A record number of doctors applied to be certified to treat obesity this year amid the soaring popularity of weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy.

Nearly 1,900 doctors signed up for the annual exam this October, the medical board behind the test said, which was a 50 percent increase compared to the previous year.

Passing the exam distinguishes doctors as competent in treating obese patients and could set them on A path to rake in higher salaries.

It comes after official data showed a record 40 percent of adults are now obese in three states — West Virginia, Louisiana and Oklahoma — while every state had seen a rise in rates compared to just a decade ago.

Weight loss drug prescriptions have surged in the US with five million written last year, up 2,000 percent in 2019. 

Analysts suggest this market will be worth $56billion by 2030, with doctors who have specialized in obesity medicine likely able to charge more to patients. 

Data from the American Board of Obesity Medicine revealed a record number of doctors had signed up to take the exam this year.

Back in 2012 — when the accreditation scheme was set up — barely 200 doctors applied.

Healthcare workers do not need the obesity certificate in order to treat obese patients, but it can make them more competent in caring for the patients. 

It can also serve as a stepping stone to doctors signing up for further training as bariatric surgeons — or a doctor who has specialized in performing weight loss surgeries such as a gastric bypass.

This would require another one to two years of training on top of the initial four required to become a doctor plus the three-to-seven-year residency.

Bariatric doctors earn about $450,000 per year on average, statistics suggest, compared to $412,000 for general surgeons. In some cases, they can be paid upward of $700,000.

The ABOM says doctors are expected to become certified by them in order to become a bariatric surgeon. 

Modules taught to doctors in the course look at the causes of the disease and how to help patients lose weight through diet changes and exercise.

They may also be taught about ‘pharmacotherapy’ for helping patients reduce their waistlines, which may include being taught about popular weight-loss drugs.

Dr Kimberly Gudzune, the medical director for the ABOM, told Insider: ‘As there’s more awareness of both obesity as a chronic disease and all of the effective treatment options, patients are coming into their physicians and saying: “I want to be treated”.

‘And I think that that is oftentimes the trigger for a lot of busy practitioners to say, “I really need to know how to do this”.’

She added: ‘We’re working to address that gap [on obesity knowledge among doctors].

‘But it does take time, and I think that the growth does speak to us working in that direction.’

There are more than one million doctors in the US, of which nearly 7,000 — or 0.007 percent — have the board certification to treat obesity.

The specialization is not needed in order to be allowed to treat obese patients, but it will give doctors advanced knowledge.

As well as their busy schedules, doctors will also need to complete at least 30 hours of lectures and another 30 of studying before taking the exam.

A gold rush is currently on among pharmaceutical giants to tap into the nascent weight-loss medications market.

Novo Nordisk — which is behind semaglutide used in Wegovy and Ozempic — raked in a record $5.5billion last year after investing in factories to manufacture the drug in the United States.

It is also behind a number of drugs for diabetes patients and some medicines for hemophilia patients.

Eli Lilly has also cashed in on the market with its obesity treatment tirzepatide, projected to make $48billion once approved.

Pfizer — which made billions with its Covid vaccine — is also developing its own class of weight-loss drugs in order to access the market.

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By Cassidy Morrison Senior Health Reporter For Dailymail.Com

Published: 14:36 EDT, 22 September 2023 | Updated: 15:06 EDT, 22 September 2023

Drug store chains like CVS Health and Walgreens will carry updated Covid-19 vaccines as soon as this week, the chains announced Wednesday. 

The news comes after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) approved updated vaccines Tuesday to tackle new variants, such as Eris and BA.2.86, which have caused an uptick in US Covid cases and hospitalizations. 

Walgreens said it would start taking appointments for the updated vaccines this coming Monday but could begin earlier appointments as stores receive vaccines this week.

Rite Aid, meanwhile, said appointments would be live on Friday.

CVS said some pharmacies would begin receiving the new vaccines on Wednesday, with all pharmacy locations expected to have vaccinations in stock by early next week. 

On Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved updated vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna for all Americans ages 12 and above. The agency has also authorized the shots for emergency use in children ages six months through 11 years.

The government has said the updated shots will still be free for most Americans with health insurance coverage. However, the US has been paying about $26 per dose of the vaccine, but some manufacturers, such as Pfizer and Moderna, are planning to increase the price up to $130 when the shots are sold on the private market this fall.

The updated shots are designed to boost protection against newer variants.

It’s unclear when other pharmacies, such as Walmart, will begin offering the vaccines. Health officials hope to rev up protection ahead of winter as Covid rates rise across the country for the first time this year — though top experts expect it to be another mild wave.

Even Americans who have never had a Covid shot are eligible.  

But appetite for more Covid vaccines is dwindling. Nearly six in 10 Americans over 65 years old failed to get last year’s bivalent booster shot, and experts think even fewer will come forward once the newly formulated Covid vaccines are rolled out. 

