have _ united kingdom variant and how many cases have actually _ united kingdom variant and how manyis the latest data on those i what is the latest data on those variants? — what is the latest data on those variants? . ~ what is the latest data on those variants? ., ,, , ., what is the latest data on those variants? . ~' , ., ~ variants? thank you. well, the answer is _ variants? thank you. well, the answer is really _ variants? thank you. well, the answer is really clear— variants? thank you. well, the answer is really clear that i variants? thank you. well, the answer is really clear that we l variants? thank you. well, the i answer is really clear that we have answer is really clear that we have a high degree of confidence that the vaccine will work to make people safe and it is vitally important that people come forward for their vaccine. we have a plan for what to do if we need to update the vaccines to work on the new variants. but we also have a plan to keep those new variants under control and keep them suppressed and currently the number of new variants that have been ident

>> the one that is spreading most here so far is the b-117 which is the u.k., united kingdom variant. and we've identified a few hundred cases of it but we haven't looked very hard or deeply. so it has to be more proevalent than that. we still don't know whether it is more infectious or we've caught some por case and that requires more of a look. we've seen a few cases of the variants from south africa and from brazil. those are the ones where the vaccine doesn't seem to work as well. but the one most worrisome is the u.k. variant. they identified the first cases of it in november and by january it was about 70% of the cases in london. so it spreads faster, it may be a little bit more dangerous as well. a little bit higher fatality rate so that is the one that i think we're most worried about. >> so given that it is against -- a race against time, against the variants, to try to smother them before they mutate and get more powerful. how does this effect the suggestion to take a look at maybe just giving more people the first dose as opposed to holding them back to save them for the se

. -- united kingdom variant. they said by the end of march, that's not that far away -- four weeks-plus -- by the end of march, it will be the dominant strange of coronavirus in the united states. i was taken aback by that to think that a variant could become that dominant that quickly. but it was fair warning that that is about to occur. and then they talked about the south african variant, which is just starting to appear. the good news is they've done enough testing to believe that the major vaccines we are now using across america -- moderna and pfizer -- both of them are effective against the u.k., united kingdom variant. the jury is still out when it comes to the south african variant. and there is a third variant, and i won't venture into trying to remember exactly what that was about. but i remember it had some origin in south america. i heard that news, and i thought to myself, this is an ongoing battle. we haven't run up any kind of score against this coronavirus. we can't sit back and relax. we're in a

already over 200 cases of the united kingdom variant in florida alone, there are 700 around the countryagious -- >> that's just the tip of the iceberg, what we've found so far to look for. the point being this is how every one of the b11 7 epidemics in the countries of europe started out and they've been devastating. england has been in lockdown since before christmas, same with portugal, belgium, the netherlands, ireland, seen it in the middle east. israel is in very serious trouble right now with this particular virus, and it is just a matter of time before it happens here. as i pointed out, we have data showing that the number of these isolets of infection are doubling every ten days. when you double small numbers it is not such a big increase. when you start doubling big numbers as we saw in europe, we will be in trouble. i think the darkest days of the pandemic are yet to come, as hard as it is for people to hear. they don't want to hear that, but i'm convinced that's what is going to happen over the next 12 to 14 weeks. >> well, you know your stuff and you've been right throughout

you know, the urgency of course is that we're trying to race ahead of the new united kingdom variant,ariant. that's going to start to accelerate in march and april. and so we're trying to get as many americans vaccinated and texans vaccinated ahead of that variant because we know it's much more transmissible and the mortality rate's going to start going up. we're in a race against time. this is a terrible time to have this kind of delay. >> these power outages impacting the actual vaccines themselves since they are so temperature sensitive and they need to be kept in deep freezes, is that correct? >> yeah, and also delays in shipments as well because people -- you know, they don't want to ship to sites where they think you might not be able to maintain specific temperatures. they're pretty fragile, these new mrna technology vaccines. they're kind of fussy in terms of their temperature requirements. so it's unfortunate that the logistics of the first vaccines out of operation warp speed are the most complicated. but that is the reality. so hopefully, we can get back online pretty soon.

