Month: February 2021

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World News

Nio deliveries in January quadruple from a 12 months in the past signaling a robust begin to 2021

Nio deliveries in January quadruple from a year ago signaling a strong start to 2021

Bin Li, CEO of Chinese electric vehicle startup NIO Inc., celebrates after the doorbell as NIO stock goes to trading on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) during the company’s initial public offering (IPO), New York, September 12, 2018.

Brendan McDermid | Reuters

BEIJING – Chinese electric car start-up Nio has had a solid start to the year, even if there is still a long way to go to catch up with market leader Tesla.

The company announced on Monday it had delivered 7,225 vehicles in January, more than four times the 1,598 vehicles delivered in the same month last year.

Last month’s numbers also mark Nio’s sixth consecutive month of record shipments, bringing the startup’s cumulative shipments to 82,866.

It took Nio about six years to reach this point, while Tesla delivered 180,570 cars in the last three months of 2020 alone.

Nio’s shares, listed on the New York Stock Exchange, are up 17% year-to-date, just ahead of Tesla’s 19% gain. Both stocks outperform the S&P 500 by around half a percent.

Xpeng, another US-listed Chinese electric car company, is up 15% year-to-date.

Xpeng announced on Monday that it had shipped 6,015 electric cars in January, a third record month in a row. The company’s P7 sedan made up more than half of last month’s deliveries, a total of 18,772 since mass launch began in late June.

Categories
Business

In Myanmar Coup, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Ends as Neither Democracy Hero nor Navy Foil

In Myanmar Coup, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Ends as Neither Democracy Hero nor Military Foil

During the years when Myanmar was intimidated by a military junta, people hid secret photos of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, talismans of the heroine of democracy who would save their country from a fearsome army despite being under house arrest.

But after she and her party won historic elections in 2015 and last year through a landslide that cemented civilian government and her own popularity in Myanmar, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi was seen by the outside world as something entirely different: as a fallen patron saint, the had made a Faust pact with the generals and no longer deserved their Nobel Peace Prize.

In the end, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, 75, was unable to protect her people or appease the generals. On Monday, the military, which had ruled the country for nearly five decades, took power again in a coup d’état and disrupted the governance of their National League for Democracy after just five years.

Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, along with her top ministers and a number of pro-democracy figures, were arrested in a raid before dawn. The round-up of the military’s critics continued until Monday evening, and the country’s telecommunications networks were constantly disrupted.

Government billboards across the country still carried their image and that of their party’s struggling peacock. But the army, under Major General Min Aung Hlaing, was again responsible.

The disappearance of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, who represented two completely different archetypes in front of two different audiences at home and abroad, proved that she was unable to do what so many expected: a political balance with the military with whom she shared power.

Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi lost the military’s ear when she halted negotiations with General Min Aung Hlaing. And by defending the generals in their ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya Muslims, she lost the trust of an international community that had campaigned for them for decades.

“Aung San Suu Kyi dismissed international critics, claiming that she was not a human rights activist but a politician. But the sad part is, she wasn’t very good at it either, ”said Phil Robertson, assistant Asia director for Human Rights Watch. “It failed a major moral test by covering up the military’s atrocities against the Rohingya. But detente with the military never materialized, and their landslide election victory is now being undone by a coup. “

President Biden made a strongly worded statement in the first test of his response to a coup designed to turn a democratic election upside down, which appeared to be different from the way his predecessor handled human rights issues.

“In a democracy, violence should never attempt to override the will of the people or attempt to obliterate the outcome of a credible election,” he said, using language similar to his own after the January 6 siege of the US Capitol Choice to overthrow. He called on the nations to “come together with one voice” to urge the military in Myanmar to give up power immediately.

“The United States takes note of those standing together with the people of Burma at this difficult hour,” he added, using the former name for Myanmar as it is still used by the US government.

The speed at which Myanmar’s democratic era was disintegrating was staggering, even for a country that had been under direct military rule for almost half a century and spun with coup rumors for days.

In November, its National League for Democracy put pressure on the military’s proxy party as many voters once again selected Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s political force as the best and only weapon to contain the generals. Her army placement for the past five years has been viewed by some as political jujitsu rather than appeasement.

The military, which retained significant power in the “discipline of flourishing democracy” that it had designed, complained of mass fraud. On January 28th, representatives of General Min Aung Hlaing sent a letter to Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi ordering a recount and a delay in the opening of parliament.

The military’s takeover of full power on Monday went hand in hand with a year-long state of emergency declaration that shattered any illusions that Myanmar was providing the world with an example of democracy on the rise, however flawed it may be.

“She’s the only person who can stand up to the military,” said U Aung Kyaw, a 73-year-old retired teacher. “We would all have voted for her forever, but today is the saddest day of my life because she’s gone again.”

Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi had close ties with the best of the military from the start, and her National League for Democracy was formed in alliance with senior military officials. After emerging from house arrest in 2010, she often dined with a former junta member who had imprisoned her.

Her followers said the coziness was more than Buddhist equanimity or political tactics. The daughter of the founder of the modern Myanmar army, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, has publicly said that she has a great affection for the military.

When the military stepped up its attack on Rohingya Muslims in 2017, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi appeared to display a synchronicity of emotions with the generals that exceeded mere political benefit.

According to United Nations investigators, the slaughter and village burnings, in which three quarters of a million members of the Muslim minority fled to neighboring Bangladesh, were carried out with genocidal intent. At the International Court of Justice in 2019, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, who served as Myanmar Foreign Minister and State Advisor, dismissed the violence as an “internal conflict” in which the army may have used disproportionate force.

Her tone towards the Rohingya seemed almost scornful, and she followed the example of the military in not mentioning her name so that her identity would not become human.

“Some will be tempted to believe that she has unsuccessfully enlisted in the military, that she has defended and still lost genocide for political favor,” said Matthew Smith, founder of Fortify Rights, a human rights watchdog. “Aung San Suu Kyi did not defend the military in court to maintain the balance of power. She defended the military as well as her own role in the atrocities. She was part of the problem. “

Even when Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi apologized to the military for decades of persecution, her relationship with General Min Aung Hlaing was frayed, according to her advisors and retired military officials. Her increasing popularity with Myanmar’s Buddhist majority has been increasingly viewed as a threat by the generals, and she has not spoken to the army chief in at least a year – a dangerous silence in a country where politics is deeply personal.

The normal precedent was that General Min Aung Hlaing, whose family and acolytes benefited from his decade in power, should relinquish his position as army chief in 2016. He extended his term and vowed to retire for good this summer.

Due to the poor communication between the commander in chief and Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, it became increasingly difficult for him to secure an outcome in which his patronage network would survive, military and political analysts said. General Min Aung Hlaing announced through his proxy that he may also have political ambitions. Some even announced his name as president, a position Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is constitutionally prohibited from holding.

