Covid-19 Updates & Info

[ti-amie]

I had to split the thread because there can only be 5 URL's per post.

[ponchi101]

I had to split the thread because there can only be 5 URL's per post.

Can be easily changed. Let me know if you want that

[ti-amie]

This was an unusual thread so let's not tinker with things right now. If she always posts like this I'll PM you.

[MJ2004]

Love the Doonesbury strip.

We just spent the last two days driving to my parents' place in Florida, even though my parents are staying in Maine until they get vaccinated. We weren't comfortable flying, which would have included two cars rides to and from the airport, time spent in the airport terminal (more dangerous than the flight itself), plus the obvious sitting next to strangers on the flight. People were masked in rest areas. We checked in/out of the hotel remotely and used keyless entry through our phone on the hotel door (cool feature). Packed most of our food with just one take-out stop at a restaurant.
We got to the land of Floriduh where masks are used much less. We were in the elevator with our luggage at my parents' condos (plan to take the stairs mostly) and of course a woman with no mask gets on with us.

Stay safe through the holidays everyone! Hopefully it's the final stretch before we are able to get vaccinated.

[ponchi101]

Colombia going back to some restrictions. As of today, what they call "Pico y Cedula" (Peak & ID) goes back into effect. You can only shop on days matching your ID number (even numbers on even days, odds on odds). Xmas shopping and related activities made everybody go out, so the country is going back to high numbers of cases and deaths.
By now, only massive vaccination will control this. And that is hoping that none of the mutations can bypass the vaccinnation.

Enjoy Fla, MJ. Hope you have a view of the ocean.

[ti-amie]

toomas hendrik ilves
@IlvesToomas
Russian Scientist Who Worked on Coronavirus Vaccine Stabbed, Falls Out of Window

https://t.co/s2hKDxhMJt?amp=1

[ponchi101]

Well, that's a change. I thought the standard Russian MO was for the people to fall from the window and LAND ON THE KNIFE.
They are getting better at this.

[Suliso]

0.1% of US population has died from Covid-19 so far.

[ponchi101]

It is one of those numbers that is puzzling. On the one hand, 0.1%. Very small. On the other, that is 350,000 people. A large cohort.
Today I received a mail from the skiing club I belong to in Colorado. Two members, elderly, have died of C19. The wife of one of them is in the ICU, but in stable conditions.
That little town (Pagosa Springs) is basically a retirement community. A large elderly population, which votes GOP. Then a large service sector (the stoners) that vote DEM. It would be interesting to see which group is suffering the most (the dems are also not that young. Lots of 60's hippies that found Nirvana in that mountain).

[ponchi101]

Suliso's post got me curious. How many deaths are in the USA every year? The CDC keeps track. And for 2018, the numbers were (just the top 8):

Cause	Number
Heart Disease	655,381
Cancer	599,274
Accidents	167,127
Chronic resp disease	159,486
Strokes	147,810
Alzheimer	122,019
Diabetes	84,946
Influenza/pneumonia	59,120

Source: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm

So, with a little over one week to go for the year, C19 will end 2020 as the third leading cause of death (assuming numbers similar to 2018), combining for more deaths than accidents and respiratory disease put together.

[ti-amie]

They Helped France Fight the Virus. Now France Is Fast-Tracking Their Citizenship.
Some 700 foreigners who were exposed to the coronavirus through their frontline work are being given expedited naturalization reviews.

By Constant Méheut
Dec. 22, 2020

PARIS — Nine months after its president declared “war” against the coronavirus, France announced Tuesday that it has fast-tracked hundreds of citizenship applications from foreign frontline workers who have distinguished themselves in the battle.

“Foreign workers gave their time and swung into action for all of us during the Covid crisis,” said Marlène Schiappa, France’s junior minister for citizenship. “It is now up to the Republic to take a step toward them.”

The beneficiaries include not just health care workers but also garbage collectors, housekeepers and cashiers, Ms. Schiappa said.

The fast-tracking measure is a notable departure for a country that has adopted increasingly tight immigration rules. Caught in the clog of paperwork, citizenship applications can take years to complete, and the number of naturalizations has been decreasing over the years.

Some 48,000 people acquired French nationality through naturalization last year, or about 18 percent fewer than in 2015, according to statistics from the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies.

The government initiated the measure in September, when France was bracing itself for a second wave of the pandemic. On Tuesday it announced that some 700 foreigners who were exposed to possible coronavirus infection through their work have been put on a fast track for naturalization since then.

Aziz Youssef, a Tunisian-born physiotherapist who migrated to France in 2014, said that obtaining citizenship by naturalization amounted to “an obstacle course.” He recalled first sending an application in late 2016 after graduating with a physiotherapy degree — and being given an appointment for a year later.

Mr. Youssef, who said that he had visited dozens of isolated patients during the first wave of the pandemic, had expected his application to be completed by 2022. But after learning about the government’s new exceptions for frontline workers, he checked in with the local authorities, who fast-tracked him. His penultimate interview took place in early December.

“Everything sped up very quickly,” Mr. Youssef said, adding that he viewed acceleration as “a form of recognition for the work that was done.”

The first coronavirus wave in France came close to breaking the country’s health care system — and frontline workers were at greater risks than most. So Ms. Schiappa asked regional officials to accelerate the citizenship applications of foreign workers who were among them.

“They actively participated in the national effort, with dedication and courage,” Ms. Schiappa wrote in a letter to regional authorities.

With more than 60,000 deaths caused by the coronavirus and close to 2.5 million coronavirus infections reported, France has paid a heavy toll in the pandemic. With infection rates failing to fall as quickly as predicted, the French government recently decided to delay the relaxation of some lockdown restrictions.