that there are covid viruses that have variations and their genetic makeup, the so-called united kingdom variant , the south african variant, and now we have a case of the brazilian variance. and while these viruses do have specific changes oftentimes in their spike proteins, which is the part of the protein where the virus binds to cells in the body, it tells us that the clock is ticking for us to very aggressively push vaccines forth in west virginia, because as dr. fauci said and other people, the way that these variants spread is that they mutate during the time they are infecting us. the best way to reduce the potential for them to mutate is to have an impact on the infection. as we talked about, and the governor just talked about we have seen such a substantial reduction in hospitalizations, which is frankly very surprising, given the worry about december holidays and new year. we would be really full and perhaps even searching in the hospital. at least my own perspective is the reason we are not is, one, people in west virginia are doing a great job with masks and mitigating. importantly,

and we observed in late 2020 a very rapid expansion of the variant throughout the united kingdom. based on various modeling studies the reproductive number of the variant is approximately one.five timesy higher the data suggest be 115 or b 117 is one.five times higher in transmissibility compared to the previous dominant variant.e i want to touch on the evidence suggesting potential increasees severity the data is pulled from a previously unpublished data reviewed by the emerging viruses with the threat advisory groups february 2021. based on the composite analysis of 22 different related analysis or studies with a combination of the 117 confirmed variance or the target failure marker in review of all the evidence from the analysis of the data sets of infection to be associated with increased risk of death compared to infection. the results of the preliminary report p varied but some outcomes were statistically significant with death up to one.seven times higher with the variant with the baseline virus it should be noted one of the key conclusions is the absolute risk of death al

germany because they look at the rate of spread of the variance whether that's the variant 1st detected in the united kingdom or the variant 1st is active in south africa they see that those spikes in infections and they say there's a 3rd wave which gives you a sense of what's happening here in berlin but also in brussels dominic came in that across that nation for us from that land thank you so much dominic. well still ahead here on al-jazeera india and out says new rules to regulate social media fans weeks after a dispute with have a content related to protesting found. an ecological disaster on the israeli coast but a great tank a company is denying responsibility. for the perfect. sponsored point qatar airways how i once again we've got some very heavy rain in the forecast for parts of central china a fair bit of cloud here just spilling out of that pots over china pushing towards shanghai or associated with this weather system here which does have some tropical entrained within it so heavy downpours which will make their way through the east china sea southern areas of japan q show in particular we'll s

can these stop that united kingdom variant which we found out over the weekend is more deadly than west thought? >> yeah, absolutely, and again, first of all, it's great to see the vaccine numbers really ramp up. i do think all the evidence that the uk variant is clearly susceptible to our vaccines. the race right now is to get as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible. >> that's full speed ahead right now. at the same time, you're seeing several states, several cities starting to relax the restrictions. too soon? >> yeah, i wish -- i totally understand while cases are down they want to do. i would say hold a little longer and get the rest of the high-risk people vaccinated. i just wish they could hold off for a little longer. >>> we're following a lot of other headlines including harry and meghan bring valentine's day reveal. they're expecting baby number two. >>> and "bachelor" host chris harrison stepping aside after dou defending a contestant's past racial comments. this morning, we'll hear from the first black bachelorette, rachel lindsay. >>> but first, back to ginger. he

spreading across the country as we speak for some time we've heard about the variant first discovered in the united kingdom now researchers are finding a variant here on the west coast that may also be easier to spread and possibly even more deadly kron four's dan kerman is live at ucsf tonight with more dan. >>has happened and what we can tell you about tonight as we hear a lot about these community testing sites and in this case a community testing site in the mission has yielded some very interesting information about these variants specifically as it relates to transmissibility and possibly as it relates to the icu and death. a community testing site in san francisco's mission district has yielded some eye opening results. researchers ucsf and the chan zuckerberg hot found more than half of the positive cases discovered there in january or of a west coast variant of covid-19. most concerning though is that the variant is much easier to pass person to person in a given household about a quarter. >>of the people in the house. are likely to get sick if an infected person comes into the house. as part of t

starting to outcompete the other strains so we're starting to see the rise of the uk variant, the one from united kingdomvariant, the brazil variant. and these are much more highly transmissible and possibly cause worse disease as well. i'm worried we're going to be swept you by a huge surge over the next couple of months. i can't tell you exactly when it's going to start. maybe in a month, maybe in two months. but it's going to happen. so the way i'm thinking of this is we're in the eye of the hurricane right now, and this is the time that we have to get ready for that next big piece and that means vaccinating the american people as fast as possible. >> and how are the current vaccinations equipped to combat these new strains? >> well, the vaccines are good, and i think that even though the protection against the new strains is not quite as strong, it's good enough, the key is this, we have to really look at vaccinating three quarters of the u.s. population ahead of the variants. so that's 240 million americans, and that's times two doses, we're looking at roughly half a billion imuniizations, that's 3

