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Australia recorded three new COVID-19 deaths in its most populous state of New South Wales and nearly 1,500 new cases of the coronavirus disease Sunday.Speaking to reporters in Sydney, New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said the peak of the most recent outbreak was expected “in the next couple of weeks.”Regarding the vaccination efforts, Berejiklian said 40% of the adult population in her state had received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.The Australian state of Victoria recorded at least 180 new locally contracted cases of the coronavirus Sunday.Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews said the majority of people hospitalized with COVID-19 were not vaccinated. Andrews urged people to take the vaccine.New Zealand officials on Saturday reported the country’s first COVID-related fatality in more than 200 days. Doctors said the nonagenarian had several underlying health problems in addition to COVID-19.In Japan, the Nikkei newspaper reported Sunday that the government plans to issue COVID-19 vaccination certificates online.The report said the certificates for people vaccinated from around mid-December are intended for overseas travel rather than domestic use.In Brazil, federal health regulator Anvisa has placed a 90-day suspension on the use of more than 12 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine because they were made in a plant that had not been authorized by it.Several cities in Brazil have begun providing vaccine booster shots, even though most citizens have yet to receive their second shots. The booster shots were prompted by concerns older Brazilians have about the efficacy of the Sinovac vaccine, The Associated Press reported.France, Israel, China and Chile are among those countries giving boosters to some of their older citizens, and a U.S. plan to start delivering booster shots for most Americans by Sept. 20 is facing complications that could delay third doses for those who received the Moderna vaccine, Biden administration officials said on Friday.Japan and South Korea are planning booster shots in the fourth quarter of this year. Malaysia is also considering boosters, but Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said those who have yet to receive their first shot are being prioritized.Thailand began giving booster shots this week, but only for health and frontline workers.Russia, Hungary and Serbia also are giving boosters, although there has been a lack of demand in those countries for the initial shots amid abundant supplies.According to The Associated Press, France’s worst coronavirus outbreak is unfolding 12 time zones away from Paris, devastating Tahiti and other idyllic islands of French Polynesia.Regional health officials say the South Pacific archipelagos lack enough oxygen, ICU beds and morgue space, and that the vaccination rate is just half the national average.With more than 2,800 COVID cases per 100,000 inhabitants, the region now holds France’s record for the highest infection rate. The majority of the region’s 463 documented COVID-19 deaths have taken place in the past 30 days.Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center said early Sunday that it had recorded nearly 220.3 million global COVID-19 infections and 4.56 million deaths. The center said more than 5.4 billion vaccines have been administered.Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters.  
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Funeral director Wayne Bright has seen grief piled upon grief during the latest COVID-19 surge. A woman died of the virus, and as her family was planning the funeral, her mother was struck down. An aunt took over arrangements for the double funeral, only to die of COVID-19 herself two weeks later. “That was one of the most devastating things ever,” said Bright, who also arranged the funeral last week of one of his closest friends. Florida is in the grip of its deadliest wave of COVID-19 since the pandemic began, a disaster driven by the highly contagious delta variant. While Florida’s vaccination rate is slightly higher than the national average, the Sunshine State has an outsize population of elderly people, who are especially vulnerable to the virus; a vibrant party scene; and a Republican governor who has taken a hard line against mask requirements, vaccine passports and business shutdowns. As of mid-August, the state was averaging 244 deaths per day, up from 23 a day in late June and eclipsing the previous peak of 227 during the summer of 2020. (Because of the way deaths are logged in Florida and lags in reporting, more recent figures on fatalities per day are incomplete.) Hospitals have rented refrigerated trucks to store more bodies. Funeral homes have been overwhelmed. This 2016 photo provided by Cristina Miles shows her and her husband, Austin, in Palm Coast, Fla. Cristina’s husband died after contracting COVID-19, and less than two weeks later, her mother-in-law succumbed to the virus.’Weird dream state’Cristina Miles, a mother of five from Orange Park, is among those facing more than one loss at a time. Her husband died after contracting COVID-19, and less than two weeks later, her mother-in-law succumbed to the virus. “I feel we are all kind of in a weird dream state,” she said, of herself and her three children. Hospitals have been swamped with patients who, like Miles’ husband and mother-in-law, hadn’t gotten vaccinated. In a positive sign, the number of people in the hospital with COVID-19 in Florida has dropped over the past two weeks from more than 17,000 to 14,200 on Friday, indicating the surge is easing.  