As New Variant Surges, Officials Warn More Will Follow Without Global Vax Effort
Consider This from NPR
NPR
4.2 • 6.2K Ratings
🗓️ 12 July 2022
⏱️ 14 minutes
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Summary
Dr. Ayoade Alakija, co-chair of the African Union's Africa Vaccine Delivery Alliance, warns that more variants will follow unless global vaccine efforts get more aggressive.
Atul Gawande, head of global health for the U.S. Agency for International Development, says Congress needs to authorize a new round of spending to help get vaccines to countries where many people still have not been vaccinated.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | There's a new coronavirus variant surging around the world. |
| 0:04.3 | COVID cases continue to surge in India. |
| 0:06.1 | The South Asian country has recorded all of that. |
| 0:08.2 | After a lull in cases since April, there's been a resurgence of COVID-19 in France with |
| 0:13.0 | a 45-foot. |
| 0:14.0 | Last week, BA-5, a sub variant of Omacron, became the most dominant strain of COVID-19 in the |
| 0:19.5 | country according to the CDC. |
| 0:21.7 | And the White House COVID response team said Tuesday, this marks a new moment in the |
| 0:25.2 | pandemic. |
| 0:26.2 | We've been watching this virus evolve rapidly. We've been planning and preparing for this |
| 0:31.0 | moment. |
| 0:32.0 | Dr. Ashish Jha is the White House COVID-19 response coordinator. |
| 0:35.4 | We have tracked this carefully. We are not surprised that we are here at this moment. |
| 0:40.3 | And more than not being surprised, we are prepared. |
| 0:42.2 | This strain has a greater ability to evade immunity from prior infection or vaccination. |
| 0:47.6 | That means even if you're vaccinated or you recently had COVID, you could still get |
| 0:51.7 | sick again. |
| 0:53.0 | In the U.S., new infections are far higher than this time last summer. |
| 0:57.4 | And public health officials acknowledge that at-home testing means the true extent of this |
| 1:01.8 | latest surge is hard to gauge. |
| 1:04.9 | Hospital admissions, while still relatively low, have doubled since May. |
| 1:09.0 | Dr. Anthony Fauci said there is some good news. |
... |
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