Tag Archives: COVID-19

Coronavirus wave takes Haiti, yet to begin vaccinations, by surprise

By Andre Paultre and Sarah Marsh

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – For more than a year, Haiti escaped the worst ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic, reporting few cases and fatalities – a rare break for the poorest country in the Americas, which has so often been beset by misfortune.

COVID-19 treatment centers closed for lack of patients, Haitians resumed life as normal, and the government hesitated to even accept its allotment of free AstraZeneca vaccines through the U.N.-backed COVAX mechanism due to safety and logistical concerns.

Now, though, as some countries are already moving into a post-pandemic phase thanks to vaccination campaigns, Haiti is grappling with its first serious outbreak.

And it is one of only a handful of countries worldwide that has yet to administer a single shot of coronavirus vaccine.

Last month, infections and fatalities rose more than fivefold following the arrival of new variants, in what the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) called a “cautionary tale in just how quickly things can change with this virus.”

Officially, Haiti had recorded 15,895 infections and 333 deaths from COVID-19 as of June 5 among its 11 million people – relatively low case numbers compared to elsewhere in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Yet data is limited due to low testing rates and doctors say the real numbers are likely much higher. Every day comes news of deaths from COVID-19 of well-known figures, like a former senator or the head of the pension agency.

And the upwards trend could prove “catastrophic,” according to Laure Adrien, General Director of Haiti’s Health Ministry.

Poor sanitation means disease can spread fast in Haiti. Its slums are densely packed, and its already overwhelmed and shambolic healthcare system is dependent on fickle donations.

Last week, two of the main hospitals treating COVID-19 patients in capital Port-au-Prince announced they were saturated.

“We are overwhelmed with patients,” said Marc Edson Augustin, medical director of St. Luke Hospital.

Jean ‘Bill’ Pape, a top Haitian infectious disease expert, said the country was now not as prepared as it had been.

“We need to reopen new centers to increase the number of dedicated COVID beds,” said Pape.

The new wave also comes amid surging gang violence that is hampering the provision of what little healthcare is available.

The St. Luke hospital warned on Monday it may have to close its COVID-19 unit altogether as violence was making it hard to stock up on oxygen at the production site in the Cite Soleil slum.

Already in February Doctors Without Borders (MSF) shut all but the emergency department at the hospital in Cite Soleil where it last year treated COVID-19 patients.

Wealthier Haitians are paying to be medevaced to Florida or the Dominican Republic.

NOT A PRIORITY

Haitian doctors largely credited their country’s apparent resilience to the coronavirus last year to its relatively young population. Around half of Haitians are under 25 years old.

Many locals dismissed the virus as not a big deal or even doubted its existence. Its importance faded amid a growing humanitarian crisis in the wake of political unrest and extreme weather associated with climate change.

So when reports emerged last month of the arrival of the new variants first identified in Britain and Brazil and an uptick in cases, reaction was initially subdued.

Authorities mandated renewed precautions like masks in public spaces, instituted an overnight curfew, and suspended year-end graduation ceremonies. President Jovenel Moise urged Haitians to drink medicinal tea to ward off the virus, an unproven remedy.

Yet many Haitians continued life as usual, with authorities unwilling or unable to enforce measures. One mayor of a Port-au-Prince district last week staged a music concert attended by thousands not wearing masks.

Pressure is building, though. PAHO Director Carissa Etienne said last week there was “no time to waste” as additional health capacity and preventive measures to curb transmission would be “decisive.”

Businesses are starting to require Haitians to only enter wearing masks and new COVID-19 treatment centers are opening.

“We have to open new structures to take more patients with respiratory difficulties to avoid a catastrophe,” said Ronald Laroche, a doctor who runs a network of low-cost health centers and hospitals, and opened a COVID-19 center this week.

On Monday, the electoral council postponed a referendum on a new constitution that had been scheduled for the end of June.

And next week, Haiti should receive its first batch – 130,000 doses – of COVID-19 vaccines through the World Health Organization’s COVAX vaccination scheme.

Doctors say the challenge now will be convincing Haitians to actually have the vaccine.