population, including the population of texas ahead of this variant that's coming out of the united kingdom17 variant, which we think will start accelerating cases again. thousand there's new information posted by the u.k. government this week that the mortality rates, the death rates are higher with this variant. so we're in a race now to race against vaccinating the u.s. population before this variant takes over and that's what it's looking like basis on the emdeem logical models last year. >> do we have any reports of losing power and losing refrigeration for the vaccine and therefore losing vaccine? >> not necessarily hospitals but we've heard of instances where a lot of vaccine is going to go bad. there was a quick rush to vaccinate everybody we could find in order to not throw those vaccines away. the message i've been sending in the state of texas is the worst thing can you do is throw vaccine away. don't throw any vaccine away, it's all good in terms of helping us interrupt transmission. people have to then that message. in one case at rice university there was that issue and rather

authorities are working to contain clusters of the more contagious corona virus variant 1st identified in the united kingdom. a brazilian earth observation satellite amazonia one has soared to space aboard an indian rocket along with 18 passenger satellites the facility and satellite has infrared capabilities that allow it to monitor the speed and scale of deforestation in the amazon region regardless of the weather. speaking of the weather winter in northern india is jehmu and territory means snow fall and therefore winter sports the center for most of these activities is the town of gulmarg famous for its ski slopes it's now drawer in crowds though for another reason and not involves lots of wanting and learning new customs. in the snowy high country it's really not out of place but of course this isn't the far north of canada or greenland this is the western himalayas and while the igloo from a distance says in a weird tribe the flourishes at the entrance way and then inside say john woo and kashmir. this is to use what i would use as fund as part of a ritual for good omens it also helps to keep the evil

population, including the population of texas ahead of this variant that's coming out of the united kingdoms again. and now there's new information posted by the uk government on their website this week that the mortality rates, the death rates are higher with this variant. so we're in a race now to race against vaccinating the u.s. population before this variant takes over and that's what it's looking like based on the epidemiological models and the experiences of what we saw in southern england late last year. >> do we have any reports of facilities in texas basically losing power, therefore losing the refrigeration capacity for the vaccine and therefore losing some viable vaccine? >> not necessarily hospitals but we've heard of instances where a lot of vaccine is going to go bad. there was a quick rush to vaccinate anybody who we could find in order to not throw those vaccines away. the message i've been sending in the state of texas is the worst thing can you do is throw vaccine away. i don't care whether it's 1a, 1b, 1c, don't throw any vaccine away. it's all good in terms eventually h

as we look to the united states and we learn that the variant that was predominant in the united kingdom week or so in this country, what does that mean for the effort to get out ahead of it here, dr. reiner? >> well, first of all, what i would stress is that something look so much better in the united states overall than things did six weeks ago. if you look yesterday, the covid tracking project reported that the u.s. had 96,000 new cases, which is the first time since december or actually since november that the u.s. has reported less than 100,000 new cases in a day. so cases are cropping rapidly in the united states. hospitalizations are dropping rapidly. but the new variants, particularly the uk variant is becoming more common. when we isolate viruses, so we're in a race. we need to continue to do what we're doing now, get more people to mask up, and most importantly, we need to get shots into arms. saturday was a remarkable day. we had 1.8 million vaccines administered in the united states. if we can do that every single day, than we'll stay ahead of this. but the trends right now i

illustrated not chillingly is in the new variant so you have variants in south africa or variants in brazil in the united kingdom the less vaccinated people in these countries the more those variants will spread making all of the vaccines potentially less effective causing problems to the very richest countries who have bought this vaccine i just want to say though i'm a fan of yours i admire your vision and i also like your son writing a lot but i do want to say that i think god he has had. has demonstrated in a similar way to the failure of western pharmaceutical companies a failure of western philanthropy got he has never really pushed western pharmaceutical manufacturers to release these monopolies on their vaccines and to seek more collaborators as missing now you know a bit doing out of necessity so pfizer has got affected move artists and so no fee to produce its vaccine because it just doesn't make enough but you know we knew this early on we knew this last year and that's why there's a proposal at the beauty oh it's. you know i think you may have something to do it in the future where india and africa h

