December 30 coronavirus news

A staff member inspects syringes of Covid-19 inactivated vaccine products at a packaging plant of the Beijing Biological Products Institute Co., Ltd, a unit of state-owned Sinopharm, in Beijing on December 25.

China has drastically scaled up its emergency use program in recent weeks, officials revealed Thursday as they announced the approval of the country’s first homegrown coronavirus vaccine, developed by Sinopharm.

Since December 15, the country has administered more than 3 million doses of coronavirus vaccines on “key groups” in the population, Zeng Yixin, vice-minister of China’s National Health Commission, said at a news conference Thursday. He did not identify who those groups were.

That’s on top of the more than 1.5 million doses of coronavirus vaccines administered to “high-risk groups” as of the end of November, Zeng added.

Among those who have been inoculated, fewer than 0.1% developed a light fever, and about two people per million developed “relative serious adverse reactions” such as allergies, according to Zeng.

China rolled out its controversial emergency use program in July, inoculating hundreds of thousands of people with experimental vaccines that did not have their safety and efficacy proven in clinical trials. People who received the vaccines include healthcare workers, border control personnel and state-owned company employees who needed to travel overseas.

This post has been updated to accurately reflect the number of adverse reactions.

Chinese regulators have approved a coronavirus vaccine developed by state-owned pharmaceutical giant Sinopharm, officials announced Thursday.

Sinopharm said yesterday its coronavirus vaccine is 79.34% effective, citing interim analysis of Phase 3 clinical trials.

Though few details were provided, the company said the vaccine met the standards of the World Health Organization and China’s own regulator, the National Medical Products Administration.

Read more about the Sinopharm vaccine:

BEIJING, April 14, 2020 . A staff member tests samples of the COVID-19 inactivated vaccine at a vaccine production plant of China National Pharmaceutical Group ,Sinopharm, in Beijing, capital of China, April 11, 2020. China has approved two COVID-19 inactivated vaccine candidates for clinical trials, according to the State Council joint prevention and control mechanism against the coronavirus Tuesday. The two vaccine candidates are developed by Wuhan Institute of Biological Products under the China National Pharmaceutical Group ,Sinopharm, and Sinovac Research and Development Co., Ltd, a company based in Beijing. Clinical trials of the two vaccines have started. (Photo by Zhang Yuwei/Xinhua via Getty) (Xinhua/Zhang Yuwei via Getty Images)

Related article China's Sinopharm says its coronavirus vaccine is 79% effective

A pharmacist dilutes the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine while preparing it to administer to staff and residents at the Goodwin House Bailey's Crossroads, a senior living community in Falls Church, Virginia, on December 30.

A total of 2,794,588 coronavirus vaccine shots have been administered in the United States, according to the latest numbers from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Meanwhile, 12,409,050 doses have been distributed across the country, according to the CDC.

Through the federal partnership with long-term care facilities, 167,149 shots have been administered and 2,166,200 doses have been distributed, the CDC reported.

Numbers of vaccine doses distributed and administered among each state are also displayed on the CDC website.

Reporting delay: Federal officials have acknowledged a delay in the reporting of numbers of vaccines distributed and administered.

More than 14 million vaccine doses have been distributed to date, but the CDC tracker hasn’t yet reported the additional doses, Operation Warp Speed chief operating officer Gen. Gustave Perna said Wednesday in a news briefing.

Several shipments of Moderna Covid-19 vaccines were delayed before the Christmas holiday due to “temperature excursions,” meaning they had been refrigerated inappropriately while in transit, according to the Texas Hospital Association.

Leadership reported the issue immediately, Carrie Williams of the Texas Hospital Association said. The federal government shipped replacement vaccines.  

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Moderna vaccine should arrive onsite frozen between -25°C (-13°F) and -15°C (5°F) and stored at the same temperatures. Once vaccines are thawed, they must be kept between 2°C (36°F) and 8°C (46°F) and only for up to 30 days. 

The CDC also provides strict and specific handling guidance for Moderna vaccines.

CNN is still learning about the incident from the CDC, the Texas state health authorities and the shipping company.

The United States reported 125,220 current Covid-19 hospitalizations on Wednesday, setting a new record high since the pandemic began, according to the Covid Tracking Project (CTP).

This is the 29th consecutive day that the US has remained above 100,000 current hospitalizations. 

According to CTP data, the highest hospitalization numbers are:

A medical staff member sets up a ventilator for a patient in the Covid-19 intensive care unit at the United Memorial Medical Center on December 29 in Houston, Texas.

Texas has reported a record number of hospitalizations for the third day in a row. 

The Texas Department of State Health Services shows that 11,992 patients are currently hospitalized with Covid-19, up from Tuesday’s record of 11,775.

The state has also reported 17,458 new positive cases and 326 deaths related to the virus on Wednesday. 

Note: These numbers were released by the Texas Department of Health Services and may not line up exactly in real-time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the Covid Tracking Project.

Los Angeles County reported 274 new fatalities related to coronavirus, surpassing a total of 10,000 deaths, health officials confirmed in a news conference on Wednesday.

The county broke its previous record of 227 deaths on Tuesday. 

Ferrer also noted that the high number is due to a backlog associated with an outage.

According to Ferrer, the number of people dying from the virus is as high as the average number of people dying each day from every other cause, which is about 170 people.

Mortuaries across the county are filling up and they are struggling to find space for Covid victims, Department of Health Services Director Dr. Christina Ghaly said.

More data: The daily positivity rate in the county is about 20% and over 7,000 people are hospitalized, Ferrer said.

While the new Covid-19 variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, has not been reported in Los Angeles County, she said, “this doesn’t mean the variant is not circulating in L.A. County.”

She explained that the variant was not found in the first set of samples that were tested.

To date, the county has a total of 756,116 coronavirus cases and 10,056 deaths.

A pharmacist prepares to administer a Covid-19 vaccine to staff and residents at a senior living community in Falls Church, Virginia, on December 30.

If the US is able to “diligently vaccinate” people in 2021, the nation could return to normal life by early fall, Dr. Anthony Fauci said in an interview with California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday.

Although Covid-19 vaccine rollout is off to a slower start than expected, if the US is able to “catch up” in 2021, widespread vaccination could be possible beginning in April, Fauci said.

Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that herd immunity against coronavirus could likely be achieved if about 70% to 85% of the population gets vaccinated. 

“By the time we get to the early fall, we will have enough good herd immunity to be able to really get back to some strong semblance of normality – schools, theaters, sports events, restaurants,” he said. “I believe if we do it correctly, we will be there by the early fall.”

Fauci urged people to get vaccinated.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee announced a one-week extension of the state’s Covid-19 restrictions, according to a news release by the governor’s office. 

The release added: “An updated reopening plan is currently being developed to provide a pathway for businesses and workers impacted by this order to reopen safely. The updated plan will be released next week.” 

Dr. Anthony Fauci speaks before receiving his first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine at the National Institutes of Health on December 22 in Bethesda, Maryland.

Covid-19 vaccines should be effective against the new UK virus variant, Dr. Anthony Fauci said Wednesday.

Fauci told California Gov. Gavin Newsom that Covid-19 vaccines will likely protect against the new variant, which has now been identified in California and Colorado. The variant appears to be more transmissible but not more deadly.

However, something to keep an eye on is how monoclonal antibodies will work against this new strain. 

“Since these are specific mutations, we want to make sure that they don’t evade the protection of certain of the monoclonal antibodies, because the monoclonal antibody is against a very specific component of the virus,” he said.