After the coup on Monday, the army chief will have ultimate authority in his hands for at least a year after the coup on Monday. You have put yourself back into full relevance, no matter how many voters chose Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi. By Monday evening, the army had announced the outline of a new cabinet staffed with active and retired military officers.

The brazen return of the military is a reminder that despite all of the abuses Myanmar’s general coupling committed during its decades-long takeover – systematic repression of ethnic minorities, massacres of pro-democracy demonstrators, dismantling of a once promising economy – not a single high-ranking military officer came before Court fully accountable.

Barbara Woodward, the United Nations Ambassador to Britain, who holds the presidency of the Security Council in February, said the council would meet on Tuesday on the crisis in Myanmar. “We want to have as constructive a discussion as possible and examine a number of measures,” she said, and she would not rule out possible sanctions against the putschists.

“We want to respect the democratic will of the people again,” the ambassador told reporters.

In Washington, Mr Biden’s testimony clearly indicated that the US government would also consider reimposing sanctions if the coup was not reversed. The United States had “lifted sanctions against Burma over the past decade as a result of progress made towards democracy.”

However, some officials, who spoke in the background because they were not authorized to speak to the press, noted that the effects of Western sanctions could be cushioned by China, even if they were restored. Chinese telecom giant Huawei is building Myanmar’s 5G telecom networks over US objections, and China has dominated dam, pipeline and energy project construction.

On Monday, as dusk fell on a nation still in shock from the military takeover, the old fears and survival tactics resurfaced, untrained but still in muscle memory. Individuals took their flags from the National League for Democracy. You spoke in code.

Amid the coronavirus pandemic, the Minister of Health, appointed by the National League for Democracy, submitted his resignation “according to the evolving situation”. In the evening, the military began rounding up the National League for Democracy legislators from their homes in the capital, Naypyidaw.

“We are concerned that the military will cast a wider web of their arrests,” said Smith of Fortify Rights. “I’m afraid we’re only just seeing the first stage.”

Late on Monday afternoon, U Ko Ko Gyi, a former student democracy activist who had spent more than 17 years in prison, posted on Facebook that he had so far evaded the magnet that had captured high-ranking politicians.

But he took a family photo as a precaution, he wrote. He said goodbye. His children didn’t know what was going on.

“I have to do what I have to do,” wrote Ko Ko Gyi. “Let’s face it tomorrow.”

David E. Sanger contributed to coverage from Washington.

Categories
Health

¿Qué vacuna debo ponerme? – The New York Instances

¿Qué vacuna debo ponerme? - The New York Times

At first glance, after a long wait for Johnson & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine test, the results reported on Friday, January 29th, may have been disappointing. Its effectiveness – the ability to prevent moderate and severe illness – was 72 percent in the US, 66 percent in Latin American countries, and 57 percent in South Africa.

These numbers are well below those of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, the first two emergency vaccines approved in the United States that were 94 to 95 percent effective.

Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert and now President Joe Biden’s chief medical officer on coronavirus pandemic-related issues, acknowledged the remarkable difference at a news conference on Friday, January 29.

“If you woke up and said, ‘Well, if I go to the left door I get 94 or 95 percent, if I go to the right door I get 72 percent.’ Which door would you choose? ”He asked.

However, Fauci assured that the most important indicator is the ability to prevent serious illness, which means people will not be hospitalized and deaths will be avoided. In that regard, Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine reported 85 percent in all countries it was tested in, including South Africa, where a rapidly spreading variant of the virus has shown some ability to escape vaccines.

More important than preventing “some aches and pains,” Fauci explained, is defending against serious illness, especially among people with underlying illnesses and older adults who are more likely to become seriously ill and die of COVID-19.

“If you can prevent serious illness in a high percentage of people, it will greatly alleviate the stress of human suffering and death from this pandemic that we are witnessing right now,” Fauci added. “As we all know, our healthcare system has been impacted by the number of people hospitalized and critical care over the past few weeks.”

Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, compared the ability to prevent serious illness to the effects of flu vaccines, which do not always prevent influenza completely but make it less severe.

“The same thing seems to be happening here, in a situation where this variant of the virus is clearly making it a little harder to get the strongest response you want,” Collins said. “But still he looks great with a serious illness.”

Moderna’s vaccine was also shown to be 100 percent effective against severe cases of the disease. Pfizer-BioNTech also reported similar numbers, but the total number of serious cases in the study was too few to be conclusive.

However, the researchers caution that trying to compare effectiveness between new and previous studies can be misleading because the virus is evolving quickly and tests have looked to some extent on different pathogens.

“You have to recognize that Pfizer and Moderna have an advantage,” said William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University, in an interview. “They did their clinical studies before the strain variants became very obvious. Johnson & Johnson not only tested their vaccine against the standard strain, but they also had the variants. “

The best way to stop mutations from spreading and prevent new ones from emerging is to vaccinate as many people as possible as soon as possible, explain Fauci and other researchers. Viruses cannot mutate if they do not replicate, and they cannot replicate if they cannot enter cells. Keeping them in check with immunization can stop the process.

In addition to the Pfizer BioNTech and Moderna vaccines already used in the US, three more will be available shortly: those manufactured by Novavax, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca. The use of the AstraZeneca vaccine has already been approved in the UK and other countries.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is expected to play an important role worldwide, but especially in low and middle income countries, as it works in one dose, is more or less cheap, and is easier to store and distribute than that Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines because they don’t share their strict freezing and refrigeration requirements.

People waiting to be vaccinated may wonder if there is a choice between vaccines and if they should hold out and wait until the one that best suits them becomes available.

Paul Offit, a vaccines expert at Philadelphia Children’s Hospital, told CNN that if Pfizer BioNtech and Moderna vaccines were adequately supplied, they would be his first choice because of their overall greater effectiveness.

But right now there aren’t enough of these vaccines.

If you can’t get the Pfizer BioNTech or Moderna vaccine, you would choose the Johnson & Johnson injection, Offit said, as long as the data the company presents to the Food and Drug Administration is as good as Friday’s .

Offit said Johnson & Johnson’s report on reducing major illnesses was a huge benefit.

“This is what you are looking for,” added Offit. “You want to be away from the hospital, away from the morgue.”

The doctor noted that the company was also investigating a two-shot regimen that could make the vaccine more effective.

People who choose the Johnson & Johnson vaccine should be able to safely get a Pfizer BioNTech or Moderna vaccine later if a booster shot is needed, he added.

However, Schaffner warned that there is no data on the effects of receiving different types of vaccines. “We didn’t study that,” he said.

Schaffner said he had just attended a meeting with other public health experts and they had asked each other what they would say to their spouses or partners if they could get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine tomorrow or had to wait three weeks for Pfizer -BioNTech or Moderna.

“We all said, ‘Get it tomorrow,'” said Schaffner. “The virus is bad. You risk another three weeks of exposure instead of receiving protection tomorrow. “

He said Johnson & Johnson’s 85 percent effectiveness against the severe version of the disease was slightly less than that reported by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, “but still quite high”.

