JACKSON, Miss. - Officials in Mississippi say about 2% of the coronavirus vaccinations given so far in the state have gone to people with out-of-state addresses.
Mississippi guidelines say vaccination is available to anyone 65 or older or to those who are least 16 years old and have underlying health conditions that might make them more vulnerable to the virus.
The state’s top public health officials said Monday that the vaccination is supposed to be limited to Mississippi residents, or to people from other states who work in Mississippi. However, they said people giving the shots do not check identification or verify that out-of-state residents work in Mississippi.
The New Orleans Advocate/The Times-Picayune recently reported that Louisiana residents are traveling to Mississippi to be vaccinated because Louisiana has tighter vaccination eligibility guidelines.
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THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:
- California joined with the federal government to open two new mass vaccination centers as test areas for new President Joseph Biden’s effort to create 100 such sites nationwide in 100 days.
- Evidence is mounting that having COVID-19 may not protect against getting infected again with some of the new variants.
-The Dutch government is extending the country’s curfew until March 3, declaring that was necessary to slow the spread of the more infectious coronavirus variant first detected in Britain.
-The drive to vaccinate Americans against the coronavirus is gaining speed and newly recorded cases have fallen to their lowest level in three months, but authorities worry that raucous Super Bowl celebrations could fuel new outbreak s.
- South Africa seeks a new virus vaccination pla n after deciding not to use AstraZeneca jab, fearing it’s not effective enough against the country’s dominant variant
- Follow all of AP’s pandemic coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic, https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
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HERE’S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:
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MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Hundreds of people have showed up at Alabama vaccination sites as the state drastically expands eligibility to receive immunizations against the coronavirus.
Starting Monday, people who qualify for vaccinations in Alabama include everyone 65 and older, educators, grocery store workers, some manufacturing workers, public transit workers, agriculture employees, state legislators and constitutional officers.
Only health care workers, first responders, nursing home residents and people 75 and older were eligible previously.
The change means as many as 1.5 million people in the state now qualify for shots, up from about 700,000. But vaccine supply is still limited, and officials are asking people who aren’t at high risk for becoming ill to let other people get vaccines first.
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PORTLAND, Ore. - Appointments to receive the coronavirus vaccine in Oregon have been quickly booked as residents who are 80 years and older are now eligible to receive doses.
Seniors in Oregon have waited weeks to receive the vaccine, after the original eligibility date was delayed and then Gov. Kate Brown decided to prioritize educators ahead of the elderly.
The elderly have been the hardest hit group in state when it comes to the virus - people 60 years and older account for 90% of Oregon’s COVID-19 deaths.
On Monday, seniors 80 and older began to receive shots. And media reports say every available appointment for seniors were booked up.
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LANSING, Mich. - A judge in Michigan has dismissed disorderly conduct charges against six hair stylists who were ticketed last spring during a protest at the state Capitol.
The women were cutting hair to protest Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s decision to keep barber shops and salons closed for nearly three months because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The women argued the tickets should be dismissed because the state Supreme Court ruled in October that many Whitmer orders were issued under an unconstitutional law.
Lansing District Judge Kristen Simmons granted the request Monday.
There was no immediate comment from the attorney general’s office.
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INDIANAPOLIS - Indiana lawmakers have taken the first step toward overriding the governor’s veto of a bill blocking cities from regulating rental properties.
Gov. Eric Holcomb had said the law shouldn’t be adopted during the coronavirus pandemic, and critics of the measure argued it would prevent local officials from protecting tenants from abusive landlords.
The state Senate voted 30-17 on Monday to override the veto that Holcomb issued in March following last year’s legislative session. The bill’s supporters say it avoids a “hodgepodge” of local regulations.
The state House would also have to vote to override the veto for it to be overturned.
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GENEVA - The head of the World Health Organization said Monday the emergence of new COVID-19 variants has raised questions about whether or not existing vaccines will work, calling it “concerning news” that the vaccines developed so far may be less effective against the variant first detected in South Africa.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a media briefing that South Africa’s decision on Sunday to suspend its vaccination campaign using the AstraZeneca vaccine is “a reminder that we need to do everything we can to reduce circulation of the virus with proven public health measures.”
He said it was increasingly clear that vaccine manufacturers would need to tweak their existing shots to address the ongoing genetic evolution of the coronavirus, saying booster shots would most likely be necessary, especially since new variants of the virus are now spreading globally and appear likely to become the predominant strains.
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WASHINGTON - President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris “virtually toured” a federally supported mass-vaccination site Monday in Glendale, Arizona.
The drive-thru 24-hour facility at the State Farm Stadium is giving one COVID-19 shot about every 10 seconds.
Biden and Harris have promised to open 100 similar sites across the country in the coming weeks and have called on Congress to provide funding for even more. Biden has ramped up federal support for the facilities through the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Pentagon.
The president said he is ahead of pace to deliver on his promise of providing 100 million injections in the first 100 days of his presidency, saying, “I think we’ll exceed that considerably.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that more than 22 million doses have been given since Biden’s inauguration less than three weeks ago.