Ronald Jean, 38, a restaurant manager in Port-au-Prince, said he was for the first time afraid of the virus.

But “first the authorities should take the vaccine on television, we’ll see how they do,” he said. “And then I will decide whether or not to take it.”

(Reporting by Andre Paultre and Valerie Baeriswyl in Port-au-Prince and Sarah Marsh in Havana; Additional reporting by Anthony Boadle in Sao Paolo; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)

Moscow to toughen enforcement of COVID-19 rules as cases rise

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Authorities in Moscow said on Wednesday they would step up enforcement of rules requiring people to wear medical masks and gloves in indoor public spaces due to a rising number of COVID-19 cases in the Russian capital.

Russia on Wednesday reported 10,407 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, its highest number of daily infections since early March. In Moscow, there were 4,124 infections, creeping past the 4,000 mark for the first time since mid-January.

“The epidemiological situation is worsening in Moscow, the number of cases is rising,” RIA news agency quoted city official Yevgeny Danchikov as saying.

“The enforcement of the use of personal protective equipment by people in public places, including on public transport, on the metro and at entertainment centers, … will increase.”

Muscovites are required to wear masks and gloves on public transport, in taxis and in places like shopping malls, but the rules are not strictly enforced.

People without personal protective equipment can face fines.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin — who last month remarked on how few residents had chosen to get vaccinated against COVID-19 despite free and easy access to shots — said on Wednesday the city of more than 12 million was not planning to impose a fresh lockdown.

The government coronavirus task force said on Wednesday that 399 people had died nationwide as a result of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours, pushing the national death toll to 124,895.

The federal statistics agency has kept a separate toll and said that Russia recorded around 270,000 deaths related to COVID-19 between April 2020 and April 2021.

Russia, home to around 145 million people, has recorded more than 5.1 million COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic.

(Reporting by Gleb Stolyarov and Maria Kiselyova; Writing by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

Blinken casts doubt on methodology of coronavirus lab-leak report

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken cast doubt on Tuesday on the methodology of a report on the origins of COVID-19 cited by the Wall Street Journal that concluded the hypothesis of a virus leak from a Chinese lab was plausible.

“I saw the report. I think it’s on a number of levels, incorrect,” Blinken told a Senate committee hearing on the State Department’s budget request when asked about the Journal article.

The Journal on Monday cited people familiar with a classified report by a U.S. government national laboratory as saying it concluded that the hypothesis of a virus leak from a Chinese lab in Wuhan was plausible and deserved further investigation.

The report said the study was prepared in May 2020 by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and referred to by State when it conducted an inquiry into the pandemic’s origins during the final months of former President Donald Trump’s administration.

Blinken said that to the best of his understanding, the report originated after the Trump administration asked a contractor to look into the origins of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, with a particular focus on whether it was a result of a lab leak.

“That work was done, it was completed, it was briefed, to relevant people in the department. When we came in, we also were made aware of the findings,” Blinken said.

“The Trump administration, it’s my understanding, had real concerns about the methodology of that study, the quality of analysis, bending evidence to fit preconceived narrative. That was their concern. It was shared with us.”

Blinken said the report was the work of one officer and a few individuals and not the “whole of government effort” President Joe Biden has ordered, led by the intelligence community, to look into the origins of the virus.

Asked whether he supported declassifying information as to the origins of the virus, Blinken said there should be “as much transparency as we possibly can with whatever information we find” subject to the need to protect intelligence sources.

In announcing his 90-day probe, Biden said U.S. intelligence was considering two likely scenarios – that the virus resulted from a laboratory accident or that it emerged from human-animal contact – but had not come to a conclusion.

A still-classified U.S. intelligence report circulated during Trump’s administration alleged that three researchers at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became so ill in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, U.S. government sources have said.

(Reporting by David Brunnstrom and Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

Amtrak restores long-distance routes after funding from Congress

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. passenger railroad Amtrak said it had restored daily service on Monday for long-distance routes that serve the East Coast and the Gulf Coast after receiving new emergency funding from Congress.

