An Updated Covid Guide For four different types of households.

The new C.D.C. guidance has excited many Americans and scared many others. Some people feel both emotions, understandably enough: They’re excited to start returning to more normal daily life and still scared by a pandemic that is killing about 600 Americans a day. This morning, I want to think through the real-world implications of the new guidelines for individual families. Those guidelines mostly allow people to behave more freely. But they will also lead some to take new precautions. I am going to break down households into four categories, depending on vaccination status:

Breakthrough Infections Rare Among Vaccinated Americans

In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided its first public data about breakthrough Covid-19 cases to CNN last week and it shows that vaccines have been highly effective at reducing infections, hospitalizations and death. As of last week, around 78.5 million Americans had been fully vaccinated and the CDC's data states that 5,800 cases of Covid-19 occurred among fully vaccinated people, 396 of whom required hospitalization with 74 deaths recorded.

U.S. Calls for Pause on Johnson & Johnson Vaccine After Clotting Cases

The Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control will stop using the vaccine at federal sites and urge states to do so as well while they examine the safety issues.

Likely Legal, ‘Vaccine Passports’ Emerge as the Next Coronavirus Divide

Businesses and universities want fast, easy ways to see if students and customers are vaccinated, but conservative politicians have turned “vaccine passports” into a cultural flash point.

AZD1222 US Phase III trial met primary efficacy endpoint in preventing COVID-19 at interim analysis

79% vaccine efficacy at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 100% efficacy against severe or critical disease and hospitalization Comparable efficacy result across ethnicity and age, with 80% efficacy in participants aged 65 years and over Favorable reactogenicity and overall safety profile