More than 70 applicants have obtained citizenship since September and 693 more are in the final stage of the process, the authorities said. Although their nationality has not been made public, beneficiaries mainly include health care and social workers, as well as shop employees and civil servants.

There are several different ways to gain citizenship in France: through marriage; by being born in France or to a French parent; and through naturalization. In this last case, the applicant must have lived in the country for at least five years — or two years for immigrants with a degree obtained in France — have stable resources and be considered integrated into French society.

In September, Ms. Schiappa also ordered officials to reduce the residency period in France required to obtain citizenship by naturalization to two years from the usual five in the case of “great services rendered.”

Didier Leschi, the director of the French Office of Immigration and Integration, said the fast-tracking measure was part of “a long tradition that can be traced back to the French Revolution, which is to grant citizenship to the benefactors of the country.”

But Mr. Leschi added that it partly broke with this tradition, which generally applied only to individual and exceptional cases. “Here, a collective effort was rewarded,” he said.

This was not the first time in recent years that France departed from its strict rules of naturalization to reward laudable actions. In September 2018, Mamoudou Gassama, a migrant from Mali, was made a French citizen after heroically rescuing a 4-year-old boy who was hanging from a balcony.

Mr. Youssef, the physiotherapist, said he was now waiting for his final interview, where he will be tested on his historical and cultural knowledge of France.

“This pandemic has revealed that France needs these people: doctors, surgeons, essential workers,” Mr. Youssef said.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/22/worl ... d=tw-share

[ponchi101]

What a novel concept: grant citizenship to people that have risked their lives for your country.
I wonder what other country could use this idea. Uhm.... nope, I draw a blank.

[ti-amie]

Meanwhile back in the US...

Brandi Buchman @BBuchman_CNS
The unanimous consent request from Dems to vote on increasing direct payments to $2k failed on the House floor because GOP House Leader Kevin McCarthy needs to consent and he does not. @CourthouseNews

@DebDingell during the presser with Leader Hoyer lets loose and says of outgoing President Trump that he "doesn’t give a damn about people."
"He sowed more fear. He threw kerosene on a fire."

"Republicans blocked it, not Democrats," Dingell says of the push to increase stimulus checks from $600 to $2,000. "I’m merely to here to say on Christmas Eve we will come back on Monday."

The UC was blocked, the House can pass $2,000 but will McConnell take it?
Hoyer: We can only do in the House what we can do. We will have a new president and that president will give leadership.

Hoyer: "This president told R leaders he would sign this bill and then he gave his five-minute press conference."
On Monday, Hoyer will meet with Speaker Pelosi and leaders of Dem caucus and determine how to move forward.

Hoyer: "We're not going to let the government shut down and we're not going to let the American people down.

Hoyer, when fielding a question on whether it was a mistake to combine spending and the covid relief bill, he laughs lightly and says it was not but "perhaps the only mistake was believing the president would sign the bill."

Trump said he would not veto the bill explicitly. He said he wanted more. That's why Democrats are here today to get this done, Hoyer says, to "accommodate his perspective."

The MSM should really stop giving the GOP cover by saying "Congress"

[ti-amie]

CNN Breaking News @cnnbrk
Japan will ban entry to foreign nationals starting Monday through the end of January after several cases of the Covid-19 variant were recorded in the country, according to Japan's public broadcaster, NHK https://cnn.it/3hjMLHD

[ti-amie]

U.K. variant of coronavirus continues global spread, despite containment efforts

By
Miriam Berger
Dec. 26, 2020 at 12:12 p.m. EST

The highly transmissible variant of the novel coronavirus first detected in England had by Saturday been documented in several European countries, Japan, Australia and Lebanon, despite efforts to curb its spread through massive global disruptions in travel and movement.

Fears over the fast-spreading form of the virus that causes covid-19 come in sharp contrast to a wave of hope sweeping some countries and communities as vaccination programs begin to be rolled out. Scientists do not think that the British variant is more deadly or resistant to the current coronavirus vaccines.

The variant has also been detected in France, Denmark, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, Germany and Italy.

While the United States has not yet reported a case, experts say it is likely due to the nation’s very low rate of genetic sequencing of the virus to check for such changes, despite Americans leading the world in coronavirus infections and deaths.

Beginning Monday, the U.S. government will require all travelers flying in from Britain to show proof of a negative coronavirus test taken within 72 hours of the plane’s departure. Early in the pandemic, the United States banned travelers from China and the European Union, among others, though by that point the novel coronavirus had already been widely spreading undetected due to limited U.S. testing.

Japan on Saturday temporarily banned all foreign nationals except those with residency from entering the country starting Dec. 28 through the end of January. Japan reported its first case of the British variant on Friday amid a new surge of coronavirus cases in the capital, Tokyo. Japan said five patients detected with the variant had all traveled from the United Kingdom, from which Japan had curbed travel last week.

Countries across Europe and other continents began to block or restrict travelers from the U.K. last week in reaction to the variant’s outbreak. Some, like France, have since walked back near total border closures amid widespread disruptions in trade and travel.

France initially closed its border to all travelers from the United Kingdom on Sunday, but on Wednesday began allowing E.U. citizens to pass through. The border closure, however, led to a massive backlog in freight trucks, leading thousands of drivers stuck Christmas Day near the border waiting for coronavirus test results to be able to cross the English Channel back to France.

Elsewhere, hopes are tentatively rising. Hungary on Saturday became the first European Union member to begin vaccinations, a day ahead of France, Germany and Spain, among others, who will kick off vaccinating high-risk populations on Sunday.

Scientists, however, are additionally closely following news of another variant of the novel coronavirus first detected in South Africa that experts say also appears to be highly transmissible. British health officials have already documented cases of the South African variant in the United Kingdom.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... beyond-uk/