Forbes - 900,000

Plus: The confusing vaccine rollout for kids under 5

It was just a little over two years ago, on January 18, that the first Covid-19 infection was detected in the United States. Today, Johns Hopkins University reports that over 900,000 people have now died in this country from the disease. Over the past seven days, an average of over 2,400 people have died from Covid infections brought on by the omicron surge. Thankfully, this trend may soon reverse - the sharp decline of new Covid-19 cases in the United States continues in every state but Maine, and the number of Americans who are hospitalized has fallen 15% since mid-January (though that number, around 124,000, is still high compared to other points in the pandemic.) The sharp decline in these two metrics should definitely come as a relief to healthcare systems that have been overwhelmed these past few weeks. Despite the decline, the rate of daily news cases is still high compared to pre-omicron peaks, meaning this wave isn’t over yet.

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More Covid News

The stock market jumped on Friday while bond yields surged after the U.S. economy added back a much higher-than-expected 467,000 new jobs in January.

According to a real-world study from the CDC, N95 and KN95 masks reduce the odds of testing positive for Covid-19 by 83% compared to not wearing a mask at all. The infection odds reduction is 66% for surgical masks and 56% for cloth masks.

A recent preprint study suggests that omicron may survive on surfaces for longer periods of time than other variants. 

Regeneron expects no sales of its Covid-19 antibody cocktail REGEN-COV in the first quarter of 2022 now that it has been found to be ineffective against the omicron variant.

What Else We Are Reading

• Does Omicron hit kids harder? Scientists are trying to find out (Nature)

• A coronavirus variant once helped the global pork industry. Could one protect us? (Science)

• How Denmark Decided COVID Isn’t a Critical Threat to Society (The Atlantic)