COVID-19 News from Around the Web

Nearly 180,000 children in the US were diagnosed with coronavirus infections from November 26 to December 10, bringing the cumulative total to over 1.6 million US cases since the pandemic began, the American Academy of Pediatrics said Tuesday. Children account for a little more than 12% of all Covid-19 cases in the states that report cases by age. The group, which represents pediatricians, noted there was a 23% increase in child Covid-19 cases during that period.

Between April and September 2020, his team conducted an online survey of about 6,200 U.S. adults. Roughly 1,000 participants answered questions about loneliness and their lockdown status each month. By September, close to 65% of those who were locked down to reduce the spread of COVID-19 reported high levels of loneliness versus 48% of those who were living without such restrictions, the survey showed.

The CDC wants Americans who receive the COVID-19 vaccine to wear that fact like a badge of honor, even releasing its own design for bright orange and white stickers or buttons that say "I got my COVID-19 vaccine!" Experts say encouraging people who get the COVID-19 vaccine to acknowledge it with some kind of "swag" could help promote efforts to vaccinate as many Americans as possible or serve as a public reminder for people to get the shot when it's available to them and follow up when they're due for the second dose required for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

The newly-approved Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is slowly making its way across the US. But those eagerly waiting their turn need to beware of dangerous scams and misinformation about the vaccine's distribution. Several government organizations have warned against scammers promising access to the vaccine in exchange for sensitive personal information, as well as companies selling bogus treatments promising to cure or prevent Covid-19.

A California Healthline review of local data from the state’s 12 most populous counties found that communities with relatively high poverty rates are experiencing confirmed COVID-19 infection rates two to three times as high as rates in wealthier areas. By late November, the analysis found, about 49 of every 1,000 residents in the state’s poorest urban areas — defined as communities with poverty rates higher than 30% — had tested positive for COVID-19. By comparison, about 16 of every 1,000 residents in comparatively affluent urban areas —communities with poverty rates lower than 10% — had tested positive.

The coronavirus vaccine made by Moderna is highly protective for adults and prevents severe cases of Covid-19, according to data released on Tuesday by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration. Based on the encouraging findings, the agency intends to grant emergency authorization for use of the vaccine on Friday, people familiar with the F.D.A.’s plans said. The decision would give millions of Americans access to a second coronavirus vaccine beginning as early as next week. The review by the F.D.A. confirms Moderna’s earlier assessment that its vaccine had an efficacy rate of 94.1 percent in a trial of 30,000 people. Side effects, including fever, headache and fatigue, were unpleasant but not dangerous, the agency found.

The rollout of the first coronavirus vaccine began Monday morning and marked a major turning point in the U.S.'s battle against surging case numbers as the first doses of the Pfizer medication was administered to health care workers and nursing home staffers. Sandra Lindsay, a critical care nurse from Northwell Long Island Jewish Medical Center was the first vaccinated in New York at 9:23 a.m. during a livestreamed event with Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

The U.S. crossed the 300,000 threshold on the same it day it launched the biggest vaccination campaign in American history, with health care workers rolling up their sleeves for COVID-19 shots Monday. The death toll was reported by Johns Hopkins University from data supplied by health authorities across the U.S. The real number of lives lost is believed to be much higher … some public health experts project 100,000 more could die before the end of January.

Despite a growing number of Covid-related travel restrictions nationwide and caution from the federal government, more than 4 million people in the US spent Thanksgiving away from home, including more than 1.6 million who traveled out of state for the holiday, according to data shared with CNN by The Center for New Data. … Nearly 2.5 million people -- more than half of those who spent the holiday away from home -- traveled more than 60 miles to their holiday destination, and about 91,000 devices were detected flying, the data shows.

Tisha Coleman has lived in close-knit Linn County, Kansas, for 42 years and never felt so alone. As the public health administrator, she’s struggled every day of the coronavirus pandemic to keep her rural county along the Missouri border safe. In this community with no hospital, she’s failed to persuade her neighbors to wear masks and take precautions against COVID-19, even as cases rise. In return, she’s been harassed, sued, vilified and called a Democrat, an insult in her circles. Even her husband hasn’t listened to her, refusing to require customers to wear masks at the family’s hardware store in Mound City. … By November, the months of fighting over masks and quarantines were already wearing her down. Then she got COVID-19, likely from her husband, who she thinks picked it up at the hardware store. Her mother got it, too, and died Sunday, 11 days after she was put on a ventilator.

Apple and Google jointly releasing software in May that enabled state and national public health departments to build such “exposure notification” (EN) apps. But as the pandemic burned through the country, slow development, sparse public outreach and suspicion of the new software from both states and users stymied the effort for months. … But EN app adoption rates in some states are now skyrocketing by comparison, thanks in part to a new approach from Apple and Google.

As Covid-19 has spread from big cities to rural communities, it has stressed not only hospitals, but also what some euphemistically call "last responders." The crush has overwhelmed morgues, funeral homes and religious leaders, required ingenuity and even changed the rituals of honoring the dead. … Officials in many smaller cities and towns learned from seeing the overflow of bodies during this spring's first wave of Covid-19 deaths in places such as Detroit, where nurses at Detroit Medical Center Sinai-Grace Hospital alerted the media to bodies accumulating in hospital storage rooms.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers unveiled a detailed COVID-19 aid proposal on Monday in hopes it would serve as a model for its battling leaders to follow as they try to negotiate a final agreement on a new round of virus relief. The dozen or so lawmakers unveiled two bills. One is a $748 billion aid package containing money for struggling businesses, the unemployed, schools, and for vaccine distribution. The other bill proposes a $160 billion aid package for state and local governments that’s favored by Democrats and GOP-sought provisions shielding businesses from COVID-related lawsuits.

Economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic has set back decades of progress against the most severe forms of malnutrition and is likely to kill 168,000 children before any global recovery takes hold, according to a study released Monday by 30 international organizations. … Osendarp, who led the research, estimates an additional 11.9 million children — most in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa — will suffer from stunting and wasting, the most severe forms of malnutrition

British scientists are trying to establish whether the rapid spread in southern England of a new variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 is linked to key mutations they have detected in the strain, they said on Tuesday. The mutations include changes to the important “spike” protein that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus uses to infect human cells, a group of scientists tracking the genetics of the virus said, but it is not yet clear whether these are making it more infectious.

The first of many freezer-packed COVID-19 vaccine vials made their way to distribution sites across the United States on Sunday, as the nation’s pandemic deaths approached the horrifying new milestone of 300,000. The rollout of the Pfizer vaccine, the first to be approved by the FDA, ushers in the biggest vaccination effort in U.S. history — one that health officials hope the American public will embrace, even as some have voiced initial skepticism or worry. Shots are expected to be given to health care workers and nursing home residents beginning Monday. Quick transport is key for the vaccine, especially since this one must be stored at extremely low temperatures — about 94 degrees below zero.