Florida made an aggressive effort early on to vaccinate its senior citizens. But Dr. Kartik Cherabuddi, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Florida, said the raw number of those who have yet to get the shot is still large, given Florida’s elderly population of 4.6 million. “Even 10% is still a very large number, and then folks living with them who come in contact with them are not vaccinated,” Cherabuddi said. “With delta, things spread very quickly.” Cherabuddi said there is also a “huge difference” in attitudes toward masks in Florida this summer compared with last year. This summer, “if you traveled around the state, it was like we are not really in a surge,” he said. FILE – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks at a news conference at Orlando Regional Medical Center, June 23, 2020, in Orlando, Fla.DeSantis’ stancesGovernor Ron DeSantis has strongly opposed certain mandatory measures to keep the virus in check, saying people should be trusted to make decisions for themselves. He has asserted, too, that the spike in cases is seasonal as Floridians spend more time indoors to escape the heat. At his funeral home in Tampa, Bright is working weekdays and weekends, staying past midnight sometimes. “Usually we serve between five and six families a week. Right now, we are probably seeing 12 to 13 new families every week,” he said. “It’s nonstop. We are just trying to keep up with the volume.” He had to arrange the burial of one of his closest friends, a man he had entrusted with the security code to his house. They used to carpool each other’s kids to school, and their families would gather for birthday and Super Bowl parties. “It is very, very difficult to go through this process for someone you love so dearly,” he said. Pat Seemann, a nurse practitioner whose company has nearly 500 elderly, homebound patients in central Florida, had not lost a single patient to COVID-19. Then the variant she calls “the wrecking ball” hit. In the past month, she lost seven patients in two weeks, including a husband and wife who died within days of each other. “I cried all weekend. I was devastated, angry,” she said. Elderly hit hardestOverall, more than 46,300 people have died of COVID-19 in Florida, which ranks 17th in per capita deaths among the states. The majority of the deaths this summer — like last summer — are among the elderly. Of the 2,345 people whose recent deaths were reported over the past week, 1,479 of them were 65 and older, or 63%. “The focus needs to be on who’s dying and who’s ending up in the hospital,” Seeman said. “It’s still going after the elderly.” But the proportion of under-65 people dying of COVID-19 has grown substantially, which health officials attribute to lower vaccination rates in those age groups. Aaron Jaggi, 35, was trying to get healthy before he died of COVID-19, 12 hours after his older brother Free Jaggi, 41, lost his life to the virus. They were overweight, which increases the risk of severe COVID-19 illness, and on the fence about getting vaccinated, thinking the risk was minimal because they both worked from home, said Brittany Pequignot, who has lived with the family at various times and is like an adopted daughter. After their death, the family found a whiteboard that belonged to Aaron. It listed his daily goals for sit-ups and push-ups. “He was really trying,” Pequignot said. 
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Some cities in Brazil are providing booster shots of the COVID-19 vaccine, even though most people have yet to receive their second jabs, in a sign of the concern in the country over the highly contagious delta variant.Rio de Janeiro, currently Brazil’s epicenter for the variant and home to one of its largest elderly populations, began administering the boosters Wednesday. Northeastern cities Salvador and Sao Luis started on Monday, and the most populous city of Sao Paulo will begin Sept. 6. The rest of the nation will follow the next week.France, Israel, China and Chile are among those countries giving boosters to some of their older citizens, but more people in those countries are fully vaccinated than the 30% who have gotten two shots in Brazil. A U.S. plan to start delivery of booster shots by Sept. 20 for most Americans is facing complications that could delay third doses for those who received the Moderna vaccine, administration officials said Friday.About nine out of 10 Brazilians have been vaccinated already or plan to be, according to pollster Datafolha. Most have gotten their first shot but not their second.Brazil’s cases and deaths have been falling for two months, with 621 deaths reported in the seven days through Sept. 2 — far below April’s peak of more than 3,000 reported deaths over a seven-day period. Older Brazilians have expressed concern about the efficacy of the Chinese Sinovac vaccine against the delta variant, prompting authorities to offer the booster shots.Diana dos Santos, 71, received two shots of the Sinovac vaccine even after President Jair Bolsonaro spent months publicly criticizing it. Dos Santos, who lives Rio’s low-income Maré neighborhood, is diabetic and was hospitalized for a heart condition. She refuses to leave home until she gets her booster.“I can’t go out like before and I’m still afraid of all of this,” dos Santos said. “I will feel safer (with a booster).”Because of the variant, some experts say the government should slow the rollout of boosters and focus on distributing second doses. Delta is the most contagious variant identified, and many studies have suggested that one dose doesn’t protect against it.Two shots provide strong protection, with nearly all hospitalizations and deaths among the unvaccinated.Ethel Maciel, an epidemiologist and professor at the Federal University of Espirito Santo, said pushing boosters at this early stage recalls the lack of concern given the gamma variant that overwhelmed Amazonian city Manaus earlier this year, only to feed a new wave nationwide. Brazil has seen more than 580,000 deaths from COVID-19, making it home to world’s eighth-highest toll on a per capita basis.Elderly residents wait for a dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, during a booster shot campaign for the elderly in long-term care institutions, at Casa de Repouso Laco de Ouro nursing home, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sept. 2, 2021.“It seems we’re in the same movie, repeating the same errors,” Maciel said. “It’s only a matter of time until what’s happening in Rio leads to a greater number of more serious cases in the rest of the country.”The delta variant already is dominant in Rio de Janeiro state, detected in 86% of the samples collected from COVID-19 patients, according to the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. Intensive care units have reached full capacity in eight municipalities, although only a small rise in deaths have been recorded so far.Authorities in Sao Paulo state expect a similar scenario within weeks. It registered its first confirmed death from the delta variant on Tuesday, a 74-year-old woman who had received two Sinovac shots.Globally, doubts have plagued Chinese vaccines, especially as the delta variant has gained hold in many countries. Chinese officials have maintained the vaccine protects against delta, particularly preventing hospitalizations and severe cases.Still, Brazil’s Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga said Aug. 25 that people aged 70 or older or who have a weak immune system will be eligible for a third dose, starting Sept. 15 — preferably with the Pfizer vaccine. He said that people over 18 will have received their first doses by then, although he didn’t address their vulnerability to the delta variant without a second shot.He also criticized governors and mayors who sought to deliver booster shots earlier, saying it could lead to vaccine shortages.Carla Domingues, former coordinator of Brazil’s national immunization program, agrees with the need to provide the elderly boosters, but not for people aged 70 and up right away. Shots should first go to nursing homes and people who are bed-ridden, she said, then people 80 and above, with the age slowly decreasing as supply allows.