However, new variants like Eris and BA.2.86 have caused an uptick in cases and hospitalizations, increasing demand for vaccines.

Covid hospitalizations have been rising since late summer, although — thanks to some lasting immunity from prior vaccinations and infections — not nearly as much as this time last year.

Data from the CDC showed 17,400 patients admitted to hospitals nationwide in the last week of August, up 16 percent on the previous seven-day spell.

Despite the rise, rates remain at historic lows. For comparison, there were 150,000 Covid admissions per week at the height of the pandemic in January 2021, and hospitalizations reached as high as 44,000 a week earlier this year.

But protection wanes over time, and the coronavirus continually churns out new variants that can dodge prior immunity.

The FDA said starting at age five, and most people can get a single dose even if they’ve never had a prior Covid shot.

Children aged five and above can get a single dose of a booster Covid vaccine, as long as it has been at least two months since their last Covid shot.

Kids between six months old and four years old, on the other hand, are eligible for one or two doses of the booster shot. Timings of the injections will depend on when they received their last Covid vaccine.

If the child is under five and is yet to receive any Covid vaccines, they will be able to get three doses of the Pfizer booster or two doses of the Moderna booster.

The agency said: ‘The FDA is confident in the safety and effectiveness of these updated vaccines, and the agency’s benefit-risk assessment demonstrates that the benefits of these vaccines for individuals six months of age and older outweigh their risks.’

Younger children might need additional doses depending on their history of Covid infections and vaccinations.

The newest shots target an Omicron variant named XBB.1.5. That specific strain is no longer dominant.

Still, it’s close enough to coronavirus strains causing most Covid illnesses today that FDA determined it would offer good cross-protection.

Early tests show that it is also effective in protecting against BA.2.86, which has triggered fears of a fresh Covid wave.

There are also promising signs it will work against the EG.5 Covid variant, also known as Eris, which is currently dominant in the US.

Doctors have been put on high alert about rising cases of a potentially severe respiratory virus in parts of the United States, which could signal a bad nationwide outbreak is to come. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned medical professionals the rising rates of respiratory syncitial virus, or RSV, in Florida and Georgia in recent weeks signal the start of the respiratory virus season.  

And the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has advised healthcare workers to brace for what could be a ‘tripledemic’ of RSV, flu, and Covid-19 cases this winter.

RSV infects the lungs and the respiratory tract and typically causes cold-like symptoms, though it can be deadly to seniors who have weaker immune systems and infants whose already-narrow airways fill with mucus, making it hard to breathe. 

RSV is the leading cause of hospitalization for infants one or younger in the US. Each year, the virus causes up to 80,000 hospitalizations and 300 deaths in children under age 5. 

And in seniors, the virus can cause up to 160,000 hospitalizations and 10,000 fatalities every year.

Treatments and preventive measures for RSV have become more widely available in just the past year, and the CDC is urging clinicians to stock up on vaccines for adults and pregnant women and monoclonal antibodies for infants when they become available.    

This summer ushered in the most substantial win for protecting babies FROM RSV, though, with the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) approval of a monoclonal antibody to protect against RSV called Nirsevimab, which will become available in October.

Nirsevimab is a single-shot monoclonal antibody that, in clinical trials, cut the chance of serious RSV infection requiring hospitalization by nearly 75 percent. 

For seniors 60 years and older, there are now two new vaccines to help fend off the virus, with one of them proving to be 80 percent effective at preventing RSV infection. 

But the vaccines for older adults are not like a traditional flu shot that is available to all who want one. Doctors must decide after consultation with their patients whether the rare, yet potentially severe health risks associated with the vaccine, such as atrial fibrillation and neurological complications, outweigh the benefit of protection. 

Regional increases early in the season, such as those currently occurring in the Southeast, offer health officials a glimpse of what may be to come for the rest of the country in the next several months. 

Agency officials monitoring disease testing results in Florida found the number of diagnostic tests coming back positive for RSV exceeded five percent for about a month. The typical test positivity rate for RSV this time of year is around three percent. 

In Georgia, the CDC observed an uptick in the number of hospitalizations due to RSV. Around two for every 100,000 children in Georgia were hospitalized for RSV during the week ending on August 5. By August 19, that rate had risen to seven hospitalizations per 100,000 children. 

The uptick in cases this time of year would not otherwise be noteworthy, as seasonal RSV, along with influenza, typically begins in early fall and peaks in the winter. 

But the last few years have been an exception to that rule thanks to pandemic-era social distancing measures like masking and isolation. Meant to stave off Covid, the measures also largely stamped out seasonal virus outbreaks as we knew them.

But when the world gradually reopened in 2021 after Covid-19 vaccines became available, seasonal viruses came back too. 

Last year’s RSV season was among the worst. 

Covid, flu, and RSV began to circulate with some overlap, garnering fears of a ‘tripledemic’. 

Now, there is renewed concern of another ‘tripledemic’, a situation in which three diseases join forces and overwhelm the healthcare system, which so far has not had the devastating consequences at the scale many epidemiologists feared. 

