July 1, 2021. New York Times. Coronavirus stuff.

July 1, 2021

An informed guide to the pandemic, with the latest developments and expert advice about prevention and treatment.

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The New York Times

By Amelia Nierenberg and Jonathan Wolfe

The Delta variant is not driving a hospitalization surge in England, health data shows. Digital Covid certificates aimed at facilitating free movement in the E.U. came into force across the bloc. The Biden administration is expected to advance a law to protect patients from surprise medical bills. Get the latest updates here, as well as maps and a vaccine tracker.

The view from New Zealand

Countries across the Asia-Pacific region — including Australia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Bangladesh — are scrambling to slow the spread of the Delta variant. Many governments are reimposing restrictions. For societies that had just begun to reopen, it’s a jarring reminder that the pandemic is far from over.

For insight into the situation in Australia and New Zealand, we turned to Natasha Frost, who writes the Europe Edition of the Morning Briefing.

Natasha: When I returned from New York to my home country of New Zealand in October, it was like slipping through a portal into another world — one where people casually brushed past strangers while waiting in line, routinely went without a mask and even shared plates of fries.

A few months later, Auckland went into lockdown because of what would eventually total 15 Covid cases. In most of the world, so few cases would have been cause for celebration. In New Zealand, it was a sign that something had gone drastically wrong.

It’s a similar story in Australia, where a recent outbreak of over 200 cases has led to about half the country being placed under heavy restrictions. (In the U.S., new cases routinely exceed 10,000 a day.)

Having decided almost from the outset to pursue an elimination strategy, Australia and New Zealand have undergone a radically different experience of the pandemic from the rest of the world. As well as having shorter lockdowns and fewer restrictions, we’ve been insulated from much grief and suffering.

Still, it hasn’t always been easy. Closing borders has cut many people off from their families, decimated our tourist industries and prevented some citizens from returning home from overseas. But few would choose the alternative. Our total deaths from the coronavirus are in the dozens.

The latest chapter of the pandemic, where many people in European and North American countries are vaccinated and societies are steadily opening up, is different for us yet again. Our inoculation campaigns have been sluggish. Our borders remain firmly shut even to our citizens. And though we have far fewer cases than in most of the rest of the world, lockdowns remain an active tool.

Our approach post-pandemic is also likely to be different. Some countries like Singapore are already planning to handle Covid-19 as a new endemic disease, to be managed rather than eradicated. But having invested so much in a zero-Covid strategy, Australia and New Zealand seem likely to continue their hard line, even after most people have been vaccinated.

“Now that we have really effective vaccines and public health measures,” said Michael Baker, an epidemiologist at New Zealand’s University of Otago, “we will aim for no transmission in our community.”

Frontline workers speak out

Outside of hospitals, especially in places with high vaccine rates, people have started to change the way they talk about the pandemic.

“Once this is all over” has become “now that this is all over.” Friends talk about a “post-pandemic” world, exhaling in a shared agreement that “things are back to normal.”

But not frontline workers.

Doctors and nurses are reeling from rising Covid-19 cases in parts of the U.S. But even where cases are in sharp decline, they’re also coping with burnout and prolonged stress from a pandemic that, for them, seems never-ending.

It’s not just frustration, exhaustion or post-traumatic stress. The pandemic worsened chronic staffing shortages, as thousands left the field or died on the frontlines.

In the South and Mountain West, where the transmissible Delta variant is gaining traction among the unvaccinated, staff members share a familiar sense of dread and frustration. Last time, they watched their neighbors refuse to wear masks or socially distance. This time, people refuse to get vaccines.

“People think they are exercising their rights by refusing to get vaccinated, but in reality, they’re exposing themselves and others to risk,” said Dr. Clay Smith, an emergency room doctor who travels between two distant hospitals in South Dakota and Wyoming.

In Missouri, caseloads increased more than 40 percent from two weeks earlier. In Springfield, the CoxHealth Medical Center had to reopen the 80-bed Covid unit it had shuttered in May. There, the Delta variant comprised 93 percent of all cases last week, said Dr. Terrence Coulter, a critical care specialist.

“The country has started the end zone dance before we cross the goal line,” Dr. Coulter said. “The truth is we’re fumbling the ball before we even get there.”

Vaccine rollout

Amid lagging vaccination rates, Romania is looking to offload doses before they expire. Seven countries in the E.U. have approved India’s Covishield as an acceptable vaccine for travel, the BBC reports. In the U.S., the people you live with are likely to share your vaccination status.

See how the vaccine rollout is going in your county and state.

