covid-19-pandemic

"We've seen numbers go up, we've seen hospitalizations in kids go up"

"What is particularly troubling about the newest Omicron wave - not just in the United States but worldwide - is that it appears to hitting highly vaccinated states and countries much more heavily than less vaccinated areas."

"Scientists from the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), along with national and international experts, are actively monitoring and evaluating this recombinant sub-lineage and the associated studies"

"What we are seeing is that children under five remain unvaccinated so there's still a relatively large population of children who are naive, so they have no preexisting immunity to this virus"

"Funding from American Rescue Plan will help CDC and Governors monitor, track, and defeat emerging variants that are currently threatening pockets of the country"

"[other countries had seen omicron’s fast growth, but the U.S. data showed] a remarkable jump in such a short time"

"I look at this through a lens of evolution. Early on in the pandemic, I anticipated this would go at least 18 months. That was because the only real perspective I had to understand what this coronavirus might look like was previous influenza pandemics. And I think that many of us assumed that at some point it would become a seasonal infection like influenza after two years or so. I got a rude awaking earlier this year in March and April when I saw the new Alpha variant emerge as well as the Beta and Gamma variants, and I had a sense that this was going to change how the pandemic would unfold. As a result, I thought that some of the darkest days of the pandemic would be ahead of us and that was at a time in the spring when case numbers were dropping markedly in the United States and vaccine was flowing. But I realized that variants were like 210-mile-an-hour curveballs, and we couldn't predict if they might have increased transmissibility or the ability to cause severe illness. This conclusion was not popular among many of my colleagues and policy makers."

"China has a population that’s very vulnerable to this new variant. This is a much more contagious variant, it’s going to be harder to control, and they don’t have a population that has natural immunity"

"In the two years since its emergence, Omicron has proved to be not only staggeringly infectious, but an evolutionary marvel, challenging many assumptions virologists had before the pandemic. It has given rise to an impressive number of descendants, which have become far more adept at evading immunity and finding new victims. “It was almost like there was another pandemic,” said Adam Lauring, a virologist at the University of Michigan."

"Since Omicron surged again in April, almost five times as many vaccinated people have been hospitalized."

"We are looking at the degree of virulence this (Omicron) strain has, we are seeing if the vaccines with which we immunize the population would be working for this strain. Everything says they do."

"We engineered three SARS-CoV-2 viruses containing key spike mutations from the newly emerged United Kingdom (UK) and South African (SA) variants: N501Y from UK and SA; 69/70-deletion+N501Y+D614G from UK; and E484K+N501Y+D614G from SA. Neutralization geometric mean titers (GMTs) of twenty BTN162b2 vaccine-elicited human sera against the three mutant viruses were 0.81- to 1.46-fold of the GMTs against parental virus, indicating small effects of these mutations on neutralization by sera elicited by two BNT162b2 doses."

"RNA viruses like the coronavirus can mutate when they replicate, especially when circulating at high rates."

"And so the message remains clear. If you are unvaccinated get vaccinated, and particularly in the arena of omicron if you are fully vaccinated, get your booster shot"

"We have no alternative but to impose some fairly heavy and immediate restrictions"

"Gauteng was absolutely clobbered by the Delta wave only five months ago, so there’s no doubt that this variant is causing significant numbers of reinfections, due to that fact alone."

"[it’s unclear how much milder omicron really is compared with other variants]. That’s the big uncertainty now"

"Let’s face the facts: Omicron is no big deal. The media, always desperate to panic gullible souls and spread fear, began the countdown to Armageddon and it’s still counting. Actually, Omicron deftly evades antibodies, which are part of the body’s first defenders, but that is Omicron’s only strength. Ironically, those who have been vaccinated, as I have, are more prone to an Omicron attack. Vaccine-induced antibodies perform much worse against Omicron than against other variants. But it’s no big deal. Boosters lessen these infections. I’m 85, and I drink and smoke and stay up late, yet after three days I was once again training and carousing, although I did feel rather funny when starting up again."

"[T]he death gap between the pro-Trump and pro-Biden counties did shrink slightly over the winter from 2.73 to 2.26. That likely was mostly down to the Omicron variant, according to William Hanage, an epidemiologist at Harvard University. Hanage says that Omicron is much more effective at evading masks and other measures to prevent infection. "Before Omicron, actions that people were taking, like masks in schools, would have a really significant impact," he says. "After Omicron they have far less.""