Denise Grady has been a science reporter for The Times since 1998. She wrote Deadly Invaders, a book about emerging viruses. @nytDeniseGrady

Categories
Business

Physician predicts one other Covid surge amid presence of latest variants

Doctor predicts another Covid surge amid presence of new variants

Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, medical director of the Special Pathogens Unit at Boston Medical Center, told CNBC’s “The News with Shepard Smith” that she expects Covid infections to rise further as the new variants of the virus emerge in the US

“If I run into someone who has any of these variants, the more likely I will get the infection from them, and then again, much more likely that I will transmit it, which means we may have a lot.” more infections, “said Bhadelia during an interview on Monday evening.” And so you could see more infections in February, which then lead to more hospitalizations and deaths in March. “

The director of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Monday that the dangerous new variants of Covid “remain a major problem” even though cases are falling across the country. At least 32 states have reported cases of new strains of Covid discovered in the UK, Brazil and South Africa, according to the CDC. Health officials in Maryland reported the first case of the South African variant by the state over the weekend, making it the third known case of the strain in the United States

Dr. Anthony Fauci said Monday that vaccines are the best way to tackle the variants.

“Viruses can’t mutate if they can’t duplicate,” said Fauci.

Bhadelia, a medical worker for NBC News, said that while the vaccines are less effective than the new variants, they can protect people from more severe cases of the virus and overwhelming health systems.

“After 49 days, Johnson & Johnson still has 100% protection, 100% protection from major illness and hospitalization,” said Bhadelia. “Any vaccine that turns a disease from fatal to mild will keep people out of hospitals.”

The US vaccination efforts are slowly picking up speed, according to the CDC. In the past seven days, the number of people fully vaccinated in the US has increased 79%, and as of January 31, approximately 1.8% of all Americans were vaccinated.

In addition to vaccinations, the Biden government is working to make home testing more widely available to help slow the spread of Covid. Andy Slavitt, Senior Advisor to the White House’s Covid-19 Response Team, announced Monday that the country’s first over-the-counter Covid test at home will be available soon. “The test is conducted by a company called Ellume and is on a test platform developed as part of the NIH RADx initiative,” he said.

Bhadelia told host Shepard Smith that readily available rapid tests could have a significant impact in fighting the virus.

“People can be clear about whether or not they will get infected, and they could stay home, hopefully not travel, and all of these are ways we could prevent one person from transmitting to another,” Bhadelia said . “I think it will make a difference.”

Categories
Politics

Senators say they’ll push pot invoice in 2021

Senators say they will push pot bill in 2021

An employee holds up a jar of marijuana for sale after it became legal in the state to sell recreational marijuana to customers over the age of 21 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Illinois will begin legal marijuana sales on January 1, 2020.

Matthew Hatcher | Reuters

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and two other Democratic Senators said Monday they will be pushing for sweeping law passed this year that would end the federal marijuana ban, legalized to some extent by many states.

This reform would also provide so-called restorative justice to people convicted of pot-related crimes, the senators said in a joint statement.

“The war on drugs was a war against people – especially people with skin color,” said a statement by Schumer of New York and Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Ron Wyden of Oregon.

“Ending the federal marijuana ban is necessary to eradicate the wrongs of this failed war and end decades of damage that has been done to color communities across the country,” they said.

“But that alone is not enough. As states continue to legalize marijuana, we must also take action to raise people who were wrongly targeted in the war on drugs.”

The senators said they would release “a single draft discussion on major reforms” earlier this year and that passing the law will be a priority for the Senate.

The trio also said the legislation would not only end the federal pot ban and ensure restorative justice, it would “protect public health and introduce responsible taxes and regulations”.

A few years ago Schumer supported the legislation to decriminalize marijuana.

The statement comes as public support for legal marijuana has grown. A Gallup poll in November found that 68% of Americans, a record high, are in favor of legalizing marijuana.

Any initiative that included decriminalizing or legalizing marijuana on the ballot in 2020 has been passed.

Voters in New Jersey and Arizona decided to legalize marijuana for adult recreational use. Mississippi voted to legalize medical marijuana use, and South Dakota legalized the drug for both recreational and medical use.

To date, 15 states and the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana for recreational adult use, and 36 states allow the drug to be used medicinally.

Oregon is the first country to decriminalize hard drugs.

Categories
Business

How Wealthy Hospitals Revenue From Sufferers in Automobile Crashes

How Rich Hospitals Profit From Patients in Car Crashes

As part of the check-in process, an Oklahoma Catholic hospital is offering some accident victims a waiver of signing that they do not want their health plan to be billed for care. One patient received the waiver shortly after a car accident in which her head hit the windshield. She said she had no reminder of signing the document but had a pledge of $ 34,106.

“The way they turn it, you don’t want to get your health insurance because someone else caused it,” said Loren Toombs, an Oklahoma trial attorney who represented the patient. “It’s clearly a business tactic and a major problem, but it’s not always illegal.”

Hospitals have been scrutinized in recent years as they increasingly turned to the courts to get back patient bills even amid the coronavirus pandemic. Hospitals, many of which have received substantial bailouts over the past year, have used these court rulings to garnish patients’ wages and move into their homes.

However, less attention was paid to hospital lien laws, which many states passed early in the 20th century when less than 10 percent of Americans had health insurance. Laws should protect hospitals from the burden of caring for uninsured patients and give them an incentive to treat those who could not prepay.

A century later, hospital liens are most commonly used to track debts of victims of car accidents. The practice can be as lucrative as documents and interviews show that some hospitals use outside debt collection companies to search police records for recent accidents to make sure they determine which of their patients may have been in a wreck to pursue can mortgage liens.

Some laws limit the amount of a patient’s agreement that a hospital can claim, and others only allow nonprofit hospitals to collect debts in this way. Certain states require hospitals to bill accident victims for health plans instead of using a lien. This approach is seen as more consumer friendly as patients benefit from the discounts health plans negotiated on their behalf.

“If there is a patient who has viable coverage from multiple sources, it would be a reasonable position to require payment from anyone who will pay more,” said Joe Fifer, executive director of the Healthcare Financial Management Association, a trading group of Hospitals tax officials.

Categories
Entertainment

Watch Sabrina Carpenter’s “Pores and skin” Music Video

Watch Sabrina Carpenter's "Skin" Music Video

Sabrina Carpenter had a headache when she dropped her new single “Skin” last month, and now we finally have the music video to go with it. On Monday, the 21-year-old dropped the expected video, which contains nothing but Chilling adventures from Sabrina Star Gavin Leatherwood as her love interest. (We don’t lose the irony that Gavin starred opposite another Sabrina.) If you thought the lyrics to the track were steamy, just wait until you see Carpenter and Leatherwood on-screen together. While Carpenter is singing at her window, we see different shots of her and Leatherwood kissing in the rain, sharing a sweet moment in the living room and cuddling on a snow-covered bed. It’s basically a mini rom-com!