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SEATTLE - Dozens of Washington state hospitals have learned N95 respirator masks believed to be purchased from 3M Company are counterfeits that were not manufactured by the company.
The Seattle Times reported the Washington State Hospital Association alerted the state’s hospitals about a notification from 3M that some masks were knockoffs.
The association has asked the state’s 115 hospitals to sort through mask supplies and pull potentially affected equipment.
Several hospitals sent masks to 3M for testing and the company confirmed some were counterfeit.
It is unclear whether the counterfeit masks are less safe than those manufactured by 3M.
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JERUSALEM - Israeli and Greek officials have agreed to clear the way for vaccinated tourists to travel between their Mediterranean nations in a bid to boost their economies amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced the agreement in Jerusalem on Monday. The deal is designed to allow tourists with vaccination certificates to move between the countries “without any limitations, no self-isolation, nothing,” Netanyahu said at a press conference.
Both economies have large sectors devoted to tourism, an industry devastated by travel restrictions during the 11-month pandemic.
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MOSCOW - Russia issued updated statistics Monday on coronavirus-linked deaths which showed that 162,429 people with COVID-19 died last year, a number far higher than previously reported by government officials.
The state statistics agency, Rosstat, released its figures for December on Monday, updating its count of coronavirus-linked deaths that includes cases where the virus wasn’t the main cause of death and where the virus was suspected but not confirmed.
Rosstat’s count is much higher than the 77,068 deaths that have been reported by the Russian government’s coronavirus task force so far, including deaths that occurred in January and February. Russian officials ascribe that to different counting methods, saying the task force only includes deaths where COVID-19 was the main cause.
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MADRID - Spain’s top virus official claims that a slowdown in coronavirus contagion can be linked to the vaccination of nearly 800,000 residents, although he warned that it’s early for complacency and that pressure in hospitals continues to be a challenge.
Monday’s Health Ministry update showed over 62,000 accumulated fatalities for COVID-19, with at least 909 of them since Friday, the highest weekend death toll since April last year. There were 47,095 new coronavirus cases, bringing the country’s accumulated tally of officially confirmed infections close to 3 million.
“We are in levels of risk that are high, very high,” Fernando Simón, director of Spain’s health emergency coordination center, told reporters at a regular press conference on Monday.
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NEW ORLEANS - A Louisiana sheriff is dropping a lawsuit filed in May seeking damages from China because of the spread of the new coronavirus.
The Tangipahoa Sheriff’s Office filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit Monday in federal court in New Orleans.
Sheriff Daniel Edwards’ lawsuit was filed as a class-action suit on behalf of sheriffs throughout the nation.
The suit said there was evidence that the virus originated in a laboratory in China - a contention discounted by experts. It said the spread of the virus and the resulting effect on commerce in the United States caused sheriffs to lose revenue from various fees and taxes, including those tied to property values. And, the suit said, it drove up the sheriffs’ costs of running jails, requiring testing of inmates and guards.
Monday’s court filing gave no reason for seeking dismissal.
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TAMPA, Fla. - So much for the mayor’s order requiring masks at Super Bowl parties. Throngs of mostly maskless fans took to the streets and packed sports bars as the clock inside Raymond James Stadium ticked down on a hometown Super Bowl win for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
“It is a little frustrating because we have worked so hard,” Tampa Mayor Jane Castor said during a Monday morning news conference with the Super Bowl Host Committee. “At this point in dealing with COVID-19, there is a level of frustration when you see that.”
Some 200,000 masks were handed out ahead of the game, and “a majority” of people and businesses followed the rules, she said.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said President Joe Biden was concerned about images “that show many, many people without masks in close distance with one another at the height of a pandemic.”
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WASHINGTON - As COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations fall around the country, federal officials are warning states not to relax restrictions on dining out and other social activities that can lead to more spread of the virus.
“We have yet to control this pandemic,” Dr. Rochelle Walensky, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters on Monday. The three waves of infection last year showed that the virus does rebound when people more mobile.
Walensky said she would discourage any idea or move that would relax restrictions on social distancing. The nation is coming down from the wave of infections that began in November and crested in January, but Walensky says the background level of cases remains dangerously high.
White House officials say they are communicating their concerns to state governors and public health departments, but senior adviser Andy Slavitt says it would be counterproductive to detail those conversation in public.
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WASHINGTON - Dr. Anthony Fauci is cautioning against deviating from the two dose regimen for the approved coronavirus vaccines, warning that delaying the second dose in an effort to speed vaccinations to more people could increase the number of potentially dangerous variants.
Speaking at a White House briefing, the nation’s top infectious disease expert expressed concern that the immune response to the virus may be weaker without the “booster” shot. He added that, “The way viruses respond to pressure, you could actually be inadvertently selecting for more mutants by a suboptimal response.”
Fauci said altering the three-week interval between doses for the Pfizer vaccine and four weeks for the Moderna shot should only be recommended after rigorous scientific study. But he said that the months it would take to gather the data would largely render the outcome “moot.”
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