety for two years after their second dose.  

“We plan to submit these data to FDA as a proposed amendment to our Emergency Use Authorization in the coming weeks and to other regulators around the world, with the hope of starting to vaccinate this age group before the start of the next school year.”  

A separate Phase 1/2/3 study of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in children ages 6 months to 11 years launched last week, when the first participants ages 5 to 11 received a shot.

Pfizer/BioNTech plans to begin dosing 2 to 5-year-olds next week and work its way down to participants ages 6 months to 2 years. The company aims to enroll 4,644 children in the trial and expects results by the end of 2021. 

Moderna is also testing its Covid-19 vaccine in adolescents and children, in two clinical trials of children ages 12 to 17 and those ages 6 months to 11 years.  

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ROME, ITALY - MARCH 25: A healthcare worker of the Italian Army prepares doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech (Comirnaty) COVID-19 vaccine at the military citadel of Cecchignola, on March 25, 2021 in Rome, Italy. At the request of the European Commission, Italian security forces discovered 29 million does of the AstraZeneca vaccine at a Catalent factory. Meanwhile European public trust dwindled with reported side effects of the AstraZeneca vaccine, a prosecutor in Italy is investigating possible manslaughter after a naval office died hours after being inoculated with the AstraZeneca vaccine. (Photo by Antonio Masiello/Getty Images)

Related article Pfizer/BioNTech says its Covid-19 vaccine is 100% effective and well tolerated in adolescents

China’s foreign ministry on Wednesday said it was “immoral” and “unpopular” to politicize the issue of virus origin tracing after 14 countries, including the United States, raised concerns in a joint statement on the World Health Organization report released Tuesday, following its Wuhan investigation.

“We have repeatedly emphasized that origin tracing is a scientific issue, and it should be carried out cooperatively by global scientists and cannot be politicized, which is also the consensus of most countries,” said foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying in a regular briefing Wednesday.

Hua said the joint statement questioning the report is concrete evidence that countries like the US “disrespect science” and “engage in political manipulation.”

Governments from countries including the United States, Australia and Canada, jointly expressed concerns about the WHO report released Tuesday on COVID-19 origin tracing in China and called for independent and fully transparent evaluations with access to all relevant data in the future.

Chinese scientist and World Health Organization team leader Liang Wannian said Wednesday that WHO should do more Covid-19 studies that cover a wider range of regions and perspectives.

“Based on this, the perspective of tracing the origin of the virus must be broader.”

This comes after the WHO report into the origins of the virus, compiled by a team of international experts and their Chinese counterparts, was finally released on Tuesday after several delays.

It provides a detailed examination of the data collected by Chinese scientists and authorities from the early days of the pandemic but offers little new insight or concrete findings on where and how the virus spread to humans.

Following the release, the United States and 13 other governments, including the United Kingdom, Australia and South Korea, released a joint statement expressing concerns over the study’s limited access to “complete, original data and samples.”

Herd immunity to Covid-19 could come and go, scientists say. Or we might never reach it at all. Here are some of the obstacles to achieving and maintaining it.

Young People

Very few people younger than 16 will get a Covid-19 vaccine soon. Dr. Anthony Fauci – director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases – has said younger Americans will likely have to wait until early 2022 for vaccines.

And that’s a major obstacle to herd immunity. Young people may not get very sick from Covid-19 in high numbers, but they can still get infected and transmit the virus.

Anti-vaxxers

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation COVID-19 Vaccine Monitor, 20% of people surveyed in the US said they definitely would not get vaccinated or would only get vaccinated if their job or school required it.

If not enough people are willing to get vaccinated, herd immunity isn’t achievable. And if that happens, the virus will have ample opportunity to spread.

Variants

If the virus keeps spreading, replicating itself in new people, it has more opportunities to mutate. And if there are significant mutations, new and more dangerous variants could emerge.

This could also mean that drug companies have to keep updating their vaccines to be effective against new variants, and it’s not guaranteed that every vaccine will be successful against new variants.

Immunity could wear off

Dwindling immunity – either from previous infection or from vaccination – could be another reason the US could slip in and out of herd immunity. Scientists don’t know yet how long immunity from vaccines might last. So people may need to get booster shots in the future, or annual shots that can work against new variants. That’s how the yearly flu shot works.

The UK is “100% confident” in the efficacy of the AstraZeneca vaccine and the shot is “safe,” UK Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said Wednesday, after Germany  suspended its use in people under the age of 60.

Germany announced Tuesday evening it would limit AstraZeneca shots to people over 60s following reports of “rare but very severe thromboembolic side effects” in 31 people following their first dose. People under 60 can voluntarily receive vaccine in consultation with doctors, considering individual risk.

When asked if the UK government thinks it should look at the vaccine again, Jenrick said: “No we don’t.”

The minister added that “people should continue to go forward, get the vaccine,” adding that he certainly will, when his time comes.

“It is a safe vaccine and the UK vaccine rollout is saving people’s lives, right across the country every day,” he said.