“The other thing that they’ve noted in the UK, is that people who have been infected don’t seem to get reinfected by this, which means that the immunity that’s given to you when you get infected is protective against this particular strain,” he added.

Fauci said the new strain does not appear to have any impact on diagnostics. He noted that the National Institutes of Health, along with other scientists in the US, are working to learn more about the new strain using isolates from the UK.

The new Covid-19 variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, has been detected in a Covid-19 patient in San Diego, California, county supervisor Nathan Fletcher announced Wednesday during a news conference. 

Fletcher said the patient is a 30-year-old man with no travel history that started developing Covid-related symptoms on Dec. 27. 

An ensemble forecast published Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now projects there will be 383,000 to 424,000 coronavirus deaths in the US by Jan. 23.

Unlike some individual models, the CDC’s ensemble forecast only offers projections a few weeks into the future. The previous ensemble forecast, published Dec. 23, projected up to 419,000 coronavirus deaths by Jan. 16.

At least 340,956 people have already died from Covid-19 in the United States, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

A woman receives a Covid-19 testing kit at a regional pop-up walk-up testing site in Baldwin Park on Monday, December 21.

The new Covid-19 variant, first identified in the United Kingdom, has now been found in Southern California, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday during an interview with Dr. Anthony Fauci on Facebook.

Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the news about the new strain, which appears to be more transmissible but not more deadly, was to be expected.

“I don’t think that Californians should feel that this is something odd,” Fauci said. “This is something that’s expected.”

There have been at least 19,653,653 cases of coronavirus in the US, and at least 340,956 people have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

So far today, Johns Hopkins has recorded 142,817 new cases and 2,395 reported deaths.

At least 12,409,050 vaccine doses have been distributed and at least 2,589,125 doses of the vaccine have been administered, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases. 

A woman receives a Covid-19 vaccine at a retirement home in Delray Beach, Florida, on Wednesday.

Covid-19 vaccines will likely protect against a new variant of the virus that was first reported in the UK and now identified in Colorado, US Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary Adm. Brett Giroir said Wednesday.

“We do expect – we haven’t proven it 100%, but we will soon – we do expect that the vaccines now being administered or under development will cover this strain very well,” Giroir told CNN’s Jake Tapper.

The new variant appears to be more transmissible, but not more deadly.

Giroir said it is likely that the variant has been in the US for a while.

“It’s very unlikely that it’s rampant, but I think it’s certainly been here,” he said.

The US needs to be doing a better job with its Covid-19 vaccine rollout, Assistant Secretary for Health Admiral Brett Giroir said Wednesday.

“Of course, we need to be doing a better job, but all vaccine programs start somewhat slow,” Giroir told CNN’s Jake Tapper.

He said he expects distribution to ramp up soon and that the US is on track to distribute 20 million vaccine doses by the first week of January.

As pharmacies begin to play a larger role in vaccine administration, Giroir said he expects the pace to quicken.

“We have a federal contract with 40,000 pharmacies – that’s 60% of all pharmacies in the US – to provide vaccines,” said Giroir. “The scale will go up very rapidly as things progress and evolve.”

“Vaccines on the shelf are no good,” he added. “They need to get in people’s arms and we are leaving no stone unturned to do that.”

Some background: Operation Warp Speed is on track to fall well short of the 20 million vaccine shots they predicted would be administered by the end of December.

Nearly 2.6 million vaccine doses have been administered in the United States, according to data given to CNN by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Bills Stadium is seen before a game on December 13.

Approximately 6,700 fans will be allowed to attend the upcoming Buffalo Bills first playoff game, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced Wednesday.

Cuomo said the decision to allow fans at the first playoff game was an agreement between the New York Department of Health, the Buffalo Bills, and the National Football League.

All fans will need to be tested for Covid-19 before the game and anyone with a positive test will not be allowed to attend.

Every fan must wear a mask from when they leave their vehicle in the parking lot to when they reenter their vehicles to go home. All fans will be sitting in socially-distanced “pods” with the people they came with, Robert Mujica, New York State’s Budget Director, said Wednesday. 

No tailgating or congregating will be allowed. Following the game, contact-tracing will occur to monitor any possible spread of Covid-19, Cuomo said.

Any fans who refuse to comply will be removed from the premises, Dr. Howard Zucker, New York’s Health Commissioner, said Wednesday.

The outdoor, controlled venue at the upcoming Buffalo Bills game will serve as a “pilot” program to test ways the state can reopen businesses and events smartly and safety, Cuomo said.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took a definitive stance against moving forward on a House-passed bill to increase direct stimulus payments to $2,000, criticizing the policy and making it clear nothing will move forward in the chamber that doesn’t include President Trump’s other two priorities: a full repeal of online liability protections and an investigation into voter fraud. 

McConnell, on Tuesday, introduced legislation that combined the three Trump priorities – each a pre-requisite for Trump signing the Covid-19 relief and spending package earlier this week.

McConnell, on Wednesday, made clear that the introduction of that legislation met the contours of the agreement with Trump, which stipulated only starting the process to vote on the issues. 

As it currently stands, there are no votes scheduled on McConnell’s bill, or the House-passed legislation, and GOP aides say it’s likely the 116th Congress comes to an end without any action on increasing direct payments. 

The Kentucky Republican opened up his floor remarks Wednesday blasting Vermont Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders for holding up the NDAA override vote. 

“Today the Senate was supposed to finish legislation securing critical tools, training and support for America’s armed forces. But the junior senator from Vermont had other ideas,” he said.

McConnell added: “We’ll stay on this important bill until we complete it, one way or another.”

Sanders has said he will delay the NDAA override vote unless McConnell brings a $2,000 checks to a vote on the floor. A final vote could stretch into Saturday if Sanders continues to hold it up. Eventually, though, it will pass. It’s just a matter of how long this takes.

The NBA says no players tested positive for Covid-19 during the league’s latest testing window.

According to the league and the NBA Players Association, 495 tests have been administered since Dec. 24 with zero positive results for the virus.

The latest results are down from last week, in which two new players returned a positive test for Covid-19. 

Travelers walk at Brussels Airport in Belgium after flights to the United Kingdom resumed on December 23.

Belgium has stepped up its rules for travelers arriving in the country to prevent the possible spread of the new variant of Covid-19, a press release from the prime minister’s office said Wednesday.

These are the new measures:

This measure will provisionally apply until Jan. 15.

Belgium had imposed a partial travel ban on UK travelers from Dec. 23 to Dec. 31, which allowed some limited essential travel.

The number of Covid-19 deaths reached a new high in California on Wednesday.

California recorded 432 new fatalities, the highest reported in a single day so far. In Southern California, Los Angeles County officials described the grim situation there in a tweet Wednesday, and said one person dies from Covid-19 every 10 minutes.

Some of these deaths are believed to be part of a backlog announced by Los Angeles Tuesday. The number of people who have died from the virus in the Golden State is nearly 25,000.

Gov. Gavin Newsom called the high number of fatalities “very, very sobering.”

California added 30,921 cases Wednesday, bringing the state’s total to more than 2.2 million Covid-19 infections. More than 746,000 of those are in Los Angeles County, the nation’s most populous. About 40% of Californians who died of Covid-19 lived in Los Angeles County.

Hospitalizations and intensive care unit admissions remain at an all-time high. ICU capacity is down to 0% statewide, with the brunt of the impact in Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley. Projections for each region show the demand for ICU beds exceeding capacity for at least the next four weeks.

