Pennsylvania and New Jersey, following MIchigan’s unforutnate lead, are now epicenters of COVID-19 activity as the nation pushes to vaccinate all citizens ages 16 and older by May 31.
Officials say if accomplished, the May 31 deadline would see Americans enjoying an almost normal Fourth of July.
Cases are rising in Pennsylvania, with the state averaging more than 5,000 cases a day over the past week. New Jersey reported a case spike in March, but case counts in that state have begun to decline.
New Jersey has averaged more than 3,200 over the past week.
Delaware is also adding more cases per capita and follows Michigan, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey in 7-day average of cases.
The state is averaging 405 new cases per day, up 115% from March.
The United States reported 67,933 new COVID-19 cases yesterday, and 477 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins COVID-19 tracker. In total, the country has confirmed 31,772,125 cases, including 568,196 fatalities.
This week roughly 80% of the world’s countries will receive the highest travel warning from the US State Department—”Level 4: Do Not Travel” designation—because of high levels of COVID-19, according to the Washington Post.
Currently only 16% of countries have a level 4 designation, but international travel is slowly returning. The State Department suggests all Americans should avoid unnecessary travel, but United Airlines has announced it will be adding new flights to Greece, Iceland, and Croatia starting in July.
Earlier this week, French President Emmanuel Macron, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” his country will begin lifting international travel restrictions in May.
The Centers for the Disease Control and Prevention has said fully vaccinated Americans can travel domestically, it doesn’t fully encourage it and also cautions that international travel increases the risk of spreading new COVID-19 variants.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), said yesterday, April 20, 221 that it will fund a phase 3 trial called ACTIV-6 that will test several existing prescription and over-the-counter medications for people to self-administer to treat symptoms of COVID-19.
Several treatments for moderate to severe COVID-19 have been approved, but there are currently no at-home recommended treatments for mild cases of the virus.
“While we’re doing a good job with treating hospitalized patients with severe disease, we don’t currently have an approved medication that can be self-administered to ease symptoms of people suffering from mild disease at home, and reduce the chance of their needing hospitalization,” said NIH Director Francis Collins, MD, PhD. “ACTIV-6 will evaluate whether certain drugs showing promise in small trials can pass the rigor of a larger trial.”
Everyone in the United States over the age of 16 is now eligible for a COVID-19 vaccine as of yesterday, but 20% of adults ages 65 and older are still unvaccinated. Health experts do not see a challenge with those older Americans securing a vaccine.
The CDC still maintains that COVID-19 is spread primarily through droplet transmission, though multiple experts have long argued that the virus is airborne.
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