Still, the CDC is recommending doctors ramp up testing for RSV, as well as Covid and the flu, in schools, daycares and long-term care facilities, and stockpile the latest medicine. 

The health agency also recommends all infants under eight months born during RSV season should receive the antibody within their first week of life, while infants born outside the typical season should get Nirsevimab before the next RSV season begins. 

While the shot has been shown to be extremely effective, the CDC acknowledged not all hospitals will have it in their arsenal immediately due to high demand. 

Pregnant women can also receive a vaccine that confers immunity to their unborn babies for a continuous six months of protection after birth. 

Joe Biden has been slammed for taking off his face mask while standing next to an 81-year-old war hero – despite his wife Jill testing positive for COVID the day before.

The President, who was awarding a Congressional Medal of Honor to Captain Larry Taylor, entered the White House wearing a black face mask, but removed it during the prayer portion of the ceremony.

He did not replace it when he stood beside Taylor for four minutes, and fastened the medal around his neck.

The president remains negative after being tested on Monday night and Tuesday morning and shows no symptoms.

The White House said before the event he would follow Centers for Disease Control and Prevent guidelines when it comes to testing and masking.

But his extended time in close proximity to Taylor raised eyebrows.

‘I’m floored by his behavior. There’s no point walking in masked to then unmask & put everyone at risk,’ remarked one woman. 

‘I hope their families sue if they get sick,’ said another critic.

Another shared on Twitter a screenshot of an unmasked Biden standing next to an unmasked Taylor, and said: ‘Look at this.’

One commented: ‘He doesn’t seem very consistent in his mask wearing, unfortunately.’ 

The video of Biden placing the medal around Taylor’s neck was shared online, with one remarking: ‘Aaaaand he took it right off to breathe on an elderly veteran’s neck.’ 

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden would remove his mask indoors when ‘sufficiently’ distanced from others.

‘He will be masking while indoors and around people in alignment with CDC guidance and as as has been the practice in the past. 

‘The President will remove his mask when sufficiently distance from others indoors and while outside as well,’ she said on Tuesday, before the ceremony.

The president didn’t put his mask back on to walk out of the East Room but did give a thumbs’ up when asked how his wife was doing, saying she was ‘well.’

Meanwhile, Jill Biden missed the first day of school on Tuesday. The first lady, who teaches English at the Northern Virginia Community College, is arranging a substitute for her classes. 

‘She’s working with NOVA to ensure her classes are covered by a substitute,’ her office said.

The first lady remains at the couple’s Rehoboth Beach home, which is where she was when she tested positive. 

The Bidens spent a long holiday weekend at their vacation house and traveled to Florida together on Saturday to see damage from Hurricane Idalia.

Jill Biden ‘is experiencing mild symptoms and will remain in Delaware for the week. President Biden tested negative last night for COVID-19 and tested negative again today. He’s not experiencing any symptoms,’ Jean-Pierre noted. 

‘There are currently no updates to the White House COVID-19 protocols,’ she noted. 

COVID cases are on the rise throughout the country. 

Nationwide COVID hospitalizations increased by nearly 19% in a single week and deaths by more than 21%, according to late August data from the CDC.

There are two new variants: the Omicron variant EG.5, nicknamed Eris, has become dominant in the U.S., while BA.2.86 is starting to spread.

The first lady, 72, usually teaches classes on Tuesday and Thursday. It’s unclear when she will return to the White House and her regular schedule. 

Jill Biden also was scheduled to attend a dinner on Tuesday night for U.S. athletes competing at the Invictus Games, the games for wound warriors founded by Prince Harry.

She had to cancel that appearance. 

President Biden remains negative despite the close contact with his wife. 

The couple spent Sunday night together at their Rehoboth Beach home before Joe flew to Philadelphia Monday to mark Labor Day with a speech to union workers. 

In a statement released Monday, Jill’s spokesman Elizabeth Alexander said: ‘This evening, the First Lady tested positive for COVID-19.

‘She is currently experiencing only mild symptoms. She will remain at their home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware,’ Alexander said. 

Jill Biden previously had COVID last August and got stuck at the property the couple had vacationed at on Kiawah Island in South Carolina. 

She was prescribed the antiviral Paxlovid and tested positive with a rebound case of COVID several days later. 

President Biden tested positive for COVID last July. He also was treated with Paxlovid and suffered a rebound case days later.

Both the president and first lady are vaccinated and boosted. 

The president is expected to leave Thursday for the G20 summit in New Delhi, India. 

‘All travelers including the President will test before traveling to India,’ Jean-Pierre said, noting that Biden will test on a ‘regular cadence.’

She would address questions on what happens if Biden tests negative in route to the trip or how often he would test while there. 

The first lady was not expected to attend. 

While COVID cases are on the rise, neither the president nor the first lady have worn a mask in public recently. 

