The Evening Update - May 25th
Denmark’s COVID contact number continues to hold fast.
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Denmark’s Health Minister Magnus Heunicke says for a 4th week in a row the COVID contact number (R0 or reinfection rate) is at 1.1. He says while infections continue to inch up “vaccine deployment, intensive testing, rapid detection, and breaking local infection chains are our main weapons.”
Anything above 1.0 means degrees of coronavirus spread while anything under one indicates a declining infection rate.
Denmark is reporting 794 COVID infections and one coronavirus death in the last day.
Yesterday there were 510,680 total corona tests done, 139,159 PCR and 371,521 rapid, for a (PCR only) positivity percentage of 0.57%.
On the variant front, several mutations of concern continue to gain ground in Denmark. There are now 207 confirmed infections involving the further-mutated UK variant, with the E484K mutation the so-called escape mutation helping the virus evade the body’s defenses. The Staten Serum Institut says most of those infections are on Sjælland.
The India variant, B.1.617, now has three different sub-types detected in Denmark including B.1.617.2, an international variant of concern. There are now 79 cases involving B.1.617.2 and 32 other infections involving the other India variant sub-types.
COVID hospitalizations (148) have edged upward (+5) while the number of infected people in an ICU (36) inched down (-1) and of those the number on a ventilator (20) is unchanged.
On the Danish vaccination campaign, to date 1,893,795 1st dose vaccinations (32.4% of the population) have been administered while 1,193,046 people (20.4%) are now fully vaccinated.
Yesterday there were 33,087 total vaccinations done.
Practio, the vaccine company with a contract to administer the shelved AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, will open its first vaccination center on Thursday. It will be located at the DGI Byen in Copenhagen.
In a press release, the company said there are more than 18,000 on a waiting list to get vaccinated in the alternate scheme. It says about half of those people are living in areas of Denmark outside the capital region. As of today, doctor consultations by video, are available in Roskilde, Odense, Aarhus, and Aalborg.
People looking to get vaccinated outside the state-run system must have a consultation with a doctor, be informed about the risks of AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, and then give their consent to be vaccinated on the record.
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The Danish Agency for Patient Safety is urging everyone who was at or around Brøndby Stadium celebrating the big football win to go get tested as soon as possible.
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Sweden has added 6,034 infections and another 30 virus deaths since its last update on Friday.
To date 3,556,089 1st dose (43.4% of the population) and 1,213,015 2nd vaccine doses (14.8%) have been administered.
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Sweden is now opening up vaccinations to pregnant women. It has already recommended vaccinations for expecting mothers with underlying health conditions, making them a higher COVID risk. But it is now extending the recommendation to all pregnant women. The Swedish Public Health Agency says it has assessed all the latest data, including follow-up studies in the United States involving over 35,000 vaccinated pregnant women, to check it is safe. It has also consulted with the Swedish Association for Obstetrics and Gynecology, the Swedish Midwifery Association, the Medical Products Agency, and other professional organizations to inform its decision.
The health agency says pregnant women can now be vaccinated by age as the rest of the population. Only mRNA vaccines can be used, so Moderna and Pfizer. It recommends waiting until after the 12th week of pregnancy to get vaccinated.
The United States, Canada, Israel, Belgium, and the United Kingdom have all recommended pregnant women get a coronavirus vaccination.
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Radio Sweden is reporting that an expert group is warning against relaxing COVID restrictions. It cites a report by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences saying infections need to drop significantly before restrictions are lifted. The Swedish government has floated the idea of easing some measures next week. Among them increasing the number of people who can gather indoors. "We feel that it's a little bit premature," says Gunilla Karlsson Hedestam, a member of the Academy's expert group who wrote the report.
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Finland has registered 125 infections and three more corona deaths since yesterday’s update.
COVID hospitalizations (114) and ICU numbers (18) are down (both -4).
To date 2,315,143 1st dose (41.6% of the population) and 390,659 2nd vaccine doses (7%) have been administered.
