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China orders Wuhan mass testing, Beijing restrictions as Covid delta spreads

China orders Wuhan mass testing, Beijing restrictions as Covid delta spreads

Residents of Wuhan city in China’s Hubei province queue to take nucleic acid tests for Covid-19 on August 3, 2021.

STR | AFP | Getty Images

China is facing pockets of resurgence in major cities from Beijing to Wuhan, and authorities have imposed mass testing and widespread travel restrictions in some areas.

Daily Covid-19 cases are rising again as the delta variant spreads across the country.

China’s National Health Commission said it confirmed 96 Covid cases on Wednesday — the third straight day it reported 90 cases and above. Of the newly confirmed cases, 71 were locally transmitted, said the health commission.

Economists are concerned that a strict government clampdown on movements could hurt the economy — the only major economy to grow last year.

“China has shown before that it is willing to take tough action to control Covid, and we don’t doubt that it will do so again this time,” Robert Carnell, regional head of Asia-Pacific research at Dutch bank ING, said in a note on Wednesday.

“Tough restrictions on movement and travel already in place will likely bring the desired results. But the delta variant is a particularly slippery little critter, and the concern for us, and we imagine, many others, is how quickly this will occur, and at what economic cost in the meantime,” he added.

Read more about China from CNBC Pro

When Covid-19 first emerged in the country in late 2019, authorities used strict lockdowns and mass testing to control the nationwide outbreak.

Since then, Chinese authorities have clamped down hard on any flare-ups in Covid infections. The latest spread of the more transmissible Covid delta variant has again led authorities to tighten containment measures across the country.

State media Xinhua News Agency reported that authorities have urged people to limit travel and avoid gatherings, as well as suspended some flights, trains and long-distance bus services.

The capital of Beijing imposed strict entry and exit controls on Sunday and is said to be at a “critical stage” of epidemic control after cases rose late July for the first time in months, Xinhua reported.

Wuhan city, where the coronavirus first emerged, will test all its residents for Covid new cases emerged, the news agency said.

As of July 20, more than 17 million doses of Covid vaccines have been administered in Wuhan, and the vaccination rate of those 18 years and above hit 77.63%, according to the Wuhan municipal health commission.

‘Slow patch’ in China’s economy

China’s economic recovery has been uneven, with exports-oriented sectors driving most of the growth while domestic consumption has been slower to return.  

The resurgence in Covid-19 infections and the latest containment measures would delay a recovery in Chinese household spending, said Sian Fenner, lead Asia economist at consultancy Oxford Economics.

“The geographical spread of the delta variant is going to be concerning the Chinese authorities. We’ve already seen that they have a very low tolerance towards, you know, even a relatively small flare up,” she told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia” on Wednesday.

“We had hoped that with the increase in vaccination rates, that would actually improve that service consumption, but it looks like we’re in for another sort of slow patch going forward and … the delayed recovery in household spending,” she added.

Fenner said she’s maintaining her full-year growth forecast of 8.4% for China for now. That’s slightly higher than the International Monetary Fund’s projected growth of 8.1% in China.

— CNBC’s Weizhen Tan contributed to this report.

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How Native Media Spreads Misinformation From Vaccine Skeptics

How Local Media Spreads Misinformation From Vaccine Skeptics

One radio show that appears to have been part of this effect is Coast to Coast AM, which airs on 640 local stations and reaches nearly three million listeners a week. His host, George Noory, has had Dr. Tenpenny interviewed Robert Kennedy Jr., an attorney and anti-vaccine activist, and Erin Elizabeth, the founder of the Health Nut News website and a vaccine skeptic.

Understand the state of vaccine mandates in the United States

The activists used their segments on the show to reinforce their messages. In an advertising campaign for Dr. For example, Tenpenny’s appearance to discuss the coronavirus in April 2020 said the Coast to Coast AM website, “It claims that there are so many unknowns about testing, tracking, symptoms and other factors that the information we have communicated about the disease are meaningless. “

This line was posted on Dr. Tenpenny shared and tweeted by some of her followers.

In a statement, Mr. Noory said: “We have all views on my program, and that includes people who are against vaccines.”

Vaccine misinformation has also been posted on websites pretending to be local news but which are paid websites. These pages, where articles are ordered and paid for by conservative think tanks, political activists, corporate executives and public relations experts, were created to fill the vacuum left by the loss of local publications.

Recent articles on some of these sites, like Last Frontier News in Alaska and Bowling Green Today in Kentucky, highlighted people who died after receiving the Covid vaccines, without saying that a Times review found it unclear whether the vaccines were responsible were . The stories followed a pattern established on anti-vaccine blogs to pull data from a national database on post-vaccination deaths without explaining the boundaries of the data.

Last Frontier News and Bowling Green Today did not respond to requests for comment.

At least one local radio host recently revoked his anti-vaccination stance. Phil Valentine, a conservative radio host in Tennessee, said in a blog post in December that he would not get the vaccine because his likelihood of dying from the virus was “far less than one percent”.

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb estimates as much as 1 million Individuals contaminated with Covid every day as delta spreads

Dr. Scott Gottlieb estimates up to 1 million Americans infected with Covid daily as delta spreads

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Friday he believes the coronavirus is significantly more widespread in the U.S. than official case counts reflect as the highly contagious delta variant sweeps the nation.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if, on the whole, we’re infecting up to a million people a day right now, and we’re just picking up maybe a 10th of that or less than a 10th of that,” the former Food and Drug Administration commissioner said in an interview on “Squawk Box.” Gottlieb now serves on the board of Covid vaccine maker Pfizer.

The current seven-day average of new daily coronavirus cases in the U.S. is roughly 67,000, according to a CNBC analysis of Johns Hopkins University data. That’s up 53% compared with a week ago, as the country grapples with a surge in new infections driven largely by delta, first discovered in India and now the dominant variant in the U.S.

The highest seven-day day average of new Covid cases recorded in the U.S. was roughly 251,000 on Jan. 8, according to CNBC’s analysis. Case counts had dropped off dramatically in the spring as the country’s vaccination campaign picked up speed.

