The latest on the coronavirus pandemic and vaccines

Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, said on Wednesday that is seems “fairly unlikely” that the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine is causing blood clots, and that he was surprised that so many countries have paused administration of the vaccine.

“Everything that I have heard so far – but we’re waiting for the European Medicines Agency report tomorrow – would indicate that this is one of those things where clotting is a fairly common medical problem and you have 17 million people getting a vaccine, some of them are going to have various medical problems just because that was going to happen to them anyway,” Collins told CNN on Wednesday.

Collins said the that US Food and Drug Administration will look “with great care and stringency” at AstraZeneca trial results from the US. The information will start to be revealed soon, he said, and that the company will put in a request for emergency use authorization. 

Collins said he was “a bit surprised” that so many countries have decided to pause the rollout of the vaccine, “especially at a time where the disease itself is so incredibly threatening in most of those countries.”  

However, he added that he didn’t have access to any of the primary data that may have caused alarm in those countries.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers toured the newly opened Covid-19 community vaccination site at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, which he says has the capacity to vaccinate 6,000 to 10,000 people a week, depending on supply.

The governor said the state is heading in the right direction with vaccinations, saying, “We've put over 2 million shots in people's arms. We have more than 1.25 million people who have received the first dose and more than 700,000 people in the state of Wisconsin have been vaccinated twice.”

Lambeau Field is now one of 17 NFL facilities being used as a vaccination site, Green Bay Packers President and CEO Mark Murphy said.

Approximately 90 million stimulus checks have been disbursed to Americans, the Department of Treasury, Internal Revenue Service, and the Bureau of the Fiscal Service announced Wednesday, totaling over $242 billion in payments. 

The payments of up to $1,400 per person began processing on Friday after President Biden signed the $1.9 trillion Covid relief bill into law last Thursday, with direct deposits beginning over the weekend. 

This first batch, the statement said, “primarily went to eligible taxpayers who provided direct deposit information on their 2019 or 2020 returns, including people who don’t typically file a return but who successfully used the Non-Filers tool on IRS.gov last year.” 

The first batch of payments also included approximately 150,000 mailed paper checks totaling approximately $442 million, the statement said. 

Additional batches will be sent in the coming weeks, a majority via direct deposit, but also through checks and debit cards. 

Families will receive an additional $1,400 per dependent, so a couple with two children could receive up to $5,600. Unlike prior rounds, families will now receive the additional money for adult dependents over the age of 17. 

The full amount goes to individuals earning less than $75,000 of adjusted gross income, heads of households (like single parents) earning less than $112,500 and married couples earning less than $150,000. But then the payments gradually phase out as income goes up.

Americans can now track the status of their payments via a “Get May Payment” tool on IRS.gov.

National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis S. Collins said he’s “surprised” at the number of countries temporarily halting the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine rollout.

The European Medical Authority has said there's "no indication" that the vaccine has caused blood clots. The EMA's safety committee is investigating whether there is any possible link between the vaccine and a small number of blood clots in vaccinated people. It is slated to release its findings on Thursday.

“It seems at the present time fairly unlikely that this is something that has been in any way caused by the vaccines,” Collins said, adding that he doesn’t have access to the data that might have caused alarm. 

The US Food and Drug Administration will look at the vaccine with “great care and stringency,” he said. 

Collins also said he is surprised by overall vaccine hesitancy, despite vaccines with “amazing characteristics.” 

“There's all this overlay — and some of it is politics, and some of it’s social media conspiracy theories, and some of it is distrust of anything the government had anything to do with. We have a long way to go yet to overcome that. And I'm kind of a little astounded as well that we haven't gotten further in overcoming that hesitancy,” he said. 

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The US Department of Health and Human Services is funneling $10 billion to states to help implement coronavirus surveillance testing in K-12 schools across the country, the agency announced Wednesday. It's part of the Biden administration's push to help schools reopen safely for in-person learning.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is also releasing new guidance on the appropriate use of surveillance testing in schools and other communal settings, HHS announced.

The agency said the funds, which were approved as part of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief law, "will be able to be deployed quickly" and will help schools test teachers, students and staff who were exposed to the virus and help identify asymptomatic cases of the virus to prevent the virus from spreading further in schools.

President Biden has set a goal of reopening a majority of schools in the US for in-person learning within his first 100 days in office.

Earlier this month, Biden urged states to prioritize teachers and school staff to get at least one shot by the end of March and used his authority to prioritize teacher vaccinations through the federal supply of vaccines to pharmacies.

The CDC will also spend an additional $2.25 billion to boost testing and other mitigation measures in underserved populations, which will include grants to public health departments and funding to improve data collection efforts.