health authorities are working to contain costs to be more contagious coronavirus variant 1st identified in the united kingdom. in nigeria more than 40 students and teachers who were abducted 2 weeks ago have been freed they were kidnapped by gunmen from a school in the north central state of new chef on friday more than 300 girls were abducted at gunpoint from another school in neighboring them far a state that fate is still unknown. but does lead to football now and lights made history in a thrilling match against not only did they keep their title hopes alive by scoring 3 2nd half goals but it was the 1st time that they ever won in the top league after being 2 goals down. 2 of the best coaches in the business came to grips in large 6 yulian knuckles man's home side of a 4 game winning streak founded on a physical defense but a little too much muscle from day 0 up of mccown on meant that marco rose's men would open the story from the spot for your misfortune one after just 6 minutes it was a bad start and things would get worse for leipzig just 13 minutes later baucus to run was waiting on mark at the back

authorities are working to contain clusters of the more contagious corona virus variant 1st identified in the united kingdom. in nigeria more than 40 students and teachers who were abducted 2 weeks ago have been freed they were kidnapped by gunmen from a school in the north central state of nigeria on friday more than 300 girls were abducted at gunpoint from another school in neighboring them far a state their fate is still unknown. and spanish police have come under attack during protests against the railing jailing of a popular rapper loosing broke out in barcelona as police confronted supporters of public has said the singer has been jailed for glorifying terrorism some of his fans claim the sentence suppresses free speech. some but in this league of football now in light safe made history in a thrilling match against not only did they keep their title hopes to life by scoring a 3 2nd half goals it was the 1st time that they have ever won in the top league after being 2 goals down. 2 of the best coaches in the business came to grips in logic you leonardo's months home saw them a 4 game winning streak fou

across the country, but new variants are threatening to cancel out the progress, a new study released today finds that arm or contagious strain first discovered in the united kingdom is spreading rapidly across the united states. this confirms the cdc is prediction that the variant could dominate coronavirus cases by march states or scramble into speed up vaccine distribution to stay ahead of the new variants. and transform stadiums into mass vaccination sites university scientists also sith astrazeneca to modify the shot by the fall to help protect against the new strength. be we won't be reducing the number of cases of asthma much but we still won't be seeing that the deaths, the hospitalizations on the severe disease, and that's really important for health care systems. health experts worry that the super bowl parties that were held today may lead to another surgeon cases. well, state health officials say the number of hospitalizations continues to go down. as of today, more than 12,000. people in california are in the hospital for covid-19. that's a 5% drop from the day before. health officials also reported 295 deaths today bring the california death toll to

. >> i am worried about this variant, the b117 variant from the united kingdom. if that takes over, the numbers will start to spiral up again. >> reporter: there are questions about the u.k. covid-19 variant and whether it can cause another surge before america can suppress it. >> i'm optimistic we're going to get there. >> reporter: vaccines are on the move again after a week of severe weather causes delays. the the over the 6 million vaccine doses already been delivered, the vast amount. maybe we're starting to return to normalcy. >> reporter: the amount of dose continues to outpace supply. for those who are able to get the vaccine, utit's a relief. >> it's so easy for us to not fall into doing anything. i'm definitely hoping that will get a lot better. we're really glad to have the shots. >> reporter: wolf, as you can understand, this has been so difficult for so many people. we all seem to know someone who lost someone due to covid-19. people were almost in tears today receiving their shots. this long line has been like this since this morning. there are four

variants trains. >>involve the one that was first detected in the united kingdom. t here at home, we know that that means 3 variance in the bay area mcauliffe would be a variance the uk variant and was recently some having said the brazilian variant us air. so i think all of is making concerned ucsf infectious disease expert doctor, peter, chin-hong says the worry is just how transmissible these variants are especially since people are still actively dealing with the it isn't going away anywhere. >>we still about 5 times way be wearing october getting vulnerable people vaccinated is the best way to keep us from seeing another surge. >>when asked whether or not the country should just start giving out at least one dose of the vaccine to as many people as possible. doctor chan hong says it might be the right call you'd asked me 2 months ago. >>i probably would have been area of not following the science to the tea. i think right again with these variants going around we just need to get as many people immunized as possible, you know looking at the science you know you

