Category: General

Japan will open its borders to foreign tourists in June for the first time since imposing tight pandemic travel restrictions about two years ago, but only for package tours for now, the prime minister said Thursday.

Beginning June 10, Japan will allow the entry of people on tours with fixed schedules and guides, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said.

Tourists from areas with low COVID-19 infection rates who have received three vaccine doses will be exempt from testing and quarantine after entry.

Japan this week is hosting small experimental package tours from four countries, Australia, Singapore, Thailand and the United States. That experiment, which involves only 50 people who received special visas, not tourist visas, is to end May 31.

“Free and active exchange of people is the foundation of economy and society, as well as that of Asia’s development,” Kishida told his speech at a Tokyo hotel Thursday.

Japan, while watching the infection situation, will gradually accept more tourists in stages to the level of arrivals before the pandemic, he added.

After facing criticism that its strict border controls were xenophobic, Japan began easing its restrictions earlier this year and currently allows entry of up to 10,000 people a day, including Japanese citizens, foreign students and some business travelers.

Japan will double the cap to 20,000 a day from June 1, which will also include package tour participants, said Makoto Shimoaraiso, a Cabinet official in charge of pandemic measures.

The scale of the package tours and other details will be finalized after officials evaluate the results of the current experimental tours, he said.

It will take some time before foreign visitors can come to Japan for individual tourism, Shimoaraiso said.

Japan this week also eased requests for mask wearing. While masks are still requested on public transportation, hospitals and other public facilities, people can take off masks outdoors where others are not around or talking. Despite the easing, most Japanese so far are seen sticking to wearing masks in public.

Japan’s tourism industry, hit hard by the border controls, is eager for foreign tourism to resume. COVID-19 infections have slowed in Japan since earlier this year and the government is gradually expanding social and economic activity.

Kishida said during a visit to London earlier this month that he planned to ease the border controls as early as June in line with the policies of other Group of Seven industrialized countries, but gave no further details.

Foreign tourist arrivals fell more than 90% in 2020 from a record 31.9 million the year before, almost wiping out the pre-pandemic inbound tourism market of more than 4 trillion yen ($31 billion).

Source: Voice of America

The coronavirus mutant that is now dominant in the United States is a member of the omicron family, but scientists say it spreads faster than its omicron predecessors, is adept at escaping immunity and might possibly cause more serious disease.

Why? Because it combines properties of both omicron and delta, the nation’s dominant variant in the middle of last year.

A genetic trait that harkens back to the pandemic’s past, known as a “delta mutation,” appears to allow the virus “to escape pre-existing immunity from vaccination and prior infection, especially if you were infected in the omicron wave,” said Dr. Wesley Long, a pathologist at Houston Methodist in Texas. That’s because the original omicron strain that swept the world didn’t have the mutation.

The omicron “subvariant” gaining ground in the U.S. — known as BA.2.12.1 and responsible for 58% of U.S. COVID-19 cases last week — isn’t the only one affected by the delta mutation. The genetic change is also present in the omicron relatives that together dominate in South Africa, known as BA.4 and BA.5. Those have exactly the same mutation as delta, while BA.2.12.1 has one that’s nearly identical.

This genetic change is bad news for people who caught the original omicron and thought that made them unlikely to get COVID-19 again soon. Although most people don’t know for sure which variant caused their illness, the original omicron caused a giant wave of cases late last year and early this year.

Long said lab data suggest a prior infection with the original omicron is not very protective against reinfection with the new mutants, though the true risk of being reinfected no matter the variant is unique to every person and situation.

In a twist, however, those sickened by delta previously may have some extra armor to ward off the new mutants. A study released before it was reviewed by other scientists, by researchers at Ohio State University, found that COVID patients in intensive care with delta infections induced antibodies that were better at neutralizing the new mutants than patients who caught the original omicron.

“The omicron infection antibody does not appear to protect well against the subvariants compared to delta,” said Dr. Shan-Lu Liu, a study author who co-directs the viruses and emerging pathogens program at Ohio State.

But Liu said the level of protection a delta infection provides depends partly on how long ago someone was ill. That’s because immunity wanes over time.

People who got sick with delta shouldn’t think of themselves as invulnerable to the new subvariants, especially if they’re unvaccinated, Long said. “I wouldn’t say anyone is safe.”

One bright spot? Booster shots can provide strong protection against the new mutants, Liu said. In general, vaccines and prior infection can protect people from the worst outcomes of COVID-19. At this point, scientists say, it’s too early to know if the new mutant gaining ground in the U.S. will cause a significant uptick in new cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

Scientists are still trying to figure out how virulent these new mutants are. Long said he hasn’t seen anything that answers that question for him, but Liu said emerging data point toward more serious illness. Liu said the subvariants have properties suggesting they spread more efficiently cell-to-cell.

The virus “just hides in the cell and spreads through cell-to-cell contact,” Liu said. “That’s more scary because the virus does not come out for the antibody to work.”

Dr. Eric Topol, head of Scripps Research Translational Institute, said the new mutants certainly don’t appear less virulent than previous versions of omicron, and whether they are more virulent or not “will become clear in the months ahead.”