"Omicron’s gift for spreading fast was the result of dozens of mutations. They altered the virus’s surface, so that antibodies produced by vaccines or previous infections could not stick tightly to it and prevent the virus from invading cells. “It was the first virus to figure out in a major way how to escape immunity,” said Dr. Jacob Lemieux, an infectious disease specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Lemieux and many other Omicron experts suspect that the variant gained its new mutations while infecting a single person with a weak immune system. Immunocompromised people can only fight off some of the coronaviruses in their bodies during an infection, allowing the ones that remain to acquire mutations that can thwart the immune system. “It becomes like a laboratory for virus evolution,” said Peter Markov, a virologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine."

""During this Omicron wave, we're seeing an increased number of mild infections — at-home type of infections, the inconvenient, having a cold, being off work, not great but not the end of the world. And that's because these Omicron variants are able to break through antibody protection and cause these mild infections," John Moore, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Weill Cornell Medical College, told CBS News."

"Building new hospitals or shelters alone (to treat COVID-19-infected people) is not adequate. It will also need to be complemented by community strategies, such as limiting group activities, and personal hygiene practices."

"We (China) are still at a very critical stage in fighting the (COVID-19) Coronavirus. International solidarity is extremely important and for that purpose all countries should behave in a responsible manner."

"The public has criticised us (Wuhan government) a lot ... why? It was because some of our work was not done well. What have we not done well? At present, the contradiction between supply and demand of hospital beds has remained conspicuous. Honestly, we are in pain and feel regrettable that a lot of the patients who have been confirmed infected or were suspected to have contracted the (COVID-19) coronavirus were unable to receive proper treatment at hospitals. This problem definitely has remained unresolved."

"We (Centers for Disease Control) are warning that anyone who refuses to cooperate with our quarantine officers or is disrespectful toward them (for the examination of COVID-19) will be strictly punished according to the law. Disease prevention is not a game, so we will impose the heaviest punishment for obstructing public officers in discharging their duties."

"You (medical staffs who attain to COVID-19 patients treatment) are trying every means to save lives. When you are putting your efforts to save lives, you have to protect yourselves too."

"The main reason for this (global emergency) declaration (of COVID-19) is not because of what is happening in China, but because of what is happening in other countries. Our (World Health Organization) greatest concern is the potential for the virus to spread to countries with weaker health systems."

"The moment we heard about this (COVID-19) outbreak, we started to put our feelers out to get access to these isolates."

"Closing the (Hong Kong's) border entirely (from Mainland China) is the only effective way to prevent the spread of the (COVID-19) virus."

"The (COVID-19) outbreak will probably continue for at least several more months. It would be best that the (Japan) national government comes up with a plan that accounts for the long-term issues."

"There are two keys to tackling the (COVID-19) epidemic: early detection and early isolation. They are the most primitive and most effective methods."

"Momentum of the Wuhan virus epidemic outbreak may decline in 20 days (since 26 January 2020) based on the current prevention and control measures of pneumonia caused by the novel coronavirus."

"We (China) are sure to be able to win in this battle to beat the (COVID-19) epidemic through prevention and control."

"We (World Health Organization (WHO)) are working 24/7 to support China and its people during this difficult time (COVID-19 pandemic) and remain in close contact with affected countries, with our regional and country offices deeply involved. WHO is updating all countries on the situation and providing specific guidance on what to do to respond."

"Those (anyone who returns from Wuhan being isolated for 14 days with all necessary medical attention) are the sorts of measures that will protect countries from the introduction of the (COVID-19) virus and onward transmission. There's always a balance between the draconian measures of public health and what people might want to do, and obviously it's regrettable if people who turn out not to have the virus are quarantined unnecessarily."

"The local (COVID-19) transmission chain (in Hong Kong) has begun (as of 6 February 2020), and if we do nothing to control it, Hong Kong will become another mainland city that has suffered lots of cases."

"The federal government has done something that nobody has done anything like this other than perhaps wartime. And that’s what we’re in: We’re in a war."

"The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries. CDC & World Health have been working hard and very smart. Stock Market starting to look very good to me!"

"Biden ordered private employers to fire unvaccinated Americans from their jobs as he blames the American People for his own failures. On December 4, 2020, Biden promised that he would never mandate vaccines, saying, “No I don't think it should be mandatory, I wouldn't demand it be mandatory.” Less than one year later, Biden imposed an unconstitutional federal vaccine mandate and threatened that any American who refused to comply should be “prepared to pay.”"