There is some glimmer of optimism, as the positivity rate in California is showing a slight dip and has dropped to a two-week average of 12.2%. 

Note: These numbers were released by the California Department of Public Health and Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and may not line up exactly in real time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the Covid Tracking Project. 

Actress Dawn Wells is seen in September 2019.

Dawn Wells, who played the lovable castaway Mary Ann Summers on “Gilligan’s Island,” died in Los Angeles Wednesday from Covid-19 complications, her publicist Harlan Boll confirmed to CNN.

She was 82.

This story is developing.

Passengers traveling from the United Kingdom to Sweden are now required to show a negative coronavirus test result in order to enter the country, the Swedish government announced on Wednesday.

The new conditions will go into action on Jan. 1 —  with the lifting of a flight ban from the UK, previously set to Jan. 21 —  and won’t be applicable to Swedish residents, the statement said.

Sweden expects these new measures to “reduce the risk of spreading the Covid-19 virus, especially the new variant of the virus discovered in the UK.”

Nearly 2.6 million vaccine doses have been administered in the United States, according to data given to CNN by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As of 9 a.m. Wednesday, 12,409,050 doses were distributed.

That’s an additional 461,982 doses distributed, and 963,875 doses administered since the CDC’s figures were last updated on Monday.

A medical worker in Barcelona, Spain, administers an injection December 17 during a trial of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine.

Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine may be authorized for emergency use in February and could be a “game-changer” for the US, Moncef Slaoui, chief scientific adviser for Operation Warp Speed (OWS), said Wednesday.

Slaoui said Phase 3 trial recruitment for the vaccine has been completed.

Slaoui said OWS is working with Johnson & Johnson to accelerate the availability of its vaccine doses. The vaccine requires a single dose, which may make the logistics around its distribution and administration easier.

“I think it can be quite a game-changer,” Slaoui said. “We’re hopeful that this vaccine, which is a one-shot vaccine will have equivalent efficacy to those of Moderna and Pfizer.” 

Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech’s vaccines both require two doses and have more than 94% efficacy.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says data suggests the new Covid-19 variant — first reported in UK and now reported in Colorado — has been circulating undetected in the United States and transmitted person-to-person.

Walke said that even though there is no evidence that this variant causes more severe symptoms, or increase risk of death, they could lead to more cases and “put even more strain on our heavily burdened health care systems.”

Additionally, Walke stated that as of today, there’s no evidence of a second variant that was first identified in South Africa is circulating in the United States, and researchers are still learning how the two variants respond to different treatments.

“We’re still learning how they might respond drugs, and other Covid-19 treatments including monoclonal antibodies and convalescent plasma,” Walke said. 

Health officials in Colorado confirmed on Wednesday that a member of the Colorado National Guard is the person who has the new Covid-19 variant case.

Officials are looking into a probable case in another guard member. 

Both members were deployed to the Good Samaritan nursing home in Simla. 

Officials would not confirm any additional details on the identities of the two guard members but did say that there is no travel history on either person.

The guard members were part of a team of six deployed to the Good Samaritan Society — Simla after a recent outbreak of Covid-19 hit residents and staff. 

Dr. Rachel Herlihy, the state epidemiologist for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said during a news conference on Wednesday that they are still investigating how these two guard members were infected.

She said that health officials tested staff and residents in the facility yesterday and that additional testing will be performed today to see if anyone there has the variant. 

Randy Fitzgerald, regional vice president of Good Samaritan Society, told CNN in a statement that they expect to know the results in the next few days. 

“We will continue to work closely with the state while following vigorous infection control measures,” Fitzgerald told CNN. 

Herlihy said that they are currently doing contact tracing and quarantine orders will be issued to those who were in close contact with the person who has the positive variant. She said the quarantine period will be for 14 days.  

“This new variant is just another reminder that there is a lot that we don’t know about the virus,” Polis said today.

Fitzgerald told CNN in the statement that the Good Samaritan Society — Silma will be vaccinating residents starting next week and that the vaccines will help keep the residents and staff members safe.

As CNN reported, the facility has experienced a Covid-19 outbreak in the past two and a half weeks.

Colorado health officials said today that all 26 residents and 20 of 34 staff members have tested positive for the virus so far.  

Shoppers are seen in the city center of Dublin, Ireland, on Saturday.

Ireland will return to a full lockdown for “at least” a month — initially until Jan. 31 — in an attempt to get the latest surge in Covid-19 cases under control, Irish Prime Minister (Taoiseach) Micheál Martin announced on Wednesday.

The “Level 5” restrictions, which will come into force starting tomorrow, Dec. 31, include a ban on household visits and the closure of nonessential shops. Schools will remain closed until Jan. 11.

Martin described the situation as “extremely serious.”

“We must apply the brakes to movement and physical interaction across the country,” Martin said.

“You should stay at home except for travel for work, education or other essential purposes, or to take exercise within 5km of home,” he added.

In this undated photo, a researcher in Oxford, England, works on the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University.

The Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine may be authorized for emergency use in the US in April, Dr. Moncef Slaoui, chief scientific adviser for Operation Warp Speed, said Wednesday. 

The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine was authorized for use in the UK Wednesday.

“As you know, that vaccine is in Phase three trials here in the US,” Slaoui said during a briefing. “We have almost totally completed the recruitment of that trial.”

Slaoui said the vaccine is being manufactured ahead of the potential authorization.

The Tennessee Department of Health has updated its Covid-19 vaccination plan which now includes administering to teachers and residents 75 and older. 

The state’s health department announced on Wednesday that updates to the current vaccination plan are being made based on new recommendations from the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices and discussions with Tennessee’s Unified Command Group and a stakeholder group of more than 30 partner agencies and organizations. 

K-12 teachers and childcare workers have also been moved up right behind frontline workers in the state’s vaccination plan.

During a news conference on Wednesday, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee said this layered approach that now includes teachers and residents 75 and older will make the state’s vaccine distribution plan more efficient and effective. 

A pharmacist prepares a Covid-19 vaccine at a senior-living community in Falls Church, Virginia, on Wednesday.

The US is working to address a lag time in reporting on Covid-19 vaccine numbers, Operation Warp Speed officials said during a briefing Wednesday. 

Recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show 2.1 million Covid-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the US.

“Surely, it’s a number that is smaller than the 14 million doses that are out there already available for use,” said Dr. Moncef Slaoui, chief scientific adviser for Operation Warp Speed.

The number is “lower than what we hoped for,” he added.

Gen. Gustave Perna, chief operating officer of Operation Warp Speed, said he is personally working to address the 72- to 96-hour delay in reporting on vaccine numbers, noting that the data will “tighten up,” as reporting becomes more routine.

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice announced that all elementary and middle schools will reopen to in-person learning on Jan. 19.

“During 2020, we learned that Covid-19 transmission rates in our schools during the first semester was 0.02% among students and…0.3% among our staff,” Justice said. 

The governor said that despite their efforts, switching to virtual learning has not worked well for students in West Virginia.

He added that the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources reported a reduction in Child Protective Services referrals by an average of 50-54% a month.

The governor said the transmission rate among students aged 15 and up is significantly higher than that in children under 15. 

Nurse Courtney Senechal inoculates Phyllis Fischer with a Covid-19 vaccine in Boston.

More than 14 million Covid-19 vaccine doses have been distributed in the United States, Gen. Gustave Perna, chief operating officer of Operation Warp Speed, said Wednesday.