“Certainly, there will be problems with shortage, because there won’t be enough vaccine,” Domingues said.Japan and South Korea both wrestled with slow vaccine rollouts, and under half their populations are fully vaccinated; their governments are only planning booster shots in the fourth quarter of this year. Malaysia also is considering boosters, but Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said the priority is those who haven’t received a first dose.Aloysio Zaluar, 84, is injected with a dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine during a booster shot campaign for elderly residents in long-term care institutions in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Sept. 1, 2021.Thailand began giving booster shots even as most people wait to be vaccinated — but only for health and front-line workers who received two Sinovac shots. The decision came after a nurse died of COVID-19 in July.Russia, Hungary and Serbia also are giving boosters, although there has been a lack of demand in those countries for the initial shots amid abundant supplies.In addition to doubts over boosters, the issue is sensitive due to implications for global vaccine distribution. World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has called for a moratorium on boosters “to allow those countries that are furthest behind to catch up.”Epidemiologist Denise Garrett, vice president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, which advocates for expanding global vaccine access, said in an interview there is no doubt about the need for two jabs, but she sees no scientific or moral justification for a third.“Authorities giving a third dose are prioritizing protection against light disease instead of shielding people in poor countries from death,” said Garrett, who is Brazilian. “That is shameful, immoral, and this vaccine inequity must end.”That doesn’t sway 97-year-old Maria Menezes, who wants to spend time outside her home where she has lived for the last seven decades in Rio’s western region. Her two daughters say Menezes wants to a booster shot.“She asked us to take her for the third vaccine,” said daughter Cristina França, 38. “It will be important to beef up her immunity to reduce her risks. Her life won’t change much after the third dose, because she is more frail now, but she would live with more calm.”
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A U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report released Friday says the coronavirus can cause “severe illness” in children and adolescents.From late June to mid-August, when there was an “increased circulation” of the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus, weekly COVID-associated hospitalization rates for children and adolescents rose nearly fivefold. Hospitalization rates, however, were “10 times higher among unvaccinated than among fully vaccinated adolescents,” the study said.India’s health ministry said Saturday morning that 42,618 new COVID cases were reported in the previous 24-hour period and 330 deaths.India is second only to the United States in COVID tolls. India has almost 33 million COVID-19 infections and 440,225 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. The U.S., Johns Hopkins says, has nearly 40 million infections and close to 650,000 deaths. Public health officials have warned, however, that India’s tolls are likely undercounted.The COVID-related death of a woman in her 90s is the first COVID-related death in New Zealand in more than 200 days.In addition to COVID, doctors say the women had several underlying health problems.Fighter Oscar de la Hoya has been hospitalized with COVID-19, forcing him to drop out of a comeback fight scheduled for next month.Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center said early Saturday that it had recorded nearly 219.8 million global COVID infections and 4.5 million deaths. The center said 5.4 billion vaccines have been administered.
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Cuban authorities on Friday launched a national campaign to vaccinate children ages 2-18 against COVID-19, a prerequisite set by the communist government for schools to reopen amid a spike in infections.Children 12 and older will be the first to receive one of the two domestically produced vaccines, Abdala and Soberana, followed by younger kids.Schools have mostly been closed in Cuba since March 2020, and students have been following lessons on television. With the school year starting Monday, they will continue learning remotely until all eligible children are vaccinated.Laura Lantigua, 17, got the first of three injections at Saul Delgado high school in the Cuban capital, Havana.”I always wanted to be vaccinated,” Lantigua told AFP. She said that doctors measured her blood pressure and temperature before giving her the shot, then told her to wait for an hour to ensure she didn’t have any side effects.”I felt normal, fine,” Lantigua said.Late Friday, the Medicines Regulatory Agency (Cecmed) announced that it authorized the emergency use of the Soberana 2 vaccine for minors between the ages of 2 and 18.The composition of Cuban vaccines, which are not recognized by the World Health Organization, is based on a recombinant protein, the same technique used by the U.S. company Novavax.With the delta variant spreading across the island of 11.2 million, the country’s health care system has been pushed to the brink.Of the 5,300 novel coronavirus deaths recorded since the outbreak started, nearly half were in August, as were almost a third of all reported cases.The government said it plans to gradually reopen schools for in-person instruction in October after the vaccination campaign among children is completed.
