With the threat of inflation back at the forefront for many investors, there’s one large stock-market investor positioning for it to be a decade-long phenomenon. In a note posted to the firm’s website, Chief Investment Officer William Smead of Phoenix-based Smead Capital Management, which oversees $5.83 billion in assets, said “we are loaded with inflation beneficiary stocks like oil and gas stocks and useful real estate.” The firm likes home builder D.R. Horton DHI; Simon Property Group SPG, a real estate investment trust…
Tag: Merck & Co. Inc.
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COVID-related ICU patients rise to 5-month high above 5,000—are new cases really falling?
While many have been focused on the apparent explosion of COVID cases in China, and the lack of reliable data from China’s government, there are signs suggesting the U.S. situation is also getting worse even as case counts and deaths are falling.
At first look, initial fears of another COVID surge in the U.S. over the holidays may be overblown. About a week after the year-end holiday gatherings began, the seven-day average of new COVID cases fell to a more than three-week low of 58,354 on Thursday, down 9% from two weeks ago and down 17% from a recent peak of 70,508 on Christmas Eve, according to a New York Times tracker.
And the daily average for deaths fell has fallen to a three-week low of 355, and has dropped 5% in two weeks.
But as the NYT tracker has been warning, case and death counts could be “artificially low” this week, as officials who track those numbers take vacation for the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. Therefore, hospitalization data, which is typically not affected by holidays, should remain more reliable.
And by that measure, the numbers are getting worrisome.
The daily average of hospitalizations rose to 41,620 on Thursday, up 3% from two weeks ago but also the highest number seen since mid-August.
There are 29 states that have seen hospitalizations increase from two weeks ago, including 20 states that have seen double-digit percentage increases, led by South Carolina at 54%, West Virginia at 52% and Louisiana at 47%.
The number of severe COVID cases is also seeing a troubling rise, the daily average of COVID-related patients in intensive care units (ICUs) climbed to 5,080 on Thursday. That’s up 10% from two weeks ago, and the most seen since July 30.
The New York Times
Another sign that the fall in case counts is artificial is that the test positivity rate has been rising, to a four-month high above 14% on Thursday, with 41 states seeing double-digit positivity rates.
“Higher test positivity rates are a sign that many infections are not reported — even if they are tested at home. This results in a more severe undercount of cases,” the NYT tracker said.
The New York Times
Stay up to date on COVID news through MarketWatch’s daily “Coronavirus Update” column.
Meanwhile in China, amid a “lack of adequate and transparent” data from China’s government, there is reason to believe the situation will still get a lot worse before it gets better.
U.K. health firm Airfinity estimates that new daily COVID cases in China is currently running at about 1.8 million, based on data from China’s regional provinces, and on new-case trajectories from areas that also lifted zero-COVID policies, such as Hong Kong.
That case number is expected to more than double, to about 3.7 million a day, in mid-January, Airfinity estimates, before another surge in March takes the number up to about 4.2 million per day.
As a result of the concerns over surging case counts, Spain joined the growing number of countries that are requiring COVID tests for air passengers arriving from China, as the Associated Press reported. This comes after the European Union said Thursday that it is “assessing” the situation in China.
The U.S. will also require those arriving from China to take a PCR test, starting Jan. 5, while Japan started requiring a test on Friday. Other countries requiring a test for air passengers from China include Italy, India and South Korea.
The BBC reported that the U.K. was set to announce that travelers will need to show a negative COVID test before they board a plane from China.
In other COVID news, China’s National Medical Products Administration has given emergency approval to Merck & Co. Inc.’s
MRK,
-0.33%
COVID antiviral molnupiravir. That joins Pfizer Inc.’s
PFE,
-0.96%
Paxlovid, which has already been approved for use in China. Merck’s stock, which fell 0.4% in afternoon trading Friday, has soared 44.0% in 2022, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-0.88%
has lost 9.4%.Novavax Inc.
NVAX,
+0.21%
said Friday that it has initiated a Phase 2 trial for its COVID-19-Influenza Combination (CIC) vaccine candidate in people aged 50 through 80. “We believe that like influenza, COVID-19 will also be seasonal moving forward, and that there is room in the market for new alternatives to provide better protection against the impact of influenza, particularly in older adults, and to explore the potential to combine this with protection from COVID,” said Chief Executive Stanley Erck. Novavax’s stock, which eased 0.3% Friday, has plunged 93.2% year to date while the S&P 500 index
SPX,
-1.03%
has dropped 20.1%. -
All 30 Dow stocks rise, led by Disney and Apple, the previous session’s worst performers
The Dow Jones Industrial Average’s
DJIA,
+1.11%
307-point rally in morning trading Thursday was unanimous, as all 30 components were gaining ground. The top performers were shares of Walt Disney Co.
DIS,
+4.43% ,
up 4.1%, and Apple Inc.