Perna did not say how many of those doses have been administered. The vaccine distribution process, he said, has entered a good cadence.

“This week we provided jurisdictions with the final allocations of doses available,” Perna said. “That means by tomorrow night, all the jurisdictions will be able to place orders for up to 20 million doses of vaccine, which has been collective over the last two weeks plus.”

Perna said the US is working to get people their second doses soon.

“This week we started not only pushing first dose vaccine, but we started pushing second dose vaccine for the Pfizer vaccine,” he said.

“It is a pretty grim and depressing picture at the moment” in England, Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam told a Downing Street news conference on Wednesday.

Echoing the prime minister’s call for the nation to stay at home over New Years, Van-Tam said: “You have just got to play your part now in bringing us back from this dangerous situation we find ourselves in.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi speaks to reporters during her weekly press conference on December 30 in Washington, DC.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi assailed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for slow-walking the $2,000 CASH Act providing more relief funding for Americans in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic that passed through the House earlier this week. 

“I do hope that in the days ahead – we only have a few days left in this session – that they will see the light and understand the suffering that is going on in our country,” Pelosi added.

She did not, however, commit to bringing the CASH Act back up in a new Congress if it dies in the Senate.

“Let’s be hopeful it can happen this week, because the sooner it happens, the sooner the checks can go out. We’re not giving up on it, the President of the United States, Donald Trump, is advocating for it,” she said. “It would have bipartisan support in the Senate if Mitch McConnell would only allow it to come to floor instead of being an obstruction to those checks going to the American people.”

Pelosi also blasted the current administration for “holding up” the distribution the coronavirus vaccination to Americans, saying that “this has to be done better.”

“Let’s hope in the last few weeks of the Trump administration that they will follow the science,” she added.

“This pandemic is horrible,” Pelosi said. “But it has also pulled back the curtain to reveal further disparities in our economy in our society, “ she said, announcing that she is going to ask the Rules Committee in the new Congress to stand up a new committee to address economic disparity and fairness. 

Pelosi also addressed the death of Congressman-elect Luke Letlow of Louisiana, who died from complications of Covid-19, “It could happen to anyone, and it has happened to 350,000 Americans.”

An SUV delivers the "2021" New Year's Eve numerals to Times Square in New York during a coast-to-coast tour on December 21.

New York Police Chief of Department Terence A. Monahan said Wednesday the New Year’s Eve Times Square event “will look completely different than it has any other time in history.”

“We could all agree that 2020 has been a year unlike anything else we’ve experienced,” he said at a Wednesday briefing.

His message: “Please stay at home.”

“Don’t come,” he said, “if you think you’re going to be able to stand there and watch the ball, you’re mistaken.”

There will be “absolutely no spectators allowed in Time Square” and no “fireworks” in Coney Island or “midnight run” in Central Park.

Hotels in the area will be allowed to operate, but patrons must remain in the hotels.

The spectators that will be seen on television are cast members part of the production that have been prescreened for the virus, he said.

There will be “many less” NYPD officers in time square but he assures the NYPD will still have assets “similar” to what has been seen in the past.

He said there is about an 80% reduction in cops that will be in Times Square, which will allow cops to be in the outer boroughs “where they are needed.”

Officers will be posted in the streets of Times Square and subways, including heavy weapons teams and a counter terrorism overlay.

New York is currently “undertaking preparations” to have emergency hospital facilities ready in case there is another Covid-19 surge, including Javits Center in New York City, an official in the governor’s office said. 

“The Governor has made clear that we’re laser focused on preserving hospital capacity and protecting our healthcare system as cases increase and continue to do so as we move through the holiday season,” said Rich Azzopardi, senior advisor to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. 

Azzopardi encouraged New Yorkers to continue taking precautions against Covid-19 so that the state can “avoid a surge that overwhelms our hospital system.”

President Donald Trump's name appears on a stimulus check on May 3.

Americans can expect to start seeing $600 in their bank accounts immediately as the federal government’s second round of stimulus payments is being sent out, the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service said.

The direct deposits will continue into next week, while paper checks will be mailed out beginning Wednesday. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday said that the Treasury and the IRS are working with “unprecedented speed” to issue the second round of payments.

The Covid-19 relief package, which President Trump signed Sunday evening, provides individuals who meet income limits with $600; couples who meet income limits with $1,200; and eligible families with an additional $600 per child.

The $600 is half of what Americans received in the first round of stimulus payments Congress approved back in March. It took two weeks after that first Covid-19 relief bill was passed for the IRS to start sending out the money — but some eligible recipients still haven’t received it, months later.

An individual’s most recent tax returns determines their eligibility for the stimulus payment.

Anyone who made under $75,000 as an individual or $150,000 as a couple would receive the full amount.

Read more here.

Amir Bukhari.

Unemployment benefits for workers will be extended through March 14, but relief may be held up because President Trump delayed signing the coronavirus relief package.

Amir Bukhari and Fareeha Haq are raising their family of six in Brooklyn, New York, on less than $400 a week in unemployment, and they could go without that money next week. 

“It’s going to hit rock bottom,” Bukhari told CNN’s Vanessa Yurkevich. The money that was supposed to arrive this week was going to feed the family, he said. The couple lost their jobs in March.

Under the relief package, the jobless will receive a $300 weekly federal enhancement in benefits through March 14. The amount is half of the earlier federal boost, which ran out at the end of July.

Also, the deal extends by 11 weeks two other pandemic unemployment programs that were created in the $2 trillion CARES Act in March and were set to expire at year’s end. An estimated 12 million laid-off workers in these programs were facing the loss of their aid.

Haq used to work at the Council of Peoples Organization handing out food. Now she relies on the nonprofit to help feed her family. 

“I was there helping people receive benefits, and now I’m on the other end and I’m asking for benefits,” she said. 

Watch their story:

Wednesday’s English Premier League encounter between Tottenham Hotspur and Fulham has become the latest fixture to be postponed following positive Covid-19 test results within Fulham’s players and first team staff.

The game was due to kick-off at 6 p.m. GMT at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London.

It’s the third game to be postponed this season after Aston Villa vs. Newcastle United (Dec. 4) and Everton vs. Manchester City (Dec. 28).

In a statement Tottenham said: “The Premier League informed us of the decision this afternoon, with Fulham having requested the postponement on the grounds of the number of COVID-19 positive cases among their players and staff.”

The team added that a new date for the fixture would be confirmed in due course.

The Premier League said that despite the postponement it “continues to have full confidence in its COVID-19 protocols and being able to continue to play our fixtures as scheduled.”

Some more context: On Tuesday, the Premier League announced 18 new positive Covid-19 tests among players and club staff in its latest round of testing.

That’s the highest number of positive tests recorded since the league began weekly testing at the start of the current season.

More areas of England will move into Tier 4 “stay at home” coronavirus restrictions – meaning three quarters of the population will be under the strict regulations, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said Wednesday.

Hancock told the House of Commons over 21,000 people are currently in hospital with coronavirus in England.

“Unfortunately this new variant is spreading across most of England,” he warned.

The Midlands, the North East, parts of the North West and parts of the South West of England are among those escalated into Tier 4 from midnight local time. 

Between Dec. 18 and 24 the weekly Covid-19 case rate in England rose to 402.6 per 100,000 – a 32% increase on the previous week – the Department of Health said in a press release Wednesday.

