According to the school district, there are 22 students and staff in the elementary school in quarantine, which will continue with face-to-face lessons.
Health Department officials say children under the age of 16 are not yet eligible for COVID-19 vaccination. They say the best approach is to make sure others are vaccinated, along with testing, social distancing, wearing face masks, and frequent hand washing.
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THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:
– Medical students who are a bulwark of India’s COVID-19 response feel betrayed
– In the fight against viruses, Biden looks for a way back to normal
– In Africa, the hesitation of the vaccine is leading to a slow introduction of doses
– Lockdown skeptics tried to silence far-right critics in Madrid elections
– For more information on AP’s pandemic, please visit https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine
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HERE HAPPENS WHAT OTHER HAPPENS:
Tehran, Iran – Iran says three cases of the coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa have been confirmed in the south of the country, state television reported on Tuesday.
On a state television broadcast, Health Minister Saeed Namaki was quoted as saying, “We have received a report stating that we have found three cases of a South African variant of the coronavirus for the first time in one of our southern provinces.”
Namaki said the Ministry of Health is monitoring the cases and conducting further tests to ensure the variant has been correctly identified.
He also said cases with a variant of the virus identified in India have surfaced very close to the Iranian border and the government is testing all Indian citizens in Iran.
Iranian officials reported Tuesday that the daily death toll from COVID-19 rose by 462, bringing the total to 70,532 people in the pandemic. Authorities blame people for deaths for disregarding infection control measures while using public transport and at family celebrations.
Health Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said 20,963 new cases were confirmed within 24 hours, bringing the total to more than 2,438,000.
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NEW DELHI – India recorded more than 320,000 new cases of coronavirus infection as the surge weighed on the country’s healthcare system.
Tuesday’s 323,144 new infections brought India’s total to over 17.6 million. It ended a five-day streak that saw the largest single-day gains in any country during the pandemic. However, the decrease is likely due to lower weekend testing rather than lower spread of the virus.
The Ministry of Health reported an additional 2,771 deaths, with approximately 115 Indians contracting the disease every hour. The recent deaths have brought India’s total to 197,894, which experts say is likely an undercount.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi tweeted photos of the first delivery of medical aid India received from the UK on Tuesday. It included 100 ventilators and 95 oxygen concentrators.
Other nations such as the US, Germany and Pakistan have also promised medical aid to India.
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SEOUL, South Korea – South Korean President Moon Jae-in met with Novavax CEO in Maryland and promised to call for swift approval of the company’s coronavirus vaccine, made by a local biotech company.
South Korean officials hope that SK Bioscience’s production of the Novavax vaccine will help avoid potential supply bottlenecks in the coming months as the US, European nations and India tighten controls on vaccine exports while managing domestic outbreaks.
According to official information, SK Bioscience will be commissioned to manufacture 40 million doses of the Novavax vaccine this year. Production could begin in June and, according to official figures, up to 20 million recordings could be shipped for use in South Korea by September. SK is already producing the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca in its factory in the southern city of Andong.
In his meeting with Novavax CEO Stanley Erck on Tuesday, Moon said his government would set up a dedicated team within the Department of Food and Drug Safety to ensure a speedy approval process for the Novavax vaccine, which is currently in the UK and Europe is being examined, South Korean government said.
South Korea hopes to get 190 million doses of coronavirus vaccines this year through bilateral contracts with pharmaceutical companies and the WHO-supported COVAX program.
Around 2.4 million of the 51 million people in South Korea received their first shots on Tuesday.
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PESHAWAR, Pakistan – Pakistani police have recorded a case against a provincial health minister who allegedly hosted a grand dinner in violation of social distancing rules in the northwestern part of the country.
Taimur Saleem Jhagra is Minister of Health in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, which borders Afghanistan.
The police action on Tuesday came hours after a photo surfaced on social media of Jhagra breaking a Ramadan fast with dozens of friends and supporters of the ruling political party.
Jhagra hosted dinner Monday night as Pakistan is in the middle of a third wave of coronavirus infections. The country reported 142 more virus-related deaths on Tuesday, one of the highest daily death tolls since last year.
The government has deployed troops to make sure people adhere to social distancing rules.
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PARIS – France is sending breathing, intensive care and long term oxygen devices to help hospitals across India treat thousands of virus patients.
The first aid shipment is expected to leave France later this week and bring eight oxygen generators. Each generator can equip a hospital with 250 beds for several years, said the office of French President Emmanuel Macron.
France will also ship breathing apparatus, pumps and containers of liquid medical oxygen to help up to 10,000 patients a day, according to the French Foreign Ministry. This first shipment of oxygen is expected to come to India from Europe next week.
The value of the aid was not disclosed.
The French government said efforts are aimed at providing long-term aid to Indian hospitals for both the crisis they are facing now and beyond the pandemic.
France is still battling an ongoing virus spill at home.
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TOKYO – Japan will set up a large vaccination center in Tokyo and Osaka from late May to accelerate the vaccination campaign at a snail’s pace so that at least the elderly can finish their second shots by the end of July Tuesday.
Cabinet chief Katsunobu Kato told reporters that a vaccination center will be set up in a government building in Tokyo on May 24, where self-defense forces will send their doctors and nurses to fire for about three months. Kato said a similar vaccination center is also underway in Osaka and that further details are yet to be decided.
Each of the major vaccination centers is expected to host around 10,000 people and use the Moderna vaccine, which the Ministry of Health is expected to approve in May.
Japan’s attempts to develop its own vaccines are still in the early stages. Japan has so far only approved the vaccine from Pfizer Inc., approval for Moderna and AstraZeneca is still pending.
The vaccinations started in mid-February and only affected about 1% of Japanese people. Vaccinations for 36 million elderly people began in mid-April and only a fraction of them got their first shots.
Japan began its third state of emergency in Tokyo, Osaka and two neighboring areas on Sunday to contain a rapid resurgence three months before the Tokyo Olympics. Japan has reported more than 567,000 cases and about 10,000 deaths since the pandemic started last year.
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COLOMBO, Sri Lanka – Sri Lanka closed schools in the capital and suburbs for four days on Tuesday and issued work-from-home plans for government employees in the final stages to address the rising number of COVID-19 positive cases contain.
After reporting fewer than 300 new cases a day for weeks, Sri Lanka confirmed 997 in the past 24 hours. Most were in the Colombo district, which includes the capital.
Health officials have warned of a rapid surge as people celebrate crowded festivals and shop during the traditional New Year festival, which was held on April 14.
As of Tuesday, half of government employees would be called to offices while the rest would work from home.
The government has already closed nearly a dozen villages in different parts of the country.
Sri Lanka has reported more than 102,376 virus cases with 642 deaths.
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SAN FRANCISCO – Officials at the University of California at San Francisco say a man in his thirties is recovering after developing a rare blood clot in his leg within two weeks of receiving the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine.
By Friday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had reported the rare blood clots in 15 people, all women, after 8 million doses of the vaccine were administered nationally.
Federal officials on Friday lifted an eleven-day hiatus from using the single vaccine, saying the benefits outweighed the very rare risks.
The university said Monday that “to the best of our knowledge, this is the first male patient with VITT syndrome in the US”. The man was admitted 13 days after receiving the vaccination and was due to be released shortly.
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