But in recent weeks, as U.S. cases again started to accelerate, Gottlieb has said a large number of coronavirus infections were likely going unreported because the testing landscape is different now than at earlier stages in the pandemic.

For example, he previously told CNBC people can now complete at-home tests and those results are unlikely to make their way to health authorities and then show up in official case counts.

Additionally, Gottlieb has said vaccinated Americans who may become infected are likely to have a mild case or remain entirely asymptomatic, making them less likely to seek out a Covid test than they would’ve been before they were inoculated against the disease.

— CNBC’s Nate Rattner contributed to this report.

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion Inc. and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”

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As Virus Instances Rise, One other Contagion Spreads Among the many Vaccinated: Anger

As Virus Cases Rise, Another Contagion Spreads Among the Vaccinated: Anger

As coronavirus cases resurface across the country, many vaccine Americans are losing patience with vaccine holdouts who they believe neglect a civic duty or cling to conspiracy theories and misinformation, even as new patients arrive in emergency rooms and the nation renews mask recommendations.

The pandemic appeared to be leaving the country; Almost a month ago there was a feeling of celebration. Now many of the vaccinated fear for their unvaccinated children and fear that they themselves are at risk for breakthrough infections. Rising case numbers are turning plans to reopen schools and workplaces upside down and threaten another wave of infections that could overwhelm hospitals in many communities.

“It’s like the morning sun came up and everyone was arguing about it,” said Jim Taylor, 66, a retired civil servant in Baton Rouge, LA, a state where fewer than half of adults are fully vaccinated.

“The virus is here and killing people, and we have a proven way to stop it – and we’re not going to. That is rude.”

The rising sentiment adds support for further coercive measures. Scientists, business leaders, and government officials are demanding vaccine mandates – if not from the federal government, then from local jurisdictions, schools, employers, and corporations.

“I’ve gotten angrier over time,” said Doug Robertson, 39, a teacher who lives outside of Portland, Oregon and has three children too young to be vaccinated, including a toddler with serious health.

“Now there’s a vaccine and a light at the end of the tunnel and some people choose not to go to it,” he said. “You are making it darker for my family and others like mine by making this decision.”

On Monday, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio ordered all city workers to be vaccinated against Covid-19 or subjected to weekly tests until schools reopen in mid-September. Officials in California followed hours later with a similar mandate that covered all government employees and health care workers.

The Department of Veterans Affairs on Monday called for 115,000 local health care workers to be vaccinated over the next two months, becoming the first federal agency to mandate a mandate. Nearly 60 major medical organizations, including the American Medical Association and the American Nurses Association, called for mandatory vaccination of all health care workers on Monday.

“It is time to blame the unvaccinated people, not the ordinary people,” a frustrated Governor Kay Ivey, Republican of Alabama, told reporters last week. “It’s the unvaccinated people who fail us.”

There is no doubt that the United States has reached a turning point. According to a New York Times database, 57 percent of Americans 12 and older are fully vaccinated. Eligible Americans receive an average of 537,000 doses per day, down 84 percent from the high of 3.38 million in early April.

Infections are on the rise as a result of delayed vaccinations and lifted restrictions. As of Sunday, the country recorded 52,000 new cases a day, an average of 170 percent more than the previous two weeks. Hospital stays and death rates are also increasing, though not as rapidly.

Communities from San Francisco to Austin, Texas recommend that people who have been vaccinated wear masks again in public indoor spaces. Citing the spread of the more contagious Delta variant of the virus, Los Angeles and St. Louis, Missouri counties have mandated indoor masking.

For many Americans who were vaccinated months ago, the future looks bleak. Frustration strains relationships even within close-knit families.

Josh Perldeiner, 36, a Connecticut public defender who has a 2-year-old son, was fully vaccinated in mid-May. But a close relative who visits frequently refused to get the syringes, even though he and other family members urged them to do so.

She recently tested positive for the virus after traveling to Florida, where hospitals are filling up with Covid-19 patients. Now Mr Perldeiner is concerned that his son, too young to have a vaccine, might be exposed.

“It’s beyond risk,” he said. “People with privileges are opposed to the vaccine, and it affects our economies and continues the cycle.” As infections rise, he added, “I feel like we are on the same precipice as we were a year ago, when People don’t care if more people die. “

Hospitals have become a particular focus. Vaccination remains voluntary in most facilities and is not required for nursing staff in most hospitals and nursing homes. Many large hospital chains are just beginning to require their employees to be vaccinated.

A city stirs

As New York begins its post-pandemic life, we are investigating the ongoing effects of Covid on the city.

Despite being fully vaccinated, Aimee McLean, a nurse case manager at the University of Utah Hospital in Salt Lake City, is concerned that she will contract the virus in a patient and accidentally pass it on to her father, who has a severe chronic condition Suffers from lung disease. Less than half of Utah’s population is fully vaccinated.

“The longer we get near that number, the more it feels like there is a decent percentage of the population that honestly doesn’t care about us as healthcare workers,” said Ms. McLean, 46.

She suggested that health insurers link hospital bills to vaccination. “If you choose not to be part of the solution, you should be responsible for the consequences,” she said.

Many schools and universities will resume classroom teaching as early as next month. With the increase in the number of infections, the tensions between vaccinated and unvaccinated people have also risen in these settings.

Recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to reopen K-12 schools are tied to community virus transmission rates. In communities where vaccination is delayed, these rates are rising and vaccinated parents are again concerned about school outbreaks. The vaccines are not yet approved for children under 12 years of age.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that children wear masks in class when schools reopen. School districts from Chicago to Washington began enacting mandates on Friday.

Universities, on the other hand, can often require students and staff to be vaccinated. But many don’t have what frustrates the vaccinated.

“If we respect the rights and freedoms of the unvaccinated, what happens to the rights and freedoms of the vaccinated?” Said Elif Akcali, 49, who teaches engineering at the University of Florida at Gainesville. The university doesn’t require students to be vaccinated, and as rates rise in Florida, it worries about exposure to the virus.

Some even wonder how much sympathy they should have for fellow citizens who are not acting in their own interests. “I feel like if you decide not to have a vaccination and now you get sick, it’s kind of bad,” said Lia Hockett, 21, the manager of Thunderbolt Spiritual Books in Santa Monica, California.