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, recently turned heads by conceding that data was lacking on whether masks stopped the spread of the virus. 

‘When you’re talking about the effect on the epidemic or the pandemic as a whole, the data are less strong,’ Fauci recently said on CNN. 

‘But there are other studies, that show at an individual level, for individuals, they might be protective.’ 

Fears of a fresh Covid resurgence globally have been heightened since the discovery of a new virus variant called Pirola, described by experts as the ‘real deal’. 

Covid infection rates in Britain are already starting to shoot up.

Last week officials also confirmed Covid testing and community surveillance is set to be ‘scaled up’ ahead of this winter, after originally winding it down earlier this year. 

But to date, just four known Pirola cases have been confirmed in the UK.

So, what do experts predict will happen this winter? How deadly is the new variant? And could we even see another lockdown?  

Here MailOnline breaks down everything you need to know about what’s happening with Covid in the UK. 

Are cases on the rise? 

Yes. Covid cases in the UK are rising sharply — almost doubling in a month — just as the country heads into the autumn when the NHS gets busier.  

Data from the ZOE health study shows there were 93,432 new daily cases of symptomatic infection on September 2 — up from about 50,000 at the start of August.

The study, which is based on data from millions of users of the ZOE app, estimates there are around 1.17million people in the UK with the virus right now – roughly one in 57. 

But the estimated peak of the pandemic, in cases, was in late March 2022, where at one point about 4.9million people were thought to have the virus.

What is happening in hospitals? 

Hospital admissions and numbers of beds occupied by Covid patients had also been rising.

Latest NHS data shows daily Covid hospital admissions have risen almost 30 per cent since June, with a seven-day rolling average of 322 as of August 25, compared to just 251 on June 7. 

However, UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) data released on August 31 shows hospitalisations have plateaued slightly, after peaking at 379 on August 21. 

However, hospitalisation figures lag behind trends in infection rates due to the time it takes for someone to catch the virus and become ill enough to need NHS care. 

But current UK hospital admission levels are also nowhere near levels seen earlier in the pandemic, when a high of 4,100 admissions were logged per day. 

And, as time has worn on, fewer and fewer admissions are directly down to the virus. 

Instead, many patients are just coincidentally ill as they go to hospital for another condition. 

Are deaths due to Covid increasing? 

Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) also show that 74 people died due to the virus in the seven days to August 11.

It marks a 57.4 per cent increase on the previous week when 47 Covid deaths were logged — signalling the biggest surge in virus fatalities this year.

But it is a far cry from the darkest days of the pandemic, with the highest number of deaths recorded on a single day being January 19, 2021, when 1,490 fatalities were registered. 

In total, under 230,000 people have died in the UK with Covid listed as one of the causes on their death certificate since the start of the pandemic. 

This includes those whose death was directly caused by the virus as well as those where it contributed to their death from another health issue.

What will happen over winter? 

Experts predict Covid cases will continue to rise as the UK heads into the autumn, as people mix more indoors.

This could contribute to NHS pressures, with the season traditionally a busier period for the NHS than summer. 

Professor Paul Hunter, a respected infectious disease specialist at the University of East Anglia, told MailOnline today: ‘I do expect cases to increase as we move towards the end of the year, after all the other coronaviruses are very seasonal peaking November to February. 

‘But I doubt we will see hospitalisation rates close to what they were last winter. 

‘Each wave of Covid since Omicron has seen fewer people in hospital primarily because of Covid than the previous wave. 

‘But with winter adding to the pressure that may not hold for a winter peak.’ 

Some scientists have recommended a return of pandemic mitigation measures, including mask wearing, and increased ventilation because of the virus’ resurgence. 

Others have instead urged ministers to reconsider vaccine eligibility criteria, after the Government ditched plans last month to offer the jabs to under 65s this winter.

Dr Simon Clarke, a microbiologist from the University of Reading, told MailOnline: ‘People need to be sensible when going about their business over winter. 

‘If you’re feeling under the weather, what feels like a heavy cold to you might be very serious to someone else.’ 

He added: ‘Don’t go spreading germs around your workplace if you could easily work from home. 

‘Similarly, bosses need to be mindful that insisting on attendance every day when people could work from home might lead to much more sickness absence and lost productivity in the long run, when germs spread.’ 

Will there be a lockdown?

Experts agree it is unlikely Britain will see severe mitigations like lockdown again. 

In recent months the Government has also insisted it will never revert back to pandemic-era measures unless a doomsday variant emerges. 

Dr Clarke told MailOnline: ‘The chances of any sort of lockdown or tiered restrictions are vanishingly small. 

‘That would only be considered if there were an outbreak of a particularly novel, nasty form of flu or a variant of Covid that can overwhelm the immunity currently found in the population. 

‘While neither is impossible, they’re not worth people losing sleep over.’ 

Professor Hunter also told MailOnline: ‘I think the value of non-pharmaceutical interventions has fallen substantially since the early days of the pandemic. 