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In the first report of its kind, the World Meteorological Organization examines the close link between air quality and climate change and how measures stemming from COVID-19 influenced air quality patterns in 2020.Government-imposed lockdown measures and travel restrictions to control the spread of COVID-19 resulted in a marked improvement in air quality in many parts of the world. For example, the WMO said Southeast Asia experienced a 40% reduction in air particles in 2020.However, the chief of the WMO’s Atmospheric Environment Research Division, Oksana Tarasova, said the dramatic fall in emissions of key air pollutants was short-lived. She said city dwellers who reveled in seeing blue skies during periods of lockdown inactivity, had to again endure living under a pollution cloud once the cars started rolling again.WMO Chief of atmospheric and environment research division Oksana Tarasova attends a press conference Nov. 25, 2019 in Geneva.“As soon as mobility has increased, we are back to business as usual,” Tarasova said. “So, those improvements were not very long lasting. And that is why we always stress that the extreme measures which were taken under lockdown is not a substitute for long term policies.”During this same period, the WMO said extreme weather events fueled by climate and environmental change triggered unprecedented sand and dust storms and wildfires that affected air quality.In parallel with the human-induced experiment on lockdowns and travel restrictions, Tarasova said those, and other natural phenomena also were controlling air quality around the world.“There were several very strong events that happened in 2020 related to bio-mass burning where the smoke pollution from this burning bio-mass impacted air quality in large parts of Siberia, the United States,” Tarasova said. “Early in the year, there was an episode in Australia that caused dramatic deterioration of air quality in those parts of the world.”Smoke from wildfires is seen east of Hobart in the Australian island state of Tasmania Jan. 4, 2013.The episode Tarasova refers is to Australian wildfires.The WMO says changes in climate can influence pollution levels directly. It says the increased frequency and intensity of heatwaves may lead to greater accumulation of pollutants close to the surface. It notes the intense wildfires breaking out in many parts of the world and huge dust and sandstorms also worsen air pollution.The weather agency warns air pollution has significant impacts on human health. That is borne out by estimates from the latest Global Burden of Disease assessment. The data show global mortality from pollution nearly doubled from 2.3 million in 1990 to 4.5 million in 2019 — most due to particulate matter.  
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Amid the latest wave of COVID-19 infections, less than 1% of people in Africa’s most populated country, Nigeria, have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus. Nigerian authorities are scrambling for more vaccines but say misinformation and myths are discouraging uptake. Timothy Obiezu looks at efforts to dispel the rumors in this report from the capital, Abuja.
Camera: Emeka Gibson       Producer: Jason Godman
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The African Union has announced that Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines assembled in South Africa will no longer be exported to Europe and will instead be distributed among African countries.In addition, millions of J&J vaccines already shipped to Europe, but currently stored in warehouses, will be returned to South Africa, African Union COVID-19 envoy Strive Masiyiwa said Thursday.The deal between J&J and Aspen Pharmacare, the South African facility manufacturing the J&J vaccines that were sent to Europe, had received harsh criticism as less than 3% of the population of the African continent has been inoculated, compared to richer regions of the world that have begun or will soon begin booster shot campaigns.The World Health Organization has warned that the pandemic cannot be brought under control unless all the world’s regions are equitably vaccinated.Meanwhile, WHO has listed a new coronavirus strain as a “variant of interest.” The Mu variant is responsible for nearly 40% of the COVID cases in Colombia where it was first identified.Greek health care workers demonstrated Thursday against a COVID mandate that went into effect Wednesday.Under the new regulation, workers will be suspended without pay if they have not been inoculated or recovered from the coronavirus in the last six months.Musicals are back on Broadway, after an absence of more than a year because of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Tony Award-winning Hadestown, a modern interpretation of the ancient Greek legend of lovers Orpheus and Eurydice, opened Thursday.Also, the musical Waitress began a limited run Thursday, starring singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles.Hamilton, The Lion King, and Wicked return to Broadway theaters Sept. 14.The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center has recorded 219 million COVID infections and 4.5 million coronavirus deaths.  The center said early Friday that 5.3 billion vaccines have been administered.  Some information for this report came from the Associated Press.  
