FiveThirtyEight -
July 9, 2021
Overall, Republicans were among those most likely to say they’re hesitant or resistant to getting vaccinated. But 58 percent of Republicans who get their news from mainstream outlets and 54 percent of Republicans who get their news from Fox News said they had either already received a dose of a COVID-19 vaccine or would get vaccinated as soon as possible. Just 32 percent of Republicans who get their news from far-right news sources said the same.
Gallup -
July 9, 2021
Fewer than one in five Americans (18%) now say they are completely or mostly isolating themselves from nonhousehold members, a marker of strict social distancing that peaked at 75% near the onset of the pandemic last April.
CNN -
July 8, 2021
In total, three countries account for more than a third of all global deaths. The US, which has the highest number of fatalities at 606,000, accounts for 15% of the global total, followed by Brazil and India. The grim milestone, announced Wednesday, comes as new cases and deaths are dropping in the US and Europe, where significant numbers of residents have been vaccinated. But some developing countries, such as Indonesia, are still facing surging outbreaks, as authorities struggle to secure enough vaccines to protect citizens.
STAT -
July 8, 2021
With the global supply of Covid-19 vaccine still woefully inadequate, vaccine makers are scouring the pharmaceutical landscape for partners to ramp up manufacturing, and civil society groups are pressing politicians to waive intellectual property protections in a bid to spur still more production. But what if there was a simpler way? What if current supplies could be stretched, to vaccinate more people more quickly?
Vox -
July 8, 2021
1) What are boosters and how do they work? … 2) Which groups will need a booster shot for Covid-19? … 3) Are you more likely to need a booster if you got J&J or Oxford/AstraZeneca than if you got Pfizer or Moderna? … 4) Is it important for your booster shot to match the original vaccine you got? Or can you mix and match? …
CNN -
July 8, 2021
A new data analysis identifies clusters of unvaccinated people, most of them in the southern U.S., that are vulnerable to surges in Covid-19 cases and could become breeding grounds for even more deadly Covid-19 variants. … The five clusters are largely in parts of eight states, starting in the east in Georgia and stretching west to Texas and north to southern Missouri.
Yahoo! Finance -
July 8, 2021
New weekly jobless claims unexpectedly ticked higher last week in another sign of the labor market's choppy recovery. … Despite the past week's slight bump higher, initial unemployment claims have been on the decline for months now, as vaccinations enabled re-openings that in turn fueled a need for workers across industries to keep up with consumer demand.
Gallup -
July 8, 2021
The percentage of Americans who evaluate their lives well enough to be considered "thriving" on Gallup's Live Evaluation Index reached 59.2% in June, the highest in over 13 years of ongoing measurement and exceeding the previous high of 57.3% from September 2017. During the initial COVID-19 outbreak and economic shutdown, the thriving percentage plunged nearly 10 percentage points to 46.4% by late April 2020, tying the record low last measured during the Great Recession.
NPR -
July 7, 2021
The highly contagious delta variant now accounts for more than 51% of COVID-19 cases in the U.S., according to new estimates released by the CDC. … And in parts of the U.S., the delta strain accounts for more than 80% of new infections, including some Midwestern states like Missouri, Kansas and Iowa. … The good news is the vaccines being used in the U.S. all appear to be highly effective at protecting against serious disease, hospitalization and death.
TODAY -
July 7, 2021
The WHO on Tuesday recommended using arthritis drugs Actemra from Roche and Kevzara from Sanofi with corticosteroids for COVID-19 patients after data from some 11,000 patients showed they cut the risk of death. … the risk of dying within 28 days for patients getting one of the arthritis drugs with corticosteroids such as dexamethasone is 21%, compared with an assumed 25% risk among those who got standard care. For every 100 such patients, four more will survive, the WHO said.
HealthDay -
July 7, 2021
Women who are breastfeeding and wonder if COVID-19 vaccination is safe for their baby may be reassured by the results of a new study. Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, report that "vaccine-associated mRNA" -- the active components of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines -- "was not detected in 13 milk samples collected 4 to 48 hours after vaccination from 7 breastfeeding individuals."
Reuters -
July 7, 2021
U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday encouraged Americans who have not yet been vaccinated against COVID-19 to get their shots to protect themselves from the widely-spreading, highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus. Biden told reporters the United States will reach a mark of 160 million Americans being fully vaccinated by the end of this week, but he warned against complacency as the Delta variant spreads among those who have not been inoculated.
Fox News -
July 7, 2021
The research team, which published its findings online in the Journal of the American Medical Association, analyzed data from April 15-May 12, 2021, and May 13-June 9, 2021. … Both Ohio and the rest of the U.S. experienced significant declines in vaccination rates prior to the May 12 lottery announcement, but the researchers noted that after it launched adult vaccination rates did not significantly increase in either Ohio or the rest of the U.S.
Vox -
July 7, 2021
That polarization has now opened political rifts in vaccination rates, with people’s decision to get a shot or not today a better predictor of states’ electoral outcomes than their votes in prior elections. It’s led the US’s vaccination campaign to hit a wall, missing President Joe Biden’s July 4 goal. Meanwhile, the more infectious delta variant is spreading, raising the risk of infections, hospitalizations, and deaths in unvaccinated — and often heavily Republican — areas.
Reuters -
July 6, 2021
Israel reported on Monday a decrease in the effectiveness of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in preventing infections and symptomatic illness but said it remained highly effective in preventing serious illness. The decline coincided with the spread of the Delta variant and the end of social distancing restrictions in Israel. Vaccine effectiveness in preventing both infection and symptomatic disease fell to 64% since June 6, the Health Ministry said. At the same time the vaccine was 93% effective in preventing hospitalizations and serious illness from the coronavirus.
NPR -
July 6, 2021
Currently, 67% of adult Americans have gotten either the first shot of the Moderna or Pfizer vaccine, or the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine. … But drilling down from national rates, the picture varies widely at the regional level, and from state to state. For example, Massachusetts and most states in the Northeast reached or exceeded 70% (for adults 18 and older) in June. Tennessee and most southern states have vaccination rates between 50% and 60%, and administration rates are slowing down.