Amtrak, which received about $2 billion from Congress in the year before the coronavirus pandemic, has been awarded $3.7 billion in emergency funding since March 2020. The routes include New York to New Orleans, Savannah and Miami.

The $1.7 billion awarded in March required Amtrak to restore daily service to 12 long distance routes that were reduced in October to three times per week due to the pandemic, and for the railroad to recall more than 1,200 furloughed employees. Other West Coast routes have already been restored.

On Friday, Amtrak said it was restored traditional dining service starting in late June on some long-distance routes.

Amtrak says ridership is rising and said around the Memorial Day holiday, ridership exceeded 50% of pre-pandemic levels.

In its last budget year that ended Sept. 30, Amtrak said operating revenue fell 32% to $2.3 billion over 2019 levels.

In April, Amtrak asked Congress for $5.4 billion in the budget year starting Oct. 1.

U.S. President Joe Biden has called for $80 billion in new spending on high-speed rail projects.

Amtrak asked for $3.88 billion for “base needs” and to address the impact of COVID-19 and $1.55 billion in additional U.S. funding needed to address Northeast Corridor infrastructure projects and begin advancing new corridor routes across the country.

The Biden administration’s April 9 budget called for $2.7 billion for Amtrak, a 35% jump over pre-COVID levels.

Amtrak wants to expand across the United States and by 2035 add up to 39 new corridor routes and up to 166 cities. It hopes to serve 20 million additional people annually.

Mass transit systems also suffered as Americans took billions of fewer trips last year, but ridership is increasing. Congress in March awarded mass transit systems another $30.5 billion in emergency assistance after giving them $39 billion previously.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Marguerita Choy)

From lapsing job benefits to full stadiums, June could be U.S. recovery’s pivot

By Howard Schneider and Ann Saphir

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Fourteen months after the pandemic triggered a national emergency, the final chapter of the U.S. economic recovery may begin this month, with rapid changes starting with the end of enhanced unemployment benefits in half the states and ending in the fall’s expected reopening of schools and universities.

Along the way, Major League Baseball stadiums are slated to return to full capacity, and the largest state economy, California, on June 15 will shed its final COVID-era restrictions and give bars, restaurants and other businesses a green light on the road to normal.

That same day in Washington, the U.S. Federal Reserve is expected to open debate about when and how to cut the economy loose from its crisis-fighting monetary policy and shift to managing what is hoped to be a long economic expansion.

The questions about just what the post-pandemic economy will look like are myriad: How many people will return to jobs? How many businesses will have survived or failed? How resilient will the country be when pandemic supports are withdrawn? The answers should start to come soon.

“The timing really is awesome,” Porchlight Brewing Co. general manager Tyson Herzog said of the just-in-time-for-summer end of California’s restrictions, which closed many restaurants for parts of last year and kept them under strict limits during the fight against the virus.

An $800 billion small business assistance program helped many firms survive, including Herzog’s. After a year of home-delivering beer in his 1999 Dodge Caravan he plans to hire more onsite staff and expand production amid already record sales.

Since coronavirus vaccines rolled out in December, forecasts have pointed to record-breaking numbers this year, including the fastest annual gross domestic product growth in nearly 40 years.

More than 60% of people 12 years and older are at least partially vaccinated. The rate of new infections and deaths has plummeted, while confidence, travel, and human socializing – and the commerce that accompanies all that – have risen steadily.

Still, the pieces have not yet clicked in unison.

Companies in May added 559,000 jobs, but the total number remains 7.6 million short of early 2020. About 3.6 million more people are unemployed, and the labor force is 3.5 million smaller.

Shortages of supplies, workers and raw materials have crimped the recovery with businesses curtailing hours, turning away customers, or delaying filling orders. The Fed’s most recent national economic snapshot referenced shortages 44 times, compared with 17 in January and three a year ago.

Economists expect that to ease. The pandemic put the economy into what some likened to an induced coma. Shaking off the stupor takes time, and is complicated by some of the programs used to cushion the economy’s sharp drop last spring.