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Racial minorities in the United States will bear a disproportionate burden of the negative health and environmental impacts from a warming planet, the Environmental Protection Agency said Thursday, including more deaths from extreme heat and property loss from flooding in the wake of sea-level rise.The new analysis, which comes four days after Hurricane Ida destroyed homes of low-income and Black residents in Louisiana and Mississippi, examined the effects of the global temperature rising 2 degrees Celsius compared with preindustrial levels. It found that American Indians and Alaska Natives are 48% more likely than other groups to live in areas that will be inundated by flooding from sea-level rise under that scenario, Latinos are 43% more likely to live in communities that will lose work hours because of intense heat, and Black people will suffer significantly higher mortality rates.The world has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius since the Industrial Revolution began and is on track to warm by more than 1.5 degrees by the early 2030s.Joe Goffman, acting head of the EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, said the comprehensive review was a “first of its kind.” It amounts to a federal acknowledgment of the broad and disproportionate effect that global warming is having on some of America’s most socially vulnerable groups. Just this week, the Department of Health and Human Services established the Office of Climate Change and Health Equity, the first federal program aimed at specifically examining how the burning of fossil fuels and other greenhouse gas emissions affect human health.The impact of Hurricane Ida, whose remnants Wednesday wreaked havoc in New Jersey and New York City, is still being calculated. But Goffman said many Black and low-income residents in Louisiana and Mississippi are faced with the challenge of mustering the resources to replace living rooms drowned in floodwaters and rooftops ripped apart by powerful winds.“But one of the underlying lessons of this report is that so many communities that are heavily Black and African American find themselves in the way of some of the worst impacts of climate change,” he said, “as was the case with Katrina and, we may find, turns out to be the case with Ida.”Cristiane Rosales Fajardo, a community organizer in New Orleans who said she took in more than three dozen undocumented residents displaced by Ida, said people of color need more support after storms in part because they helped bring the city back from the brink after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.“We need to think about, how do we support an entire city when a hurricane comes?” she said. “We need to think about how to help our entire city, because guess what? Our blood and our sweat is going to be what it takes to rebuild the city, just like we rebuilt it” after Katrina.Other climate-driven disasters, from heat waves to flooding, are already affecting vulnerable Americans. Late last month, for example, the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration confirmed that a worker on a construction site collapsed June 28, the hottest day on record in the state, and died less than two weeks later. It attributed the death at Robinson Construction to “heat stress.”A separate report released Thursday by the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center said the United States now suffers more than 8,500 excess deaths in a typical year due to extreme heat driven by recent warming. That will increase to nearly 60,000 by 2050, it added, “with populations in Arizona, Southern California and southwest Texas hit hardest.”The lights of Times Square in New York are reflected in standing water Sept 2, 2021, as Hurricane Ida left behind not just water on city streets but wind damage and severe flooding along the Eastern seaboard.Extreme heat has put the United States on track to lose an average of $100 billion a year from lost productivity, the analysis found, with the figure rising to $200 billion by 2030.Dominique Browning, co-founder of the green group Moms Clean Air Force, said the EPA’s report “couldn’t be more perfectly timed,” following Ida’s destructive wake. “We are in such an emergency.”But she added that it remains to be seen whether the Biden administration and Congress will put in place powerful enough legislation and regulation to cut pollution and slow-rising temperatures. The group is pressing the EPA, for instance, to set tougher standards for ozone and soot, two pollutants at higher levels in neighborhoods with more racial minorities.Black people are 40% more likely than other groups to currently live in places where extreme temperatures driven by climate change will result in higher mortality rates, the analysis found. In addition, African Americans are 34% more likely to live in areas where childhood asthma diagnoses are likely to be exacerbated by climate change.EPA staffers launched the study last summer under President Donald Trump, with an eye toward publishing it in an academic journal. But “the Biden-Harris administration took ownership of this report and elevated it,” Goffman said, because of its focus on climate and environmental justice.President Biden issued an executive order a week after taking office aimed at addressing the historic pollution burdens faced by communities of color that were targeted for the construction of railroad depots, coal-fired power plants, freeways and factories that produce toxic chemicals. But he has yet to deliver on some of his most sweeping promises to address historic inequities, as Congress has yet to enact his legislative proposals that would pour billions of dollars into these areas.Low-income residents with no high school diploma — including White people, who like the other groups fall under the environmental justice umbrella of communities historically zoned for pollution — will also experience more flooding and lost work hours from flooding, the analysis said.A passport and other documents are seen water logged on a counter in a basement apartment on 153rd Street in the Flushing neighborhood of the Queens borough of New York, Sept. 2, 2021, in New York.The study “drew on a growing body of literature,” the authors wrote, such as the fourth National Climate Assessment, which “focuses on the disproportionate and unequal risks that climate change is projected to have on communities that are least able to anticipate, cope with, and recover from adverse impacts.”The analysis covers only the Lower 48 states, excluding Alaska and Hawaii. As a result, the authors said, it does not capture the full effect on some groups, including Alaska Natives and Asian Americans.The new study looked at a range of adverse effects based on average global temperatures rising between 1 degree Celsius and 4 degrees Celsius.But global temperature increases are not felt evenly. A 2 degrees Celsius increase worldwide could cause an average annual temperature spike of 3 degrees Celsius in large swaths of the United States, scientists said, including the Great Plains, Midwest, Northeast and Southwest.A worldwide rise of 4 degrees Celsius would cause an average annual spike of up to 6 degrees Celsius in those areas.Black people 65 and older would probably be profoundly affected by poor air quality. They are 41% to 60% more likely to die as a result of fine-particle pollution, or soot, depending on how high temperatures rise.In 49 cities analyzed for the study, from Seattle to Miami, Black people are 41% to 59% more likely to die as a result of poor air quality.Black children 17 and younger would also suffer disproportionately, the study found. They are 34% to 40% more likely to be diagnosed with asthma depending on the range of temperature increases based on where they live.Native Americans and Latinos are more likely to be affected by extreme temperatures where they work. Latinos would be 43% more likely than others to lose work hours and pay because it’s too hot, while American Indians and Alaskan Natives are 37% more likely to lose hours. 