‘Early on the benefits from lockdowns were worth the harms but now I think any harm for lockdown would overshadow any benefits. 

‘Last year the ONS infection survey showed that wearing masks were associated with about a 20 to 30 per cent reduced risk of infection prior to Omicron but from February 2022 they had little benefit.’

He added: ‘I do not see any real value in extending the vaccination programme beyond what is currently planned. 

‘The value of the vaccine is now primarily in preventing severe disease, not in reducing transmission. 

‘Protection against infection for most of us only lasts a few months. People not in a risk group are unlikely to get severe disease and have already had multiple infections.’

Professor Lawrence Young, a virologist at Warwick University, also said: ‘I can’t see a situation where severe mitigation measures will be necessary or acceptable.

But he added: ‘Having said that, the unpredictability of Covid and its impact means that we can’t simply ignore this virus. 

‘Providing access to free lateral flow tests would be one way to encourage people to regularly test and, where necessary, self-isolate to prevent the virus from spreading. 

‘This measure alongside other mitigations — masking, ventilation, expansion of access to the Covid vaccine — would help us get through the winter by protecting the most vulnerable and preventing the other consequences of Covid.

What is Pirola and where did it come from? 

Pirola, scientifically called BA.2.86, is a mutated cousin of Omicron and was first detected in Israel and Denmark last month. 

It is one of more than 600 Omicron sub-variants currently circulating, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). 

Other sub-variants include Kraken (XBB.1.5) and Orthrus (CH.1.1). 

As with all viruses Covid constantly changes through mutation and sometimes these mutations result in new variants. 

Why is it called Pirola?

Like other new Covid variants, online virus trackers decided to call BA.2.86 something catchy following its discovery. 

They came up with ‘Pirola’.

It is understood the variant could be shortened to ‘Pi’, the letter which follows Omicron in the Greek alphabet – the system officials use to name new strains. 

This will only happen if WHO declare it a ‘variant of interest’. 

Is it more deadly than other variants?

There is currently no evidence that Pirola is any more of a threat than the dozens of strains that have come before it. 

Virologists have warned it is too early to reliably pinpoint if BA.2.86 has any new specific symptoms, as scientists are still analysing the recently discovered cases. 

Professor Francois Balloux from University College London said: ‘Based on the tiny number of BA.2.86 cases diagnosed to date there is no evidence for, but also no reason to expect, a significant shift in symptoms.’

Professor Young also added that a combination of immunity induced by previous infections, Covid vaccinations and ‘a combination of changes in the virus’ has seen Covid symptoms alter over the last three years. 

‘It’s much more like a cold now than when we first experienced Covid,’ he said.

However, he noted: ‘That doesn’t mean that those who are more vulnerable due to underlying conditions won’t suffer more severe symptoms if infected with BA.2.86.’

Early evidence suggests Pirola does not make people more seriously ill than other Omicron-descendant variants. 

In a weekly update published by the WHO on Friday, it also confirmed: ‘To date, no deaths have been reported to WHO among the cases detected with BA.2.86.’ 

It added: ‘The potential impact of the high number of mutations in BA.2.86 is presently unknown and is under assessment.’ 

Why has BA.2.86 sparked such attention?

This is because it has 35 mutations on its spike protein, the part of the virus that Covid vaccines are designed to target. 

Several of Pirola’s mutations have unknown functions but others are thought to help the virus evade the immune system. 

The genetic leap ‘is roughly of the same magnitude’ as seen between the initial Omicron variant and the previous Delta variant which the former replaced, the US’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Wednesday. 

Pirola has also sparked attention because of action the Government has taken in its wake.  

Concerns over the variant prompted the Department of Health and Social Care to last week announce that vaccinations for care home residents and vulnerable adults would start earlier than scheduled.

GPs and pharmacies are set to dish out the jabs from September 11, a full month earlier than originally planned.

Ministers said they had made the decision to reduce pressure on the health service while scientists rush to learn more about Pirola.

How can it be treated?  

According to the CDC, existing tests to detect and medications used to treat Covid — such as Paxlovid, Veklury, and Lagevrio — appear to be effective with BA.2.86.

But prevention from infection at all is still advised and Brits have been urged to test for the virus if they have symptoms to help reduce the chance of spreading it to other people, some of which may be vulnerable. 

Where can I get a Covid test? 

Covid tests are no longer available free of charge. 

Lateral flow tests can be purchased for £2 from pharmacies on the High Street or online.

PCR tests, which give a more definitive indication of a person’s infection status, cost around £50. 

Where has Pirola been spotted globally?

Alarm bells over Pirola first rung in mid-August after a prominent online virus-tracker spotted cases initially cropping up in Denmark. 

The discovery came just a day after the same lineage was detected in Israel. 

Since then, further cases have been reported in both countries. 

Cases have now also been confirmed in the USA, UK, France, South Africa, Portugal, Sweden and Canada.