Understand the state of vaccine mandates in the United States

As the virus spreads again, some vaccinated people believe the federal government should start using sticks instead of carrots, like lottery tickets.

Carol Meyer, 65, of Ulster County, NY, suggested withholding incentive payments or tax credits from vaccine objectors. “I have a feeling that in this country we have a social contract with our neighbors, and people who can get vaccinated and choose not to get vaccinated are breaking it,” said Meyer.

Bill Alsstrom, 74, a retired innkeeper in Acton, Massachusetts, said he would not support measures that would directly affect individual families and children, but asked if states that do not meet vaccination goals are withholding federal government funding should be.

Perhaps the federal government should require employees and contractors to be vaccinated, he thought. Why shouldn’t federal funding be withheld from states that don’t meet vaccination goals?

Although it is often viewed as a conservative phenomenon, hesitant and refused vaccination occurs in the United States for a variety of reasons across the political and cultural spectrum. No argument can address all of these concerns, and rethinking is often a slow, individual process.

Pastor Shon Neyland, who regularly pleads with members of his Portland, Oregon church to get Covid-19 vaccines, estimates that only about half of the members of the Highland Christian Center church have been injected. There was tension in the community over vaccination.

“It is disappointing because I was trying to show them that their life is in danger and that this is a serious threat to humanity,” he said.

Shareese Harris, 26, who works in the Grace Cathedral International office in Uniondale, NY, has not been vaccinated and is “taking my time” with it. She fears that the vaccines may have long-term side effects and that they have been brought to market.

“I shouldn’t be convicted or forced into a decision,” said Ms. Harris. “Society will just have to wait for us.”

Rising resentment among vaccinated people may well lead the public to support stronger coercive action, including mandates, but experts warn that punitive action and social exclusion can backfire and end dialogue and outreach.

Elected officials in several communities in Los Angeles County, for example, are already refusing to enforce the county’s new mask mandate.

“Anything that limits the opportunity for honest dialogue and persuasion is not a good thing,” said Stephen Thomas, professor of health policy and management at the University of Maryland School of Public Health. “We are already in isolated, isolated information systems where people are in their own echo chambers.”

Gentle persuasion and persistent urging convinced Dorrett Denton, a 62-year-old home nurse in Queens, to get vaccinated in February. Her employer repeatedly urged Ms. Denton to get vaccinated, but in the end it was her doctor who persuaded her.

“She says to me: ‘You have been coming to me since 1999. How many times have I operated on you and your life was in my hands? You trust me with your life, don’t you? ”Ms. Denton recalled.

“I said, ‘Yes, Doctor.’ She said, ‘Well, trust me on this.’ “

Giulia Heyward contributed the coverage from Miami, Sophie Kasakove from New York and Livia Albeck-Ripka from Los Angeles.

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Goldman cuts Southeast Asia GDP forecasts as delta variant spreads

Goldman cuts Southeast Asia GDP forecasts as delta variant spreads

Students, wearing face masks amid the Covid-19 pandemic, sit by a mural depicting the Indonesian flag at an Islamic junior high school in Banda Aceh on June 10, 2020.

Chaideer Mahyuddin | AFP | Getty Images

SINGAPORE — Covid-19 infections are surging in several major Southeast Asian economies, and that has led Goldman Sachs to cut its 2021 growth forecasts for most of the region.

The spread of the more transmissible delta variant has pushed daily Covid cases to record highs in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand in recent weeks. That has led to more stringent restrictions in Indonesia and Thailand, and an extension of restrictions in Malaysia, Goldman economists wrote in a Thursday note.

In the Philippines, the coronavirus spread has made loosening of social-distancing measures “more unlikely” this year, the economists added.

Renewed virus surges and tighter restrictions are likely to “weigh significantly more” on growth in the second half of 2021 than previously thought, the economists said.

Goldman slashed its growth forecasts by more than 100 basis points for Indonesia, Malaysia and Philippines. Singapore and Thailand saw a smaller cut by the bank.

Slow vaccination pace

The rapid climb in Covid infections across Southeast Asia has come as vaccination progress in the region — except for Singapore — has lagged many countries such as the U.S. and the U.K.

Singapore has one of the fastest vaccination rates globally, with over 41% of its population fully inoculated, according to the latest data compiled by online statistics portal Our World in Data.

But the rest of the region is much slower: Malaysia has fully vaccinated 12.4% of its population while Indonesia has inoculated 5.7% of its people fully, the data showed. Less than 5% of the populations in Thailand and the Philippines have been fully inoculated against Covid.   

Singapore, which tightened social-distancing measures in early May, started to ease restrictions last month. Goldman economists predicted that Malaysia will be the next to follow suit in the fourth quarter, while the other Southeast Asian economies will only do so in the first half of 2022.

Goldman said stronger global growth will benefit trade-oriented economies such as Singapore and Malaysia the most. Malaysia, which is a net commodity exporter, is also likely to gain from higher commodity prices, the bank said.

Meanwhile, “larger exposures to sectors like tourism, lower exposures to global trade, and limited policy buffers, are likely to push sequential growth lower in Indonesia and Thailand, and keep the sequential growth rebound more muted in the Philippines than our prior expectations,” it added.

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Hospitalizations rising once more as delta variant spreads among the many unvaccinated, medical doctors say

A mobile Covid-19 vaccination center outside Bolton City Hall in Bolton, where the number of cases of the Delta variant identified for the first time in India was relatively high.

A mobile Covid-19 vaccination center outside Bolton City Hall in Bolton, where the number of cases of the Delta variant identified for the first time in India was relatively high.

Peter Byrne | PA pictures | Getty Images

Top infectious disease specialists say the spread of the Delta variant over unvaccinated parts of the country is causing flares and spikes in hospital admissions as cases rise.

The number of cases is on the rise again nationwide, as the highly transferable variant prevails as the dominant burden in the USA.The seven-day average of the newly confirmed Covid cases has risen to around 23,300 per day, almost twice as high as the average a week ago . according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

Health officials and doctors have hoped that high vaccination rates among the most vulnerable and oldest Americans would also prevent hospitalizations, which are generally delayed by a few weeks. But that hasn’t happened before, doctors said in a call hosted Tuesday by the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

“Hospital admissions and ICU deaths are all lagging behind (new cases), so we expect these to get worse, much worse, over the next two to three weeks,” Dr. Andrew T. Pavia, director of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Utah School of Medicine, said on the call.