While there has been a lot of talk about the inspiration behind the track, the singer previously teased that it wasn’t a specific person but a handful of experiences she’s had over the past few years. “I’ve been at a turning point in my life for a myriad of reasons. That’s why I was inspired to do what I normally do to cope with it and write something I wish I had in the past can say, “she wrote on Instagram. “People can only reach you if you give them the power to do so.” Check out her new music video above!

Categories
Health

Biden official says docs holding again wanted doses as reserve

Biden official says doctors holding back needed doses as reserve

Close-up of the Moderna vaccine at the Park County’s Department of Health’s COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic for Seniors 80+ on January 28, 2021 in Livingston, Montana.

William Campbell | Getty Images

Some health care providers have regularly withheld doses of vaccine for Covid-19 to ensure supplies are in place when people come back to get their second shots, an official on President Joe Biden’s coronavirus response team said Monday.

Andy Slavitt, a senior advisor to Biden’s Covid Response Team who previously served in the Obama administration, said health care providers shouldn’t withhold vaccine doses. He said the practice is actually causing some vendors to cancel appointments and preventing some Americans from getting their first shots.

“We want to make it clear that we understand why health care providers did this, but that it doesn’t have to and shouldn’t,” he told reporters during a coronavirus briefing, adding that US officials are aware of supplies of Covid vaccines to states were often unpredictable during the early rollout in late December.

“We fully understand that this is a direct result of the unpredictability that many states and suppliers have had about the number of doses they would receive,” he said. “That’s one reason we announced last week that the federal government would provide a continuous three-week window for the vaccines to be shipped.”

“With this move, states and vaccine providers will use their allocation of the first doses faster to vaccinate as many people as quickly and equitably as possible because they now have the predictability,” he said, that the second shots will be on time.

Biden is trying to accelerate the pace of vaccination in the US after a slower-than-expected rollout under the administration of former President Donald Trump. The Biden government has advised states and health care providers that they no longer need to withhold the two-dose doses reserved for the second round of Pfizer and Moderna vaccinations.

Still, some states have raised concerns that the federal government will be able to maintain an adequate dose supply for the second round of firing. Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two vaccinations three to four weeks apart, and the states vaccinate approximately 1 million people daily.

The U.S. has distributed nearly 50 million doses of vaccine, but only about 31.1 million had been administered as of 6 a.m. ET Sunday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As of Monday, states had 62% of their vaccine inventories managed, but officials expect that number will improve, Slavitt said.

U.S. officials also hope vaccine supplies will increase after Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine was approved by the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use. The FDA could give the OK this month.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced in August that it had signed a contract with Janssen, J & J’s pharmaceutical subsidiary, worth approximately $ 1 billion for 100 million doses of its vaccine. The deal gives the federal government the opportunity to order another 200 million cans, according to the announcement.

Unlike Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccines, J & J’s vaccine only requires one dose, which makes logistics easier for healthcare providers.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, said Monday that making sure people who get their first dose can get their second remains a top priority for officials. CDC director Rochelle Walensky said the agency is still recommending people get their second recordings on time.

On Sunday, an epidemiologist advising Biden’s transition to the Covid-19 crisis warned of an impending wave of infections and said the US should adjust its vaccination strategy to save lives.

Dr. Michael Osterholm told NBC’s Meet the Press that the government should try to give as many first vaccine doses as possible, especially for those over 65, before there is a potential increase in cases involving mutations overseas.

Categories
Business

Main snowstorm slams Northeast, spurring shutdowns and blackouts

Major snowstorm slams Northeast, spurring shutdowns and blackouts

The first major snow storm in 2021 is underway. New Jersey blackouts, a state of emergency declared in 44 New York counties, and the largest recorded snowfall at Chicago O’Hare Airport since 2015.

Around 1,500 customers in New Jersey were without power by Monday noon, Governor Phil Murphy said on Twitter. The worst storm was still not felt. Forecasters expect a few more inches of snow in southern New Jersey and at least one more meter of snow in the north of the state.

In New York State, snow is expected to fall at a rate of about two inches per hour this afternoon. Areas in the New York City, Long Island, and Mid-Hudson regions could see up to 2 feet of snow by Tuesday morning.

Major airlines have ceased operations to most NYC airports, and American Airlines has ceased operations in several affected states, with return flights restricted on Tuesday.

According to the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency, expect 2 to 3 inches an hour on Monday afternoons in Pennsylvania.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Monday the Biden administration has contacted FEMA and is monitoring the storm.

A worker shovels snow in New York City

A worker clears snow from a sidewalk in New York on Monday, February 1, 2021.

Jeenah Moon | Bloomberg | Getty Images

A resident crosses the street as snow piles up in Manhattan

People walk through the snow in Manhattan on February 1, 2021 in New York City.

Spencer Platt | Getty Images

Harlem residents fight their way through the snow in New York

During a winter storm in New York on February 1, 2021, people struggle through heavily falling snow in the Harlem part of Manhattan.

Facebook Facebook Logo Log in to Facebook to connect with Mike Segar Reuters

Residents enjoy a snowball fight in Washington, DC

People take part in a snowball fight while the National Mall is covered in snow on Sunday, January 31, 2021 in Washington, DC.

Kent Nishimura | Los Angeles Times | Getty Images

A snowman appears near the US Capitol

A snowman can be seen in the National Mall near the U.S. Capitol in Washington, the United States, on Jan. 31, 2021.

Cheriss May | Reuters

A snowman with a traffic cone near the Washington Monument

People play in the snow on the National Mall near the Washington Monument in Washington DC, Jan. 31, 2021.

Liu Jie | Xinhua News Agency | Getty Images

A bike ride with no traffic in Times Square

A person cycles through Times Square during a snow storm amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in New York on February 1, 2021.

Carlo Allegri | Reuters

A New Yorker strolls through snow-covered Times Square

A person crosses a street during a snow storm amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic in the Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, New York, the United States, on February 1, 2021.

Carlo Allegri | Reuters

A snowball fight in front of the New York Stock Exchange

People have a snowball fight outside of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) during a snow storm in New York on February 1, 2021.

Brendan McDermid | Reuters

The snow-covered Charging Bull on Wall Street

The Wall Street Bull can be seen in New York City during the Pass of the Snowstorm on January 31, 2021.

Eduardo MunozAlvarez | VIEW press | Corbis News | Getty Images

A pedestrian walks through the snow in New York City

A person walks in New York City during a snow storm amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic on February 1, 2021.

Brendan McDermid | Reuters

Outdoor seating in Manhattan is covered in snow

An outdoor dining area is seen in the Greenwich Village neighborhood during a snow storm amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in the Manhattan neighborhood of New York on February 1, 2021.

Andrew Kelly | Reuters

A truck spreads salt on the streets of Times Square

A truck spreads salt when snow falls in Times Square during a winter storm on January 31, 2021.

