News Mash-up: COVID-19 Lockdowns

UK in lockdown again as it starts new vaccine Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced Jan. 4 a new national lockdown for England until at least mid-February to combat a fast-spreading new variant of the coronavirus, even as Britain ramped up its vaccination program by becoming the first nation to start using the shot developed by Oxford University and drugmaker AstraZeneca. Johnson said people must stay at home again, this time because the new virus variant was spreading in a “frustrating and alarming” way. As of Jan. 4, there were 26,626 COVID-19 patients in hospitals in England, an increase of more than 30% from a week ago. (AP) Auckland in new lockdown after 3 infected New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland, was hurriedly placed into a three-day lockdown Feb. 14 after three unexplained coronavirus cases were found. It’s the country’s first lockdown in six months and represented a setback in its largely successful efforts to control the virus. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the three community cases — an Auckland mother, father and daughter — were of the more contagious variant first found in Britain and that genome testing hadn’t linked them to any previous known cases. (AP) These articles were provided by The Japan Times Alpha.