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The Delta Covid-19 variant first detected in India now accounts for 83.2% of Covid-19 cases in the US, and 90% of cases in Missouri, according to estimates updated Tuesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky told a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions hearing about the 83% projection earlier on Tuesday. “This is a dramatic increase, up from 50% for the week of July 3rd,” she said.
The Delta variant, also known as B.1.617.2, now accounts for nearly 90% of cases in Missouri, the CDC says.
The B.1.1.7 or Alpha variant first detected in the UK accounted for 8.3% of cases in the US as of July 17, the CDC estimates. The P.1 or Gamma variant first seen in Brazil accounts for 3.3% of cases. Other variants account for very few cases, the CDC estimates show.
The CDC used data collected in the two weeks ending in July 17. It creates estimates by sequencing samples taken from some people and modeling what that might mean for the whole country.
Researchers say they’ve found some evidence that people who got the single-dose Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine might benefit from a booster dose to better protect them from new variants of the virus.
The study was done in the lab and does not reflect real-world effects of the vaccine – and it’s published online as a preprint, meaning it was not subject to careful peer review.
But Nathaniel Landau of the New York University Grossman School of Medicine and colleagues said their tests of blood taken from vaccinated volunteers shows that at least some of the newly emerging variants may evade the protection offered by a single dose of Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen vaccine.
They tested the blood using lab-engineered versions of the key parts of coronavirus variants. It’s an approach many labs are using to approximate what might happen in real life.
They found that, as other studies have shown, two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines provide a strong and broad immune response against the variants, with enough of a cushion to protect people even if the variant does evade the immune system somewhat.
But a single dose of the J&J vaccine did not provide the same degree of protection, they wrote. Johnson & Johnson published similar research in the New England Journal of Medicine last week that showed a single dose of its vaccine protected well against the Delta variant, with protection lasting at least eight months. Tuesday’s study contradicts this finding.
The variants Landau’s team tested includes the Delta or B.1.617.2 variant, which has been shown to be more transmissible than older lineages, as well as Beta (B.1.351), Epsilon (B.1.427/B.1.429), Iota (B.1.526), Delta plus (AY.1) and Lambda (C.37).
“Several reports have shown partial resistance of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern to vaccine-elicited antibodies. The data shown here extend those findings to the Delta plus and Lambda variants,” the researchers wrote.
Lambda is so far barely showing up in the US, while the Delta variant represents 83% of newly diagnosed cases that are sequenced, according to the US Centers for Disease control and Prevention. Each variant carries a slightly different cluster of mutations that affect how well the immune system can recognize them.
The tests the Landau team ran showed a single dose of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine did not produce an overwhelming antibody response against the Beta, Delta, plus and Lambda variants. It was reduced by five-fold to seven-fold compared to older lineages, they said. This “according to mathematical modeling, could result in decreased protection against infection,” they wrote.
“The data presented here emphasize the importance of surveillance for breakthrough infections with the increased prevalence of highly transmissible variants. If an increase in breakthrough infections accompanied by severe COVID-19 is found following adenovirus vector or mRNA vaccination, this would provide a rationale for public health policy-makers and manufacturers to consider booster immunizations that would increase protection against the variants of concern and Lambda variant.”
UPDATE: Some information in this story has been removed as it was under embargo.
About 22% of the US population – nearly 73 million people – lives in a county considered to have “high” Covid-19 transmission, according to data published Monday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
This is about 10 times what it was in early June, when less than 3% of the population lived in a county with “high” Covid-19 transmission.
The CDC considers a county to have “high” transmission if there have been 100 or more cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 residents or a test positivity rate of 10% or higher in the past seven days.
The number of people living in a county with “low” community transmission has been cut in half since in early June.
According to the latest CDC data, about 5% of the US population – some 16 million people – lives in a county considered to have “low” transmission, defined by the CDC as less than 10 new Covid-19 cases per 100,000 residents and a test positivity rate of less than 5% in the past seven days, down from about 10% of the population and about 32 million people.
And now, about half of the US population lives in a county with “moderate” community transmission.
Test positivity rate is one of two indicators used by the CDC to assess community transmission levels. But the number of daily Covid-19 tests have dropped off — down 34% from a month ago – according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services. The CDC did not respond to CNN’s requests to learn more about this metric.