Wastewater samples in Thailand, Switzerland and the US have already tested positive for the strain, suggesting Pirola is also in local circulation within the countries. 

This means the strain has now been detected in four separate continents.

How many UK Pirola cases are there? 

Four known cases have been confirmed by health officials to date.  

UKHSA officials originally confirmed one unidentified patient has tested positive for the strain while being treated in a London hospital. 

A second case in England and the first in Scotland were confirmed by UKHSA and Public Health Scotland (PHS) last week. 

The new variant was also found in wastewater testing in another Scottish NHS Health Board area, PHS said.  

During a meeting last week the UKHSA’s variant technical group confirmed the UK’s three known BA.2.86 cases at the time were identified through hospital testing and ‘have no known recent travel history’. 

The group is tasked with forecasting scenarios of Covid variants and producing assessments on the risk of emerging strains. 

‘The first UK case was mildly unwell and the second UK case — in England — did not have respiratory symptoms,’ they said. 

A third case in Scotland however was symptomatic. But officials noted there was no laboratory data available yet, with two of the UK samples currently ‘in culture’.

Public Health Scotland today also confirmed a second case had been identified through PCR testing. 

But details surrounding the fourth case have not yet been disclosed. 

Do the vaccines still work? 

Early expert analysis shows Pirola may have some ability to dodge the immunity offered by vaccines as well as that from prior infection. 

Last week, Steve Russell, Chief Delivery Officer and National Director for Vaccinations and Screening, NHS England said: ‘While it is difficult to predict the combined effect of the large number of mutations on severity, vaccine escape and transmissibility, expert advice is clear that this represents the most concerning new variant since Omicron first emerged.’ 

But even if the protection offered by vaccines or prior infection doesn’t work perfectly against the variant, immunity is likely to still hold up, with most Brits also having been exposed to one or more previous Omicron variant.

High levels of protection against the virus gave ministers in the UK the confidence to ditch all Covid measures last year as the country moved to living with the virus.

A highly mutated variant feared to be better at infecting vaccinated people has now been detected in a third state.

The BA.2.86 strain was picked up via wastewater testing in Ohio, the state’s health department announced Wednesday, after the variant was detected in Virginia and Michigan over the past week.

Further analysis by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is ongoing to confirm the Ohio sample is the new strain, also known as ‘Pirola’.

The CDC announced Wednesday it believes ‘the large number of mutations in this variant raises concerns of greater escape from existing immunity from vaccines and previous infections compared with other recent variants.’

It comes as Covid hospital admissions across the US jumped 22 percent in a week, the fifth week in a row they have increased. The CDC is now forecasting an acceleration in new hospitalizations over the coming month.

The CDC’s forecast replaces a previous projection that admissions would ‘remain stable or have an uncertain trend.’

The forecast, released Monday, suggests around 2,000 Americans are being admitted to the hospital each day, the vast majority of whom are over 65.

Hospitalizations are still three times lower than they were this time last year, and death rates are still very low.

Doctors on the ground are also saying that the illness is the most mild they’ve seen in Covid patients during the pandemic. 

Still, concerns about the new variants have led to masks creeping back into daily life.

A Kaiser Permanente hospital in Santa Rosa, California and Upstate Community Hospital in Syracuse, New York, which serve millions of Americans, have brought back mandates for doctors, nurses, patients and visitors. 

Ken Gordon, a spokesperson for the Ohio Department of Health (ODH), told CBS News the department was ‘working with the CDC on further evaluation of the sample’ but added that the ‘preliminary detection has not [yet] been confirmed.’

Wastewater is tested as part of routine monitoring for the National Wastewater Surveillance System. 

Positive wastewater tests can pick up old cases, but may also signal new cases.

Since the pandemic was declared over, the number of people doing swab tests is very low, and only a handful of these are analyzed for variants.

The BA.2.86 strain is highly mutated, and is potentially more likely to infect vaccinated Americans, the CDC said yesterday. 

The stain has more than 30 mutations on its spike protein — the part the virus uses to infect people — that separates it from the currently dominant strains, which is feared to make it harder to recognize for the immune systems of vaccinated or previously infected people.

It may also be better at causing illness in people who’ve recently recovered from a Covid infection.

‘The large number of mutations in this variant raises concerns of greater escape from existing immunity from vaccines and previous infections compared with other recent variants,’ the CDC said in its risk assessment of BA.2.86, which has also been dubbed the ‘Pirola’ variant.

However, the agency said it was too soon to know if this will cause more severe infection than other variants and appears confident in its assessment that levels of immunity in the US population will still offer broad protection.

‘Nearly all the US population has antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 from vaccination, previous infection, or both, and it is likely that these antibodies will continue to provide some protection against severe disease from this variant,’ the CDC said.

DailyMail.com revealed Tuesday that the variant had been detected in a patient in Virginia, which was the second official case after a resident in Michigan was diagnosed with it last week.