we're starting to see the variant from the united kingdom starting to accelerate in the u.s. that variant is more transmissible and there's some data from the u.k. that is yet as unpublished that there's higher mortality rate. the worry is that we're in the eye of the hurricane more than finally getting our way out of this. that the numbers will start to climb again. and what this means, practically speaking. we have to accelerate our timetable for vaccinating the american people to get ahead of that u.k. variant. >> speaking of vaccines over the week, the vaccination site at l.a.'s dodger stadium had to close because of a shortage of available doses, believe it or not. it comes as some state's exhibit paneled the number of people who are now eligible to get a vaccination, including those with underlying health concerns. what are some of your concerns about the pace of vaccinations versus the current supply that exists? >> well, i think the biden administration has done a good job in intervening, putting the full power of the federal government and expanding vaccination hubs,

. >> i am worried about this variant, the b 117 variant from the united kingdom. that takes over, the numbers are going to start to spiral up again. >> reporter: there are questions still about the impact of covid-19 variants and whether they could cause another surge before americans are vaccinated. >> the more we can suppress it, the fewer mutations it has. so i'm optimistic we're going to get there. >> reporter: vaccines are on the move again after a week of severe weather caused delays. the biden administration expects the backlog to be gone by midweek, saying at least 2 million out of the 6 million delayed vaccine doses have already been delivered. helping to clear the backlog, the opening of new mass vaccination sites this week in new york, texas, and georgia. >> getting the shot today is just the first step. it may be starting the beginning of the return of normalcy. >> reporter: more than 44 million people have been able to receive at least one dose while demand for doses continues to outpace supply. for those able to get the vaccine, it's a relief. >> but

united states. you can see this all around the world. you can see this in places where the predominant strains are the variants, places like united kingdom africa. something is happening around the world. it's probably a combination of the populations learning how to social distance, how to wear masks finally. also maybe the seasonality of the virus and also finally the fact of so many people have been infected with this virus, we're starting possibly to see some elements of community immunity. so i'm not so sure. look, i'm just a simple heart doctor, but i'm not so sure that we're necessarily destined to see another major surge. we need to continue doing what we're doing now. vaccinate. wear masks. continue to push this virus down. it's not a done deal that we're going to see another major spring surge. >> well, you may be, as you say, just a heart doctor. i think you're downplaying -- >> i said simple heart doctor. >> even more so. i think you're downplaying your accomplishments. and i do have to say pretty much everything that you predicted during this has been right on. thank you, doctor. i appreciate it. see you soon. >> my pleasure

united states haven't had apparently as many cases of the variants, they have been here almost certainly for months. if you look around the world where these particular variants are endemic like the united kingdomouth africa, they are seeing the same dramatic declines in cases as we are seeing in the united states, and those are in places enriched with these variants. so i'm not convinced that the u.s. is destined to see another surge from these variants because all of the mitigation strategies, which appear to be working and as dr. schaffeener said, the fact that so many people in this country have probably been a symptomatically exposed to the virus, we're seeing the outer reaches of some community or herd immunity. i'm not sure we're going to see or we're destined to see a surge from these variants. we need to watch these. we need to surveil for these variants. we need to do more genomic sequencing. i think it's not a destiny that we're -- we will certainly face necessarily. >>ly >> i will happily take that assessment. always happy to have you with us. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> just ahead, a wealthy donor gave $2 million for voter fraud investigations. well, now he sa

variants trains. involve the one that was first detected in the united kingdom. but here at home, we know that that means 3 variance in the bay area. >>mcauliffe would be a variance the uk variant and was recently some having said the brazilian variant us air. so i think all of is making concerned ucsf infectious disease expert doctor, peter, chin-hong says the worry is just how transmissible these variants are especially since people are still actively dealing with the virus little bit isn't going away anywhere. >>with still about 5 times way be wearing october getting vulnerable people vaccinated is the best way to keep us from seeing another surge. >>when asked whether or not the country should just start giving out at least one dose of the vaccine to as many people as possible. doctor chan hong says it might be the right call you'd asked me 2 months ago. >>i probably would have been area of not following the science to the tea. i think right again with these variants going around we just need to get as many people immunized as possible, you know looking at the