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What else we’re following

An outbreak is crashing over Myanmar and doctors are on strike to protest the junta, which has neglected the pandemic. Mexico’s death toll from Covid-19 could be 60 percent higher than official numbers, Reuters reports. Indonesia, which is especially hard-hit, announced restrictions for parts of Java and Bali islands in an effort to contain the Delta variant. Almost five out of every six virus cases went undetected in the first months of the pandemic, The Los Angeles Times reports. The W.H.O. said crowds for European Championship soccer games are driving infections in Europe. Queens, N.Y., was once the epicenter of the virus. Many neighborhoods, although alive with hustle, are struggling to rebound. As weddings restart, officiants add pandemic protections. Indoor smoking will return in to casinos in Atlantic City, N.J. on the Fourth of July. A new study suggests that pets often catch Covid-19 from their owners, the BBC reports. The Washington Post has advice for taking a pandemic-purchased pooch on its first road trip.

What you’re doing

In March 2020, we moved my 89-year-old mother from a senior residential community to our home. Our two grown sons also moved home, thinking our little farm was a safe place to ride out the pandemic. Then we all got Covid, brought home inadvertently by the N.Y.C. son. We got through it, but preparing meals for five people, while ill, was grueling. . The kitchen looked like a bomb went off for weeks. Fifteen months later, and I am tired of the trivial family disagreements and grown kids assuming they know more about everything — because their parents are now supposedly “over the hill”! I am also tired of my mother being sassy. I am dreaming of simple dinners for two with my husband, less toilet paper, loving our adult children from a distance, and a mother who is safe and cared for by someone else most of the time. I know I will miss this close family time someday, and I am extremely grateful to have become re-acquainted with my adult children, and that my mother was not locked up in an institution for a year. But right now I just want to get back to living a simple life. It is time. — A tired mother, wife and daughter, Bucks County, Pa.

I'm adding this to my list of favorite chess quotes.

Masud Rana

I like chess.

Jamalpur  Bangladesh

Some good news for the gravedigger business.

New York Times

The number of confirmed cases is growing faster than ever as new hot spots emerge around the world.

The pandemic is ebbing in some of the countries that were hit hard early on, but the number of new cases is growing faster than ever worldwide, with more than 100,000 reported each day.

Twice as many countries have reported a rise in new cases over the past two weeks as have reported declines, according to a New York Times database. On May 30, more new cases were reported in a single day worldwide than ever before: 134,064. The increase has been driven by emerging hot spots in Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

Over all, there have been more than 6.3 million reported cases worldwide and more than 380,000 known deaths. More than a quarter of all known deaths have been in the United States. But the geography of the pandemic is changing quickly.

The increases in some countries can be attributed to improved testing programs. But in many places, it appears that the virus has only now arrived with a wide scope and fatal force. Here is a look at some of the countries where the number of new cases has been doubling every two to three weeks.

The death toll in Brazil, Latin America’s largest country, passed 30,000 on Tuesday, when officials reported 1,262 deaths, which was the nation’s highest one-day total. President Jair Bolsonaro, who has repeatedly minimized the threat, said, “We are sorry for all the dead, but that’s everyone’s destiny.” Brazil now has more than half a million known cases, second only to the United States.

But it has no health minister: Two were forced out in less than a month after they balked at expanding the use of hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug promoted by President Trump and subsequently Mr. Bolsonaro that has not been proved effective against the virus. And despite the growing number of cases and hospitals that are close to capacity, businesses have started reopening in major cities, including Rio de Janeiro, Manaus and Vitória.

Peru has more than 170,000 confirmed cases, despite taking the virus seriously early on. The president, Martín Vizcarra, ordered one of the first national lockdowns in South America. Though the official virus death toll stands at around 5,000, Peru had 14,000 more deaths than usual in May, suggesting that a growing number of people are dying at home as hospitals struggle to handle a flood of cases.

The pandemic provoked an exodus from Lima, the capital, as people unable to work fled by bus, and even by foot, to family farms. It is widely expected that the number of new cases and of deaths will continue to rise in coming weeks as winter nears and the economy slowly reopens.

For months, Egypt, the Arab world’s most populous country, seemed to avoid the worst of the pandemic. In early March, Egypt confirmed 45 cases on a Nile tour boat in the area, among both crew and passengers. But recently the number of cases there has been rising significantly, reaching 27,536 on Tuesday.

The recent death of a young doctor, who was denied treatment for Covid-19 at an overwhelmed hospital, ignited a revolt by members of the medical staff. They said the government had failed to provide adequate protective equipment and training to front-line workers.

With more than 35,000 confirmed infections, the most in Africa, South Africa still has a growing number of new cases, despite enacting a strict lockdown in March that included a ban on the sale of tobacco and alcohol. The prohibition was lifted this month even though the total number of cases continued to rise.

Bangladesh now has 55,000 known cases, and its troubles were compounded last month by Cyclone Amphan, a deadly storm that tore through communities under lockdown.