Stimulus payments and low interest rates, for example, fueled a boom in home sales that spilled into home construction and lumber prices. Yet the costs for wood and some other commodities already have begun easing: lumber futures are down 24% from their peak, with copper and aluminum falling around 5%. Likewise, the splurge on automobiles, appliances and other goods will likely prove a one-time affair; even if demand remains strong, supply will likely catch up.

Workers sidelined by a variety of issues, from health concerns to lack of childcare, have been given latitude on when to return to work through expanded unemployment benefits that pay some more than their former jobs. That starts to wind down on June 12 when the first four states end the extra benefits launched last spring as one plank in a financial “bridge” to the other side of the pandemic.

In all, $5.2 trillion deployed across an array of programs helped make the coronavirus recession unique: Personal incomes actually rose even as unemployment hit 14.8% in April 2020.

With the money now largely spent, the programs one-by-one are being shuttered.

By July 10 half the states will have ended the extra unemployment benefits, and the program lapses nationwide on Sept. 4. The Payroll Protection Program of small business loans closed May 31.

There’s dispute over what role those and other programs play in decisions to work or not. But to the degree prices, wages and other factors have been distorted by the pandemic, the next few weeks should wring those distortions out.

June will inaugurate a “summer-boom with demand still strong and supply issues – on labor and capital – being resolved,” said Gregory Daco, chief U.S. economist for Oxford Economics. “There is evidence of supply bottlenecks slowly easing…On the labor front, reduced virus fear, reduced benefits, better childcare, will draw people back.”

And people seem primed to respond.

After a year of lockdown, public parks are again hosting crowds, sports stadiums are filling, and restaurants are booked to the limit.

California had among the first cases of COVID-19, imposed some of the stiffest restrictions, and will be among the last states to let it all go.

Damian Fagan, owner of the Almanac Taproom in Alameda, is getting ready. While he is adding up to six new employees to his current 12-person staff ahead of the June 15 reopening, he expects such a rush of business he plans to limit his hours for another few weeks “so we don’t have this tsunami of changes.”

“I don’t know how long this party will last,” he said. Eventually, “this massive excitement period dies down,” and business can get back to normal.

(Reporting by Howard Schneider and Ann Saphir; Editing by Dan Burns and Andrea Ricci)

More unvaccinated U.S. adolescents hospitalized; myocarditis may be rare vaccine side effect in teens

By Nancy Lapid

(Reuters) – The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

COVID-19 hospitalizations up among U.S. adolescents

COVID-19 hospitalizations rose among U.S. adolescents in March and April, and nearly a third of those hospitalized needed intensive care, according to data from more than 250 hospitals in 14 states released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday. “Rates of COVID-19-associated hospitalization among adolescents also exceeded historical rates of seasonal influenza-associated hospitalization during comparable periods,” researchers reported in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The hospitals reported a total of 204 adolescents hospitalized for COVID-19 in March and April. “Until they are fully vaccinated, adolescents should continue to wear masks and take precautions when around others who are not vaccinated to protect themselves, and their family, friends, and community,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said in a statement on Friday. “I ask parents, relatives and close friends to join me and talk with teens about the importance of these prevention strategies and to encourage them to get vaccinated.”

Heart inflammation may be rare vaccine side effect in teens

Temporary heart inflammation may be a rare side effect of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in teenagers, according to pediatricians who reported on seven cases from across the United States. The previously healthy adolescents – all boys – developed chest pain within four days after their second dose. MRI exams showed myocarditis, or heart muscle inflammation. “Fortunately, none of our patients was critically ill,” the authors reported on Friday in Pediatrics. The boys’ symptoms resolved “rapidly” with medication. Measures of cardiac status had returned to normal at check-ups performed after one-to-three weeks. Myocarditis is a known rare adverse event following other vaccinations, the authors noted. There is no proof, however, that the vaccine caused these cases. “So far, over 2.2 million teenagers (aged) 16-17 have already received 2 doses of Pfizer vaccine, and over 3 million kids 12-15 years old have received dose #1,” said coauthor Dr. Judy Guzman-Cottrill of Oregon Health & Science University. “These are huge, very reassuring denominators.” COVID-19 itself can cause myocarditis, she noted. “After looking at the risks and benefits, the data support getting kids vaccinated.”