authorities are working to contain clusters of the more contagious corona virus variant 1st identified in the united kingdom. spanish police have come under attack during protests against the jailing of a popular rapper looting broke out in barcelona as police confronted supporters of the house so the singer has been jailed for glorifying terrorism and insulting royalty in his songs that has sparked a debate over freedom of expression in spain. and a brazilian earth observation satellite the amazonia want to soar to space aboard an indian rocket 18 passenger satellites the brazilian satellite has infrared capabilities that allow it to monitor the speed and scale of deforestation in families on region regardless of the weather. for well in the 1960 s. and 1970 s. the french government took away nearly 2000 children from the island of re-union on one of france's overseas territories in the indian ocean their plan was to repopulate rural areas of mainland france and the children were promised education and opportunity instead many injured years of mistreatment now generation of stolen children watch the french

the prime minister choose not to do the one thing that sage said could prevent new variants coming to the united kingdomme minister? >> actually, mr. speaker, sage did not recommend a complete ban. they say travel ban should not be relied upon to stop new variants. but we have one of the toughest regimes in the world and anybody coming from south africa, not only has to do a test before they come here, but anybody coming from south africa now will find themselves obliged to go into quarantine for ten days and they will have a -- an isolation insurance agency checking up on them. and it's illegal to go on holiday in this country, it's illegal to travel from south africa or all of the countries on the current red list. and we will be going forward, mr. speaker, with a plan to ensure that people coming into this country from those red list countries immediately have to go into government mandated quarantine hospitality. >> mr. speaker, i'm intrigued by the prime minister's answer. i don't think he disputes what sage's view was, but only a complete closure of all arrivals will work. he doesn't seem to dispu

south african variant is now here in the united states and the uk variant is also here, even in larger amounts. and now the uk variant, in some areas, has picked up -- the united kingdomadditional mutation to make it look more like the south african variant. with goeft to vaccinate the american people ahead of these variants and that means by the spring. so, we have to find a way to really expand and accelerate vaccinations in a faster timetable than the original biden plan was, which was to vaccinate by the fall. >> so, given this news about astrazeneca, should people find out what strain they have of covid before picking the vaccine that they're going to use? it seems like some vaccines are more perfective against certain strains than others. what are people supposed to do? >> well, right now there are limited options in terms of what vaccines are available. they're all protecting against the original strain, and most of them are also partially protective and adequately protective against the south african variant. so, whatever vaccine you're offered in the united states through emergency use authorization, you definitely want to take. and then as the south african

happen as the vaccine roll—out continues and as we get use to more and different variants emerging in the united kingdomfficult, i suppose, as always, the nature of viruses that they evolve, and every opportunity they get to change, to protect themselves so they can keep replicating is kind of what they do. and we always have to be, if not one step head, then very, very close behind. that's right, and the government strategy on this is two fold. one is to look at vaccines and whether we might need to tweak vaccines in the future to be able to deal with new variants. some talk there might be a booster jab needed in the autumn, we don't know that for sure yet. but if we do, it shouldn't be that difficult to make these changes is what the scientists say. the other thing they are doing is rolling out this surge testing. so in areas that you see levels of these variants, even just a handful, even if it's one or two cases, they really try to hammer down on it, test everyone in the local area whether they have symptoms or not. and that's what they are doing here. so, for example, a couple of these cases were f

lisa: this is a real concern because it's not just new variant in the united kingdom, it is also southica. how do you track people coming into the u.k. or the u.s.? the other aspect of this, do you think business travel ever come back? jonathan: in certain places. this is my scenario. client one, we are not going to come down to because we are not traveling as much. it's to zoom call. another bank calls at the same client and says let's go to lunch. who gets the deal? where they have those face-to-face meetings, that's where things get interesting. is it in new york? is it miami? tom: we are going to have to see. we are opening restaurants here. it's going to be the third time we have tried to open restaurants. lisa: this is going to be tough. i want to go back to the planet, not bailout, -- plan, not bailout. u.s. airline spent 96% of their free cash flow before the pandemic on share buybacks. there is a question of use of cash and management of the airlines. that is one of the political questions as we deal with assistance from the federal government given what could be attached. jon

scientists say a coven 1000 variant detected in the united kingdom has further mutated in. a way that could help it evade vaccines tests show the changes are similar to those seen in the more contagious south african and brazil variance the u.k. is tightening measures to control the spread of new strains with more testing and tougher travel restrictions while while the a nations try to ramp up their vaccination programs countries across africa lagging far behind the answer for now is to find existing drugs that can treat coded one candidate is ivermectin and there's been a huge demand even though it's normally found on farms and whole reports either make tin is best known for treating parasites in livestock and in human form as a treatment for skin conditions like scabies it's been taken safely by billions of people trials conducted across the developing world who've also revealed ivermectin to be an effective treatment for covert 19 reducing symptoms cutting mortality by up to 75 percent and even inhibiting transmission. in parts of india it's been credited with bringing c

