COVID-19 has killed every 435,000 Americans, and infections have continued to rise despite the introduction of a pair of vaccines late in 2020. USA TODAY is tracking the news. Keep refreshing this page for the newest updates. check-in for our Coronavirus Watch newsletter for updates to your inbox, join our Facebook group, or scroll through our in-depth answers to reader questions.
Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot vaccine shields against COVID-19, and while it's not as effective as different vaccines already authorized within the U.S., it appears to be extremely effective against severe disease.
Johnson & Johnson said Friday that data from its late-stage trial within the U.S. and 7 other countries showed the vaccine had an overall 66% effectiveness in preventing moderate to severe illness.
The two-shot vaccines, from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech, are quite 94% effective, but J&J's global research chief, Dr. Mathai Mammen, said, "Gambling on one dose was certainly worthwhile."
Because of its single-dose regimen, the J&J vaccine has been described as a "game-changer" within the campaign against the coronavirus pandemic. and therefore the vaccine doesn't get to be kept frozen, allowing it to be distributed through normal vaccine supply chains without the necessity for brand spanking new, expensive equipment.
Meanwhile, Novavax, a Gaithersburg, Maryland-based biotechnology firm, showed its COVID-19 candidate vaccine to be safe and roughly 90% effective against the virus.
COVID-19 vaccines for teachers comes right down to location – and luck
Amid fraught negotiations nationwide about reopening more schools for in-person learning, especially in large districts, vaccines for teachers are now viewed as a lynchpin for getting kids back to class.
But a chaotic vaccine rollout combined with a patchwork of conflicting local guidance has raised serious ethical questions on where and the way teachers fall in line. and that is resulted in wildly uneven access, meaning that youngsters in some communities may have an opportunity to return to colleges before others because their teachers had more access to inoculations.
"It's a multitude," said Megan Ranney, an emergency physician, and researcher at Brown University in Rhode Island. "We'll be lucky if we get teachers getting vaccinated by March or April in most states."
In some cases, teachers may qualify for the primary priority group supported by their age or medical conditions. But as states and localities follow Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on who to prioritize, each can add its variations.
White House officials: Vaccination pace is before schedule
The Biden administration is running before its initial vaccination goal but hasn’t reached the upper pace that President Joe Biden said could be possible, officials announced Friday.
An average of 1.2 million shots each day were administered over the past seven days, White House senior adviser Andy Slavitt told reporters at one among the pandemic briefings the administration has pledged to carry 3 times every week. Biden has promised to deliver 100 million shots within the first 100 days of his administration.
Questioned about whether that goal is ambitious enough, Biden said Monday that he hopes the pace will accelerate to 1.5 million each day. Slavitt told reporters that he wasn’t announcing a replacement target, “other than to inform you that, every day, when the amount comes out, all folks that are breathlessly awaiting the amount and searching for as high variety as possible.”
Slavitt also outlined steps the administration is taking to build up vaccinations, through increasing the vaccine supply and speeding up distribution. These include extending more funding, supplies, and logistical support from the Federal Emergency Management Association for vaccination sites, allowing recently retired doctors and nurses who are still licensed to administer COVID-19 vaccines, and stepping up the activation of the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service.
CDC director Walensky: Community spread of South African variant is here
Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said that community spread of the highly contagious South African variant of the coronavirus is probably going already occurring within us.
Two cases of the variant were first reported within us on Thursday in South Carolina. The CDC says that preliminary data suggest that, just like the U.K. variant, the one that originated in South Africa is more contagious than other variants of the virus.
"I think one among the concerning things is that we all know these two people didn't know each other which they didn't visit South Africa, therefore, the presumption is, at now, that there has been community spread of this strain," Walensky said Friday morning in an interview with NBC's "Today" show.
CDC: Pfizer, Moderna vaccines are often used interchangeably in rare cases
Patients are often administered the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for his or her first dose and therefore the Moderna vaccine for his or her the second dose, and the other way around, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday.
In a briefing hosted by the Infectious Diseases Society of America, the agency said this is often only permissible if a patient doesn’t know which vaccine they got as a primary dose and has no documentation.
"In these extremely rare situations, CDC clarified that any available mRNA COVID-19 vaccine could also be administered because the second dose a minimum of 28 days after the primary dose," said Dr. Jay Butler, CDC deputy director of infectious diseases.
The agency acknowledged the new guidance is backed by little or no data on safety and effectiveness, but Butler said this was a far better approach than restarting the series and ultimately getting three doses.
Johnson & Johnson vaccine fully protects against hospitalization, death
Johnson & Johnson said Friday that data from its late-stage clinical test show its COVID-19 vaccine completely protects against COVID-related hospitalization and death a month after vaccination.
Although the J&J data show the vaccine is a smaller amount effective than others in its overall protection, the single-shot vaccine was still 85% effective against severe disease across all regions studied, the corporate said. The shot's effectiveness against severe disease also increased over time, with none of the vaccinated volunteers reporting severe disease quite 49 days after vaccination.
Side effects appear to be lower with this vaccine than the already approved ones, too.
That the shot is often given in only one dose and stored during a standard refrigerator would make a big contribution to the fight against COVID-19, said Moncef Slaoui, who helped run Operation Warp Speed during the Trump Administration and is now an advisor to the Biden Administration.
"From a public health standpoint, if you get around and within every week or two from that shot you're now vaccinated, and therefore the vaccine is often stable at fridge temperatures, it is so much easier (than current vaccines)," he said. "Look how difficult it's to vaccinate people. If you narrow that by 50%, it's transformational."
How COVID-19 is shaping the Super Bowl
An NFL season like no other will conclude on Feb. 7 with Super Bowl 55, which can be unprecedented in some ways itself.
A few ways Super Bowl week and Super Sunday are going to be far different during a pandemic:
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are going to be the primary team to host an excellent Bowl in their stadium, but only 22,000 fans are going to be allowed to attend.
The traditional Super Bowl week kickoff event, known originally as "Media Day" but lately as "Opening Night," is going to be drastically altered Monday. to start with, there'll be no media. All interviews are going to be done via Zoom with just nine players from each team rather than full rosters.
The Chiefs aren't expected to get on-site until next Friday or Saturday. Super Bowl teams usually spend every week at the host city – practicing, conducting interviews at media events, and dispersing into the community.
WHO team visits Wuhan hospital that had early COVID-19 patients
The World Health Organization team investigating the origins of the coronavirus visited a Wuhan hospital Friday where Chinese officials say the primary COVID-19 patients were treated quite a year ago.
The long-awaited WHO mission has become politically charged, and it's going to take years to determine the origins of the virus, requiring extensive testing and analysis.
Team members from the WHO and Chinese officials met earlier at a hotel as they prepared for a series of field visits in and around Wuhan within the coming days.
Pain relief medications okay to treat COVID-19 vaccine side effects
Avoid pain relief medications before getting the COVID-19 vaccine, but they're "perfectly fine" to require after, experts say.
Normal side effects of the COVID-19 vaccine include headache, fever, body aches, and chills, and to attenuate the discomfort, some Americans may address pain relievers like acetaminophen or ibuprofen.
Studies on how the medications could have an impact on the effectiveness of the vaccine are sparse and inconsistent, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and therefore the World Health Organization both recommend against the preventive use of pain relievers, though allow them if symptoms develop after.
In a study ublished within the peer-reviewed Journal of Virology, researchers found nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug drugs like ibuprofen can reduce the assembly of antibodies and impact other aspects of the immune reaction to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19
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