I have Betancur | AFP | Getty Images

Categories
World News

World Covid-19 Reside Updates: Information on Vaccine, Variants, Stimulus and Circumstances

Emma Fields receiving a Covid-19 vaccination in Mound Bayou, Miss., on Saturday.

Here’s what you need to know:

Credit…Rory Doyle for The New York Times

Vaccinations in the United States are slowly picking up speed as the Biden administration pushes to accelerate inoculations and blunt the spread of more contagious virus variants.

The United States has administered about 30 million doses, and, as of Sunday, is averaging more than 1.3 million doses administered over the past seven days, compared with an average of less than one million per day two weeks earlier, according to a New York Times vaccine tracker.

President Biden, under pressure to speed up coronavirus vaccinations, has recently suggested the nation could soon reach an average of 1.5 million shots a day.

But just as there are signs of progress, another problem has taken root: the spread of the variants, which scientists warn must be contained before they become dominant. Several hundred cases of the more contagious variant discovered in Britain, which experts have said could be the dominant form in the United States by March, have already been confirmed.

The country has also recorded its first two cases of the variant spreading rapidly in South Africa, which has proved to reduce the effectiveness of vaccines.

“If we didn’t have these variants looming,” we would be in a good place, said Dr. Peter Hotez, a vaccine scientist and pediatrician at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. If those variants take over by spring, “as many of us are predicting,” he said, “it changes everything. Now, we really have to vaccinate the American population by late spring, early summer.”

Two key challenges in the weeks ahead are “increasing the supply of vaccines” and “speeding up the time it takes to administer them,” Andy Slavitt, a White House adviser, said in a news briefing on Friday. Many experts have pushed for bringing other vaccine options out and releasing the first doses more widely.

The most effective state programs, said Dr. Ashish Jha, the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, are “very simple, age-based, not a lot of complex rules. They focus on getting the vaccines out.”

Here is a snapshot of how five of the best-performing states are doing:

  • West Virginia has given at least one dose to 10.7 percent of its population, second only to Alaska, and leads the nation in the percentage of its population that has received two doses (3.7 percent). Early on, the state got a head start because it opted out of a federal program to vaccinate people in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities. While other states chose the federal plan, which teamed with Walgreens and CVS, officials decided the idea made little sense in West Virginia, where many communities are miles from the nearest chain store, and about half of pharmacies are independently owned. Instead the state created a network of pharmacies, pairing them with about 200 long-term care facilities.

  • According to health officials in Alaska, there are several reasons behind the state’s relatively high vaccination rate, The Anchorage Daily News has reported. Those factors include: the state’s having received a high number of doses through the Indian Health Service; the decision to receive doses monthly, versus weekly, as most states do; and declining virus caseloads, which has allowed health care workers to focus on inoculations. The state has vaccinated 13 percent of its population, according to a Times database.

  • North Dakota has used 91 percent of the vaccines distributed to the state, according to the Times vaccine tracker. It is the only state above 90 percent; more populous states like California (58 percent) and New York (64 percent) have used less, proportionally. North Dakota was among the first states to lower the minimum age eligible for vaccination, from 75 to 65.

  • In a recent interview with the American Medical Association, health officials in New Mexico attributed part of the state’s success to its “data-oriented and science-oriented” governor, Michelle Lujan Grisham, and to an app that allowed easy registration and close coordination among hospitals and providers. The state has given 9.8 percent of residents at least one shot, and has used 83 percent of its doses.

  • Connecticut got mass vaccination sites up and running early, and uses an inventory system that allocates unused doses to places that need them. But older residents have complained about long waits.

United States › United StatesOn Jan. 31 14-day change
New cases 111,478 –32%
New deaths 1,875 –5%
World › WorldOn Jan. 31 14-day change
New cases 389,735 –21%
New deaths 8,093 +2%

U.S. vaccinations ›

Where states are reporting vaccines given

A shopping mall in Cergy-Pontoise, near Paris, on Sunday. France is still under a 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew, and places like cafes, museums and theaters are closed.Credit…Andrea Mantovani for The New York Times

PARIS — Public frustration with lockdowns is palpable across Europe, with pensioners protesting this weekend in Vienna, restaurateurs taking to the streets in Budapest and demonstrators clashing with the police in Belgium, prompting dozens of arrests. The Dutch authorities fined more than 10,000 people last week for violating the national curfew.

While none of the protests resulted in the kind of violence seen in the Netherlands in recent weeks, they reflect a growing impatience as political leaders extend restrictions to guard against a resurgence of the virus fueled by new variants.

In France, President Emmanuel Macron has resisted a full lockdown, making a calculated gamble that his government can tighten the rules just enough to avoid a new wave of infections.

Prime Minister Jean Castex appeared in front of television cameras for an unexpected statement on Friday night, announcing a handful of new curbs, including strict border closures.

“Even if the path is very narrow, we must take it,” Mr. Macron was reported to have said at a cabinet meeting last week, according to the Journal du Dimanche, pushing back against the advice of several senior aides. According to the newspaper, he added: “When you are French, you have all you need to get by, as long as you dare to try.”

Polls in France have shown weariness with restrictions, and grumbling about the rules is growing in some quarters.

France is still under a 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew, and places like cafes, museums and theaters are closed. Schools and shops are open.

After a widely publicized breach of the rules at a restaurant in the southern city of Nice last week and a call to “civil disobedience” by some restaurant owners, the French economy minister, Bruno Le Maire, warned on Monday that any establishments that flouted the rules would be cut off from coronavirus aid.

In the French Alps, protesters blocked roads on Monday to demand that ski lifts reopen.

Critics say that Mr. Macron’s approach may simply be delaying the inevitable and that he could be forced to change course if cases started to surge.

“It’s a risk, I’m hoping it was a calculated risk,” Karine Lacombe, an infectious-disease specialist, told the French news channel LCI on Sunday.

Mr. Macron’s plan is rooted partly in the relative stability of the pandemic in France. The number of new daily cases has inched up only slowly and while hospitalizations remain high, there has been no sudden surge. More contagious variants of the virus have been registered in the country, but the authorities say they believe that their spread, so far, is under control.

“Everything suggests that a new wave could occur because of the variant,” Olivier Véran, the French health minister, told the Journal du Dimanche. “But perhaps we can avoid it thanks to the measures that we decided early and that the French people are respecting.”

Aurelien Breeden reported from Paris, and Marc Santora from London.

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N.Y.C. Snowstorm Delays Vaccinations

On Monday, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York postponed coronavirus vaccinations to prevent older residents from traveling to appointments in blizzard-like conditions.