The NHS reports 14,915 patients have been admitted to hospital with Covid-19 in the past week – an 18% increase on the week before – it added.

More areas of England have also been moved into Tier 3.

Dr. Ashish Jha on December 30.

Dr. Ashish Jha, the dean of Brown University’s School of Public Health, said he’s “super frustrated” about the slower-than-promised pace of US coronavirus vaccinations. 

The Trump administration “decided that their job essentially ends when the vaccine gets to the state and there’s nothing more to do,” Jha told CNN.

Federal officials previously said that 20 million people would be vaccinated by the end of December. So far, more than 2 million doses have been administered, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Jha said vaccination centers should’ve been set up in states. 

Jha questioned why planning for vaccinations was not ironed out months ago.

“It strikes me as a level of incompetence I have to say I am stunned by,” Jha sad. “We did this with testing, we did this with PPE, but I thought we were going to get it better with vaccines.”

Watch:

US stocks rose modestly once again Wednesday, boosted by the approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine in the United Kingdom and the United States’ passing of the stimulus bill.

Trading remains thin in this shortened, holiday week. But stocks ended Tuesday in record territory, so any gains Wednesday will set new records.

Here’s how Wall Street opened:

A researcher in a laboratory at the Jenner Institute in Oxford, England, works on the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University.

Hundreds of thousands of doses of the coronavirus vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca – which was approved by UK regulators earlier today – are expected to be made available across the UK starting on Monday Jan. 4, the UK Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said Wednesday. 

British Health Secretary Matt Hancock has described the approval of the vaccine as a “breakthrough” development, marking a “massive step forward” in the country’s fight against Covid-19. 

“The light at the end of the tunnel just got brighter. Vaccines are the exit route from the pandemic,” Hancock said in a statement. 

“‘We have already vaccinated hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people and the new Oxford jab will allow us to accelerate our vaccination plan, allowing us to return to normality in the future,” he added. 

“As someone who has worked in vaccine development, distribution, administration for many years, this is not a surprise,” Rick Bright, a member of President-elect Joe Biden’s coronavirus advisory board told CNN’s Alisyn Camerota and Jim Sciutto when asked about the number of vaccine doses promised by the administration and the number that have been administered.

Bright said that “we know how hard it is to get this job done, we’ve tried to do this in 2009 and 10 responding to an influenza pandemic.”

He said that this erodes the trust and confidence that people have in the entire system, “let alone in the vaccine.”

Bright admitted that he and the rest of the Biden team have a lot of work to do.

“President-elect Biden said that he will move heaven and earth to make sure we do everything possible to get the vaccine into the arms of Americans in every pocket of our country,” Bright said. “And that’s what we’re going to focus on after January 20.”

Bright said that they will make sure they’re rolling out a strategy end to end, using the defense production act to get supplies and vaccines produced, communication and coordination to get the vaccine distributed, education and resources to support the administration and healthcare workers, and communication and education to build confidence in people to get the vaccine.

 “We have a lot of work to do, and president-elect Biden and his team have a plan and a blueprint to roll out on day one, and they want to administer 100 million doses of vaccine in those first 100 days, and I believe we’re going to get the job done,” Bright said.

 Watch:

Mitch McConnell, US Senate majority leader, walks from his office to the Senate Chamber at the Capitol in Washington on December 29.

Things are going to drag on in the Senate for a few days.

Bottom line: There is absolutely no sign right now that a standalone bill on $2,000 checks is going to get a vote on the Senate floor. It looks like McConnell is simply going to run out the clock. There were several opportunities on Tuesday when McConnell could have made that assurance or let Democrats pass the bill with a unanimous consent agreement that would have shielded his members from having to take a potentially tough vote.

McConnell blocked those efforts.

Instead, he gave himself an out card down the line — and only if he needs one — by placing on the calendar a bill that would tie a repeal of Section 230 to increasing direct stimulus payments to $2,000 for Americans under a certain income level. The Kentucky Republican may never bring it up. It’s there just in case he needs to put something on the floor. Democrats were furious. And there’s nothing they can do about it.

McConnell vs. Trump: It’s important to remember that McConnell is essentially ignoring Trump’s request at the moment. Remember, he never made Trump any promises about what he was or was not going to do on the Senate floor. Trump’s statement Sunday night was full of things he thought he’d won.

McConnell made no such mention on fulfilling those promises in his own statement thanking Trump. In a lot of ways, this moment isn’t that dissimilar to how McConnell has managed Trump for four years, letting the President rant and vent only to quietly conduct things the way he thinks is best for his members in his own chamber (remember how when the tax bill was drafted, McConnell ignored Trump’s later requests to bring up health care for the zillionth time).

Stay tuned: Let’s never rule anything out. Dynamics change. If something from polling in Georgia begins to shift to the point that McConnell feels like he needs to give Perdue and Loeffler a vote, he will.

And he now has one on the calendar he can bring up. Cornyn summed it up best when asked if he thought checks would happen: “I’ve given up making predictions around here. I didn’t think I’d be here today, either. So, I don’t know. I don’t know the answer.”

Read more here.

Suzanne Malveaux reports:

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02:00 - Source: cnn

Margaret Keenan receives her second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine at University Hospital Coventry in England on December 29.

Margaret Keenan, 91, received her second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine on Tuesday, three weeks after she became the first patient outside of clinical trials to receive the vaccine.

“It’s important that everyone comes forward to get the jab when they are invited to do so and, like other hospitals and GP surgeries across the country, we’ll be following the latest expert advice and evidence to invite people to get vaccinated at the time they need it,” Hardy added.

Keenan received the first of two doses of the vaccine on Dec. 8 at University Hospital in Coventry, less than a week after the UK became the first country to approve it.

For the fourth consecutive day after the Christmas holiday, more than 1 million people passed through airport security checkpoints on Tuesday, according to the Transportation Security Administration.  

It is also the eighth of the last 12 days where checkpoint traffic exceeded 1 million people. 

Sunday was the single busiest day of the pandemic at airports, with nearly 1.3 million people screened.  

Tuesday’s tally was at least 1,019,347 people, the agency said.  

The numbers represent a spike in pandemic era travel and raise public health concerns.  

A Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine is prepared for staff at a skilled nursing and rehabilitation center in Acton, Massachusetts, on December 28.

The United States is lagging behind several other countries in its Covid-19 vaccination efforts, according to an analysis by CNN of the most recent government data.

In the US:

That is significantly lower than the daily vaccination rates for Israel, the UK, and Bahrain.

The daily rate per 100,000 in Israel is 608, for Bahrain it’s 263, and for the UK it’s 60, according to data supplied by those governments.

The US is vaccinating quicker than Canada, where the daily rate is 10 doses per 100,000 people, according to researchers at the University of Toronto.

So far, 11,445,175 doses of the vaccine have been distributed to US states, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

US Assistant Secretary of Health Admiral Brett Giroir said the 2 million number for doses administered is likely an “underestimate” because reporting of shots “is delayed three to seven days, so we certainly expect that to be a multiple of two million.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, however, said that even if the 2.1 million is an underestimate, it’s still lower than what had been hoped for.

“Even if you undercount, two million as an undercount, how much undercount could it be,” Fauci said. “So, we are below where we want to be.”

Dr. June Raine, MHRA chief executive, speaks at a press briefing in London on December 30.

The head of the UK’s medicines regulatory agency MHRA has said that “no corners whatsoever have been cut” in the authority’s assessment of the newly-approved coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, asserting that the safety of the public is a priority. 