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26 March 2021, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Neubukow: Three prepared syringes with the AstraZeneca Corona vaccine are in Stefan Zutz's GP practice. The state-wide vaccination at GPs is starting in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, initially starter packs will be used to enable medical staff to protect themselves. In addition, some particularly at-risk patients can be vaccinated with them in the GP practices. Photo: Jens Bttner/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa (Photo by Jens Bttner/picture alliance via Getty Images) Doses of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine are prepared in Neubukow, Germany, on March 26. Jens Bttner/dpa/Getty Images

Related article Germany will limit AstraZeneca shots to over-60s

The United States and Germany are by far the biggest investors in coronavirus vaccine development, according to key research findings by the Centre for Global Health at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva.

Research findings show that the two countries have provided a combined R&D investment of $3.7 billion in developing coronavirus vaccines – the United States invested nearly $2.2 billion and Germany $1.5 billion. They are followed by a wide margin by the United Kingdom, which comes in at $500 million.

It was supposed to offer insight into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic. But since its release on Tuesday, the long-awaited World Health Organization investigation has drawn criticism from governments around the world over accusations it is incomplete and lacks transparency.

In a joint statement, the United States and 13 other governments, including the United Kingdom, Australia and South Korea, expressed concerns over the study’s limited access to “complete, original data and samples.”

The European Union issued its own statement, expressing the same concerns in slightly softer language. The criticism follows an admission from WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, that investigators faced problems during their four-week mission to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the coronavirus was first detected in December 2019.

In a news briefing Tuesday, Tedros appeared to contradict the study’s central findings by suggesting the theory that the virus escaped from a Wuhan laboratory should be followed up – even though the report noted such a possibility was “extremely unlikely” and did not recommend further research on the hypothesis.

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Security guards stand in front of the closed Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the city of Wuhan, in the Hubei Province, on January 11, 2020, where the Wuhan health commission said that the man who died from a respiratory illness had purchased goods. - China said on January 11, 2020 that a 61-year-old man had become the first person to die from a respiratory illness believed to be caused by a new virus from the same family as SARS (Sudden Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which claimed hundreds of lives more than a decade ago. Forty-one people with pneumonia-like symptoms have so far been diagnosed with the new virus in Wuhan, with one of the victims dying on January 8, 2020, the central Chinese city's health commission said on its website. (Photo by NOEL CELIS / AFP) (Photo by NOEL CELIS/AFP via Getty Images)

Related article 14 countries and WHO chief accuse China of withholding data from coronavirus investigation

A city in southwestern China near the country’s border with Myanmar is going into lockdown after nine Covid-19 cases were reported Tuesday.

Six of the nine cases found in Ruili city were symptomatic and three were asymptomatic, according to a statement from provincial health officials. Four of them are Burmese nationals.

Authorities said they will crack down on illegal border crossings from neighboring Myanmar, where the ruling military junta overthrew the country’s democratically elected leaders last month, in order to prevent the virus from spreading further within China.

Ruili officials stopped all inbound and outbound travel at 10 p.m. Tuesday and began a citywide Covid-19 testing campaign at 8 a.m. Wednesday, according to a statement from the information department of Yunnan province.

Chinese officials blamed smugglers from Myanmar for a previous surge of Covid-19 cases in Ruili in September.

India recorded 354 Covid-19 related fatalities on Wednesday, the highest death toll reported in a single day since December 17, as officials warned the country must be on guard against surging cases.

V K Paul, a health official of a government-led think tank, said the situation appeared to be going from “bad to worse.”

Between March 24 and March 29, India set consecutive new records for the number of Covid-19 cases identified in a day in 2021, according to a CNN tally of figures from the Indian Ministry of Health. 

Nearly 80% of the new cases over the previous 24 hours were reported from the six states of Punjab, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, and Gujarat, according to figures released by the ministry on Tuesday.

India has distributed more than 63 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines since it began vaccinating priority groups on January 16. Starting Thursday, anyone older than 45 can get vaccinated.

India has recorded more than 12.1 million cases of coronavirus and at least 162,468 people have died, according to the Ministry of Health.

President Joe Biden believes Americans “deserve better information” about the origin of Covid-19 and further steps from the global community, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday after the release of a World Health Organization report that said the pandemic is very likely to have started with transmission from one animal to another, and then to humans.

“I think he believes the American people, the global community, the medical experts, the doctors – all of the people who have been working to save lives, the families who have lost loved ones – all deserve greater transparency,” Psaki told reporters at a White House briefing.

She spoke shortly after the US and 12 other countries released a joint statement raising questions about the WHO report and calling for independent and fully transparent evaluations, and the European Union called for better access for researchers and further investigation.

Authorities in 219 countries and territories have reported more than 128 million Covid-19 cases and 2.8 million deaths since China reported its first cases to WHO in December 2019. More than 30 million Americans have fallen ill and more than 550,000 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University.

“They deserve better information,” Psaki said of Americans. “They deserve steps that are taken by the global community to provide that.” She went on to criticize China for its lack of transparency and called on Beijing to provide data and answers to the global community.

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White House press secretary Jen Psaki speaks during a press briefing at the White House, Wednesday, March 24, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Related article White House says Americans deserve 'better information' as allies criticize WHO coronavirus report