This week, the country reported its first death from Covid-19 in a refugee camp: A 71-year-old Rohingya man died May 31 while receiving treatment in an isolation center. His death raised fears about the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees who, after fleeing Myanmar, live in camps with tightly packed tents and shacks.

Gravediggers at the Vila Formosa cemetery in São Paulo, Brazil, last week.Credit...

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India and Bangladesh are having a bad day.

New York Times

Super Cyclone Bears Down on India and Bangladesh

Hundreds of thousands have been evacuated as Cyclone Amphan approaches, one of the region’s most powerful storms in decades.

By Sameer Yasir and Jeffrey Gettleman

May 19, 2020

NEW DELHI — A crushing cyclone barreled up the Bay of Bengal on Tuesday, heading for a swampy stretch along the border of India and Bangladesh and threatening to unleash 165-mile-an-hour winds and massive floods when it makes landfall on Wednesday.

As the cyclone, Amphan — categorized by Indian meteorologists as equivalent to a Category 5 hurricane — neared the coastal areas, hundreds of thousands of people in India and Bangladesh were bracing for the worst and had started moving toward emergency shelters.

In the eastern Indian state of Odisha, the authorities have fewer shelters to work with because many have been turned into Covid-19 quarantine centers. Indian officials are now struggling to evacuate people and prepare for floods and destruction while still under a partial lockdown to fight the coronavirus. Humanitarian officials are worried that by packing people into shelters, coronavirus infections could spread even further.

The authorities said Tuesday evening that the cyclone was weakening as it moved closer to land. But officials said it could gain intensity overnight. “Its impact is unlikely to be very severe if it maintains the current speed,” said Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, the director general of India’s meteorological office.

Some of the emergency cyclone shelters were being filled to only 50 percent capacity to reduce the risk of spreading the coronavirus.

Fishing trawlers in the Bay of Bengal have been ordered back to shore.

The storm is now predicted to pass over Kolkata, one of India's biggest cities, which is full of historic buildings. Landfall is still predicted for Wednesday afternoon

Satya Narayan Pradhan, the chief of India’s National Disaster Response Force, said the incoming storm could “wreak havoc.”

“We must take it very seriously,” he said.

Indian officials said the storm was one of the most dangerous super cyclones to hit India in decades, since a cyclone in 1999 killed more than 9,000 people. That storm packed winds of more than 170 miles per hour, devastating many states along India’s coast.

Since then, the authorities in India and Bangladesh have significantly improved their emergency response measures, drafting meticulous evacuation plans and building thousands of sturdy emergency shelters, some of which can accommodate several thousand people each.

Last year, the Indian authorities whisked more than a million people out of the path of a huge storm, deploying millions of text messages, tens of thousands of volunteers, nearly 1,000 emergency workers and television commercials, coastal sirens, buses, police officers and public address systems.

Many scientists believe that climate change and warmer temperatures are making these super storms even worse.

In Bangladesh, officials said the storm could bring slashing rains to the muddy, wooden shacks of about a million Rohingya refugees living in Cox’s Bazar. Those refugees fled ethnically driven massacres in Myanmar in 2017 and have been rendered stateless, stuck in limbo in squalid camps in Bangladesh that have been flooded time and again.

Many people in Bangladesh, apparently, are not heeding the calls to evacuate and move into emergency shelters, despite being told about the risks.

“There is a sense fear among people,” said Selim Shahrier, a station manager at a community radio station in southwestern Bangladesh. “They hesitate to leave their belongings.”

The storm surge from Amphan is likely to inundate low-lying areas. The storm is also likely to cause extensive damage to crops, houses, power lines and vegetation, Indian officials said.

“Our lives have always been filled with fear,” said Arjun Mohanty, a teacher in the Bhadrak district of Odisha, where the government had turned a shelter into a quarantine center for suspected Covid-19 cases. “First it was coronavirus, now the storm wants to kill us.”

In eastern India on Tuesday, emergency crews dressed in orange jumpsuits prowled coastal areas, blaring messages from megaphones that urged people to move into shelters as soon as possible. Indian television channels showed footage of the crews moving from place to place as the sea was whipped into a white-green froth behind them.

Indian officials also sent fleets of buses to scoop up vulnerable people and bring them to the shelters, which are stocked with water and food.

Fierce winds and intense rains have already pounded the southern Indian state of Kerala, uprooting trees, knocking down electricity poles, ripping the tiles off the roofs of many homes and damaging a famous temple.

Eashwari Thampan, a shopkeeper in the Kottayam district of Kerala, said she was sitting at home with family members when a tree crashed on their roof. Her family members, she said, ran for their lives.

“The wind was so strong it felt as if it was going to take us with it,” Ms. Thampan said. “We thought all of us would die.”

Jeffrey Gettleman is the South Asia bureau chief, based in New Delhi. He was the winner of a Pulitzer Prize in 2012 for international reporting. @gettleman • Facebook