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The COVID-19 pandemic has created a nurse staffing crisis that is forcing many U.S. hospitals to pay top dollar to get the help they need to handle the crush of patients this summer.The problem, health leaders say, is twofold: Nurses are quitting or retiring, exhausted or demoralized by the crisis. And many are leaving for lucrative temporary jobs with traveling-nurse agencies that can pay $5,000 or more a week.It’s gotten to the point where doctors are saying, “Maybe I should quit being a doctor and go be a nurse,” said Dr. Phillip Coule, chief medical officer at Georgia’s Augusta University Medical Center, which has on occasion seen 20 to 30 resignations in a week from nurses taking traveling jobs.“And then we have to pay premium rates to get staff from another state to come to our state,” Coule said.The average pay for a traveling nurse has soared from roughly $1,000 to $2,000 per week before the pandemic to $3,000 to $5,000 now, said Sophia Morris, a vice president at San Diego-based health care staffing firm Aya Healthcare. She said Aya has 48,000 openings for traveling nurses to fill.At competitor SimpliFi, President James Quick said the hospitals his company works with are seeing unprecedented levels of vacancies.“Small to medium-sized hospitals generally have dozens of full-time openings, and the large health systems have hundreds of full-time openings,” he said.The explosion in pay has made it hard on hospitals without deep enough pockets.Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly lamented recently that the state’s hospitals risk being outbid for nurses by other states that pay a “fortune.” She said Wednesday that several hospitals, including one in Topeka, had open beds but no nurses to staff them.In Kansas City, Missouri, Truman Medical Centers has lost about 10 nurses to travel jobs in recent days and is looking for travelers to replace them, said CEO Charlie Shields.He said it is hard to compete with the travel agencies, which are charging hospitals $165 to $170 an hour per nurse. He said the agencies take a big cut of that, but he estimated that nurses are still clearing $70 to $90 an hour, which is two to three times what the hospital pays its staff nurses.“I think clearly people are taking advantage of the demand that is out there,” Shields said. “I hate to use ‘gouged’ as a description, but we are clearly paying a premium and allowing people to have fairly high profit margins.”In Texas, more than 6,000 travel nurses have flooded the state to help with the surge through a state-supported program. But on the same day that 19 of them went to work at a hospital in the northern part of the state, 20 other nurses at the same place gave notice that they would be leaving for a traveling contract, said Carrie Kroll, a vice president at the Texas Hospital Association.FILE – In this Aug. 18, 2021, photo, a poster honoring medical and frontline workers hangs on a nursing station of an intensive care unit at the Willis-Knighton Medical Center in Shreveport, La.“The nurses who haven’t left, who have stayed with their facilities, they are seeing these other people come in now who are making more money. It provides a tense working environment,” Kroll said.The pandemic was in its early stages when Kim Davis, 36, decided to quit her job at an Arkansas hospital and become a travel nurse. She said she has roughly doubled her income in the 14 months that she has been treating patients in intensive care units in Phoenix; San Bernardino, California; and Tampa, Florida.“Since I’ve been traveling, I’ve paid off all my debt. I paid off about $50,000 in student loans,” she said.Davis said many of her colleagues are following the same path.“They’re leaving to go travel because why would you do the same job for half the pay?” she said. “If they’re going to risk their lives, they should be compensated.”Health leaders say nurses are bone-tired and frustrated from being asked to work overtime, from getting screamed at and second-guessed by members of the community, and from dealing with people who chose not to get vaccinated or wear a mask.“Imagine going to work every day and working the hardest that you have worked and stepping out of work and what you see every day is denied in the public,” said Julie Hoff, chief nurse executive at OU Health in Oklahoma. “The death that you see every day is not honored or recognized.”Meanwhile, hospitals are getting squeezed by the revolving door of departures and new hires from traveling agencies.Coule cited a recent example in which his hospital in Georgia hired a respiratory therapist through an agency to replace a staff member who had decided to accept a traveling gig. The replacement came from the same hospital where his respiratory therapist had just gone to work.“Essentially we swapped personnel but at double the cost,” he said.Patricia Pittman, director of the Fitzhugh Mullan Institute for Health Workforce Equity at George Washington University, said many nurses still harbor resentment toward their employers from the early stages of the pandemic, in part from being forced to work without adequate protective gear.“The nurses say, ‘Hey, if I am not going to be treated with respect, I might as well go be a travel nurse,’” she said. “‘That way I can go work in a hellhole for 13 weeks, but then I can take off a couple months or three months and go do whatever.’”