Hospital stays are on the rise again as the Delta variant spreads among the unvaccinated, doctors say doctors

After several weeks of declining infections, cases are rising again in many parts of the country, said Dr. Jay Butler, associate director of infectious diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, on the conference call. “Unfortunately, this has also been accompanied by an increase in hospital admissions and emergency room reviews for people who have ultimately been confirmed to have Covid-19,” he said.

Since the Delta variant is spreading in the US, it hits states with low vaccination rates particularly hard. First discovered in India in October, the variant quickly spreads to more than 100 countries around the world and has established itself as the dominant variety in America in just a few weeks.

“When the Delta strain emerged, it quickly became the dominant strain … For the last full week of data, more than 80% of the viruses sequenced were Delta viruses, and this week 92% of all variants” (in Utah) said Pavia. “When you think about what it means for a virus to spread so quickly, it means that it is the most suitable virus that spreads more efficiently, that it spreads in unvaccinated pockets, causing a lot of disease and a lot of stress . “

In Missouri, Arkansas, Nevada, Utah, and Florida, cases have risen faster than any other state in the past few weeks. New infections and hospital admissions are highest in rural areas, where vaccination rates are low, Pavia said. “That’s what drives outbreak vulnerability.”

In Utah, infection rates are highest among young people ages 15 to 45, and hospital admissions are similarly higher in these younger age groups than they were earlier in the pandemic, he said.

About 80% of Americans over 65, the most vulnerable population group, are fully vaccinated, which helps reduce hospital costs. Scientists have yet to figure out whether or not the Delta variant makes people sicker than the original ancestral tribe.

US health officials and doctors still disagree on whether or not a booster vaccination will be required in the fall or winter.

“We don’t see any evidence at this point that people who were vaccinated last December or January have declining immunity and are at greater risk of breakthrough infections,” said Butler, of the CDC.

Based on statements made by World Health Organization officials Monday, Butler also said that breakthrough cases are often milder and that vaccines are extremely effective at reducing hospital stays and deaths.

“There’s even evidence that people with breakthrough infections who are fully immunized shed fewer viruses … this may reduce the risk of spreading it to others,” Butler said.

The WHO recently recommended that both vaccinated and unvaccinated people continue to wear masks and practice social distancing, citing the reduced effectiveness of the vaccine against the Delta variant and increased social mixing in countries with different vaccination rates.

“Everyone wants this to be over, and a lot of the behavior that I think is driving the spread of infection is people wanting it to be over, and pretending it’s over, and even really give up the more humble precautions like wearing masks. ” said Pavia.

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WHO urges absolutely vaccinated individuals to proceed to put on masks as variant spreads

Biden administration set to relax outdoor mask guidance

People wear face masks in Central Park on April 10, 2021 in New York City.

Noam Galai | Getty Images

The World Health Organization on Friday urged fully vaccinated people to continue to wear masks, social distance and practice other Covid-19 pandemic safety measures as the highly contagious delta variant spreads rapidly across the globe.

“People cannot feel safe just because they had the two doses. They still need to protect themselves,” Dr. Mariangela Simao, WHO assistant director-general for access to medicines and health products, said during a news briefing from the agency’s Geneva headquarters.

“Vaccine alone won’t stop community transmission,” Simao added. “People need to continue to use masks consistently, be in ventilated spaces, hand hygiene … the physical distance, avoid crowding. This still continues to be extremely important, even if you’re vaccinated when you have a community transmission ongoing.”

The health organization’s comments come as some countries, including the United States, have largely done away with masks and pandemic-related restrictions as the Covid vaccines have helped drive down the number of new infections and deaths.

The number of new infections in the U.S. has held steady over the last week at an average of 11,659 new cases per day, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Still, new infections have been plummeting over the last several months.

WHO officials said they are asking fully vaccinated people to continue to “play it safe” because a large portion of the world remains unvaccinated and highly contagious variants, like delta, are spreading in many countries, spurring outbreaks.

The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that about half of adults infected in an outbreak of the delta variant in Israel were fully vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, prompting the government there to reimpose an indoor mask requirement and other measures.

“Yes, you can reduce some measures and different countries have different recommendations in that regard. But there’s still the need for caution,” Dr. Bruce Aylward, a senior advisor to the WHO’s director-general, said at the briefing. “As we are seeing, there are new variants emerging.”

The WHO said last week that delta is becoming the dominant variant of the disease worldwide.

WHO officials have said the variant, first found in India but now in at least 92 countries, is the fastest and fittest coronavirus strain yet, and it will “pick off” the most vulnerable people, especially in places with low Covid vaccination rates.

They said there were reports that the delta variant also causes more severe symptoms, but that more research is needed to confirm those conclusions. Still, there are signs the delta strain could provoke different symptoms than other variants.

It has the potential “to be more lethal because it’s more efficient in the way it transmits between humans and it will eventually find those vulnerable individuals who will become severely ill, have to be hospitalized and potentially die,” Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO’s health emergencies program, said Monday.

In the U.S., President Joe Biden said Covid deaths nationwide will continue to rise due to the spread of the “dangerous” delta variant, calling it a “serious concern.”

He warned that Americans who are still unvaccinated are especially at risk.

“Six hundred thousand-plus Americans have died, and with this delta variant you know there’s going to be others as well. You know it’s going to happen. We’ve got to get young people vaccinated,” Biden said Thursday at a community center in Raleigh, North Carolina

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Delta variant first present in India spreads to 62 nations, sizzling spots type in Asia and Africa, WHO says

Delta variant first found in India spreads to 62 countries, hot spots form in Asia and Africa, WHO says

A health worker attends to a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patient who is assisted by a mechanical ventilator and is undergoing dialysis in the COVID-19 emergency room at the National Kidney and Transplant Institute State Hospital in Quezon City COVID- 19 infections in Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines, April 26, 2021.

