COVID Not Going Anywhere Soon
By VOA News
Scientists say the rapidly evolving coronavirus will be circulating among the world’s population for some time.
One thing, however, that scientists agree upon in the battle against the virus that has killed more than 2 million people is the importance of the COVID-19 vaccinations.
Dr. T. Jacob John, a leading Indian public health official, told the Associated Press that at some point the coronavirus will become yet “another animal in the zoo’’ that the world has learned to live with, like polio or smallpox.
Zimbabwe received its first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine Monday. The Sinopharm vaccines are a donation from China, but Zimbabwe’s government has also purchased an additional 600,000 doses, state media said, that are expected to arrive in the African nation next month, still far short of what it will need to inoculate its millions of residents.
Israel had made great strides in inoculating its population against the coronavirus, but now that progress is being dramatically slowed by what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says is “the fake news and the superstitious and sometimes malicious beliefs that are planted in the public and on the internet.”
Israel has increased its digital task force to counter the misinformation and the Associated Press says Israel has also deployed DJs and offered free food to lure residents to vaccination venues.
Researchers have found at least seven new COVID-19 variants in the United States. It is not immediately clear, however, if the U.S. variants are as highly contagious as the British and South African variants.
The average number of daily COVID-19 cases in the U.S. has recently dropped below 100,000 for the first time in months. The U.S., however, remains at the top of the list as the location with the most COVID-19 cases.
There are more than 108 million global COVID-19 infections. The U.S. has more than 27 million, followed by India with 10.9 million and Brazil with 9.8 million, says Hopkins.
Mental health professionals are warning about a mental health crisis among young people brought on by the coronavirus pandemic. Mental health experts say young people are experiencing loneliness and despair and some are contemplating suicide with all the upheavals the virus has brought to their young lives.
