The Evening Report - April 1st
And no there are no jokes contained therein
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The World Health Organization had harsh words for Europe’s vaccination program. WHO Europe Director Hans Kluge said the underperforming vaccination effort was “prolonging the pandemic” and that rising infections across Europe are "more worrying than we have seen in several months."
"Vaccines present our best way out of this pandemic However, the rollout of these vaccines is unacceptably slow. We must speed up the process by ramping up manufacturing, reducing barriers to administering vaccines, and using every single vial we have in stock, now.”
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Variant infections remain a clear and present danger in Denmark. Health Minister Magnus Heunicke said today we are still holding at 10 cases of the Brazilian P1 variant. However the number of infections identified as the South African variant has risen to 49 with 16 of those directly related to travel.
Denmark is reporting 662 COVID infections and four more coronavirus deaths in the last day. Yesterday there were 311,911 total corona tests done, 177,638 PCR and 134,273 rapid, for a (PCR only) positivity percentage of 0.33%.
COVID hospitalizations (211) have dropped (-7), the number in an ICU (39) also dipped (-4), and of those the number on a ventilator (24) rose slightly (+3).
On the vaccination campaign to date, 744,088 1st dose vaccinations (12.7% of the population) have been administered. 389,589 people (6.7%) are now fully vaccinated.
Yesterday 23,295 total vaccinations were done.
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With the mass vaccinations campaign and the advent of the vaccine passport, hard hit airports are now hoping to resuscitate a dying tourism industry. Billund Airport, Denmark’s second busiest, reports the pandemic has resulted in a 94.5% decrease in passenger traffic, comparing March 2021 to pre-COVID times in March of 2019.
Airport CEO Jan Hessellund is urging the government to consider airports and tourism in its reopening plans.
“As expected, we have seen another month of low activity. We expect the same in April, before we hope to start to see a turn around, but it depends on when the government comes out with an announcement about what the summer looks like for the travel industry. We know that the Danes are on the verge of buying airline tickets and package holidays, but it all depends on when there will be clarity over the summer.”
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Sweden has added 8,305 infections and another 33 corona deaths since yesterday’s update as numbers continue to rise.
To date, 1,167,532 1st dose (14.3% of the population) and 499,251 2nd dose (6.1%) vaccinations have been administered.
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Sweden is pushing back its vaccination goalposts on more than one front. In a press conference today, Sverige’s Health and Social Affairs Minister Lena Hallengren said they are abandoning a promised July deadline to get everyone vaccinated. She said the new deadline is for August 15th and that is now only to get everyone a first vaccination dose, not both.
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Finland has registered 654 infections and two more corona deaths since yesterday’s update.
COVID hospitalizations (264) have dropped (-31), ICU numbers (52) inched up (+2). To date, 930,842 1st dose (16.7% of the population) and 89,364 2nd dose (1.6%) vaccinations have been administered.
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Finland’s pharmaceutical watchdog, FIMEA, has updated vaccine side effect reports. It says the vast majority of side effects are the normal things you might expect like pain at the injection site, fevers, headaches, and joint pain, all of which go away after a day or two.
On the AstraZeneca front, it says there have been eight reports of post-vaccination severe blood clotting and some other reports of blood coagulation issues that may or may not be related to the vaccine.
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The Finnish Health Institute says the risk of infection for children remains very low. It identified 62,600 students and staff across all grade levels who were exposed to COVID from August to February. Of those, a total of 926 tested positive, equaling 1.5% of all infections. The institute concludes “the risk of infection after exposure at school is still clearly lower than the risk of infection in other exposure situations.”
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Norway has added 905 infections and had no new virus deaths since yesterday’s update.
COVID hospitalizations (285) are down (-11), ICU numbers (98) inched up (+3), and ventilator numbers (61) also rose (+4).
On the vaccination front to date, 970,101 1st doses (12.76% of the population) and 299,853 2nd doses (5.23%) have been administered.
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There are some glimmers of hope in Norway as it struggles with a variant driven infection wave. The Norwegian Public Health Institute says after five weeks of steadily increasing infection numbers, new corona cases decreased 11% from week 11 to week 12. It says the slight easing of the infection pressure was seen across the country with the exception of Trøndelag and Møre, Romsdal.
Oslo still has by far the highest COVID incidence rate in the country.
While the health institute says hospitalizations have leveled off as well, it is reporting an alarming number of younger COVID patients. It says it has never seen so many people aged 30 to 49 years old being admitted.
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Poland remains in a dire situation with another 35,251 infections today, after recording 32,876 yesterday. COVID deaths are also rising with alarming speed. The coronavirus claimed 621 lives today and 652 yesterday. Virus fatalities haven’t been this high in Poland since November.
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Greece remains a European COVID hot spot seeing the highest infections of the entire pandemic in the last few days. Today it recorded 3,483 new infections and 67 corona deaths.
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In France, a new national lockdown was announced last night as infections march upward. Yesterday, it reported 59,038 new infections but almost 20,000 of those were backlogged cases from the previous day or two.
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Yesterday Canada reported 5,519 new infections and another 33 corona deaths as its infection curve bends back upward.
On the vaccination effort to date, there have been 4,994,627 1st dose (13.14% of the population) while 685,813 people are now fully vaccinated.
The outbreak situation in Ontario remains serious. Today it posted infection numbers not seen in two months. Health Minister Christine Elliott tweeted, “Ontario is reporting 2,557 cases of nCOVID19 and nearly 62,300 tests completed. Locally, there are 743 new cases in Toronto, 484 in Peel, 311 in York Region, 131 in Ottawa, 119 in Hamilton and 107 in Durham. As of 8:00 p.m. yesterday, 2,276,313 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered.“
It is official Ontario Premier Doug Ford has just announced a four-week province wide “shutdown.” It begins on April 3rd, Saturday, with dine in eating at restaurants banned again along with strict caps on how many people can be in stores allowed to remain open.
Quebec reported 1,271 infections and nine more corona deaths today. The province has again brought down the hammer due to the frightening speed of variant infection spread. Quebec City, Chaudières-Appalaches, Outaouais and Lower Saint-Lawrence regions have been declared COVID red zones, and are moving into a lockdown. Restrictions have also been tightened in Lévis and Gatineau. Restaurants in the impacted areas were ordered closed within 24 hours, while schools, gyms, theatres, hairdressers and other non-essential businesses will be closed until April 12. Church service attendance has been capped at 25.
In Atlantic Canada, Nova Scotia added three infections. New Brunswick registered 12. While Newfoundland and Labrador had one.
Manitoba recorded 71 new infections and one more corona death.
There were 192 infections and two deaths in Saskatchewan yesterday.
Alberta recorded 871 infections and three more deaths yesterday. It also found a record 406 variant infections, now 31% of all active screened cases.
Alarm bells in B.C. as it recorded over a thousand new infections for the first time ever in the pandemic yesterday. Officials reported 1,013 infections and three more deaths with just 9,984 tests yesterday. No news on the variant front in B.C. as some kind of glitch prevented an update yesterday.
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The COVID nightmare continues in Brazil as it registered 89,200 new infections and 3,950 more corona deaths, a record high number of coronavirus fatalities.