The storm is disrupting our vaccination effort, and we need to keep people safe. We don’t want folks, especially seniors, going out in unsafe conditions to get vaccinated. We know we can reschedule appointments very quickly because, of course, we have supply. We’re going to use the supply we have. Our problem is lack of supply. So we can take the supply we have and distribute it very quickly in the days to come, and make sure everyone gets the appointments. But it’s not safe out there today. So vaccinations are canceled today. They’re also going to be canceled tomorrow. Based on what we are seeing right now, we believe that tomorrow, getting around the city will be difficult, it’ll be icy, it’ll be treacherous. We do not want seniors, especially, out in those conditions. So we’re going to have vaccinations off for today and tomorrow, come back strong on Wednesday. We’ll be able to catch up quickly because, again, we have a vast amount of capacity. We don’t have enough vaccine. So we’ll simply use the days later in the week. Crank up those schedules, get people rescheduled into those days.

Video player loadingOn Monday, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York postponed coronavirus vaccinations to prevent older residents from traveling to appointments in blizzard-like conditions.CreditCredit…James Estrin/The New York Times

Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York said on Monday that coronavirus vaccinations scheduled for Tuesday would be postponed because of the winter storm, the second day in a row that they have been delayed.

Heavy snow was also complicating vaccination efforts in Washington, Philadelphia, New Jersey and elsewhere.

At a news conference on Monday, Mr. de Blasio of New York City said he did not want older residents traveling to vaccine appointments amid blizzard-like conditions with gusty winds.

“Based on what we are seeing right now, we believe tomorrow, getting around the city will be difficult,” Mr. de Blasio said. “It will be icy, it will be treacherous.”

He said he believed the city could quickly make up the appointments later in the week.

“We have a vast amount of capacity; we don’t have enough vaccine,” he said. “We’ll simply use the days later in the week, crank up those schedules, get people rescheduled into those days.”

The storm will temporarily derail a vaccine rollout that has been plagued by inadequate supply, buggy sign-up systems and confusion over the New York State’s strict eligibility guidelines. The vaccine is available to residents 65 and older as well as a wide range of workers designated “essential.”

About 800,000 doses have been administered so far in the city, Mr. de Blasio said.

Vaccine appointments originally scheduled for Monday at several sites in the region — the Javits Center in Manhattan, the Aqueduct Racetrack in Queens, a drive-through site at Jones Beach in Long Island, SUNY Stony Brook and the Westchester County Center — would be rescheduled for this week, according to a statement from Melissa DeRosa, a top aide to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. “We ask all New Yorkers to monitor the weather and stay off the roads tomorrow so our crews and first responders can safely do their jobs,” she said.

Mr. Cuomo said at a news conference on Monday that New York’s seven-day average positive test rate was 4.8 percent, the 24th straight day it had declined.

Mr. Cuomo added that the state had administered about 1.96 million doses of the vaccine.

In the Philadelphia area, city-run testing and vaccine sites were closed on Monday. Connecticut, New Jersey, Rhode Island and parts of the Washington, D.C., area were following suit. Some areas away from the center of the storm were expected to remain open for vaccinations, including parts of Massachusetts and upstate New York.

A medical technician at a coronavirus testing site in Austin, Texas, last month.Credit…Tamir Kalifa for The New York Times

The past few weeks in the United States have been the deadliest of the coronavirus pandemic, and residents in a majority of counties remain at an extremely high risk of contracting the virus. At the same time, transmission seems to be slowing throughout the country, with the number of new average cases 40 percent lower on Jan. 29 than at the U.S. peak three weeks earlier.

Other indicators reinforce the current downward trend in cases. Hospitalizations are down significantly from record highs in early January. The number of tests per day has also decreased, which can obscure the virus’s true toll, but the positivity rate of those tests has also gone down, indicating that the slowed spread is real.

Still, the average reported daily death rate over the past seven days remains above 3,000, compared with less than 1,000 per day in September and October.

Experts say the decrease could mark a turning point in the outbreak after months of ever-higher caseloads. But new, more contagious variants threaten to upend progress and could even send case rates to a new high if they take hold, especially if the national vaccine rollout faces hurdles.

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Biden to Discuss Pandemic Relief Package With Republicans

President Biden will meet with 10 Republican senators on Monday who have proposed a much smaller Covid-19 relief package. Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters that the Mr. Biden’s biggest concern is releasing a package that is too small.

The president has been clear since long before he came into office that he’s open to engaging with both Democrats and Republicans in Congress about their ideas. And this is an example of doing exactly that. So as we said in our statement last night, it’s an exchange of ideas, an opportunity to do that. This group obviously sent a letter with some outline, some top lines of their concerns and their priorities, and he’s happy to have a conversation with them. What this meeting is not, is a forum for the president to make or accept an offer. His view — it remains — what was stated in the statement last night, but also what he said on Friday, which is that the risk is not that it is too big, this package, the risk is that it is too small. And that remains his view, and it’s one he’ll certainly express today. But it’s important to him that he hears this group out on their concerns, on their ideas. He’s always open to making this package stronger. And he also, as was noted in our statement last night, remains in close touch with Speaker Pelosi with Leader Schumer, and he will continue that engagement throughout the day, and in the days ahead.

Video player loadingPresident Biden will meet with 10 Republican senators on Monday who have proposed a much smaller Covid-19 relief package. Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters that the Mr. Biden’s biggest concern is releasing a package that is too small.CreditCredit…Doug Mills/The New York Times

White House officials offered a pointed, if polite, warning to 10 Senate Republicans planning to pitch a scaled-back coronavirus relief package to President Biden at the White House on Monday evening: Think bigger.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, played down expectations of the meeting, a critical first test of Mr. Biden’s dueling commitments to bipartisanship and speeding pandemic aid, saying no deal would be done without further negotiations — a statement aimed at reassuring Democrats leery of a fast, weak deal.

“What this meeting is not is a forum for the president to make or accept an offer,” Ms. Psaki told reporters on Monday afternoon, repeating the president’s determination to push through a $1.9 trillion stimulus bill.

“The risk is not that it is too big, this package,” Ms. Psaki added. “The risk is that it is too small. That remains his view.”

A coalition of center-right Republican senators, led by Susan Collins of Maine, on Monday outlined a more limited $618 billion stimulus plan, which they are billing as a way for Mr. Biden to pass a pandemic aid bill with bipartisan support and make good on his inauguration pledge to unite the country.

With 10 Republicans on board, joining the Senate’s 50 Democrats, a bipartisan bill could overcome the chamber’s 60-vote filibuster rule. But Democrats have shown little enthusiasm for a measure that amounts to less than one third of what the president says is needed.

Still, after receiving a letter from the senators on Sunday requesting a meeting, Mr. Biden called Ms. Collins and invited her and the other signers to the White House. He also spoke with Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader.

The Republican proposal is likely to be met with resistance from congressional Democrats, who are preparing this week to begin laying the groundwork for passing Mr. Biden’s plan through a process known as budget reconciliation, which would allow it to bypass a filibuster and pass solely with Democratic votes.

The proposal would include $160 billion for vaccine distribution and development, coronavirus testing and the production of personal protective equipment; $20 billion toward helping schools reopen; more relief for small businesses; and additional aid to individuals. The package would also extend enhanced unemployment benefits of $300 a week — currently slated to lapse in March — until June 30.

