Hundreds of thousands of Americans celebrate Christmas morning in the dark, wet

More than 250,000 people in New York, Pennsylvania and the northeastern United States woke up on Christmas morning in the dark and wet as their electrical systems were disrupted by winds and sleet.

Hundreds of thousands of Americans celebrate Christmas morning in the dark

Not only living in darkness, people in these areas can also experience flooding, when snow from previous storms melts or forms soft ice blocks. The National Weather Service is forecasting up to 130mm of rain in parts of New York.

The US National Weather Service forecasts that in New England, winds can reach up to 100 km / h, causing trees to be broken, toppled and damaged power lines. The night temperature in this area will drop from 5 to 15 degrees Celsius to -5 degrees Celsius, so it is likely that the road surface will freeze.

According to the statistics of the worldometers.info website, updated to 6 am on December 26 (Vietnam time), the total number of infections with the new strain of Corona virus (SARS-CoV-2) causing acute respiratory infection (COVID-19) -19) globally is 80,160,206 cases, including 1,756,368 deaths.

The disease has so far appeared and spread in 218 countries and territories. Countries also recorded 56,432,813 recovered patients, the number of critical cases is currently 21,971,424 cases and 106,027 cases are in active treatment.

On December 25, the world had up to 129 countries and territories recorded new COVID-19 cases; 81 countries/territories have deaths from the pandemic. Compared to the past days, the number of deaths and new cases in many countries around the world recorded in the past 24 hours increased slightly.

The COVID-19 epidemic has complicated developments in many countries, such as the US, India and Brazil, and has spread widely, with a high number of cases in many countries, especially in Europe. Worrying disease developments have reappeared in some areas of the world, after a series of countries faced new outbreaks of the disease.

A number of European countries have had to partially reopen or tighten measures to prevent the COVID-19 epidemic during the Christmas and New Year 2021 season.

With the total number of SARS-CoV-2 virus infections reaching more than 19.2 million cases, including about 338,190 deaths, the US is currently the country hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the context of the United States entering the holiday season with many travel plans and family reunions, experts are concerned about potential risks that could aggravate the epidemic situation in the country. On Christmas Eve, California was the first state in the US to have a total of 2 million infections.

Despite the recommendations of medical experts to limit travel and stay at home, on December 25, the number of people who passed through US airport security gates was 1.19 million people, down 40% from the previous year but the highest level recorded since the outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic in mid-March 2020. In the days from December 18 to December 23, on average, US airports receive about 1 million passengers per day.

In Europe, especially in the UK, the epidemic is still very complicated, especially after the country discovered a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, called VUI-202012/01.

In the past 24 hours, the UK recorded 39,036 more cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection, bringing the total number of infections in this European country to nearly 2.2 million cases. Although the number of new infections has decreased from 39,237 cases – a record level recorded the day before, this is still the 5th day in a row that the number of daily infections in the UK has surpassed 30,000 cases, and the day has the second highest number of new infections since the peak of the epidemic in April 2020.

Faced with the above situation, many countries have tightened entry restrictions for people coming from the UK. US officials have announced that passengers arriving from the UK need to have a negative test result for the SARS-CoV-2 virus before arriving in the country. The above regulation takes effect from December 28, and testing must be done 72 hours before boarding.

Switzerland has detected the first case of infection with a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes acute respiratory infections COVID-19, a variant with a higher risk of transmission has just been discovered in the UK.

The Swiss Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH) said the national laboratory in Geneva had identified two samples with a new variant of COVID-19. Both patients reside in the UK and have tested positive for the SARS-CoV-2 virus in Switzerland in the past few days.

An estimated 10,000 British tourists have arrived in Switzerland since December 14, and they have been ordered to quarantine for 10 days. FOPH said it was communicating with passengers from the UK and South Africa via text message to inform them of the health and safety regulations.

Switzerland is among the countries that have banned travelers from South Africa and the UK due to concerns about the risk of spreading a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Switzerland has imposed an order to suspend flight operations from two countries where a new variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus appeared at midnight on December 20. However, the ban on these flights was partially lifted from December 24.