In the meantime, scientists expect the latest powerhouse mutants to spread quickly, since they are more transmissible than their predecessors.

Though home testing makes it tough to track all U.S. COVID cases, data from Johns Hopkins University show that cases are averaging nearly 107,000 a day, up from about 87,000 two weeks ago. And new hospital admissions of patients with COVID-19 have been trending upward since around mid-April, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“I’m hopeful that we don’t see a similar increase in hospitalizations that we’ve had in prior waves,” Long said. “But with COVID, any time you have lots of people being infected, it’s just a numbers game. Some of those people are going to be severe. Some of those people are going to need hospitalization. Some of them, unfortunately, are going to pass away.”

Source: Voice of America

Pfizer-BioNTech announced Monday that three shots of their COVID-19 vaccine provided strong protection for children under the age of 5.

“We are pleased that our formulation for the youngest children, which we carefully selected to be one-tenth of the dose strength for adults, was well tolerated and produced a strong immune response,” Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said in a statement.

Bourla added that the companies are looking forward to “completing our submissions to regulators globally with the hope of making this vaccine available to younger children as quickly as possible, subject to regulatory authorization.”

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is set to meet in June to decide whether to authorize the shots for children.

The FDA has already begun evaluating data from Moderna, which says its low dose, two-shot vaccine offers protection for young children.

Meanwhile, World Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Sunday at the 75th World Health Assembly that the COVID pandemic is “most certainly not over.”

His warning comes as some countries are rescinding their COVID mandates, just as cases are on the rise again. “Reported cases are increasing in almost 70 countries in all regions,” Tedros said. “This virus has surprised us at every turn — a storm that has torn through communities again and again, and we still can’t predict its path, or its intensity.”

The WHO chief said that while more than 6 million global coronavirus deaths have been reported, the U.N. agency estimates the worldwide tally is much higher at “almost 15 million deaths.”

Tedros called on countries to do all they can to eradicate COVID, including vaccinating 70% of their population, which would include 100% of people over 60 years old; 100% of health workers; and 100% of people with underlying conditions.

The WHO leader warned, “The pandemic will not magically disappear. But we can end it … Science has given us the upper hand.”

The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported Monday more than 525 million global COVID infections and more than 6 million global coronavirus deaths.

Source: Voice of America

The COVID pandemic is “most certainly not over” World Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Sunday at the 75th World Health Assembly.

His warning comes as some countries are rescinding their COVID mandates, and cases are on the rise again.

“Reported cases are increasing in almost 70 countries in all regions,” Tedros said. “This virus has surprised us at every turn — a storm that has torn through communities again and again, and we still can’t predict its path, or its intensity.”

The WHO chief said that while more than 6 million global coronavirus deaths have been reported, the U.N. agency estimates that the worldwide tally is much higher at “almost 15 million deaths.”

Tedros called on countries to do all they can to eradicate COVID, including vaccinating 70% of their population, which would include 100% of people over 60 years old, 100% of health workers. and 100% of people with underlying conditions.

“The pandemic will not magically disappear,” warned the WHO leader, “but we can end it … Science has given us the upper hand.”

Meanwhile, Gallup, the global analytics firm, asks Americans every month — What is the most important problem facing the United States?

The answer has been COVID since the beginning of the pandemic. That all changed this March, however, when concerns about COVID were replaced with worries about the U.S. economy.

Gallup Senior Editor Megan Brenan said in an interview on The Gallup Podcast with Mohamed Younis that apprehension about how the U.S. government is handling the economy and inflation, now tops the list of Americans’ worries.

The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Monday more than 525 million global COVID infections and more than 6 million global coronavirus deaths.

Source: Voice of America

Shanghai partially restarted public transport Sunday and set out new classifications for COVID -19 risk areas, signaling a gradual reopening after nearly two months sealed off from the outside world.

China’s largest city has been almost entirely locked down since April, when it became the epicenter of the country’s worst coronavirus outbreak since the early days of the pandemic.

Unlike other major economies, Beijing has dug in its heels on a strict zero- COVID approach that relies on stamping out clusters as they emerge, though this has become increasingly difficult with the infectious Omicron variant.

But as new infections have slowed, Shanghai has cautiously eased restrictions, with some factories resuming operations and residents in lower-risk areas allowed to venture outdoors.

Four of the city’s 20 subway lines restarted Sunday along with some road transport, with officials announcing last week that it would provide a “basic network covering all central urban areas.”

Those who take public transport will have to show a negative COVID test within 48 hours of their journey and have a “normal temperature”, they added Saturday.

Shanghai will also classify areas as high, medium or low-risk after May 31, city health official Zhao Dandan told a press briefing on Sunday.

Districts with 10 or more reported COVID cases — or at least two community infections — will be considered “high-risk” while areas with no positive cases for 14 days will be deemed “low-risk”, Zhao said.

Medium or high-risk areas face lockdowns of two weeks.