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Americans will likely have to get a third shot of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, Dr. Anthony Fauci said Thursday at a White House press briefing.”I must say from my own experience as an immunologist, I would not at all be surprised that the adequate full regimen for vaccination will likely be three doses,” Fauci, who is director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told reporters.He said the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would make the final decision.Whether those who got the one-shot Johnson & Johnson will need boosters remains to be seen.Any booster for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines would be given between five and eight months after the second dose.White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Jeffrey Zients said that 175 million Americans were now fully vaccinated, an increase of 10 million from a month ago.”That’s a major milestone in our vaccination effort,” Zients said at the briefing.The seven-day rolling average on Thursday of new COVID-19 cases in the U.S. was more than 150,000 per day, while hospitalizations were at 12,000 and deaths at 953, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said.Fauci also addressed the so-called mu variant, which the World Health Organization added to its list of variants of interest Monday.”We’re paying attention to it — we take everything like that seriously — but we don’t consider it an immediate threat right now,” said Fauci, who also serves as White House chief medical adviser.First identified in Colombia, mu has been seen in at least 39 countries, WHO said.Some information for this report came from The Associated Press. 
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U.S. climate envoy John Kerry warned Thursday that Beijing’s coal-building spree could “undo” global capacity to meet environmental targets, after holding talks with top officials in China. Tensions between Beijing and Washington have soared in recent months, with the two sides trading barbs on China’s human rights record and its initial handling of the coronavirus. Tackling climate change is among a handful of issues where the two sides had struck notes of harmony. But Beijing has in recent months emphasized that environmental cooperation could be hurt by deteriorating Sino-U.S. relations. Kerry told journalists Thursday evening that the United States has made it “clear that the addition of more coal plants represents a significant challenge to the efforts of the world to deal with the climate crisis.” FILE – Workers put away equipment after coming out of the Datai coal mine in Mentougou, west of Beijing, Jan. 8, 2020.Chinese plans for new coal plants could “undo the capacity of the world to reach net-zero by 2050,” he said, adding that while they had “very constructive” talks, he also was “very direct” on the topic. Despite pledges to reach peak coal consumption before 2030, then move toward carbon neutrality. China brought 38.4 gigawatts of new coal-fired power into operation last year — more than three times the amount brought online elsewhere in the world. China has challenged the United States to fix relations with Beijing in order to make progress on climate change. Kerry urged the Chinese government, however, not to let environmental cooperation be affected by tensions between the world’s two biggest polluters, calling it a “global challenge.” “It is essential … no matter what differences we have, that we have to address the climate crisis,” he said. Foreign Minister Wang Yi had told Kerry earlier in the visit that cooperation on global warming could not be disentangled from broader diplomacy between the two countries. In a video call with the climate envoy, Wang accused Washington of a “major strategic miscalculation toward China,” according to the ministry statement. “It is impossible for China-U.S. climate cooperation to be elevated above the overall environment of China-U.S. relations,” Wang said. He added that “the ball is now in the United States’ court, and the U.S. should stop seeing China as a threat and opponent.” ‘China can do more’ Kerry visited Japan earlier this week before traveling to the northeastern Chinese city of Tianjin, in a tour aiming to drum up support for a major global summit to tackle pressing climate issues.  FILE – A coal-burning power plant can be seen behind a factory in China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, October 31, 2010.The 26th edition of the U.N. Climate Change Conference of the Parties — COP26 — in Glasgow in November marks the biggest climate summit since the 2015 Paris negotiation. Kerry said he plans to meet with his Chinese counterparts again before the summit, to push for stronger emission reduction commitments.  The U.S .envoy has repeatedly urged China to step up efforts to reduce carbon emissions. “We have consistently said to China and other countries … to do their best within their given capacity,” Kerry said Thursday. “We think that China can do more.” The country is the world’s current largest emitter of carbon dioxide, followed by the United States, which has historically emitted more than any other nation to date. While Beijing has promised to reach peak carbon emissions by 2030 and become carbon neutral by 2060, it continues to be heavily dependent on coal, which fuels nearly 60 percent of its energy consumption. “We have an opportunity to make a positive impact in Glasgow,” Kerry said. “It really depends on the choices that China makes at this point.” 
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The Federal Aviation Administration said Thursday that Virgin Galactic cannot launch anyone into space until an investigation is complete into a mishap that occurred during July’s flight with founder Richard Branson.The ban came as Virgin Galactic announced plans to launch three Italian researchers to the edge of space in a few weeks.The FAA said the rocketship carrying Branson and five Virgin Galactic employees veered off course during its descent back to New Mexico on July 11. The deviation put the ship outside the air traffic control clearance area.The FAA is overseeing the probe; it’s responsible for protecting the public during commercial launches and reentries. Crew safety, on the other hand, is outside its jurisdiction. Virgin Galactic insisted Thursday that Branson and everyone else on board were never in any added danger.”Virgin Galactic may not return the SpaceShipTwo vehicle to flight until the FAA approves the final mishap investigation report or determines the issues related to the mishap do not affect public safety,” the FAA said in a statement.Virgin Galactic acknowledged the space plane dropped below the protected airspace for 1 minute and 41 seconds. The spacecraft’s free-flying portion of the up-and-down flight lasted about 15 minutes and reached an altitude of 53.5 miles (86 kilometers).Virgin Galactic said high-altitude wind caused the change in flight path and insisted the two pilots “responded appropriately.” In a statement, the company said the flight was “a safe and successful test flight that adhered to our flight procedures and training protocols.””At no time were passengers and crew put in any danger as a result of this change in trajectory,” the company noted.Branson beat fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos — founder of Amazon and the rocket company Blue Origin — into space by nine days. Bezos launched July 20 with three others from West Texas.Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin are vying to sell seats to tourists, scientists and anyone else looking to experience a few minutes of weightlessness. Virgin Galactic’s rocketship is launched from an airplane, while Blue Origin’s capsule is hoisted by a reusable New Shepard rocket.Virgin Galactic is aiming for late September or early October for its next flight, with two Italian Air Force officers, an engineer for the National Research Council of Italy, Virgin Galactic’s chief astronaut instructor and the rocketship’s two pilots. It will be the company’s first launch where researchers accompany their own experiments. The company plans to start flying ticket holders next year.Blue Origin has yet to announce a date for its next passenger flight, other than to say it will be soon.