“Our teams of scientists and clinicians have very carefully, methodically and rigorously reviewed all the data on safety, effectiveness and on quality as soon as they have become available, and have done so around the clock, looking at all the tests and trials,” MHRA Chief Executive Dr. June Raine said Wednesday during a televised briefing at Downing Street. 

Speaking alongside Dr. Raine, the chair of the UK Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), Professor Wei Shen Lim, said that while the newly-approved vaccine comes with fewer logistical challenges than the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, both will be administered in the UK as part of the country’s mass vaccination programme. 

“The committee’s advice is that for individuals eligible for vaccination in the phase 1 programme in the UK, both vaccines may be used, with no preference for one vaccine above the other,” Lim said. 

“To facilitate rapid deployment within a mass vaccination programme, and to avoid substantial vaccine wastage, it may be that in certain settings, one vaccine is offered in preference over another,” he continued, adding that the deployment of both vaccines will allow for “rapid and high levels of vaccine uptake” across the country.  

“This will allow the greatest number of eligible people to receive the vaccine in the shortest time possible, and that will protect the greatest number of lives,” Lim said. 

During the briefing, Professor Sir Munir Pirmohamed, chair of the UK Commission on Human Medicines Expert Working Group, also noted that two doses of the Oxford-Astra-Zeneca vaccine should be given at an interval of between 4-12 weeks, stressing that members of the public should continue to follow government guidelines during this period. 

“You have to wait until day 22 before you get partial immunity after the first dose, and so it is really important that people continue to follow all the government guidelines,” Pirmohamed said. 

After the first case of the UK Covid-19 variant was identified in the US, former Harvard professor William Haseltine has said that it’s imperative to take “more serious measures” to control its spread.

Speaking on CNN’s New Day program on Wednesday, Haseltine said that implementing a domestic travel ban that would include air, bus and train travel would be “highly controversial, but it’s what we need to do.”

“We know the virus is much more transmissible – and we know we’ve got to take more serious measures to control what’s inevitably going to be an increased rate of infection in our population,” Haseltine said.

On Wednesday, US health officials in Elbert County, Colorado said they were monitoring at least two cases of the new UK Covid-19 variant.

The county has one confirmed case and now has a second suspected case, Dwayne Smith, director of public health for Elbert County, told CNN.

Both of the individuals who tested positive for the new variant are men who were working at the Good Samaritan Society assisted living facility in Simla, approximately 45 miles northeast of Colorado Springs. 

Neither of the cases are residents of Elbert County and they are currently isolating in a location outside of the county, Smith said. He added that there was “no indication at this point” that virus had spread beyond the facility and into the larger community.  

It’s a season that’s so far delivered one of the more intriguing title races – just six points separate the top nine teams – but as the UK grapples with a significant spike in Covid-19 cases, the English Premier League is facing a major challenge in how it navigates the remainder of the 2020/2021 campaign.

On Tuesday, the Premier League announced 18 new positive Covid-19 tests among players and club staff in its latest round of testing. That’s the highest number of positive results recorded since the league began weekly testing at the start of the current season.

On Monday, the match between Everton and Manchester City was postponed because of a Covid-19 outbreak at the latter club, which included positive tests for players Gabriel Jesus and Kyle Walker on Christmas Day.

Monday’s postponement was the second match to be have been affected by Covid-19 this season – Newcastle’s game at Aston Villa was also postponed after a number of players and staff at the north-east club returned positive test results.

According to a number of reports, Wednesday’s game between Tottenham Hotspur and Fulham is also in doubt. Fulham has recorded a number of positive tests at the club.

New West Bromwich Albion manager Sam Allardyce, who was appointed earlier in December, has called for a temporary halt to the Premier League season amid the rising number of positive test results.

“I’m 66 and the last thing I want to do is catch Covid. I’m very concerned for myself and football … We had one positive this week and it seems to be creeping around no matter how hard we try.”

The UK is currently battling a new variant of the virus which spreads more quickly than the others and has forced increased restrictions over the holiday season.

53,135 new coronavirus cases were recorded in the UK on Tuesday, breaking a daily record since the pandemic began – for a second day in a row. A further 414 people have died, according to the British government.

Read the whole story here:

LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND - DECEMBER 28: A big screen graphic announcing the fixture being called off before the expected Premier League match between Everton and Manchester City at Goodison Park on December 28 2020 in Liverpool, England. (Photo by Tony McArdle/Everton FC via Getty Images)

Related article Calls for Premier League 'circuit break' amid rising Covid-19 cases

Indonesia’s foreign minister announced Wednesday that the country has signed deals with AstraZeneca and Novavax to secure 100 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines, state news agency Antara reported Wednesday.

Antara reported each company will supply 50 million doses but no details were given on when the shipments will arrive.

Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi also said in the press conference Wednesday that an additional 1.8 million doses of the Chinese company Sinovac’s vaccine would arrive on Thursday, following on from the 1.2 million doses that arrived earlier in December.

A volunteer in Oxford, England, is administered a coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University.

The British government has announced that it will follow a new immunisation strategy for the newly-approved Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which will prioritize giving the first of two vaccine doses to as many people as possible, before administering the second dose 12 weeks later.

According to UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock, scientists and regulators have found that the first dose of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine offers “very effective protection” from coronavirus, allowing for people to be protected for a longer period of time before receiving a second dose. 

In contrast, the prescribed two doses of the coronavirus vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech – which comes with greater logistical demands – must be administered three weeks apart. 

UK government scientific advisor Professor Calum Semple welcomed the new “sophisticated approach,” telling Sky News on Wednesday that a “one-dose approach to start with will protect a great many people.”

According to Semple, evidence from vaccine trials has shown that a single dose not only prevented people from getting severe disease, but also prompted a “very good immune response” in frail and elderly people. 

“That’s quite a significant change, and it’s quite important. That’s what is game-changing about this vaccine,” Semple said.

Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, told BBC Radio 4 on Wednesday that the second dose “will be really important” because it “will be critical for the durability of the immune response” to help prevent further waves of the disease. 

Pollard also confirmed that, at the moment, there is “no evidence” that the new vaccine won’t be effective against the new variant of coronavirus detected in in the UK. 

“We can’t be complacent with this or other variants, so now we have to monitor the virus that is around and make sure the vaccines are still effective against it,” Pollard said.

“If in the future it is necessary to tweak the vaccines, that’s entirely possible to do,” he added. 

Millions of people are expected to be vaccinated by the end of the first quarter of 2021, the CEO of AstraZeneca said Wednesday.  

“We already have millions of doses we’ll be filling over the next period of time,” Pascal Soriot told BBC Radio 4, adding that the British-Swedish company has capacity to produce and deliver two million doses of the new vaccine per week, with the first doses expected to be distributed across the UK over the next few days.

“We’re lining deliveries with the government so we can progressively ramp up the vaccination program….in January we’ll possibly already be injecting several million people and, in the second quarter, we’ll be in the tens of millions of people,” he added.

Taiwan will tighten its border restrictions for foreign nationals beginning January 1, 2021, after detecting its first case of the new UK Covid-19 variant, the country’s orhealth and welfare minister said in a press conference Wednesday. 

The person tested positive for the new variant after returning from the UK and is in hospital care with mild symptoms, Minister Chen Shih-chung said. 

The new border measures will be in effect from January 1 to January 15 and will ban entry to foreigners that do not hold Taiwan residency or permits for diplomatic services, business contracts, or humanitarian purposes, or are spouses or children of Taiwan nationals, Taiwan’s CDC said.