AAPL,
+3.15% ,
up 2.7%. Those two stocks happened to be the Dow’s worst performers on Wednesday when the Dow dropped 366 points, with Apple shares shedding 3.1% and Disney’s stock dropping 2.2%. Intel Corp.’s stock
INTC,
+2.33% ,
which is the Dow’s biggest loser year to date, was the Dow’s third-biggest gainer on Thursday with a 2.1% rise. The worst performer on Thursday was Merck & Co. Inc.’s stock
MRK,
+0.09% ,
which ticked up just 0.1%. Merck’s stock was the Dow’s second-best year-to-date performer with a 45.0% gain, behind Chevron Corp.’s
CVX,
+0.68%
51.4% rally. -
As COVID cases rise, how to steer clear of viruses during the holiday season
Amid the holiday season, here are some expert-recommended ways to keep yourself and loved ones safe from COVID-19 and other viruses in circulation.
Stay home if you’re sick. “For far too many years, whether in the workplace or for important social engagements, people took it as a badge of pride that they would tough it out and go to work even if they were sick,” James Conway, a physician specializing in pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, told Vox. “I think people have finally come around to recognizing that’s both impractical and a little disrespectful to others.”
Consider wearing a mask. “Everyone needs to know that masking really does protect individuals against all three viruses,” meaning SARS-CoV-2, the flu, and respiratory syncytial virus, Diego Hijano, an infectious disease specialist at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, said in an interview with CNBC.
Los Angeles County, New York City, and Oakland are once again recommending that residents mask up in certain shared indoor spaces as COVID cases continue to rise.
Test before you go. Some hosts are asking their guests to take a test before they get to the party, according to the New York Times. One New Yorker sent out invitations asking friends to “join me in super-spreading holiday cheer.” Other suggestions? Opening the windows and taking the party outside.
Other COVID news to know:
• The XBB subvariant is spreading in the U.S. The latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that XBB now makes up an estimated 18% of new COVID cases in the U.S., up from 11% for the week ending Dec. 17. BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 still make up the majority of new infections.
• China’s COVID surge. Health authorities estimate that 37 million people in China got sick with COVID one day this week, according to Bloomberg, and as many as 248 million likely contracted the virus in the first 20 days of December.
• Merck’s
MRK,
+0.06%
Lagevrio doesn’t prevent hospitalizations. That’s according to a new open-label, randomized, controlled study published Thursday in The Lancet. The research looked at clinical data from 26,411 people in the U.K. in the first half of the year, and it found that the antiviral didn’t reduce the risk of hospitalization or death in high-risk vaccinated individuals. However, patients who took Lagevrio recovered faster and had fewer doctor’s visits.• The U.S. reports 70,000 cases for the first time since Sept. 7. The seven-day daily average of new infections rose 5% from two weeks ago to 70,479 on Thursday, according to a New York Times tracker. Hospitalizations increased 9% to 40,758 over the past 14 days, while those in intensive care units grew 13% to 4,835, and 422 people died on Wednesday.
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The Dow industrials are on the verge of a ‘golden cross,’ even as BlackRock predicts recession like no other
Despite worries about inflation and an impending recession, there is at least one sign that some bullish market technical analysts might latch onto.
An upbeat golden cross appears to be forming in the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-0.90% ,
more than nine months after a bearish death cross formed back in March, as the hawkish agenda of the Federal Reserve shattered bullishness on Wall Street.A golden cross occurs when the 50-day moving average for an asset price trades above the 200-day MA, while a death cross, comparatively, is when the 50-day falls below the long-term average.
The 50-day moving average for the Dow stands at 32,200.32, at last check Friday afternoon, while the 200-day sits at 32,460.71, a roughly 260-point difference that could be traversed in the coming week or two, based on its current trajectory.
FactSet
A golden cross would mark the first for the Dow industrials since 2020 of August, according to Dow Jones Market Data.
The bullish chart formation also would appear at an odd time for investors, with an apparent uptrend materializing in the stock market, even as the threat of a recession in 2023 grows.
See: Goldman Sachs CEO says recession is likely, with 35% chance of a soft landing
BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, is anticipating a unique recession unlike others that we’ve seen in U.S. history.
“The new macro regime is playing out. We think that requires a new, dynamic playbook based on views of market risk appetite and pricing of macro damage,” wrote BlackRock’s Investment Institute team led by Jean Boivin.
The BlackRock team said markets aren’t necessarily pricing in the recession that is being predicted.
“Central banks appear set on doing ‘whatever it takes’ to fight inflation, making recession foretold, in our view,” the team at BlackRock wrote.
As MarketWatch’s Tomi Kilgore notes, crosses, overall, aren’t necessarily good market-timing indicators.
Check out: MarketWatch’s live blog of the market
On top of that, MarketWatch columnist Mark Hulbert concludes that the U.S. stock market on average has performed no better in the wake of a golden crosses as it did at other times.
In many cases, a golden cross can help put an asset’s move into perspective, however, they tend to be well telegraphed.
Interestingly, the recession is also being widely predicted and some don’t think investors are getting the memo. As BlackRock notes, investors aren’t reflecting the damage that is to come, particularly as earnings expectations from American companies are right-sized.
So, it might be worth it for investors to take any golden crosses in assets with a grain of salt.