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The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control has issued a report saying that based on current evidence, there is no urgent need for COVID-19 vaccine booster shots and the public health focus should remain on getting initial vaccinations to eligible European citizens.The report added additional doses should be considered for those individuals with compromised immune systems who did not respond adequately to their initial dose or doses.But the report says the available current evidence regarding the “real world” effectiveness and duration of protection provided by all the vaccines authorized for use in the European Union shows they are highly protective against COVID-19-related hospitalization, severe disease and death. COVID-19 is caused by the coronavirus.The report also noted that European nations should consider what administering boosters might do regarding the availability of vaccines for nations outside the EU, which continue to struggle with obtaining and administering enough initial doses for their populations.France Wednesday became the first EU nation to start administering booster shots to people over 65, and to those with underlying health conditions as a guard against the delta variant of the coronavirus. Spanish health authorities are considering similar action.(Some information in this report come from the Associated Press.) 
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The World Health Organization warns few governments are providing necessary care for many of the more than 55 million people living with dementia at a time when this debilitating brain condition is growing rapidly around the world.A stock-taking analysis of WHO’s 2017 Global Action Plan on Dementia shows few states are implementing measures for caring and treating people living with this condition.It finds only a quarter of countries worldwide have a national policy or plan for supporting people with dementia and their families.  It warns too many governments are unprepared to deal with this growing public health problem, which affects 55 million people globally – more than 60 percent in low-and-middle-income countries.The World Health Organization estimates the number of people with dementia will rise to 78 million by 2030 and an estimated 139 million by 2050.  WHO estimates the global cost of dementia also is expected to balloon from the present $1.3 trillion to $2.8 trillion by 2030.Technical Officer in WHO’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Use, Katrin Seeher, said too many countries lack a basic comprehensive policy to respond to the challenges that lie ahead.“We also need to strengthen the health and the social care system in countries to ensure that there is universal access to dementia diagnosis but also to treatment and care.  And we especially need to reduce the gap that exists between high-income and low-and-middle income countries and between urban and rural areas,” said Seeher.Dementia is caused by a variety of diseases and injuries that affect the brain, such as Alzheimer’s disease or stroke. It mainly afflicts people over the age of 60 and can affect memory, other cognitive functions, and make it difficult to perform everyday tasks.Tarun Dua is Unit Head of WHO’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Use. While there is no cure, she said reducing risk factors can potentially prevent up to 40 percent of dementia cases.“For example, healthy diet. Looking at the risk factors, which are the same risk factors for noncommunicable diseases, such as tobacco use or harmful use of alcohol.  Managing conditions like hypertension, diabetes, or depression—social isolation.  These are the things that we can do promote our brain health and decrease the cognitive decline and the risk for dementia,” said Dua.WHO reports people with dementia require primary health care, specialist care, community-based services, rehabilitation, long-term care, and palliative care. Health officials note dementia is not a normal part of aging.  But countries must be prepared to support and care for the increasing numbers of people that will be afflicted with this disabling condition in the years to come.
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The United Nations Environment Program on Monday marked the official end of toxic leaded gasoline use in vehicles worldwide. A company in Nairobi, where the UNEP is headquartered, is working on the next step — converting all buses and utility vehicles to electric power by 2030. Lenny Ruvaga has the story.
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After suspending the use of 1.63 million doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine over contamination concerns last week, Japan is now recalling those doses, Moderna Inc. and its Japanese partner, Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. said Wednesday.Last week, some vials of the vaccine were found to be contaminated with stainless steel.Japanese officials said Wednesday that they did not think the stainless steel particles posed a health risk, while Moderna said the contamination was probably caused by pieces of metal rubbing together in the machinery that puts stops on the vials.”Stainless steel is routinely used in heart valves, joint replacements and metal sutures and staples. As such, it is not expected that injection of the particles identified in these lots in Japan would result in increased medical risk,” Takeda and Moderna said in a joint statement.According to Taro Kono, the Japanese minister overseeing vaccinations, around 500,000 people received shots from the suspended Moderna batches.The focus on the contaminated doses was heightened after two men died within days of receiving second doses from the contaminated batches.While their deaths are still being investigated, Moderna and Takeda said there was no evidence the vaccine played a role in their deaths.”The relationship is currently considered to be coincidental,” the companies said in the statement.(Some information in this report comes from Reuters.)  
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