A coronavirus vaccine syringe
More than one million were administered in the United States on both Thursday and Friday, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Thursday marked the first time since early July that the United States crossed the one-million mark since early July.
Another important milestone was crossed on Friday as well: Over 200 million people in the United States have now received at least one dose of vaccine.
The race to vaccinate comes amidst an alarming rise in new Covid cases and hospitalizations. States which had lagged up until now, such as Oklahoma and Louisiana, are now outpacing the national average.
As of Saturday morning, the world has recorded 211.8 million Covid-19 cases and over 4.4 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, 189.6 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus.
The average daily number of new coronavirus cases in the United States over the past 14 days is 145,913, a 37% change and a trend that is fueled by the highly contagious India, or Delta, variant. The average daily death toll over the same period is 975, an increase of 96%.
Since the start of the pandemic the United States has recorded 38.4 million cases, a higher figure than any other country and one that is followed by India, which now has 32.4 million officially recorded cases and 434,209 officially recorded deaths, although experts believe that both number are in reality significantly higher.
Since the start of vaccinations at the end of last year over 4.88 billion doses have been administered across the globe as of Saturday morning, an increase of 0.04 billion over the past 24 hours and the equivalent of 66 doses for every 100 people, which is virtually unchanged over the previous 24 hours.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that, as of Saturday, 200.4 million people in the United States – or 60.4% – have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine. Of that population, 51.2%, or 169.9 million people, are now fully vaccinated, and the total number of doses that have been dispensed in the United States is now 360.6 million. Breaking this down further, 72.7% of the population over the age of 18 – or 187.8 million people – has received at least a first inoculation and 62.2% of the same group – or 160.5 million people – is fully vaccinated.
In Texas, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick blamed blacks and Democrats for the spread of the coronavirus in the Lone Star State, responding to a question by Fax News host Laura Ingraham asking whether his and Governor Greg Abbott’s policies are to blame for the surge in cases there. “The biggest group in most states are African Americans who have not been vaccinated,” he said on a Fox News program, referencing new infections and hospitalizations. While African Americans to have lower vaccination rates than other Americans, they account for a far smaller percentage of the population in the state, and they only account for 16% of total cases.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is poised to give full approval to Pfizer-BioNTech’s two-dose coronavirus vaccine on Monday. Health officials hope that the approval will help Americans who have been hesitant to take a dose of a vaccine that was only authorized for emergency use finally get vaccinated. The approval process is also expected to pave the way for a series of vaccination mandates by public and private organizations who were awaiting final regulatory approval.
Finally, the Myrtle Beach Sun is reporting that, even as the federal government is extending the national mask mandate, virtually no one at Myrtle Beach International Airport bothers to don a face mask any more. A reporter from the Sun said that there is no signage reminding people to wear masks outside of the security checkpoint in the airport and Horry County police officers not only haven’t written a ticket for mask violations in the past six weeks but they themselves violate federal law and don’t wear them either.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
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