“We recognize your calls for unity and want to work in good faith with your administration,” wrote the Republican group, which includes Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and Mitt Romney of Utah.

The measure omits a federal minimum wage increase that Mr. Biden included in his plan. It would also whittle down his proposal to send $1,400 checks to many Americans, and limit it to lower-income earners.

The proposal calls for checks of up to $1,000 for individuals making $50,000 a year or less and families with a combined income of up to $100,000, with individuals earning less than $40,000 — and families earning less than $80,000 — receiving the full amount.

Previous rounds of direct payments were targeted to Americans earning less than $99,000 annually, with those earning less than $75,000 receiving the full amount.

Congress approved more than $4 trillion through a series of bills last year to address the coronavirus crisis and its economic fallout. Most recently, in December, lawmakers passed a $900 billion stimulus plan that included $600 direct checks to many Americans.

Mr. Biden received an important boost on Monday ahead of his meeting with the senators: Gov. Jim Justice of West Virginia, a close ally of former President Trump, said he supported a bigger relief package than the one that the center-right Republicans are proposing.

“If we actually throw away some money right now, so what?” said Mr. Justice, a former Democrat who switched parties to support Mr. Trump in 2017, told CNN.

A shuttered business in Los Angeles. It may take years to return to the pre-pandemic levels of employment.Credit…Kendrick Brinson for The New York Times

The American economy will return to its pre-pandemic size by the middle of this year, even if Congress does not approve any more federal aid for the recovery, but it will be years before everyone thrown off the job by the pandemic is able to return to work, the Congressional Budget Office projected on Monday.

The new projections from the office, which is nonpartisan and issues regular budgetary and economic forecasts, are an improvement from the office’s forecasts last summer. Officials told reporters on Monday that the brightening outlook was a result of large sectors of the economy adapting better and more rapidly to the pandemic than originally expected.

They also reflect increased growth from a $900 billion economic aid package that Congress passed in December, which included $600 direct checks to individuals and more generous unemployment benefits.

The budget office now expects the unemployment rate to fall to 5.3 percent at the end of the year, down from an 8.4 percent projection last July. The economy is expected to grow 3.7 percent for the year, after recording a much smaller contraction in 2020 than the budget office initially expected.

The rosier projections are likely to inject even more debate into the discussions over whether to pass President Biden’s $1.9 trillion economic rescue package. It could embolden Republicans who have pushed Mr. Biden to scale back the plan significantly, saying the economy does not need so much additional federal support and that another big package could “overheat” the economy.

But the report shows little risk of that happening. The economy is projected to remain below potential levels until 2025 on its current path. And big economic risks remain. The number of employed Americans will not return to its pre-pandemic levels until 2024, officials predicted, reflecting the prolonged difficulties of shaking off the virus and returning to full levels of economic activity.

The Federal Reserve chair, Jerome H. Powell, warned last week that the economy was “a long way from a full recovery” with millions still out of work and many small businesses facing pressure.

Budget officials said the rebound in growth and employment could be significantly accelerated if public health authorities were able to more rapidly deploy coronavirus vaccines across the population.

As it stands, the budget office sees little evidence of growth running hot enough in the years to come to spur a rapid increase in inflation. It forecast inflation levels below the Federal Reserve’s target of 2 percent for years to come, even with the Fed holding interest rates near zero.

Other independent forecasts, including one from the Brookings Institution last week, have projected that another dose of economic aid — like the $1.9 trillion package Mr. Biden has proposed — would help the economy grow more rapidly, topping its pre-pandemic path by year’s end.

Dr. Ricardo Cigarroa hugging a patient at the Laredo Medical Center in Laredo, Texas.Credit…Verónica G. Cárdenas for The New York Times

During January, the pandemic’s deadliest month, Laredo, Texas, held the bleak distinction of having one of the most severe outbreaks of any city in the United States. The death toll in the overwhelmingly Latino city of 277,000 now stands at more than 630 — including at least 126 in January alone.

When the virus made its way to the borderlands almost a year ago, Dr. Ricardo Cigarroa could have just hunkered down. He could have focused on his profitable cardiology practice, which has 80 employees. He could have kept quiet.

Instead, Dr. Cigarroa has become a top crusader and the de facto authority on the pandemic along this stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border.

On regional television stations, he calmly explains, in both English and Spanish, how the virus is evolving. Known for making Covid-19 house calls around Laredo in his old Toyota Tacoma pickup, he is interviewed so often that Texas Monthly called him “The Dr. Fauci of South Texas,” comparing him to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious disease expert — though Dr. Cigarroa holds no official government portfolio.

Lately, Dr. Cigarroa has been losing his patience.

Looking exhausted in a video posted on Facebook, he blasted political leaders for allowing the virus to rampage through this part of South Texas. Dr. Cigarroa singled out Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, for refusing to allow Laredo to impose stricter mitigation measures.

“To the governor: It’s OK to swallow your pride,” Dr. Cigarroa said, stunning some viewers with a warning that the virus could kill 1 in 250 Laredoans by midyear. “It’s OK to say that you’re not going to do it, and then do it to save lives.”

Pleading with the people of Laredo to consider civil disobedience in the form of staying home from work if politicians fail to act, he added, “The only thing that will save lives at this point will be staying home and shutting down the city.”

Students waiting to be admitted at a public school in Brooklyn in December. In New York City, about 12,000 more white children have returned to classrooms than Black students.Credit…Victor J. Blue for The New York Times

Even as more districts reopen their buildings and President Biden joins the chorus of those saying schools can safely resume in-person education, hundreds of thousands of Black parents say they are not ready to send their children back. That reflects both the disproportionately harsh consequences the coronavirus has visited on nonwhite Americans and the profound lack of trust that Black families have in school districts, a longstanding phenomenon exacerbated by the pandemic.

It also points to a major dilemma: School closures have hit the mental health and academic achievement of nonwhite children the hardest, but many of the families that education leaders have said need in-person education the most are most wary of returning.

That is shifting the reopening debate in real time. In Chicago, only about a third of Black families have indicated they are willing to return to classrooms, compared with 67 percent of white families, and the city’s teachers’ union, which is hurtling toward a strike, has made the disparity a core part of its argument against in-person classes.

In New York City, about 12,000 more white children have returned to classrooms than Black students, though Black children make up a larger share of the overall district. In Oakland, Calif., just about a third of Black parents said they would consider in-person learning, compared with more than half of white families. And Black families in Washington, Nashville, Dallas and other districts also indicated they would keep their children learning at home at higher rates than white families.

Education experts and Black parents say decades of racism, institutionalized segregation and mistreatment of Black children have left Black communities to doubt that school districts are being upfront about the risks.

“For generations, these public schools have failed us and prepared us for prison, and now it’s like they’re preparing us to pass away,” said Sarah Carpenter, the executive director of Memphis Lift, a parent advocacy group in Tennessee. “We know that our kids have lost a lot, but we’d rather our kids to be out of school than dead.”