people of florida florida leads the nation in known cases of the b 1, 1, 7 covid variant that came from the united kingdom but governor desantis points out hospitalizations and covid cases in the state are trending downward. according to john hopkins university florida is nowhere near the worst state in the country. >>florida's percent positive is 8.6% which ranks 28th out of 50 states and florida ranks 16th in the nation for giving 2 doses of the vaccine when asked about the reports of travel restrictions white house press secretary jen psaki played down the conversations, i've seen those we are always considering what steps are necessary to keep the american people. >>we are not currently. in the process no decisions have been made around additional public health measures that would would change i should domestic considerations last year governor desantis impose travel restrictions of his own on covid hotspots like new york, new jersey and louisiana requiring visitors to quarantine but federal restrictions he says would be unfair especially for state dependent on tourism. >>we will not back down. >>and

so the b.1.1.7 variant, that was originally identified in the united united kingdom, looks like it's g to be the dominant variant that we are going to see worldwide for a while, now. it, certainly, is more transmissible. there's some really interesting evidence to suggest that people infected with that variant are able to transmit the virus for longer. so, they have a much-longer, you know, period in which they can infect others, which allows it to find more hosts, more quickly. so, we are seeing it start to, well, you know, it roared through the uk and then denmark and ireland. you know, we are now seeing it in florida, really pick up steam there. you know, los angeles. it really is starting to, you know, gain momentum. and it's going to be the -- the thing that really determines what the next four, six, eight, weeks actually looks like for much of the world. >> and i think you have analyzed how infectious this variant is in an actual setting, in a scenario. tell us about that. >> yeah. so, you know, part of the -- the work that i'm doing is working with different industries to -- to

virusesiations that have variatn their genetic makeup, the ariant so-called united, kingdom variation, the south african variant, and now we have a case of the brazilian variant. and while these viruses do have specific changes, oftentimes in their spike proteins which is that part of the protein where the virus binds to cells in the body, that it tells us thatatbo clock is ticking for us to continue to very aggressively push vaccines forward in west virginia. iscause as dr. fauci says and other people that the way that these variants, these viral variants spread, is that they mutate during the time that they're infecting us. so the best way to reduce the potential for them theial foan to really have an impact on the infections.d the and as we talked about, the governor just talked about, we h have seen such a substantial reduction in hospitalizations. which is, frankly, very surprising given the worry about the december holidays and new year where we would have guessed about now we'd be really, really for fallen and perhaps even er surging in the hospitals.specti and at least my own perspectivei is thetiga rea

unit. that's so important. but the only thing that i'm concerned about now is that we do have this uk variant, the b.1.1.7 variant out of the united kingdomto be accelerating in the united states. even though the new cases are going down now, below 100,000 confirmed new cases a day, that's great news. but i'm worried we're going to start seeing an uptick again, an upturn. and with that not only more transmissiblity but the british government put out information a couple of days ago saying they think the case fatality rate is higher with this new strain. the key now is how do we get through the spring before the mother lode of vaccines come through? >> emergency use authorization, one of those still not approved, novavax, as you heard in nick's report, is testing this new version of its covid-19 vaccine that specifically targets the coronavirus variant first identified in south africa. dr. hotez, how critical is it to have vaccines that can address these variants? >> well, we think in the united states, the uk variant is going to be dominant in the coming months. and the good news is all the operation warp speed vaccines seem to work just

officials are also concerned about a mutant variant of the virus spreading rapidly across the united states. >> we have to assume that what happened in the united kingdoming to happen here with this variant. >> reporter: swift-moving variants now identified in more than 30 states. >> the continued proliferation of variants remains of great concern and is a threat that could reverse the recent positive trends we are seeing. >> reporter: the cdc says it's stepping up sequencing efforts. >> what we need to do as quickly as possible is, obviously, vaccinate the american people. >> reporter: the pace is improving. >> saturday was a remarkable day. we had 1.8 million vaccines administered in the united states. if we can do that every single day, then we'll stay ahead of this. >> reporter: 72% doses distributed in arms. more than 9.5 million people fully vaccinated. another mass vaccination site with a focus on taxi drivers and food service and delivery workers. >> these are folks we all depend on. >> reporter: now hospit hospitalizations and cases dropping. >> this is promising but hospitalizations also remain incredibly high, much higher than the summer and