Washington Regional Medical Center in Fayetteville, Arkansas, posted a video to its Facebook Page featuring a doctor pleading with the public to get vaccinated as cases worsen among younger people.
In the video, Dr. Michael Bolding said he’s seen a dramatic rise in Covid-19 cases in unvaccinated 20- and 30-year-olds who are young and healthy.
Bolding said patients are ending up on ventilators, high flow oxygen and are sicker than at any time in this pandemic.
In Washington County where the hospital is, there’s currently 626 active cases of Covid-19, according to Arkansas’ Department of Health.
Only 41% of people 12 and older in Washington County are fully immunized, according to the state’s health department.
“If the Delta variant is affecting 20- and 30-year-olds, I don’t want to know what the next variant is going to look like and that’s not a scare tactic. That is how viruses work,” Bolding said.
The United States is facing a “collision” of rising overdose deaths and fatalities from Covid-19, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday.
“There have been two things in the last decades that have decreased life expectancy in this country. One is Covid-19 and the second is overdose,” she said in a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions hearing.
Walenksy said CDC was continuing to work to understand the rise in opioid deaths and to develop preventative measures.
“We are actively working to not only study this issue and not only study the overdose deaths, but the overdose hospitalizations, to look at surveillance, to look at the infectious diseases associated with injection drug use, to promote syringe services programs, naloxone programs,” she said, “as well as to provide services and toolkits around the country for not just substance use disorders but for mental health.”
Some more context: According to provisional numbers from the CDC, more than 93,000 people are predicted to have died from a drug overdose last year, the deadliest year on record for drug overdoses. Overdose rates have been increasing since 1999, according to the NCHS. In 2019, there were 70,630 deaths, and compared with that year’s rate, deaths in 2020 increased by almost 30%. According to the CDC data, three-fourths of all fatal overdoses last year involved opioids.
Downing Street has reiterated that people should isolate if they are notified or “pinged” by a Covid app used by the national health service to trace possible contacts of those who test positive for Covid-19.
The confirmation comes after UK business minister Paul Scully suggested that it was down to individuals and employers to follow the instructions or to ignore them.
According to the government rules, people who are told to self-isolate by the NHS app do not have to do so legally; whereas those who are contacted by the NHS Test and Trace system, in which they have been named as a close contact of someone who has tested positive, must do so.
Scully’s comments come as the NHS released its latest figures showing over half a million people in the UK were contacted and told to self-isolate between July 1 to 7, forcing disruption to businesses and pubs which were subsequently short staffed.
On Monday Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that critical workers would be exempt from the requirement to self-isolate, and would use regular testing instead, provided they are fully vaccinated. The mixed messaging has caused further criticism of the UK’s Covid-19 response, particularly as England has dropped all restrictions as of Monday despite a continuing rise of Delta variant cases.
President Biden urged all Americans to remain vigilant in the fight against Covid-19, especially with the rise of the Delta variant, during his second full Cabinet meeting of his administration.
While acknowledging that Covid-19 deaths are “down dramatically” since he took office six months ago, Biden warned that unvaccinated Americans are still at great risk of getting seriously sick because of the variants.
The first Cabinet meeting he convened was held in the East Room of the White House to allow for social distancing.
“That means the safest thing to do is to get vaccinated, get vaccinated. And that’s why we’re focusing on our next phase on getting the unvaccinated vaccinated. I know it seems like a constant uphill climb, but gradually we’re making progress, but we’ve got a way to go yet,” he added.
White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre defended the Biden administration’s effort to convince Americans to get vaccinated today when pressed by CNN’s Alisyn Camerota on why they had fallen off their aim to vaccinate 70% of Americans by July 4.
“What we are seeing now is certainly something that we are very aware of, that we are paying very close attention to, and that’s why our message has been clear on Covid, that people need to get vaccinated,” said Jean-Pierre, when Camerota pointed out that cases are once again rising.
Jean-Pierre then said that the administration still planned to hit the 70% vaccination mark despite a myriad challenges.
“We are going to hit that goal,” she said. “…We’re doing everything that we can and we have seen successes. We have seen Americans go out there and get vaccinated which is so critical.”
It is “very likely” that data about Covid-19 vaccines in children under 12 may be available by early winter, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci said Tuesday.