However, the CDC said that because so few swabs are being analyzed now, the strain is likely much more widespread than the official figures indicate.

And Covid positivity rates – the share of swabs that come back positive – have nearly doubled between July and August.

The CDC said the current increase in US hospitalizations is not likely driven by BA.2.86. because of the lag it takes for people to catch and then fall sick with Covid.

This new BA.2.86 strain is believed to be descended from the BA.2 ‘stealth’ variant that surged globally early last year, which itself is a spinoff of the original Omicron strain.

The updated Covid vaccines – due to be rolled out this fall – are targeted towards strains descending from the XBB Omicron subvariant, which have become the dominant type globally.

The CDC said researchers are evaluating the effectiveness of the updated shots, which are anticipated to reduce severe disease and hospitalizations.

Compared to other strains descended from the Omicron subvariant, BA.2.86 has many more mutations.

The CDC compared the differences between it and its likely ancestor BA.2 as being similar to the difference between the Delta and Omicron variants.

‘The large number of mutations in this variant raises concerns of greater escape from existing immunity from vaccines and previous infections compared with other recent variants,’ the CDC said.

‘For example, one analysis of mutations suggests the difference may be as large as or greater than that between BA.2 and XBB.1.5, which circulated nearly a year apart.’

‘However, virus samples are not yet broadly available for more reliable laboratory testing of antibodies, and it is too soon to know the real-world impacts on immunity.’

Covid infections in the US have nearly doubled in the past month amid the rise of two highly-mutated variants, official data suggests.

The test positivity rate in the US – the share of swabs that come back positive – has soared from one in 15 in the week ending July 15 to one in eight by August 12, according to the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data.

It means test positivity is at its highest level in more than a year. In several states, including Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana, one in six Covid swabs came back positive in the most recent week.

Because regular Americans are no longer testing en masse like they were at earlier points in the pandemic – just 40,000 swabs are being reported to the CDC each week – it has become more difficult to spot new outbreaks early. 

But all metrics indicate infections are rising rapidly. Along with the rise in positivity, hospitalization rates for Covid patients have also risen for five weeks in a row – though they still remain near-historic lows.

The rise in cases is thought to be driven by several factors, including the emergence of two highly transmissible variants, the waning of vaccine immunity and the beginning of the school year as more people gather in large groups and mingle, doctors told DailyMail.com.

Testing positivity rates are reported to the CDC by The National Respiratory and Enteric Virus Surveillance System (NREVSS), which receives its reported number of weekly tests from labs that have chosen to send their data to the surveillance system. 

The data shows that positivity soared from 6.7 percent in the week ending July 15 to 12.2 percent in the week ending August 12.

The two new variants, EG.5, or Eris, and BA.X, or Pirola, have been detected in several countries around the globe and in the US recently. 

These variants are highly mutated and thought to better at avoiding vaccine and natural immunity to cause infection.

Experts estimate Eris could account for as many as half of Covid infections, and two cases of Pirola were just recently detected last week in Michigan and in Virginia on Tuesday. 

Dr Rajendram Rajnarayanan of the New York Institute of Technology campus in Jonesboro, Arkansas, told DailyMail.Com the clinical severity and symptoms of the variants remain largely unknown as the US is only selectively testing for variants in a small sample of positive tests in hospitals or airports. 

But while more and more people contract Covid and employers may have to deal with the inconvenience of employees missing work, or students may have to make up school work, Eris and Pirola are not expected to cause a deadly wave like in the past.  

Dr. Thomas Moore, an infectious disease physician in Wichita, Kansas, told DailyMail.com while the US is seeing a rise in cases, ‘they are not severe like past variants’, which put a strain on hospitals and healthcare systems.

The new strains are ‘absolutely’ spreading faster due to the very fact that ‘variants emerge because they’re more transmissible’ and have evolved to be more contagious, Dr Moore explained. 

However, he concurs with most experts in saying there are no signs the strains are more severe or dangerous. 

He said symptoms of the strains could be similar to those of the common cold or the flu, but also cautioned while it is rare to die from the common cold or flu, Covid still has the potential to be deadly. 

Former FDA commissioner Dr Scott Gottlieb said he was concerned about the rise in Covid cases, but there was no evidence the variants are deadlier than previous strains and he doesn’t believe the variants are more likely to cause severe infections or more deaths.

‘Certainly, at this point, it doesn’t appear to be more pathogenic, so it doesn’t appear to be more dangerous [than other variants]’, Dr Gottlieb said. 

Additionally, health experts have previously told DailyMail.com the emergence of the variants ‘is not surprising’ and said it was too early to panic. 

They reassured despite increased transmissibility, the new variants were unlikely to reverse years of immunity gained throughout the more than three years of the pandemic. 

From July 15 to August 12, hospitalizations rose from 7,175 to 12,613, though they still remain three times lower than this time last year. 

Additionally, Dr Marc Elieson, a medical director at Baylor Scott and White Health in Texas, said earlier this week his colleagues are seeing Covid patients with less severe illness than at any point during the pandemic.