Eloisa Lopez | Reuters

The variant of Covid-19, first discovered in India in October, has now spread to at least 62 countries as outbreaks increase across Asia and Africa – despite a 15% decrease in cases worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.

“We continue to see significantly increased communicability and a growing number of countries reporting outbreaks related to this variant,” said WHO of the Delta strain, noting that further studies were a high priority.

The WHO changed the name of the variant to “Delta” to simplify the scientific name B.1.617.2. The new naming system for Covid variants by letters of the Greek alphabet also avoids stigmatizing countries that discover new tribes.

The P.1 variant, now known as “Gamma”, which was first discovered in Japan from Brazil, has now spread to 64 countries, according to the WHO.

Even in countries with high vaccination rates, there has been an increase in cases in the last week or two, “so no one is out of the woods,” said Dr. Mike Ryan, Executive Director of the WHO Emergency Health Program, in a WHO-hosted Q&A on Wednesday on social media platforms.

In Bahrain, where around 55% of the population are vaccinated with at least one dose, Covid cases have risen since the beginning of May and, according to Our World in Data, have reached the highest level of daily reported cases since the pandemic began.

“Relaxation of public health and social measures, increased social mobility, virus variants and unfair vaccinations are a very dangerous combination,” Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO technical director for Covid-19, explained some of the recent increases.

The West Pacific region reports the highest Covid cases and deaths since the pandemic began, according to the agency’s weekly update. The region reported more than 139,000 new cases in the past week, up 6% from the previous week. The highest number of new cases in the region was reported from Myanmar with 53,419 new cases in the past week. Most of the deaths in the region were reported from the Philippines, with 776 deaths in the past week.

“In every region (of the world) there are hotspots, there are countries that are really facing very, very difficult situations with an increase in transmission,” said Van Kerkhove, noting that a combination of highly contagious variants, relaxed measures Public health and inconsistent vaccination rates around the world are responsible for the recent surge in cases. “Eighteen months later, we are all fed up with this virus. It’s not done with us yet, and if we give it a chance to expand, it will. “

The African region reported over 52,000 new cases and over 1,100 new deaths in the past week, up 22% and 11% respectively compared to the previous week, according to the weekly update.

WHO also said last week that Africa would need at least 20 million AstraZeneca Covid vaccine doses within the next six weeks to get the second round of vaccinations to people who have already received the first. The continent has received only 1% of all vaccines administered worldwide and needs another 200 million doses of all approved Covid-19 vaccines to vaccinate 10% of the continent by September.

U.S. President Joe Biden said Wednesday that he is pulling out all the stops to at least partially vaccinate at least 70% of all American adults by July 4th, offering vaccines at hair and beauty stores, free babysitting, and Uber rides for people vaccinated, among other incentives. As of Tuesday, more than 62% of all adults in the US had at least one syringe.

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Japan’s Yo-Yoing Financial system Shrinks as Virus Spreads and Vaccinations Lag

Japan’s Yo-Yoing Economy Shrinks as Virus Spreads and Vaccinations Lag

Japan’s economy contracted in the first three months of 2021 and continued to alternate between growth and contraction as the vaccination campaign threatened to hold back recovery from the pandemic, although other major economies appeared poised for rapid growth.

In about a year since the coronavirus emerged, Japan’s domestic demand has seen cycles of shrinking and expansion as coronavirus cases have risen and consumers have withdrawn indoors and then infections have receded and businesses have welcomed customers back to have.

Japan is currently experiencing a resurgence of virus cases with much of the country in a state of emergency and the number of deaths rising, particularly in Osaka. According to analysts, the yo-yo economic pattern is unlikely to stop until the country has vaccinated a significant portion of its population. These efforts have only just begun and are unlikely to accelerate significantly in the months ahead.

These dynamics could potentially drag the country back into recession – defined as two consecutive quarters of contraction – later this year as it struggles to control the spread of more deadly and contagious variants of coronavirus.

Japan’s economy, the third largest in the world after the US and China, contracted 1.3 percent from January to March, an annual decline of 5.1 percent. The contraction followed two consecutive quarters of expansion.

Growth skyrocketed in the second half of last year as consumers who had holed up at home for months to avoid the virus piled into department stores, restaurants, bars and theaters.

The recovery went a long way in getting the economy out of the huge hole that formed in the early months of the pandemic. However, as the new data shows, the turnaround is fragile and will be difficult to sustain as long as the country continues to face the threat from the virus.

“We are in a situation where we cannot relax until the vaccine is well distributed,” said Keiji Kanda, senior economist at the Daiwa Institute of Research in Tokyo.

In early 2020, when the pandemic hit, Japan’s economy was already battling headwinds from falling demand from China, a hike in consumption tax, and a devastating typhoon. When the country plunged into distress this spring, domestic consumption crumbled and exports fell to new lows.

The result was the biggest blow to the economy since 1955, when the country first began using gross domestic product to measure its growth.

Even so, the impact of the pandemic on Japan was relatively minor compared to the devastation in the US and many European countries. Japan has never been completely locked down and the total death toll remains below 12,000.

Updated

May 17, 2021, 6:24 p.m. ET

These factors, combined with – by some measures – the world’s largest stimulus measures, have kept the country’s unemployment rate low and propped up many small businesses such as restaurants and hotels.

While Japan’s pandemic response has managed to mitigate the worst of the economic damage, the recovery will continue to be an uphill battle, said Tomohiro Ota, senior economist at Goldman Sachs in Japan.

Trade has rebounded in recent months as some countries reopened, but “without a recovery in consumption we cannot go back to the days before Covid,” he said.

To achieve this goal, two steps forward and one step back had to be taken. Home consumption has increased in waves that increase and decrease as the number of cases increases.

Japan’s state of emergency last spring devastated domestic demand when people stashed at home. Consumption recovered briefly in summer and autumn. A similar upswing followed a second state of emergency in January.

Last month, authorities put the country in dire straits for the third time to review the spread of the coronavirus ahead of the Olympics, which are slated to begin in Tokyo in late July.

The latest round of restrictions only affects parts of the country, but also includes major metropolitan areas such as Tokyo and Osaka and is stricter than the previous one. Earlier iterations focused on shortening the opening times of bars and restaurants. In this version, for the first time, officials demanded that department stores restrict most services and that restaurants stop serving alcohol.