In many cities and districts, Latino and Asian-American families are also less likely than white families to send their children back. Asian-Americans have opted out of in-person classes at the highest rates of any ethnic group in New York City. Latino families in Chicago were most likely to say they would keep their children at home when schools reopened.

Still, the pattern is most consistent and pronounced with Black families, which have been particularly affected by decades of underinvestment. By one estimate, a $23 billion gap, or $2,226 per pupil, separates funding for predominantly white districts and nonwhite districts, and Jessica Calarco, a sociologist at Indiana University Bloomington who has studied reopening, said the pandemic had amplified that inequity.

“If you know your school doesn’t have hot running water, how would you feel about sending your child to that school knowing they can’t fully wash their hands before they eat lunch?” she asked.

GLOBAL ROUNDUP

Workers loading South Africa’s first coronavirus vaccine doses at OR Tambo airport in Johannesburg on Monday.Credit…Elmond Jiyane for GCIS, via Reuters

A million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine arrived in South Africa on Monday, paving the way for the country to begin vaccinating its population of nearly 60 million. Health care workers will be the first to be offered the shots, officials said.

The country has reported by far the most cases and deaths from the coronavirus on the African continent. It has participated in clinical trials of several vaccines.

The plane delivering the eagerly awaited doses from the Serum Institute of India, which produced them, was met at the airport by President Cyril Ramaphosa. The president has come under criticism over the country’s lagging start to widespread vaccination, with many countries in Asia and the West able to start immunizing their populations weeks before South Africa could secure a supply.

South Africa experienced a surge in new cases around the turn of the year, fueled by the more transmissible variant of the virus that was first detected in the country. But the surge has begun to ease in recent weeks. Information has not yet been released on the AstraZeneca vaccine’s effectiveness against the variant, which is now predominant in the country.

Over the course of the pandemic, South Africa has reported about 1.45 million cases, and has lately been averaging about 5,800 new cases a day, according to a New York Times database.

In other developments around the world:

  • Seeking a better understanding of the pandemic’s origins, a team of 15 World Health Organization experts is visiting some of the places first hit by the coronavirus in the Chinese city of Wuhan, including a live animal market, a hospital and a disease control center. The inquiry is expected to take months to complete. Scientists initially believed the outbreak began at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, but many experts now doubt that theory.

  • The European Union will get 75 million additional doses of vaccine in the next few months, the German pharmaceutical company BioNTech announced on Monday. The vaccine jointly developed by the company and Pfizer was the first to be authorized for use in the E.U., but supplies have been limited by production issues in the early going, and several countries, including Germany, are off to slower than expected starts in vaccinating their populations.

  • The police in China said they had broken up a criminal ring that manufactured and sold more than 3,000 fake coronavirus vaccine doses, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. More than 80 people were arrested, the agency said. According to Xinhua, the police said that since September, the main suspect had been selling vials of “vaccine” that was really just saline solution.

Congressman Adriano Espaillat of New York at the Capitol this month.Credit…J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press

The scattered reports from around the country can play like a cruel irony: Someone tests positive for the coronavirus even though they have already received one or both doses of a Covid-19 vaccine.

It’s happened to at least three members of Congress recently:

But it’s been reported in people in other walks of life too, including Rick Pitino, a Hall of Fame basketball coach, and a nurse in California.

Experts say cases like these are not surprising and do not indicate that there was something wrong with the vaccines or how they were administered. Here is why.

  • Vaccines don’t work instantly. It takes a few weeks for the body to build up immunity after receiving a dose. And the vaccines now in use in the U.S., from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, both require a second shot a few weeks after the first to reach full effectiveness.

  • Nor do they work retroactively. You can already be infected and not know it when you get the vaccine — even if you recently tested negative. That infection can continue to develop after you get the shot but before its protection fully takes hold, and then show up in a positive test result.

  • The vaccines prevent illness, but maybe not infection. Covid vaccines are being authorized based on how well they keep you from getting sick, needing hospitalization and dying. Scientists don’t know yet how effective the vaccines are at preventing the coronavirus from infecting you to begin with, or at keeping you from passing it on to others. (That’s why vaccinated people should keep wearing masks and maintaining social distance.)

  • Even the best vaccines aren’t perfect. The efficacy rates for Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are extremely high, but they are not 100 percent. With the virus still spreading out of control in the U.S., some of the millions of recently vaccinated people were bound to get infected in any case.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York has said that he believed he had no choice but to seize more control over pandemic policy from state and local public health officials.Credit…Pool photo by Mary Altaffer

The deputy commissioner for public health at the New York State Health Department resigned in late summer. Soon after, the director of its bureau of communicable disease control also stepped down. So did the medical director for epidemiology. Last month, the state epidemiologist said she, too, would be leaving.

The high-level departures came as morale plunged in the Health Department and senior health officials expressed alarm to one another over being sidelined and treated disrespectfully, according to five people with direct experience inside the department.

Their concern had an almost singular focus: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo.

Even as the pandemic continues to rage and New York struggles to vaccinate a large and anxious population, Mr. Cuomo has all but declared war on his own public health bureaucracy. The departures have underscored the extent to which pandemic policy has been set by the governor, who with his aides designed a vaccination program hampered by early delays.

The troubled rollout came after Mr. Cuomo declined to use the longstanding vaccination plans that the State Department of Health had developed in recent years in coordination with local health departments. Mr. Cuomo instead adopted an approach that relied on large hospital systems to coordinate vaccinations.

In recent weeks, the governor has repeatedly made it clear that he believed he had no choice but to seize more control over pandemic policy from state and local public health officials, who he said had no understanding of how to conduct a real-world, large-scale operation like vaccinations. After early problems, in which relatively few doses were being administered, the pace of vaccinations has picked up and New York is now roughly 20th in the nation in percentage of residents who have received at least one vaccine dose.

“When I say ‘experts’ in air quotes, it sounds like I’m saying I don’t really trust the experts,” Mr. Cuomo said at a news conference on Friday, referring to scientific expertise at all levels of government during the pandemic. “Because I don’t. Because I don’t.”

His comments reflected a rift between the state’s top elected official and its career health experts of the sort that has occurred across different levels of government during the pandemic.

In Albany, tensions worsened in recent months as state health officials said they often found out about major changes in pandemic policy only after Mr. Cuomo announced them at news conferences — and then asked them to match their health guidance to the announcements.

That was what happened with the vaccine plan, when state health officials were blindsided by the news that the rollout would be coordinated locally by hospitals.

At least nine senior state health officials have left the department, resigned or retired in recent months. They include Dr. Elizabeth Dufort, the medical director in the division of epidemiology; and Dr. Jill Taylor, the head of the renowned Wadsworth laboratory — which has been central to the state’s efforts to detect virus variants — and the executive in charge of health data, according to state records.