Measuring longer-lasting COVID-19 immunity feasible

Along with testing for antibody levels after COVID-19 or vaccination to gauge a person’s immunity to the virus, measuring the response of the immune system’s T cells could provide important information, according to researchers based at Cardiff University. While antibody levels wane over time, T cell responsiveness can last for months or years. But T cells have been harder to measure in cost-effective ways. Adapting a method widely employed to measure immune responses to other types of infections, the researchers took blood samples from adults and children and stimulated T cells with small proteins specific to the SARS-CoV-2 virus. T cells that recognize these proteins, because the person has been previously infected or vaccinated, “are triggered to produce chemicals like interferon which can be easily measured,” said study coauthor Andrew Godkin. The results were about 96% accurate, researchers reported on Tuesday on medRxiv ahead of peer review. “The test is very sensitive and seems to be accurate at identifying people previously exposed to the virus,” Godkin said. “The test is widely available, easy to employ, and should play a very useful role in monitoring this pandemic.”

Virus unlikely to insert genetic fragments into patients’ genetic code

A new study refutes the controversial claim made by researchers last month in PNAS that small fragments of genetic instructions from the coronavirus became integrated into the genome of infected cells, in test tube experiments. In principle, coronavirus RNA generated by such integrated snippets, while probably not harmful, might cause positive COVID-19 PCR tests long after a patient has recovered, the authors of that study said. But when researchers in Australia sought to find signs of SARS-CoV-2 genetic code integrated into the DNA of infected cells, they could not find any. “This was despite using the same sequencing technology and cell type (as in the PNAS study) and performing substantially more DNA sequencing,” said Geoffrey Faulkner of the University of Queensland. The new finding were posted on Sunday on bioRxiv ahead of peer review. The researchers did find copies of hepatitis B virus integrated into liver tissue, and copies of other DNA elements integrated into the cells they experimented with, “suggesting our approach would have found SARS-CoV-2 copies” if they were present, he said. His team agrees with others who suggest the PNAS findings may have reflected unintended effects of experimental methods. “We think SARS-CoV-2 integration into DNA is possible in human cells even if it is likely to be incredibly rare in patients,” Faulkner said.

(Reporting by Nancy Lapid and Christine Soares; Editing by Bill Berkrot)

Nepal worries future coronavirus wave will hit children hard

By Gopal Sharma

KATHMANDU (Reuters) – Nepal asked its hospitals on Friday to reserve beds for children for fear another surge in coronavirus infections will hit them hard, something officials in neighboring India are also preparing for.

The move came as the government approved for emergency use the COVID-19 vaccine made by Sinovac Biotech of China.

Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli’s government has been criticized by experts for its handling of the ongoing second wave in Nepal, which has led to an acute shortage of oxygen, hospital beds and medicines.

“Hospitals and medical institutions must set aside at least 20% of beds for children, who are likely to suffer the most in the potential third and fourth waves of coronavirus,” the Ministry of Health and Population said in a statement.

“Hospitals must also ensure the availability of enough oxygen.”

Daily infections in the Himalayan nation are hovering around 5,000 after hitting a peak of more than 9,000 in early May. Nepal had reported fewer than 100 daily cases in March. It has reported 581,560 infections in total and 7,731 deaths.

Donors have rushed aid including oxygen, protective gear, drugs and face masks to the country, which is also struggling to secure vaccines after neighboring India stopped exports to meet its local demand.

Santosh K.C., a spokesman for the Department of Drug Administration, said “conditional permission for the emergency use” had been given for the coronavirus vaccine (Corona Vac) made by Sinovac Biotech of China, the fifth shot to be approved by Nepal.

Earlier it had approved two Indian-made vaccines – AstraZeneca’s and COVAXIN – China’s Shinopharm and Russia’s Sputnik V for emergency use in the Himalayan nation.