The economic impact of the measures will depend on the response of a public already tired of staying home, said Taro Saito, an executive research fellow at the NLI Research Institute in Tokyo.

“We cannot say with certainty that there will be a contraction between April and June,” he said because of the restrictions. But “if the target areas expand, this could put pressure on growth. The situation is very fluid. “

The stop-and-go pattern is likely to repeat itself for some time, said Izumi Devalier, Japan’s chief economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

“The domestic economy continues to be affected by developments surrounding the virus,” Devalier said, adding that vaccination remained key to improving domestic demand.

Japan’s vaccine rollout was one of the slowest among major industrialized nations. Authorities have approved the use of only one vaccine, made by Pfizer and BioNTech, and strict regulations that require vaccinations to be given by doctors and nurses have slowed its spread. Just over 3 percent of the country has received an initial shot, and vaccines are unlikely to be made available to the general population until late this summer at the earliest.

“Japan is way behind other countries that were in their vaccination programs at the time,” Ms. Devalier said, adding that slow progress “simply delays recovery.”

Mr. Kanda of the Daiwa Institute of Research said, “If vaccination makes good progress, economic activity can basically resume from fall this year.”

But, he added, “if the current pace continues, we could see another explosion of infections.”

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Business

Fallout From Hedge Fund’s Defaults Spreads By Markets: Dwell Updates

A Credit Suisse branch in Basel, Switzerland. After the bank warned of significant losses on Monday, its shares fell 14 percent.

Here’s what you need to know:

Credit…Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters

The fallout from a series of defaults at a New York hedge fund reverberated through markets for a second day on Monday, as global banks tried to size up their exposure to one firm’s string of bad bets.

Shares in Credit Suisse, the Swiss bank, dropped 14 percent on Monday and the Japanese bank Nomura closed 16 percent lower, after the banks said they could face significant losses because of defaults by an American investment firm.

U.S. stocks fell on Monday, with the S&P 500 opening 0.2 percent weaker. European stock indexes were mixed but an index of European banks was 0.6 percent lower.

Neither Credit Suisse nor Nomura named the investment firm whose default could lead to big losses, but Bloomberg identified it as Archegos Capital Management, a New York-based family office that manages the wealth of Bill Hwang, a former hedge fund manager at Tiger Asia Management who was found guilty of wire fraud in 2012.

Investment banks that provided services to Archegos, such as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, dumped huge quantities of stocks including ViacomCBS and Chinese tech companies on Friday.

Archegos was forced into the stock sales, worth about $20 billion, after bets the fund made moved the wrong way, Bloomberg reported. Shares in ViacomCBS, one of Archegos’s positions, dropped 23 percent on Wednesday last week. On Friday, the share price plummeted a further 27 percent as the investment banks liquidated positions. ViacomCBS shares fell about 3 percent in early trading on Monday.

Shares in Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley opened about 2-3 percent lower on Monday. Shares in Deutsche Bank fell more than 3 percent, after it was said to also have some exposure to Archegos.

Credit Suisse has already been roiled this month by the collapse of Greensill Capital, a London-based financial firm it sold funds for, and to whom it extended loans of $140 million. The Swiss bank told investors it would probably report some losses on the loan.

“A significant U.S.-based hedge fund defaulted on margin calls made last week by Credit Suisse and certain other banks,” the Swiss bank said on Monday. It did not yet know the exact size of the loss from exiting its positions but “it could be highly significant and material to our first quarter results,” the statement said.

  • Oil prices bounced around on Monday following news about the fate of the container ship that had been blocking the Suez Canal for nearly week. The ship was finally freed on Monday, raising the prospect that trade flows would be restored, but authorities said more work was needed before maritime traffic could restart.

  • Yields on 10-year Treasury notes fell 2 basis points, or 0.02 percentage point, to 1.65 percent.

Bill Hwang, right, with his lawyer in 2012. Archegos Capital Management manages the personal fortune of the former hedge fund mogul.Credit…Emile Wamsteker/Bloomberg

The fallout from risky investments made by Archegos Capital Management continued to spread through the global markets on Monday, and it could spur more attention from regulators on the murky world of swaps and investor borrowing, the DealBook newsletter reports.

But how did one firm’s bad bets cascade to become a multibillion-dollar fire sale of stocks by banks around the world? Here’s what we know so far:

Archegos manages the personal fortune of the former hedge fund mogul Bill Hwang, who won Wall Street’s business despite having pleaded guilty to insider trading years ago. It amassed huge positions in media giants like ViacomCBS and in several Chinese tech companies — largely with borrowed money.

The Archegos strategy included using swaps, contracts that gave Mr. Hwang financial exposure to companies’ shares while hiding both his identity and how big his positions really were. (It is also becoming increasingly apparent that several Wall Street banks lent Archegos money without knowing that others were doing the same thing for the same trades.)

Trouble for Mr. Hwang, and his banks, arose when the prices of those stocks started to fall. That prompted some of his lenders to demand cash to cover his bets. When they began to question his ability to do so, some of them, including Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, seized some of his holdings and kicked off the sale $20 billion worth in huge block trades.

That forced selling led to even bigger drops in the prices of those stocks, starting a vicious circle.

Goldman Sachs has told investors that its potential losses are “immaterial,” having covered its exposure, but other investment banks faced a reckoning:

  • Credit Suisse told investors that a “U.S.-based hedge fund” had defaulted on its margin calls, which could lead to losses that were “highly significant and material to our first-quarter results.”

  • Nomura said that one of its U.S. arms could suffer “a significant loss” because of the forced sales.

One person who is surely paying attention is Gary Gensler: President Biden’s pick to lead the S.E.C. has been an advocate for market transparency, having argued that unregulated dark pools could cause a broader risk to the U.S. economy.

Southwest Airlines, the largest buyer of Boeing’s 737 Max jet, said that it had ordered a total of the planes over the next decade.Credit…Jim Watson/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Southwest Airlines is doubling down on Boeing’s troubled 737 Max jet, adding 100 new orders for the plane just months after regulators began allowing it to fly again.