The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan delivered a windfall for coronavirus testing efforts in the US, dedicating a total of $47.8 billion.

Biden's efforts to reopen schools have moved ahead in fits and starts over the last month, amid messaging stumbles, pressure from Republicans to move faster and feuds between some teachers unions and school districts across the country.

More than 25 million people in the United Kingdom have now received their first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, the UK Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said Wednesday in a statement, adding that almost half of all adults across the country have now received the jab. 

“Figures out today show the UK health services vaccinated a total of 25,273,226 people between 8 December and 16 March with first doses of the Pfizer and Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccines, while 1,759,445 people have had their second dose,” the DHSC said in a statement. 

According to data from the Department of Health and Social Care, nine in ten clinically extremely vulnerable people in the UK have also now received their first dose of the vaccine. 

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Wednesday that the latest data marks an “incredible achievement” for the country’s vaccination rollout campaign, describing the milestone as “25 million reasons to be confident for the future” as the government prepares to ease restrictions.  

The Department of Health and Social Care has said that the vaccine rollout is “continuing at fast pace,” adding that the UK is “on track to achieve the Prime Minister’s target of offering the first dose of the vaccine to all over-50s by 15 April, as well as all adults by the end of July.” 

Projections from the DHSC show that the UK expects to have vaccinated 26.5 million people — half of all UK adults — by the end of this week. 

“The vaccination programme will continue to expand over the coming weeks and more people will receive their second doses,” UK Vaccines Minister Nadhim Zahawi said in a statement.  

“This is an incredible milestone and moves us one step closer to safely seeing our friends and family again,” he added. 

It's been a long year for Disneyland fans, but "The Happiest Place On Earth" is finally set to reopen its doors.

The Disney resort, which houses Disneyland and its sister theme park California Adventure, plans to reopen with limited capacity on April 30, the company announced Wednesday.

Disneyland, the company's flagship theme park located in Anaheim, California, has been closed more than a year because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Massachusetts is expecting to hit one million fully vaccinated residents within the next 24 hours, Gov. Charlie Baker announced today. 

During a visit to a vaccine distribution site, Baker said that there are currently 946,306 people fully vaccinated. He also said that 1.6 million have received a first dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, and 63,000 have received a dose of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine.

This comes as the state announced Wednesday morning that they would open vaccine eligibility to people 16 and over starting April 19, which was made possible by an increase in vaccines from the federal government.

The seven-day average positivity rate for the state is currently at 1.86%, and the rate has been under 2% for the last several weeks, he said.

Note: This information was provided by the state health department and may not line up directly with JHU’s Covid Tracking project.

In the first two and half months of Covid-19 vaccine distribution in the US, counties considered to have high social vulnerability had lower vaccine coverage than counties considered to have low social vulnerability, according to a study published Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 

The CDC social vulnerability index identifies communities that may need additional support during emergencies based on 15 indicators across four categories: socioeconomic status, household composition, racial/ethnic minority status and housing type. Counties were split equally between high, moderate and low social vulnerability.

By March 1, nearly 52 million vaccine doses had been administered in the US, and about 15.1% of the population had received at least one dose. But vaccination coverage was about 2 percentage points higher in counties with low social vulnerability (15.8%) than in counties with high social vulnerability (13.9%). The differences were largely driven by socioeconomic disparities, particularly differences in the share of the population with a high school diploma and per capita income. 

Only five states – Arizona, Montana, Alaska, Minnesota and West Virginia – had higher coverage in counties with high social vulnerability than in counties with low social vulnerability based on the overall index. 

Best practices in these states included prioritizing racial/ethnic minority groups in early vaccine coverage, actively monitoring barriers to vaccination, directing vaccines to vulnerable communities, offering free transportation to vaccination sites and collaborating with community partners and tribes, according to the study. 

The CDC says that achieving vaccine equity – not just equality – is an important goal, requiring “preferential access and administration to those who have been most affected” beyond proportionate distribution based on population.  

Despite disproportionate incidence of Covid-19 among non-English speaking communities and people with a disability, equal vaccination coverage was observed in these metrics for communities with both high and low social vulnerability.

Also, higher coverage in counties with larger shares of older adults is consistent with prioritization strategies. But disparities linked to access to a vehicle were “unexpected and warrants further investigation,” according to the CDC. 

The CDC social vulnerability index does not include all factors that may be used to identify disparities. Internet access, for example, is not measured. Also, population-based measures do not assess individual-level vulnerability, and vulnerabilities may vary within counties. Finally, vaccine priority groups varied by state, which may drive some differences.