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Finland says its most recent COVID testing of wastewater samples from the country’s 26 sewage plants found plenty of evidence of coronavirus activity. It says positive samples were recorded at 19 wastewater treatment plants. The only ones coming back negative were in Mariehamn, Seinäjoki, Savonlinna, Joensuu, Kajaani, Kemi and Rovaniemi.
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Norway has added 238 infections and had no new deaths in the last day.
COVID hospitalizations (107) are up (+4) while ICU (36) and ventilator numbers (17) are both unchanged.
To date 29.82% of Norwegians have one vaccine dose and 14.56% have had both.
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A preprint study has been published finding that Norway’s infection detection app ‘Smittestopp’ is highly effective at detecting close contacts. But there were differences by phone type and how the phone was being carried.
The study tested 40 phones from different brands in a number of different situations.
Norwegian Institute for Public Health Researcher and Senior Adviser Elisabeth Madslien!
“Based on other studies, we know that there is some uncertainty associated with the precision of Bluetooth-based infection tracking apps. We therefore wanted to test this out under realistic scenarios and in situations where it can be difficult to know who you have been near, such as on public transport or in the store. It is in such situations that we think that the app can have the greatest usefulness. We tested two different configurations, and came to the conclusion that the best, which is in use in Smittestopp today, detects 80% of the close contacts. This is a very positive finding and suggests that the app can be a good supplement to the manual infection tracking, provided that enough people have downloaded it.”
The study found the app detected more close contacts on Android phones than iPhones. It was also more effective when the phone was held in the hand than if it was in a pocket.
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Germany’s Health Minister Jens Spahn says over 40% of people in Germany, 33.5 million, have now had one vaccine dose and 12 million people, 14%, are now fully vaccinated. He applauds the massive increase in vaccination numbers noting just seven weeks ago just 12% of Germans had one vaccination.
Spahn has also thrown his support behind what he called an effort to empower the World Health Organization. He says it cannot continue with “business as usual” after this “once in a lifetime crisis”. He says major changes are needed in order to invest in pandemic preparedness.
“We need political will to implement the many obvious lessons of the pandemic. The time for change is now. The time for an ambitious Pandemic Treaty is now.”
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The European Union says it is close to passing a significant vaccination milestone. The trading bloc says with 46% of the adult population they will soon have half of all adults in Europe vaccinated with at least one dose.
The E.U. Says to date 300 million vaccine doses have been delivered with 245 total vaccinations administered to date.
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Canada reported 1,705 infections yesterday while suffering another 35 coronavirus deaths. Keep in mind several provinces did not report over the holiday Monday so the number is artificially low.
The Canadian vaccination campaign has passed a significant milestone, to date 19,616,143 1st dose vaccinations have been administered covering more than half the population (51.61%) while 1,665,783 people are now fully vaccinated.
As for Ontario today it tabled two days worth of coronavirus numbers due to the long weekend. All told there were 2,485 infections and 41 deaths over the last two days.
Quebec reported 346 infections and six deaths.
In Atlantic Canada, Nova Scotia registered 49 infections. New Brunswick had 15. Newfoundland and Labrador had 11.
Manitoba saw 353 infections and four deaths yesterday. In a news conference today a group of doctors in the province said Manitoba’s health system is so overwhelmed by the latest infection wave people are dying while waiting for treatment of other illnesses. They want the provincial government to shut down all non-essential businesses and issue a stay-at-home order. ICU capacity in the province has increased by 150% forcing some patients to be evacuated to hospitals in Ontario.
There were 103 infections in Saskatchewan yesterday.
Alberta recorded 732 new infections and two more corona deaths yesterday. There are 638 people in hospital with 177 in an ICU. 2,060,322 Albertans have received at least one vaccine dose while 341,610 are now fully immunized
B.C. reported 974 infections and another 12 deaths over the last three days. There are 292 people in hospital with 95 in an ICU. The province says it now has 63% of the population vaccinated with at least one dose.