"The President wanted to make sure that we had the people doing the best jobs, and making sure that we had the right people focused on all the things that needed to happen to make sure that we can deliver in these unusual times for the American people. The President also instructed me to make sure that I break down every barrier needed to make sure that the teams can succeed. This is an effort where the government is doing things that the government doesn’t normally do, where we are stretching, we’re acting very quickly. And the President wants to make sure that the is fully behind the different people running the different lines of effort to make sure that we get everything done in a speed that the President demands. The President also wanted us to make sure we think outside the box, make sure we’re finding all the best thinkers in the country, making sure we’re getting all the best ideas, and that we’re doing everything possible to make sure that we can keep Americans safe, and make sure we bring a quick end to this in the best way possible, and balance all the different aspects that need to be thought of while we do this. This truly is a historic challenge. We have not seen something like this in a very, very long time. But I am very confident that, by bringing innovative solutions to these hard problems, we will make progress."

"When the Vice President first asked me to help on the task force with different tasks, I asked the President what he expected from the task force and how I can best serve him and the task force. What the President asked is that all of the recommendations that we make be based on data. He wanted us to be very rigorous, to make sure that we were studying the data, collecting data. A lot of things in this country were happening very quickly, and we wanted to make sure that we were trying to keep updating our models and making sure that we were making informed decisions and informed recommendations to him based on the data that we were able to collect and put together."

"The President has been very, very hands on in this. He’s really instructed us to leave no stone unturned. Just this morning — very early this morning — I got a call from the President. He told me he was hearing from friends of his in New York that the New York public hospital system was running low on critical supply. He instructed me this morning. I called Dr. Katz, who runs the system, asked him which supply was the most supply he was nervous about. He told me it was the N95 masks. I asked what his daily burn was. And I basically got that number, called up Admiral Polowczyk, made sure we had the inventory. We went to the President today, and earlier today,the President called Mayor de Blasio to inform him that we were going to send a month of supply to the New York public hospital system, to make sure that the workers on the frontline can rest assured that they have the N95 masks that they need to get through the next month. We’ll be doing similar things with all the different public hospitals that are in the hotspot zones and making sure that we’re constantly in communications with the local communities."

"And what they’ve done over the last 13 days has been really extraordinary. We’ve done things that the government has never done before, quicker than they’ve ever done it before. And what we’re seeing now is we found a lot of supplies in the country. We’ve been distributing them where we anticipate there will be needs, and also trying to make sure that we’re hitting places where there are needs. So I can tell you the people on the — in the task force, they’re working day and night. You’ve got a lot of people in the government. We recognize the challenge that America faces right now. We know what a lot of the people on the frontlines are facing, the fear that they have that they won’t have the supplies they need. And our goal is to work as hard as we can to make sure that we don’t let them down."

"At the time of the SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) virus outbreak (in 2002-2003), we (Government of Macau) also did not prohibit the entry of people from Hong Kong and we refused to think of establishing a quota for entries from the neighboring Special Administrative Region for the time being (due to COVID-19 outbreak)."

"Nobody could have imagined a thing like this — a tragedy like this would have happened: the invisible enemy."

"World Health Organization — because they really are — they called it wrong. They called it wrong. They really — they missed the call. They could have called it months earlier. They would have known, and they should have known. And they probably did know, so we'll be looking into that very carefully. And we're going to put a hold on money spent to the WHO. [When asked later in the same press briefing if freezing money to the WHO during a pandemic was a good idea he replied, "No, maybe not. I mean, I'm not saying I'm going to do it, but we're going to look at it."]"

"From the perspective of continued understanding of the (COVID-19) situation, it is only at this time that everyone realizes it is so dangerous. If we (the Government of Wuhan) knew at first from the virus spread that it would be so serious, finding effective control and prevention methods of course would be good, but the problem is usually we cannot realize the severity from the outset."

"We (Government of Macau) appeal to the public not to go out unless it's absolutely necessary. That's the best prevention (against the COVID-19). We had no choice but to cancel the (2020 Lunar) new year celebrations even when everything was ready."

"We are now (26 January 2020) in a critical period of prevention and control (of the COVID-19)."

"I want to stress that for the vast majority of the people of this country, we should be going about our business as usual."