Nepal has provided at least 3.1 million vaccinations to its people so far.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Analysis-India’s vaccine inequity worsens as countryside languishes

By Krishna N. Das, Abhirup Roy and Rajendra Jadhav

NEW DELHI/SATARA, India (Reuters) – Urban Indians are getting COVID-19 shots much faster than the hundreds of millions of people living in the countryside, government data shows, reflecting rising inequity in the nation’s immunization drive.

In 114 of India’s least developed districts – collectively home to about 176 million people – authorities have administered just 23 million doses in total.

That’s the same number of doses as have been administered across nine major cities — New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Thane and Nagpur — which combined have half the population.

The disparity was even stronger last month, after the government allowed private sales of vaccines for adults aged under 45 years, an offer which favored residents of cities with larger private hospital networks. For the first four weeks of May, those nine cities gave 16% more doses than the combined rural districts, data from the government’s Co-WIN vaccination portal shows.

“My friends from the city were vaccinated at private hospitals,” said Atul Pawar, a 38-year-old farmer from Satara, a rural western district of Maharashtra, India’s wealthiest state. “I am ready to pay, but doses are not available and district borders are sealed because of the lockdown.”

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare did not respond to a request for comment.

India has administered more than 222 million doses since starting its campaign in mid-January – only China and the United States have administered more – but it has given the required two doses to less than 5% of its 950 million adults.

Rural India is home to more than two-thirds of the country’s 1.35 billion people. While urban areas account for a disproportionately large share of the confirmed COVID-19 cases, those concerned about the spread of the virus in the countryside say statistics undercount cases in villages, where testing is less comprehensive.

The health system in several regions in India collapsed in April and May as the country reported the world’s biggest jump in coronavirus infections, increasing pressure on the immunization program.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government offers vaccines to vulnerable people, healthcare workers and those aged over 45 for free. Since last month, individual states have also been expected to procure vaccines for younger adults, or to provide them commercially through the private sector.

Poorer states say this leaves their residents more vulnerable. The eastern state of Jharkhand, where nearly all districts are categorized as poor, this week urged Modi to give it free vaccines for all age groups.

In many states the doses for those under 45 are available mostly or entirely in urban areas. Some officials say this is intentional, as the infection spreads more easily in crowded cities.

“It’s because of high-positivity” in urban areas, said Bijay Kumar Mohapatra, health director of the eastern state of Odisha, explaining the state’s decision to prioritize cities.

Major international and domestic firms such as Microsoft, Pepsi, Amazon, Reliance Industries, Adani Group and Tata Motors have organized inoculations for their employees, in many cases in partnership with private hospitals. Most of these companies and the huge private hospitals that serve them are located in urban centers.

Vaccination rates in rural areas have also been depressed because of patchier internet access to use the complex online system for signing up for shots, and possibly because of greater hesitancy among villagers than among city dwellers.

“LUCRATIVE DEALS”

India’s Supreme Court criticized the government’s handling of the vaccination program this week and ordered it to provide a breakdown of shots given in rural and urban areas.

“Private hospitals are not equally spread out” across the country and “are often limited to bigger cities with large populations”, the top court said in its order dated May 31.

“As such, a larger quantity will be available in such cities, as opposed to the rural areas,” it said. Private hospitals may prefer to sell doses “for lucrative deals directly to private corporations who wish to vaccinate their employees”.

Dr. Rajib Dasgupta, head of the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University, said the risk of inequity was that parts of India would build up immunity disproportionately.

“It can leave the rural population relatively more vulnerable.”

(Reporting by Krishna N. Das, Abhirup Roy and Rajendra Jadhav; Additional reporting by Prasanta Kumar Dutta, Jatindra Dash, Sumit Khanna, Rupam Nair; Graphics by Tanvi Mehta; Editing by Peter Graff)

COVID-19 far more widespread in Indonesia than official data show – studies

By Tom Allard

JAKARTA (Reuters) – COVID-19 is many times more prevalent in Indonesia than shown by official figures in the world’s fourth most populous country, authors of two new studies told Reuters.

The country of 270 million has recorded 1.83 million positive cases, but epidemiologists have long believed the true scale of the spread has been obscured by a lack of testing and contact tracing.

The results of Indonesia’s first major seroprevalence studies – which test for antibodies – were revealed exclusively to Reuters.