The new system appears to set the stage for a degree of movement comparable to other cities, a shift from tough current measures in which even residents of lower risk areas have faced tight restrictions.

Back under lockdown

But despite broader attempts to ease those restrictions, the city’s central Jing’an district was back under lockdown on Sunday, according to an official notice.

Jing’an will undergo three consecutive rounds of mass COVID testing from Sunday and residents are not to leave their homes during this period, a WeChat notice said.

“Exit permits that have been issued will be suspended,” the notice added Saturday, while assuring residents that “victory is not far away.”

The city of 25 million residents reported more than 600 COVID cases on Sunday, 570 of them asymptomatic, according to National Health Commission data.

But restrictions continued in other Chinese cities with COVID cases, including the capital Beijing, which has already banned dining out and forced millions to work from home.

As of Saturday, nearly 5,000 people in Beijing’s Nanxinyuan residential compound had been relocated to quarantine hotels after 26 new infections were discovered in recent days, state media reported.

Fears have run high that the city may take a similar approach to Shanghai, where the lockdown has denied many adequate access to food and medical care.

Source: Voice of America

The Ukraine war, with disease and destruction following in its wake, loomed large Sunday as the WHO convened countries to address a still raging pandemic and a vast array of other global health challenges.

“Where war goes, hunger and disease follow shortly behind,” World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned on the opening day of the U.N. agency’s main annual assembly.

The assembly, due to run through Saturday, marks the first time the WHO is convening its 194 member states for their first largely in-person gathering since COVID-19 surfaced in late 2019.

Tedros warned that important work at the assembly to address a long line of global health emergencies and challenges, including the COVID-19 crisis, could not succeed “in a divided world.”

“We face a formidable convergence of disease, drought, famine and war, fueled by climate change, inequity and geopolitical rivalry,” he warned.

The former Ethiopian health minister said he was viewing the ravages in Ukraine through a personal lens: “I am a child of war.”

In Ukraine and elsewhere, he said, it is clear peace “is a prerequisite for health. We must choose health for peace, and peace, peace, peace.”

But it was war that dominated the high-level speeches on the first day of the assembly.

“The consequences of this war are devastating, to health, to populations, to health facilities and to health personnel,” French President Emmanuel Macron said in a video address.

He called on all member states to support a resolution to be presented by Ukraine and discussed by the assembly Tuesday, which harshly condemns Russia’s invasion, especially its more than 200 attacks on health care providers, including hospitals and ambulances, in Ukraine.

The resolution will also voice alarm at the “health emergency in Ukraine,” and highlight the dire impacts beyond its borders, including how disrupted grain exports are deepening a global food security crisis.

But while Russia has been shunned and pushed out of other international bodies over its invasion, no such sanctions are foreseen at the World Health Assembly.

“There’s not a call to kick them out,” a Western diplomat told AFP, acknowledging the sanctions permitted under WHO rules are “very weak.”

The Ukraine conflict is far from the only health emergency up for discussion this week, with decisions expected on a range of important issues, including on reforms toward strengthening pandemic preparedness.

“This meeting is a historic opportunity to strengthen universal architecture for security and health,” Dominican Republic President Luis Abinader Corona told the assembly.

Among the decisions expected at the assembly is Tedros’s reappointment to a second five-year term.

His first term was turbulent, as he helped steer the global response to the pandemic and grappled with other crises, including a sexual abuse scandal involving WHO staff in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

But while he has faced his share of criticism, he has received broad backing and is running unopposed, guaranteeing him a second term.

There will be no shortage of challenges ahead, with the COVID-19 pandemic still raging and demands for dramatic reforms of the entire global health system to help avert similar threats in the future.

And new health menaces already loom, including hepatitis of mysterious origin that has made children in many countries ill, and swelling numbers of monkeypox cases far from Central and West Africa —where the disease is normally concentrated.

One of the major reforms up for discussion involves the WHO budget, with countries expected to greenlight a plan to boost secure and flexible funding to ensure the organization can respond quickly to global health threats.

The WHO’s two-year budget for 2020-21 ticked in at $5.8 billion, but only 16% of that came from regular membership fees.

The idea is to gradually raise the membership fee portion to 50% over nearly a decade, while WHO will be expected to implement reforms, which includes more transparency on its financing and hiring.

The remainder came from voluntary contributions that are heavily earmarked by countries for specific projects.

“There is no greater return on investment than health,” U.N. chief Antonio Guterres told the assembly in a video address.

The COVID pandemic laid bare major deficiencies in the global health system, and countries last year agreed numerous changes were needed to better prepare the world to face future pandemic threats.

Amendments are being considered to the International Health Regulations — a set of legally binding international laws governing how countries respond to acute public health risks.

And negotiations are underway toward a new “legal instrument” — possibly a treaty— aimed at streamlining the global approach to pandemic preparedness and response.But experts warn the reform process is moving too slowly.

Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark, who co-chaired an expert panel on pandemic preparedness, warned reporters last week little had changed.

“At its current pace, an effective system is still years away, when a pandemic threat could occur at any time,” Clark said.

Source: Voice of America