“But that doesn’t mean that then it’s all of a sudden going to be allowed to happen, that will be a regulatory decision that the FDA will have to make,” he cautioned.
In a Senate hearing on Tuesday, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky pushed back on certain framings of US child deaths from Covid-19.
“Children are not supposed to die. And so 400 is a huge amount for respiratory season,” Walensky said.
The UK reported 46,558 new Covid-19 cases and 96 more deaths on Tuesday, according to government data.
The latest figures reflect the highest number of fatalities from coronavirus in a single day since March, during the tail end of the country’s second wave.
It comes the day following England’s “Freedom Day” when all lockdown restrictions were lifted despite the sharp rise in cases.
The data indicates there were 745 new admissions to hospital with Covid-19 on Monday, for a total of 4,500 over the past seven days.
More than 68% of the adult population have now received their second dose of a coronavirus vaccine, with 143,560 second doses administered on Monday, the data shows.
Dr. Jose Romero, secretary of health for the Arkansas Health Department, said, “I expect to see, this year, significant outbreaks [of Covid-19] within the school system.”
“What’s already telling me that that’s going to happen are the number of daycare closures that have occurred because of outbreaks occurring, and the camp exposures and closures that are occurring,” he said at a US News and World Report event on vaccine inequity and misinformation on Tuesday.
“What I’m trying to do publicly and privately with my own patients is stress the importance of the mask,” Romero added.
Some context: Arkansas is one of at least nine states that have banned districts from requiring masks in schools, according to CNN analysis. Romero said that “we’re considering, as an incentive for masking, considering our quarantine recommendations for school,” saying that if an individual has tested positive but the people exposed have been wearing a mask and are asymptomatic, they may not have to quarantine.
“What we’re seeing now is that they’re full, that they have a limited supply of beds. In three weeks when we start school, this will exacerbate, and that’s what I’m very, very concerned about.”
According to the most recent data, just over 35% of the state’s population is fully vaccinated; nationally, nearly 49% of the total US population has been fully vaccinated.
Children who are not vaccinated should continue to wear masks in schools, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday.
“I think it’s critically important that our schools be open for full in-person learning in the fall,” she said.
Walensky said the “highest and most important thing” is to get people vaccinated.
“The best thing would be to have everybody vaccinated who can be vaccinated. Surround unvaccinated children who are not yet eligible with people who are vaccinated to protect them,” she said.
Updated guidance is coming about mask use and travel, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Tuesday.
In May, the CDC announced that people fully vaccinated against Covid-19 do not need to wear masks or practice social distancing indoors or outdoors, except under certain circumstances. At that time, the CDC said the requirement to wear masks during travel — on buses, trains, planes and public transportation — still stood.
But today, Walensky said they are “continuing those conversations.”
“We now have a variant circulating in this country that is, you know, at the time was less than 3%, and is now 83%. And much more transmissible.” Walensky has said 83% of all samples sequenced from people newly infected with coronavirus are the Delta, or B.1.617.2 variant.
“We are continuing those conversations,” Walensky said. “And we’ll continue to revisit that as we learn more about vaccine efficacy, as we learn more about transmission in the context of vaccination, and as we understand more about the Delta variant.”
With the start of the Tokyo Olympics just days away, Covid-19 cases are rising across the United States and in other countries around the world.
Here are the top headlines you need to know this Tuesday.
The Olympics
Hotspots
Delta Variant
Vaccines
You can get a more detailed breakdown of Covid-19 around the world here.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki acknowledged that there have been prior breakthrough cases among White House staffers in addition to the fully vaccinated official who CNN reported on Tuesday tested positive for Covid-19.
CNN reported earlier Tuesday that a White House official and a senior aide in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office, who are both fully vaccinated, have tested positive for Covid-19. Axios was first to report the breakthrough cases.
Psaki later clarified the White House official who tested positive was not a commissioned officer, but declined to say what office the official worked in, citing privacy concerns. None of the other positive cases were commissioned officers, either, she said, explaining that the White House would have proactively released that information.
Psaki declined to say how many breakthrough cases had been recorded, or what level of staff was affected.
She also confirmed the case reported earlier Tuesday on the record.