Inbound travelers eligible to enter Taiwan will also have strengthened quarantine measures, the CDC added.

A group representing some 400 Hong Kong citizens and residents currently in the United Kingdom have written to the city’s government begging for it to rescind a ban on entry from the country introduced after a new, potentially more infectious variant of the coronavirus was detected in the UK. 

In a letter to the Hong Kong government, seen by CNN, the group said the “regulatory amendments, announced at understandably short notice, have severely impacted many of us.”

They requested that the Hong Kong government publicly announce a date for the ban to be rescinded, giving them a degree of certainty on when to book flights and hotel accommodation for quarantine stays, or to open a travel window to allow those currently overseas who hold Hong Kong residence to return to the city. 

The Chief Executive’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CNN. 

In an email seen by CNN to the group, a spokeswoman for the Chief Executive said the new variant in the UK had forced the government “to make a resolute move to halt further importation.” 

Multiple governments around the world have temporarily banned entry from the UK over the new coronavirus variant. A ban in France – which has now been eased – caused chaos earlier this month when thousands of heavy duty vehicles were stranded at the UK’s border on the English Channel. 

"Covid-19" is written in chalk on a coffin containing a person who died of or with the coronavirus at the Dresden-Tolkewitz crematorium in Saxony, Germany on December 29.

Germany has reported a record number of coronavirus-related deaths for a single day, data from the country’s disease control agency showed on Wednesday

According to the Robert Koch Institute’s Covid-19 dashboard, 1,129 deaths were recorded in the past 24 hours. That brings the total number of deaths in Germany to 32,107.

The previous record single-day death toll was last Wednesday with 962 fatalities.

In the past 24 hours, the institute also recorded 22,459 new coronavirus infections. 

Germany is currently struggling with a surge in cases. The country has imposed severe restrictions on public life, attempting to slow the virus’ spread.

A Covid-19 testing site continues to operate in Manchester as snow hits the UK on December 29.

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the approval of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine by the country’s regulator on Wednesday, adding that the UK would be “out of this by the spring.”

In an interview with Sky News, Hancock called the approval “fantastic news,” saying that the country’s National Health Service was “standing ready to deploy, at the sort of pace that is needed to be able to help us to get out of this pandemic by the spring.”

The vaccine, developed at Oxford University with support from the British-Swedish pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca, has become the second to receive approval from the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency.

Hancock told Sky News that the UK has ordered 100 million doses – enough to vaccinate the entire population. It plans to roll out the vaccines from January 4, and accelerate the deployment over the first few weeks of the year.

The health secretary also said the approval of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine was “good news for the whole world” because of its relatively low cost and storage conditions.

PM’s praise: UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the approval “truly fantastic news – and a triumph for British science” on Twitter.

“We will now move to vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible,” his tweet read.

A “limited number” of patients infected with the new coronavirus variant have been detected in the United Arab Emirates, government spokesman Omar al-Hammadi said on Tuesday. 

The spokesman said that the cases arrived from abroad but did not clarify how many patients were detected or where they traveled from.  

Many countries have banned flights from the United Kingdom since the country announced earlier this month that it had found a new, more contagious strain of the virus

The Emirate of Dubai has maintained international flights however even as other Gulf countries closed down, including Saudi Arabia, which extended an entry ban to the country for another week.  

The UAE reported 1,506 coronavirus cases on Tuesday, bringing its total confirmed infections to 204,369, according to the country’s Health Ministry. 

AstraZeneca has promised to supply hundreds of millions of doses of its Covid-19 vaccine to low and middle-income countries, and to deliver it on a not-for-profit basis to those nations in perpetuity.

The vaccine, developed at England’s Oxford University, was approved for use by UK regulators on Wednesday – the first country to do so.

It is significantly cheaper than other coronavirus vaccines and, crucially, it would be far easier to transport and distribute in developing countries than its rivals since it does not need to be stored at freezing temperatures.

The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine can be kept at refrigerator temperatures of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius (36 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit) for at least six months. Moderna’s vaccine has to be stored at minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit) – or at refrigerator temperatures for up to 30 days – and the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has to be stored at minus 75 degrees Celsius (minus 103 degrees Fahrenheit), and used within five days once refrigerated at higher temperatures.

“Pfizer and Moderna require freezer storage, and that just isn’t in place in many settings,” Ghani said.

“Cold chain” refrigeration is the standard storage used globally to deliver vaccines from central locations to local health clinics. AstraZeneca’s vaccine is so far “the only one that can definitely be delivered to those systems,” Ghani added.

The vaccines are based on different technology. AstraZeneca’s offering – like Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine and Russia’s Sputnik V – uses an adenovirus to carry genetic fragments of coronavirus into the body.

Read more:

FILE - In this undated file photo issued by the University of Oxford, a volunteer is administered the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, in Oxford, England. Britain has authorized use of a second COVID-19 vaccine, becoming the first country to greenlight an easy-to-handle shot that its developers hope will become the "vaccine for the world." The United Kingdom government says the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency has made an emergency authorization for the vaccine developed by Oxford University and UK-based drugmaker AstraZeneca. (John Cairns/University of Oxford via AP, File)

Related article UK regulator approves Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine

In this June 24 file photo, a volunteer receives an injection at the Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital in Soweto, Johannesburg, as part of Africa's first participation in a Covid-19 vaccine trial developed at the University of Oxford in conjunction with AstraZeneca.

The UK government says its regulator has authorized the use of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine.

A health worker prepares a syringe to inoculate a volunteer with Sinopharm's Covid-19 vaccine during its trial at the Cayetano Heredia University in Lima, Peru on December 9.

A coronavirus vaccine developed by Chinese state-owned pharmaceutical giant Sinopharm has 79.34% efficacy, the drugmaker announced on Wednesday.

A statement released online by Sinopharm subsidiary Beijing Biological Products Institute said that interim analysis of data from the Phase 3 clinical trial shows that all participants who received two doses of the vaccine produced high levels of antibodies.

The results reached the relevant technical standards of the World Health Organization and regulations issued by the National Medical Products Administration, the statement said. 

The statement added that the company has formally submitted an application to China’s National Medical Products Administration for conditional approval. 

A person sits in a personal bubble while charging devices at a Link Wi-Fi station in New York City on December 29.

The United States reported 3,725 additional coronavirus deaths on Tuesday – a record high for a single day since the pandemic began, according to Johns Hopkins University’s tally.

JHU also recorded 247,646 new Covid-19 cases nationwide on Tuesday.

At least 19,557,147 total cases and 338,563 deaths have now been recorded in the US, according to JHU.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.  

At least 11,445,175 vaccine doses have been distributed and at least 2,127,143 doses administered, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

CNN is tracking US cases:

Panama announced that it has signed agreements with four Covid-19 vaccine producers to supply some 5.5 million doses of vaccine, according to a statement tweeted by the country’s Health Ministry late Tuesday.

Those vaccines will impact some 80% of the country’s population, the ministry said.

The statement did not specify which vaccine companies the country had reached agreements with.

Panama’s President Laurentino Cortizo announced Tuesday that the nation’s vaccination process will begin in the next 90 days.

Panama is home to around 4 million people. The country has reported more than 233,000 coronavirus cases, including at least 3,933 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Indian municipal workers in personal protective equipment watch as passengers arrive from the United Kingdom, at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport in Mumbai on December 22.