‘What viruses and other organisms do over time [is] they become more contagious but have less power to kill and to hurt people,’ he told FOX44.

Despite a rise in cases and hospitalizations, weekly deaths have dropped. In the week ending July 15, there were 484 deaths, compared to 251 deaths in the week ending Aug. 12.

Furthermore, CDC data shows just one percent of intensive care unit beds are occupied by Covid-19 patients and approximately 1.5 percent of all hospital beds are occupied by Covid patients, as well.

This could be because the variants do not produce more severe cases and more than 95 percent of Americans have some level of antibodies against Covid-19 due to vaccines, booster shots and previous infections, which most experts think is sufficient to keep future infections near cold- or flu-like symptoms.

While experts say the rising transmissibility isn’t cause for alarm yet, their assurances haven’t stopped calls for mitigation efforts and experts from recommending the public begin wearing masks again. 

A college in Atlanta became the first institution to mandate masks for students and staff just days before classes began. 

The new mandate will require students and staff to wear masks in hallways and lecture halls for at least two weeks amid the recent uptick. 

Additionally, government physicians and public health officials in Seattle called for face coverings to once again be required in healthcare settings. 

Most recently, Lionsgate, a film studio in Santa Monica, California, reintroduced mask mandates at its offices after several employees tested positive for Covid-19. The studio also encouraged its employees to test themselves before coming to work. Lionsgate said the rules for its nearly 5,000 employees would be in place ‘until further notice’.

A deadly bacteria that kills up to 50 percent of people it infects has now been listed as an endemic along the US gulf coast.

Dr Julia Petras, an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who made the warning, said Burkholderia pseudomallei was now likely lurking in soil and stagnant water across the 1,600 miles from Texas to Florida.

People infected with the bacteria suffer melioidosis, a severe condition that can trigger pneumonia and sepsis and can be fatal.

Doctors are now on alert for the disease, which can initially be misdiagnosed as another infection. 

The CDC declaration comes less than a year after it was detected in the US for the first time in soil from the Mississippi coast.

 Dr Petras said: ‘It’s estimated that there’s probably 160,000 cases a year around the world and 80,000 deaths.

‘This is one of those diseases that is also called the great mimicker because it can look like a lot of different things.

‘It’s greatly under-reported and under-diagnosed and under-recognized — we often like to say that it’s been the neglected tropical disease.’

The bacteria — also known as B. psuedomallei — is native to tropical areas in South East Asia and northern Australia.

But the CDC is now warning it has been identified in the Gulf states: Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.

In these areas, the agency warns it may be lurking in topsoil or muddy fresh- or brackish water.

People can become infected after coming into contact with the water or soil — including through open wounds — or ingesting it.

It is unclear how the pathogen arrived in the United States, although this may have traveled by infected travelers. 

The deadly bacteria has been present in Puerto Rico since 1982, according to an Oxford University-backed study.

About 12 Americans are struck down by the bacteria every year, estimates suggest, although they are normally linked to foreign travel.

This is thought to be a major underestimate because many cases are misdiagnosed as other conditions.

Four cases were recorded in the US — including two deaths — in 2021, with cases later linked to a contaminated aromatherapy spray imported from India.

Another two were detected in 2020 and 2022 in unrelated individuals who lived near each other in Mississippi.

This prompted the CDC to take soil and water samples from within and around the patients’ homes, revealing the presence of the bacteria B. pseudomallei. Both patients recovered from the infection.

Dr Petras, who is an epidemic intelligence service officer, said: ‘It is an environmental organism that lives naturally in the soil, and typically freshwater, in certain areas around the world — mostly subtropical and tropical climates.

‘A lot of patients will have pneumonia with sepsis, and or sepsis, which is associated with higher mortality and worse outcomes.’

She added: ‘We have antibiotics that work. 

‘What I’m talking about is IV antibiotics for at least two weeks, followed by three to six months of oral antibiotics.

‘It’s an extensive treatment, but if you’ve finished the full course and you’re diagnosed early, which is the really key thing, your outcome is probably going to be quite good.’

Humans can become infected with the bacteria via contact with contaminated soil and muddy water, particularly if they have an open wound.

In rare cases, it can also be transmitted between humans — although this has only been reported via sexual contact and during pregnancy.

In most cases, the bacteria do not trigger symptoms because the immune system can to fight it off.

But when an infection begins, patients may suffer from symptoms including joint pain, fever and headaches in the early stages.

This can then progress to melioidosis, with the CDC warning that between 10 and 50 percent of cases are fatal.

Individuals who live along the gulf coast and have conditions such as diabetes, kidney disease and chronic lung disease are particularly at risk.

Biden taps former Obama staffer as new CDC director – with agency’s reputation in tatters after Covid mishandlings

By Cassidy Morrison Senior Health Reporter For Dailymail.Com

Updated: 19:33 EDT, 1 June 2023