US nears 1 million COVID deaths

By Peter Loewi
COVID-19 cases in the Nome, Bering Strait and Norton Sound region remain low, but nationally, cases continue to rise.
There are six active cases in the region: two cases in Nome, two cases in White Mountain, one case in Brevig Mission and one case in Shishmaref.
Nationwide, the rise in infections is accompanied by a two percent increase in deaths in the last two weeks. At this rate, the United States will reach a grim milestone this week: One million officially reported COVID deaths.
A study by the Kaiser Family Foundation released in late April estimates that since June 2021, around 234,000 of those deaths, nearly 25 percent, could have been prevented by timely vaccination. “Almost no one in this country should be dying from COVID,” FDA administrator Robert Califf said in an interview on Saturday on CNN.
As immunity wanes long after the primary doses of the vaccine, and as variants get better at evading that waning immunity, scientists are warning of a large spike in COVID cases this fall and winter if more action isn’t taken. “We’re looking at a range of models, both internal and external models,” said White House COVID-19 response coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha in an interview with ABC on Sunday. “ If we don’t get ahead of this thing, we’re going to have a lot of waning immunity, this virus continues to evolve, and we may see a pretty sizable wave of infections, hospitalizations, and deaths this fall and winter.”
According to a report released by the World Health Organization, excess deaths due to the pandemic totaled 15 million in 2020 and 2021, far above the officially reported number of 5.4 million. Even the CDC estimates that the actual number of deaths due to the pandemic in the U.S. is about 10 percent higher than officially reported.
Globally, due to the pandemic, many other childhood vaccinations are delayed. UNICEF and the WHO reported that measles outbreaks are up 79 percent compared to last year. The FDA announced that they will be meeting in early June to discuss approval of the COVID vaccine for children six-months-old to 5 years.

The week in numbers
On Tuesday, May 3, Norton Sound Health Corporation identified four new COVID-19 in Brevig Mission.
This meant that there were six active cases in the region, four in Brevig, one in Nome and one in Unalakleet.
On Wednesday, May 4, NSHC identified two new cases of COVID-19: One in Brevig Mission and one in Nome.
Active cases in the region rose to seven: Four in Brevig Mission, two in Nome and one in Unalakleet.
On Thursday, May 5, NSHC identified two new COVID-19 cases in the region. One was in Shishmaref and one was in Nome.
Active cases in the region remained at seven, with three in Brevig Mission, three in Nome, and one in Shishmaref.
Over the weekend from Friday, May 6 to Sunday, May 8, NSHC identified five new cases of COVID-19 in the region. Four were in Shishmaref and one was in Nome.
This brought active cases in the region to nine: Three in Brevig Mission, three in Nome and three in Shishmaref.
On Monday, May 9, NSHC identified four new cases of COVID-19. Two cases were in White Mountain, one was in Nome, and one was in Shishmaref.
Since the start of the pandemic, as of Tuesday, May 10, the USA has had 81,973,661 officially reported cases of COVID-19 and 998,040 related deaths.
Alaska has had 246,345 cases, 3,753 hospitalizations, and 1,220 deaths. There are currently 33 people hospitalized due to COVID-19.
The Nome, Norton Sound and Bering Strait region had at least 5,984 cases, 44 hospitalizations and 6 deaths.