variants are yet. >> right. well, first of all, we have to assume that what happened in the united kingdom is going to happen here with this variant. which means that the number of cases over there almost doubled in the span of a few weeks or a month. i agree with you 100%, information is valuable and we need that. and we are so behind in sequencing and knowing that information from other countries, i think we're like 61st or something like that. but i think we have to assume that even though right now they'll only measured or identified a few, maybe 600 of the 117 variants and u.k. variants, even though they didn't say so, i think we have to assume that there are maybe tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of those variants and it is doubling every ten days from all estimates. so, yes, that should very a priority of finding out what is going on. >> and with -- understanding that maybe that knowledge is coming. but right now say there is a few hundred and you say that is obviously wildly likely underestimated or underidentified at this moment. what does that mean in terms of -- the vaccination program? >> well

i think this next surge with this new variant from the united kingdom could very well far surpass 300,000 a day. so as much as we all want to feel better about what's happening, we just have to understand that we have some very, very dark days ahead. >> which is so sad to hear. let's talk about the fight over school re-opening. schools across the country, many states are actually pushing for kids to return to the classroom before teachers are vaccinated. is that the right call? >> the data we have today shows, particularly in younger kids, the risk of transmission to schools is exceedingly low and kind of put that into perspective. if you look at the last eight years here in minnesota, we've had 31 children who have died from influenza. while attending school. much of the transmission occurred in schools. and no one called for the stopping of education of closing schools, but now today, where we've not had a single child of school age die from covid-19 in this state, there's reluctance. i understand these teachers. it's a fearful kind of event. we have to help educate them that, in fact,

that's particularly variant you mentioned from the united kingdom.virus is much more infectious and likely to cause series illness and death. >> this is playing out here in the united states with the early spread throughout the country and the european country which each of them have to go into extensive lockdown for days. their rates of disease were extraordinary high. to give you a comparison in our worse day of the united states we had 130,000 hospital saysed patients. if we had the same rate they saw in london recently, we would be 195,000 hospitalizations a day. this is what we are up against. the super bowl parties all over the country as well as what's happening in florida. it is surely a way to reverse that trend of cases going down. >> wow. >> that's saying a lot. i want to play for you the president in his cbs news interview on the topic of reopening our schools. >> our cdc commissioner is going to be coming out with science-based judgment which i think as early as wednesday. i made a commitment that we try to get k through 8 back to school

i'm concerned about losing a week is because weave this new race ahead of the b-117 variant coming from the united kingdom and starting to take off now in florida, it is going to be pretty much nationwide we think about late in march and into april. so we're in this horrible race because the u.k. variant or the b-117 variant seems to be much more transmissible, more highly contagious than what we've seen in the past. and the u.k. government just put up information not peer reviewed but it is looking ominous that it is more severe in terms of level of disease and death rates. so, now is a real crunch time to get ahead of that variant. so losing a whole week like this is really awful. >> it is indeed. researchers as now, in both israel and canada, say a single dose of the pfizer coronavirus vaccine is enough to significantly reduce disease. dr. fauci said the second dose still provides critical durability. what do you think? should u.s. officials consider giving one dose so more americans can at least begin to get some level of vaccine protection? >> well, look, i think they could look at the data coming ou

covid viruses that have variations, and their genetic makeup from so-called united kingdom very yet, the south african variant and now we have a case of the brazilian variant. and while these viruses you have specific changes, oftentimes in their spike proteins which is that part of the protein where the virus finds itself in the body, that it tells us that the clock is ticking for us to continue to very aggressively push vaccines forward in west virginia. because as dr. fauci says, and of the people, that the way that these variants, these viral variants spread, is that they mutate during the time they are infecting us. so the best way to reduce potential for them to mutate is to really have an impact on the infections. as we talked about and the governor just talked about we have seen sets a substantial reduction in hospitalizations which is frankly very surprising given the worry about the december holidays and new year where we would've guessed about now we would be really, really very full and perhaps even surging and hospitals. at least my own perspective is the reason we're not is one, deep in west vir