The airline, already the largest customer of the Max, said on Monday that it had ordered a total of 349 Max jets over the next decade. Southwest, which resumed flights aboard the Max this month, also said it had more than doubled the number of planes it had options to buy, to 270.

“Southwest Airlines has been operating the Boeing 737 series for nearly 50 years, and the aircraft has made significant contributions to our unparalleled success,” Gary Kelly, Southwest’s chief executive, said in a statement. “Today’s commitment to the 737 Max solidifies our continued appreciation for the aircraft.”

Regulators around the world grounded the Max, which is quieter and more fuel-efficient than its predecessors, in March 2019 following fatal crashes in Ethiopia and Indonesia that killed 346 people. The Federal Aviation Administration lifted its ban on the plane in November, requiring various changes and upgrades. It was soon followed by other aviation regulators and the plane has been used on thousands of flights since.

The expanded Southwest order comes as more passengers start flying again. More than 1.5 million people were screened at airport security checkpoints on Sunday, according to the Transportation Security Administration, the most since the coronavirus pandemic began. Still, that was about 37 percent fewer people than the agency had screened on the same day in 2019.

Southwest did not say how much it will pay for its new Max order. The airline is spending more than $10 billion in new and existing airplane orders. The airline expects to receive 28 Max planes this year and at least 30 each year after through 2025.

By acquiring Houghton Mifflin, HarperCollins, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, will be better able to compete as publishing has come to be dominated by the biggest players.Credit…Richard Drew/Associated Press

HarperCollins, one of the five largest publishing companies in the United States, has made a deal to acquire Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books and Media, the trade publishing division of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, for $349 million.

The acquisition will help HarperCollins expand its catalog of backlist titles at a moment of growing consolidation in the book business. Houghton Mifflin publishes perennial sellers by well-known authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien, George Orwell, Philip Roth and Lois Lowry, as well as children’s classics and best-selling cookbooks and lifestyle guides.

News of the sale was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.

By acquiring Houghton Mifflin, HarperCollins, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, will be better able to compete as publishing has come to be dominated by the biggest players.

The book business has been transformed by consolidation in the past decade, with the merger of Penguin and Random House in 2013, News Corp’s purchase of the romance publisher Harlequin, and Hachette Book Group’s acquisition of Perseus Books. Last fall, ViacomCBS agreed to sell Simon & Schuster to Penguin Random House for more than $2 billion, in a deal that has drawn scrutiny from antitrust regulators and has raised concerns among booksellers, authors and agents.

Book sales across the industry have remained strong during the pandemic, but Houghton Mifflin saw its revenue fall sharply last year because of a steep drop in sales in its education division. Its revenue fell by more than 46 percent in the nine months that ended on Sept. 30 of last year, compared with the same period in 2019. The company put its trade publishing division up for sale last fall, as it aims to focus on its core business of K-12 educational publishing, and to pay down its debt.

“There is incredible demand for our expertise as schools across the country plan for post-pandemic learning and recovery,” Houghton Mifflin’s president and chief executive, Jack Lynch, said in a news release. “This is an inflection moment for K-12 education in our country and for HMH as a trusted partner to schools and teachers in advancing learning for every student.”

Tankers and freight ships near the entrance of the Suez Canal.Credit…Ahmed Hasan/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Oil prices fell on Monday as word spread that the giant cargo ship blocking the Suez Canal had been set free, raising hopes that hundreds of vessels, many carrying oil and petroleum products, could soon proceed through the critical waterway.

Oil prices had swirled earlier in the day, as prospects of an end to the logjam brightened, and then dimmed. But following the announcement that the containership Ever Given had been freed, the price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, fell about 2.5 percent, to $63.90 a barrel.

Since the vessel got stuck early last week, tankers have been lining up at the entrances to the canal waiting to deliver their cargoes to Europe and Asia.

The Suez Canal is a crucial choke point for oil shipping, but so far the impact on the oil market of this major interruption of trade flows has been relatively muted. Though prices jumped after shipping on the canal was halted, oil prices still remain below their nearly two-year highs of about $70 a barrel reached earlier this month.

Traders are now expected to focus on broader threats to the oil market, including whether the imposition of new lockdowns in Europe may hold back the recovery of oil demand from the pandemic.

From a global perspective, oil supplies are considered adequate, and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Russia and other producers, the group known as OPEC Plus, are withholding an estimated eight million barrels a day, or about 9 percent of current consumption, from the market. Officials from OPEC Plus are expected to meet by video conference on Thursday to discuss whether to ease output cuts.

Goldman Sachs’s headquarters in New York. A group of investors is suing the Wall Street bank over claims of fraud. Credit…Johannes Eisele/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Monday from Goldman Sachs and pension funds over a claim that the Wall Street giant misled investors about its work selling complex debt investments in the prelude to the 2008 financial crisis.

In its latest brief, Goldman makes an interesting argument, the DealBook newsletter reports: Investors shouldn’t rely on statements such as “honesty is at the heart of our business” or “our clients’ interests always come first” that appear in Securities and Exchange Commission filings and annual reports.

The case is a test of shareholders’ ability to sue over claims of investment fraud. The pension funds sought to sue as a class over Goldman’s statements, saying they belied those statements of honesty, and lower courts agreed to let them proceed. Goldman has argued that the investors are engaged in “guerrilla warfare” and aren’t providing “serious legal arguments,” relying on support from the federal government instead.

However, the Biden administration isn’t taking sides, technically. It will argue as a “friend of the court” on Monday that “meritorious private securities-fraud suits” are “an essential complement” to enforcing securities laws.

“I expect the court to be troubled by the claim that companies cannot be held accountable for saying that clients come first and then acting otherwise,” Robert Jackson Jr., who served on the S.E.C. from 2018 to 2020 and is now an N.Y.U. law professor, told DealBook.

The justices probably won’t agree with the claim that making a company “mean what it says” will lead to a tsunami of meritless lawsuits,” he added. Regardless, Goldman is right that the stakes are high, because the case is likely to decide whether shareholders can “hold corporate insiders accountable when they tell investors one thing and do another,” Mr. Jackson said.