“Yesterday, a fully vaccinated White House official tested positive for Covid-19 off campus. In accordance with our rigorous Covid-19 protocols, the official remains off campus as they wait for confirmatory PCR test,” Psaki said.
The White House reiterated first lady Jill Biden’s intent to travel to Tokyo beginning Wednesday for the Summer Olympic Games, saying it was important to her and President Biden that the administration was represented at the highest level despite a number of reported Covid-19 cases among athletes.
Biden and her colleagues, Psaki said, “will be following very strict safety and health protocols limiting engagement with the public, keeping our footprint as small as possible.”
The first lady is set to depart for Japan, by way of Alaska, on Wednesday. She will stop in Anchorage and visit the Alaska Native Medical Center before flying on to Tokyo.
Japan’s Emperor Naruhito will be attending the opening ceremony without any other member of the imperial family, according to national broadcaster NHK citing the Imperial Household Agency on Tuesday.
The agency says that the decision was made in keeping with the plans for other Olympic officials who are also attending unaccompanied by their spouses.
The Emperor is due to declare the Olympics open at the ceremony on Friday at the National Stadium in Tokyo.
On the day before the ceremony, the Emperor will receive a courtesy call at the Imperial Palace by senior officials of the International Olympic Committee, including President Thomas Bach, according to national broadcaster NHK.
A White House official and a senior aide in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office, who are both fully vaccinated, have tested positive for Covid-19, CNN has learned.
A White House official confirmed that the White House staffer tested positive off campus.
“In accordance with our rigorous Covid-19 protocols, the official remains off campus as they wait for a confirmatory PCR test. The White House Medical Unit has conducted contact tracing interviews and determined no close contacts among White House principals and staff. The individual has mild symptoms,” the official said.
The White House official has not had any recent contact with President Biden, another administration official said.
A second administration official told CNN, “If the vaccines are 90-95% effective, you’re going to have 5-10% of the vaccinated population who either test positive but are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms. What you won’t have are members of the vaccinated population going to the hospital with a severe illness or dying.”
Axios was first to report the breakthrough cases.
Pelosi Deputy Chief of Staff Drew Hammill said in a statement to CNN that the House Speaker has not had contact with the individual in her office who tested positive since exposure, which Hammill said occurred after contact with Texas Democrats last week.
Some context: Six Texas lawmakers have tested positive for Covid-19 since Saturday. The lawmakers are part of the group that left Texas, flying from Austin to Washington, DC, to break the state House’s quorum and block Republicans from passing a restrictive new voting law.
Officials with the group told CNN that all of the lawmakers participating in the quorum break trip are fully vaccinated, including those who have tested positive for Covid-19.
The number of excess deaths reported during India’s Covid-19 pandemic could be up to 10 times the official Covid-19 death toll, a working paper published by the US-based Center for Global Development said.
Between 3.4 and 4.9 million estimated excess deaths were reported in India between Jan. 2020 and June 2021, while the Indian health ministry’s reported death toll of approximately 400,000.
“The Indian government has never asked for deaths to be under-reported,” Mandaviya added.
The Center for Global Development study was based on three different estimates of excess deaths. The first estimate of 3.4 million is based on the excess deaths recorded by India’s civil registration system, that keeps a record of births and deaths, in seven states which account for about half of India’s total population.
The second estimate of four million deaths relies on India’s own seroprevalence surveys which show the proportion of the country’s population that has been infected with Covid-19, applying international infection fatality rates to this data.
The third estimate of 4.9 million excess deaths relies on the Center for the Monitoring of the Indian Economy’s survey of more than 800,000 individuals across all states to capture mortality during the first wave and some of the second wave.
The study acknowledges that each of these three estimates have their limitations and that the number of excess deaths reported in the country do not equate to Covid-specific deaths. The authors specifically note that official death numbers tend to be underreported and that the data from the Center for the Monitoring the Indian Economy has not historically tracked closely with official mortality data.
However it finds that the first wave of the pandemic was “more lethal than is popularly believed” and their estimates show a higher number of excess deaths reported during the first wave than the second.
“Regardless of source and estimate, actual deaths during the Covid pandemic are likely to have been an order of magnitude greater than the official count,” the study noted.
“True deaths are likely to be in the several millions not hundreds of thousands, making this arguably India’s worst human tragedy since partition and independence,” it added.