One nationwide study between December and January suggested 15% of Indonesians had already contracted COVID-19 – when official figures at the end of January had recorded infections among only around 0.4% of people.

Even now, Indonesia’s total positive infections are only around 0.7% of the population.

The results of the survey were not unexpected given under reporting, said Pandu Riono, a University of Indonesia epidemiologist who worked on the study carried out with help from the World Health Organization.

Siti Nadia Tarmizi, a senior health ministry official, said it was possible the study was preliminary, but there might be more cases than officially reported because many cases were asymptomatic.

She said Indonesia had low contact tracing and a lack of laboratories to process tests.

Based on blood tests, seroprevalence studies detect antibodies which show up people who likely already contracted the disease. The official figures are largely based on swab tests, which detect the virus itself and only reveal those who have it at the time.

Antibodies develop one to three weeks after someone contracts the virus and stay in the body for months.

WEAK TESTING

Seroprevalence studies in other countries – including India – have also revealed more widespread infections.

“Our official surveillance system cannot detect COVID-19 cases. It is weak,” said the principal investigator for the University of Indonesia study, Tri Yunis Miko Wahyono, who commented on it but was not authorized to confirm the figures.

“Contact tracing and testing in Indonesia is very poor and explains why so few cases are detected.”

Fellow study author Pandu said that although the study showed the wider spread of the virus, Indonesia still appeared to be far from achieving herd immunity – making it a priority to speed up vaccination.

Just 6% of Indonesia’s targeted population of 181 million have been fully vaccinated with two doses so far, while 9.4% have had one shot, according to government data.

Preliminary results of a separate seroprevalence study in Bali, done by the University of Udayana, found 17 per cent of those tested in September and November appeared to have been infected, principal investigator Anak Agung Sagung Sawitri told Reuters.

That was 53 times higher than rate of infection based on the cases officially recorded at the time on the tourist island, which is planning to reopen to international visitors next month.

The reopening is opposed by some public health experts, including academic and doctor Ady Wirawan.

“Testing, tracing, isolation and quarantine is very, very weak in Bali,” he said.

(Editing by Matthew Tostevin and Kim Coghill)

U.S. appeals court leaves CDC residential eviction ban in place

By Michelle Conlin

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A federal appeals court on Wednesday refused to overturn the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) national ban on residential evictions.

In a blow to landlords, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said it would not lift a stay of a lower court ruling that had declared the eviction ban unlawful.

In language suggesting that the government’s eviction ban was lawful, the panel said the government “has made a strong showing that it is likely to succeed on the merits” of its appeal. The moratorium, which is set to expire on June 30, covers renters whose incomes were hit by COVID-19.

Ever since the CDC implemented the eviction ban in September, landlord groups, arguing that they are on the brink of financial collapse after going months without being paid, have filed challenges in courts across the country, with mixed results.

Legal experts said that Wednesday’s ruling means that for now, the eviction ban will remain in effect until its planned expiration date on June 30, though other court challenges are pending.

For low-income housing advocates, “This is a sigh of relief,” said Eric Dunn, director of litigation for the National Housing Law Project.

As the coronavirus pandemic moves into its second year, an estimated 7 million renters across the country owe $40 billion in back rent, utilities and fees, Moody’s Analytics estimates. This is more than twice the number of homeowners who lost their homes to foreclosure in the 2008 financial crisis.

Many eviction cases are pending, and some tenants may receive a lifeline from the $50 billion in rent relief approved by Congress, even though so far that aid has been slow to trickle out.

“If the CDC eviction moratorium expires or is overturned before those funds are expended, millions of renters would be at immediate risk of losing their homes. The result would be a historic wave of evictions, with tremendous, harmful consequences to individuals, communities, and our nation’s public health,” said Diane Yentel, president of the Low Income Housing Coalition.

Landlords and real estate groups that challenged the moratorium in court said the CDC lacked the power to impose it, and unlawfully took away their right to deal with delinquent tenants.

(Reporting by David Shepardson and Jan Wolfe; Editing by Leslie Adler and Jonathan Oatis)