January 31 coronavirus news

Nine children with symptoms of Covid-19 have died in the Yanomami Indigenous Territory in the Amazonas state of Brazil, according to Júnior Hekurari Yanomami, the President of the Yanomami and Ye’kuana District Council for Indigenous Health.

The children were between the ages of 1 and 5 according to Yanomami, and each showed symptoms of Covid-19 including a high fever.

Five of the children were from the Kataroa village and four of them were from Waputha, Yanomami said, adding that health clinics in both villages closed down two months ago - leaving only one health worker there during that period. 

"We are requesting the government to send help immediately. The health professionals we have inside the Yanomami territory are insufficient. The second wave is being harsh on us, it has spread throughout the whole territory," Yanomami said.

According to Yanomami, there are 45 confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the Surucucu village, another village in the Amazonas state. Four of the cases are children with severe conditions who were moved to a hospital in the neighboring state of Roraima. 

Before December 20, there had not been any cases of Covid-19 among the nuns living at the Motherhouse campus of the Adrian Dominican Sisters in Adrian, Michigan.

Now, nine have died from the disease following an outbreak that saw 48 of the campus' 217 residents test positive -- 13 active Covid-19 cases remain and 26 people are recovering, Adrian Dominican Sisters said in a statement.

"We spent nine months keeping the coronavirus at bay. Right before Christmas, it slipped in," Sister Patricia Siemen told CNN affiliate WDIV. Siemen is the order's prioress, or leader.

The nine sisters died between January 11 and 26. Most of the sisters were already at high risk due to existing health issues, WDIV reported.

Read more here:

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9 nuns die of Covid-19 after outbreak at Adrian Dominican Sisters campus in Michigan

South Korea is extending its social distancing measures for another two weeks until after the Lunar New Year holiday, Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said in a televised speech on Sunday.

Chung said the decision didn’t come lightly, and apologized to business owners, but he stressed the importance of keeping strict rules due to the upcoming holiday from February 11 to February 13.

The Seoul Metropolitan Area is currently at Level 2.5 on the scale of social distancing restrictions -- the second-highest level -- with the rest of the country at the lower Level 2.

Under the current rules, restaurants in Seoul and surrounding areas are only allowed to receive take out and delivery orders after 9 p.m., and spectators are banned at sporting events.

The Prime Minister emphasized on Sunday that the government is committed to bringing back normal daily life as soon as possible by stabilizing the infection rate.

South Korea recorded 355 new cases of Covid-19 on Saturday, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA.)

Western Australia state is imposing a five-day lockdown for three areas -- Perth metropolitan area, Peel region and the South West region -- after a hotel security guard tested positive for Covid-19.

Starting at 6 p.m. on Sunday, these regions will go into a "full lockdown" until 6 p.m. on Friday, announced state premier Mark McGowan on Sunday.

Under this restriction:

The positive case is a man in his 20s working the Sheraton Four Points hotel, McGowan said. There were four active cases at the hotel while the employee was on shift, two of which were identified as the UK strain and one the South African strain.

"We are told the guard was working on the same floor, as a positive UK variant case," McGowan said. The man had worked two 12-hour shifts on January 26th and 27th, and said it's possible the man contracted the UK strain, though authorities are still investigating exactly how he was infected.

Officials are calling on all people who visited a specified list of venues on a certain date to get tested. All close contacts of the man are required to quarantine for 14 days.

"Western Australians have done so well for so long but this week it is absolutely crucial that we stay home, maintain physical distancing and personal hygiene and get tested if you have symptoms," McGowan said.

An earlier plan to give Guantanamo Bay detainees the Covid-19 vaccine has been paused as of Saturday, according to a US Pentagon official.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said in a Saturday afternoon tweet that no Guantanamo Bay detainees have been given a Covid-19 vaccine and announced that the Department of Defense is "pausing the plan to move forward, as we review force protection protocols."

CNN had previously reported that US Armed Forces and current US-held detainees at Guantanamo Bay were granted authorization to receive the Covid-19 vaccine on January 27 in a memo from Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs Terry Adirim.

The Department of Defense will "offer and administer vaccines to detainees and prisoners under their care," a Defense spokesperson said in a statement earlier this week.

There are approximately 40 prisoners who remain at Guantanamo Bay, so it would only be a small volume of vaccine allotted to the detention center.

Read more here:

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The US has administered more than 29.5 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The CDC reported that 29,577,902 doses have been administered -- about 59% of the 49,932,850 doses distributed.

That means 24 million people have received at least one dose of the vaccine, and about 5.25 million people have been fully vaccinated, according to CDC data. 

States have 72 hours to report vaccine data, so data published by the CDC may be delayed. 

Australia will once again allow quarantine-free travel for visitors from New Zealand on Sunday afternoon, Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt said in a news release.

"Green zone flights" will start on Sunday 2 p.m. local time, the release added.

The Australian government previously suspended quarantine-free travel for New Zealanders arriving in Australia on January 25, after a South African variant of Covid-19 was detected in a woman after 14 days of quarantine in New Zealand.

"The Acting CMO notes flights from New Zealand are sufficiently low risk given New Zealand’s strong public health response to Covid-19," the release said. Out of caution, pre and post-flight screening will be implemented, and people traveling to Australia must have been in New Zealand for 14 days prior to leaving.

The one-way travel bubble is only for people traveling from New Zealand to Australia. New Zealand still enforces a 14-day quarantine for foreign travelers.

The United States reported 136,252 new Covid-19 cases and 2,640 additional related deaths on Saturday, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

That raises the national total to at least 26,069,046 cases and 439,439 deaths since the pandemic began.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other U.S. territories, as well as repatriated cases.

At least 49,932,850 vaccine doses have been distributed so far, and at least 29,577,902 doses of vaccine have been administered, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

See CNN's live tracker of cases here.

For the first time in nearly two months, current Covid-19 hospitalizations in the United States have fallen below 100,000, according to data from The Covid Tracking Project. 

On Saturday, the US reported 97,561 Covid-19 hospitalizations, the data shows.

Before then, the last time the US had fewer than 100,000 current hospitalizations was December 1, 2020 -- 60 days ago.

On December 1, the United States had a 7-day average of roughly 163,000 new cases and 1,540 reported deaths per day, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Right now, the US has roughly the same new case average, but sees more than double the average daily deaths, with over 3,000 a day.  

Hospitalizations have been dropping consistently since the start of the year, according to CTP. This past week was the first week since November 5 that no state has reached a new record high for current hospitalizations, according to CTP.