President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela promoted an unproven remedy for Covid-19 on Facebook, which prompted the company to freeze his page. Credit…Manaure Quintero/Reuters

The Facebook page of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, was frozen for “repeated” violations of its misinformation policies, including a post about an unproven remedy for Covid-19, the company said on Sunday, the latest example of the social media giant cracking down on political figures who violate its content policies.

Mr. Maduro’s Facebook page will be frozen for 30 days in a “read-only” mode, the company said, “due to repeated violations of our rules.”

“We removed a video posted to President Nicolas Maduro’s Page for violating our policies against misinformation about Covid-19 that is likely to put people at risk for harm,” a Facebook spokesman said. “We follow guidance from the W.H.O. that says there is currently no medication to cure the virus.” The spokesman was referring to the World Health Organization.

Facebook’s move came after Mr. Maduro posted a video on his page that promoted Carvativir, a drug derived from thyme. He said in January that the medicine was a “miracle,” but did not provide evidence of its effectiveness — and declined to release the name of the “brilliant Venezuelan mind” that created the drug. In the video, Mr. Maduro falsely claimed that Carvativir can be used preventively and therapeutically against the coronavirus.

In the past, Facebook has been criticized for its inaction against political figures who test the boundaries of the company’s content policies by spreading misinformation. Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and chief executive of Facebook, has said he does not want to be the “arbiter of truth” in public discourse.

But in recent months, Facebook has cracked down on certain types of misinformation across the network. The company has banned posts containing false or misleading information regarding the coronavirus, and has shown willingness to take action against some political figures. And in the past, it has removed at least one post by Jair Bolsonaro, the president of Brazil, for false coronavirus remedy claims regarding the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine.

In January, after insurgents stormed the United States Capitol, President Donald J. Trump’s account was banned indefinitely for inciting his supporters to violent action using the social network.

In response to his account restriction, Mr. Maduro has said Facebook is practicing a form of “digital totalitarianism,” according to Reuters, which first reported Mr. Maduro’s suspension.

Mr. Maduro said on Twitter on Sunday that he would continue to broadcast his regular coronavirus briefing from his other digital accounts, including Instagram, YouTube and Twitter. And to circumvent his suspension, he said he would use the Facebook account belonging to his wife, Cilia Flores, to broadcast Covid-19 information. Facebook would not comment on whether it would suspend Ms. Flores’s account.

A rally on Friday in support of the Amazon workers outside the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union’s building in Birmingham, Ala.Credit…Charity Rachelle for The New York Times

One of the most closely watched union elections in recent history is wrapping up on Monday, one that could alter the shape of the labor movement and one of America’s largest employers.

Almost 6,000 workers at an Amazon warehouse near Birmingham, Ala., one of the company’s largest, are eligible to vote in this election. After years of fierce resistance from the company, they could form the first union at an Amazon operation in the United States.

The outcome of the vote may not be known for days, but the union drive has already succeeded in roiling the world’s biggest e-commerce company and spotlighting complaints about its labor practices, The New York Times’s Karen Weise and Michael Corkery write. If the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union succeeds, it would be a huge victory for the labor movement, whose membership has declined for decades. A victory would also give it a foothold inside one of the country’s largest private employers. The company now has 950,000 workers in the United States, after adding more than 400,000 in the last year alone.

If the union loses, particularly by a large margin, Amazon will have turned the tide on a unionization drive that seemed to have many winds at its back. A loss could force labor organizers to rethink their overall strategy and give Amazon confidence that its approach is working.

Hansjörg Wyss, the former chief executive of the medical device manufacturer Synthes, said he had agreed to join a bid for Tribune Publishing.Credit…Ruben Sprich/Reuters

A Swiss billionaire who has donated hundreds of millions to environmental causes is a surprise new player in the bidding for Tribune Publishing, the major newspaper chain that until recently seemed destined to end up in the hands of a New York hedge fund.

Hansjörg Wyss (pronounced Hans-yorg Vees), the former chief executive of the medical device manufacturer Synthes, said he had agreed to join with the Maryland hotelier Stewart W. Bainum Jr. in a bid for Tribune, an offer that could upend Alden Global Capital’s plan to take full ownership of the company, Marc Tracy of The New York Times writes.

Mr. Wyss, who has given away some of his fortune to help preserve wildlife habitats in Wyoming, Montana and Maine, said he was motivated to join the Tribune bid by his belief in the need for a robust press. “I have an opportunity to do 500 times more than what I’m doing now,” he said.

Alden, which already owns roughly 32 percent of Tribune Publishing shares, is known for drastically cutting costs at the newspapers it controls through its MediaNews Group subsidiary. Last month, the hedge fund reached an agreement with Tribune, whose papers include The Daily News, The Baltimore Sun and The Chicago Tribune, to buy the rest of the company’s shares.

The sale of Tribune, which the newspaper company hopes to conclude by July, requires regulatory approval and yes votes from company shareholders representing two-thirds of the non-Alden stock.

“We are in a hyper-growth industry,” said Dhivya Suryadevara, Stripe’s chief financial officer.Credit…Richard Drew/Associated Press

Thousands of financial technology start-ups are riding an investor frenzy driven by a growing realization that the industry is ripe for a tech makeover, writes Erin Griffith of The New York Times.

When the pandemic forced businesses to speed up their usage of digital tools, including e-commerce and online banking, the demand for what is known as fintech exploded.

Now start-ups with names like Blend, Brex and Dave that provide decidedly unglamorous banking, lending and payment processing offerings are hot tickets. That was punctuated this month when Stripe, a payments company, raised $600 million in a financing that valued it at $95 billion, the highest ever for a private start-up in the United States.

Financial technology companies are also making a splash on the stock market. On Tuesday, Robinhood, a stock trading app popular with young adults, filed for an initial public offering. And Coinbase, a cryptocurrency start-up, is scheduled to go public in the next few weeks in what could be a $100 billion listing.

In total, venture capital investors poured $44.4 billion into financial technology start-ups last year, up from $1.1 billion in 2009, according to PitchBook, which tracks private financing. Many investors are now making bold predictions that these start-ups will upend big banks, established credit card providers — and in some cases, the entire financial system.