India has extended the suspension of all flights to and from the United Kingdom until January 7.

The Minister of Civil Aviation, Hardeep Singh Puri announced the decision in a tweet Wednesday morning:

India had ordered a suspension of all flights between the two countries on December 21 as a precaution against the spread of the new variant of coronavirus, which appears to be more contagious. 

State and federal authorities have been testing and tracking the 33,000 passengers who travelled to India from the UK between November 25 and December 22. According to the Health Ministry, 114 of them have so far tested positive for Covid-19.

On Tuesday, India announced that six cases of the new Covid-19 variant had been detected so far in the country.

In this still image taken from a social media video, people wearing Santa hats gather at Bronte Beach, in Sydney, Australia, amid the coronavirus outbreak on December 25.

Australia’s Minister of Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs has threatened to cancel the visas of any visitors caught breaking rules designed to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in the country, after hundreds of people attended a beach party in Sydney’s Bronte Beach on Christmas Day.

Only 100 people were allowed to gather at an outdoor event in Greater Sydney on December 25 after a new outbreak of Covid-19 in the city’s Northern Beaches region led to tightened restrictions over the Christmas period.

But witnesses said the crowd at Bronte Beach on the afternoon of Christmas Day was in its “hundreds,” many of whom were drinking alcohol and not wearing face masks. Brad Hazzard, Health Minister for the state of New South Wales (NSW), warned the party could be a “superspreader event.”

Local journalist Peter Hannam, who walked by the event at 5 p.m., said a number of people in attendance were talking loudly in British accents.

It’s not immediately clear how many of the crowd were residents or visitors on temporary visas. Australia’s borders have been closed to anyone except citizens and residents since March, but the government announced in April that temporary visa holders – including backpackers – could extend their visas.

But now, Immigration Minister Alex Hawke has warned that any foreign citizens caught breaching public health orders could have their visas reviewed or even canceled.

Read more here.

Tom Mountain, vice-chairman of the Massachusetts Republican State Committee, appears in an interview with CNN affiliate WCVB.

The vice-chairman of the Massachusetts Republican State Committee was hospitalized with Covid-19 days after attending a White House Hanukkah party, he said in an interview with CNN affiliate WCVB.

Massachusetts GOP official Tom Mountain said he felt fine when he went to the December 9 event. Mountain said that earlier in the pandemic he “felt as though (he) was invincible” and didn’t “have to wear a mask the entire time.”

“Once you get into the main ballroom people – they’re eating, they’re mingling, they’re getting pictures taken with the celebrities that are there. So very few people were wearing masks.” 

It’s not certain that Mountain contracted the virus at that event. Health experts say the typical incubation period for Covid-19 is up to 14 days, and patients typically show symptoms within five days of exposure. Research shows people are most contagious in the days before they show symptoms – if they show them at all.

What the White House says: Neither the White House nor the East Wing responded to CNN’s request for comment. In a statement earlier in December, East Wing chief of staff Stephanie Grisham said attending the White House holiday events would be a “very personal choice.”

Grisham said the Christmas and Hannukah celebrations would have smaller guest lists, masks would be provided, and social distancing would be encouraged. But images from multiple parties viewed by CNN showed that many attendees did not wear masks.

What happened to Mountain: Mountain said he was hospitalized twice after contracting the virus, telling WCVB he came close to being put on a ventilator.

The experience has given him a new outlook. “When you go in with the Covid, you don’t know if you’re going to come out.”

“This is not the flu, this is not the common cold. This is something which is deadly serious, and it can have deadly consequences.”

According to WCVB, four members of Mountain’s family were also infected.

CNN has made multiple attempts to reach Mountain and the Massachusetts GOP. 

Congressman-elect Luke Letlow, a Republican, has died aged 41 after being diagnosed with Covid-19, CNN confirmed Tuesday night.

Two Republican sources also confirmed Letlow’s passing to CNN.

The News-Star in Monroe, Louisiana, was first to report Letlow’s death.

Letlow had announced his diagnosis on his Facebook page on December 18, writing that he was “at home resting, following all CDC guidelines, quarantine protocols, and the recommendations of my doctors.”

Days later, Letlow posted that he was undergoing treatment at St. Francis Hospital in Monroe before a statement from his office on December 23 said he had been transferred to Ochsner LSU Heath Shreveport Academic Medical Center.

Dr. G.E. Ghali, the chancellor of LSU Health Shreveport, said in a statement at the time that Letlow was in “stable condition in the Intensive Care Unit” and was receiving the drug Remdesivir and steroids as part of his treatment.

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Luke Letlow, a Republican who won the seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, 5th Congressional District, passed away on Tuesday.

Related article Congressman-elect Luke Letlow dies after battling Covid-19

The first known case of the new Covid-19 variant in the United States was discovered in Colorado Tuesday, according to state health officials. 

The variant, called B.1.1.7, has been linked to the United Kingdom. The Colorado man who was infected is in his 20s, is isolating in Elbert County and appears to have no travel history, according to Gov. Jared Polis.

No close contacts of the man have been identified yet, but health officials are working on contact tracing, Polis said.

Here’s what we know about the new Covid-19 variant:

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CDC releases illustration of the Coronavirus.

Related article Here's what we know about the new Covid-19 variant found in Colorado

A nurse works with a Covid-positive patient inside the ICU at Providence St. Jude Medical Center on December 25 in Fullerton, California.

The United States reported 124,686 current Covid-19 hospitalizations on Tuesday, setting a record high since the pandemic began, according to the Covid Tracking Project (CTP).

This is the 28th consecutive day that the US has remained above 100,000 current hospitalizations.  

The highest hospitalization numbers, according to CTP data, are: 

US President-elect Joe Biden said Tuesday that the Trump administration’s plan to distribute Covid-19 vaccines across the country has fallen “far behind.”

“As I long feared and warned, the effort to distribute and administer the vaccine is not progressing as it should,” Biden said, delivering remarks on the Covid-19 crisis from Wilmington, Delaware.

Biden said if the vaccination program continues at the current pace “it’s going to take years, not months, to vaccinate the American people.” The President-elect had received a briefing from his Covid-19 advisory team earlier Tuesday, a transition official told CNN.

On December 9, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said on CNN’s “New Day” that “20 million people should get vaccinated in just the next several weeks.”

About 11.4 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been distributed in the US and about 2.1 million have been administered as of Tuesday evening, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The President-elect has laid out a plan to distribute 100 million vaccine shots, which is enough to cover 50 million people, in his initial 100 days in office. He reiterated on Tuesday that Congress would need to provide the necessary funding in order to reach that goal.

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President-elect Joe Biden speaks at the Queen Theater on December 29 in Wilmington, Delaware.

Related article Biden expected to call out Trump administration on pace of vaccine distribution

US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said direct payments to Americans may begin to be deposited as early as tonight. 

These would be the $600 payments included in the Covid-19 relief package President Donald Trump signed on Sunday evening.

Read Mnuchin’s tweet:

The United Kingdom recorded 53,135 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, breaking its daily record since the pandemic began for a second day in a row.

An additional 414 people have died, according to the government’s dashboard.

The previous highest record was reported on Monday when the UK reported 41,385 coronavirus cases and 357 deaths.

In response to the latest figures, Dr. Susan Hopkins, senior medical adviser for Public Health England, said in a statement: “We are continuing to see unprecedented levels of Covid-19 infection across the UK, which is of extreme concern particularly as our hospitals are at their most vulnerable.”