So far, the Dow industrials have outperformed over the past three months, up about 5%, compared with a decline of 2.5% for the S&P 500
SPX,
-0.73%
and an 8.2% drop for the Nasdaq Composite
COMP,
-0.70% .Over the past three months, the Dow industrials have recent in aggregate on the back of gains in shares of Caterpillar
CAT,
-1.56% ,
Boeing Co.
BA,
+0.20%
Merck & Co.
MRK,
-1.86% ,
IBM
IBM,
-0.47%
and Travelers Cos.
TRV,
-1.10% .For the year so far, the Dow is down 7%, while the S&P 500 is off 17% and the Nasdaq is down nearly 30%.
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China’s three-week COVID case tally tops 253,000 and daily average is rising, government says
More than 253,000 coronavirus cases have been found in China in the past three weeks and the daily average is rising, the government said Tuesday, the Associated Press reported.
The trend is putting pressure on officials who are trying to ease economic disruption by easing strict controls that have confined millions of people to their homes.
China is the only major country in the world still trying to curb virus transmissions through strict lockdown measures and mass testing. The ruling Communist Party promised earlier this month to reduce disruptions from its “zero- COVID” strategy by making controls more flexible, but so far, progress has been slow.
Beijing, which announced its first COVID death in about six months over the weekend, has locked down parks, populous districts, stores and offices and many school kids have resumed online learning.
The past week’s average of 22,200 daily cases is double the previous week’s rate, the official China News Service reported, citing the National Bureau of Disease Prevention and Control.
On Tuesday, the government reported 28,127 cases found over the past 24 hours, including 25,902 with no symptoms. Almost one-third, or 9,022, were in Guangdong province, the heartland of export-oriented manufacturing adjacent to Hong Kong.
In the U.S., known cases of COVID are rising again with the daily average standing at 41,530 on Monday, according to a New York Times tracker, up 4% from two weeks ago.
Don’t miss: Confused about COVID boosters? Here’s what the science and the experts say about the new generation of shots.
Cases are rising in 24 states, plus Washington, D.C., Guam and Puerto Rico. Washington state has replaced Nebraska as leader by new cases, which have climbed 423% from two weeks ago. That’s followed by Arizona, where they are up 110% and California, up 60%.
The daily average for hospitalizations was down 1% at 27,547, but again, the trend is not uniform across the U.S. Hospitalizations are up 60% in Alaska, up 47% in Arizona and up 30% in Wyoming.
The daily average for deaths is down 2% to 294.
Physicians are reporting high numbers of respiratory illnesses like RSV and the flu earlier than the typical winter peak. WSJ’s Brianna Abbott explains what the early surge means for the coming winter months. Photo illustration: Kaitlyn Wang
Coronavirus Update: MarketWatch’s daily roundup has been curating and reporting all the latest developments every weekday since the coronavirus pandemic began
Other COVID-19 news you should know about:
• Japan approved an antiviral pill from Shionogi & Co.
4507,
+2.77%
to treat COVID after the company provided new data to show the drug’s efficacy, the Wall Street Journal reported. The treatment is the first locally developed alternative to Pfizer Inc.’s
PFE,
+1.45%
Paxlovid and Merck & Co.’s
MRK,
+0.93%
Lagevrio, which have been authorized for emergency use in Japan. Shionogi aims to win approval from the Food and Drug Administration for its pill in the U.S. Osaka-based Shionogi filed in February for emergency approval for the drug, known as Xocova, in Japan. The health ministry panel said in July it needed to see results from a larger human trial because data submitted at the time didn’t sufficiently show improvements in symptoms associated with COVID.• Dubai International Airport passenger numbers surpassed pre-COVID pandemic levels in the third quarter of 2022, the airport’s chief executive said, causing the airport to revise its annual forecast by another 1 million passengers, the AP reported. Paul Griffiths, who oversees the world’s busiest airport, told the Associated Press the annual forecast at Dubai International, or DXB, is more than 64 million. The airport saw 18.5 million passengers in the third quarter of this year, up from 17.8 million during the first quarter of 2020—prior to and at the dawn of the pandemic.
• Get ready for long lines at U.S. airports and traffic jams galore—just like old times. Airports and roads may be “jam-packed” this year, according to the AAA. It estimates that 53.6 million people will travel for the Thanksgiving weekend, reaching 98% of pre-pandemic Thanksgiving travel. “Families and friends are eager to spend time together this Thanksgiving, one of the busiest for travel in the past two decades,” said Paula Twidale, senior vice president, AAA Travel. “Plan ahead and pack your patience, whether you’re driving or flying.”
Here’s what the numbers say:
The global tally of confirmed cases of COVID-19 topped 638.5 million on Monday, while the death toll rose above 6.62 million, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University.
The U.S. leads the world with 98.4 million cases and 1,077,225 fatalities.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tracker shows that 228.2 million people living in the U.S., equal to 68.7% of the total population, are fully vaccinated, meaning they have had their primary shots.
So far, just 35.3 million Americans have had the updated COVID booster that targets the original virus and the omicron variants, equal to 11.3% of the overall population.
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20 dividend stocks that may be safest if the Federal Reserve causes a recession
Investors cheered when a report last week showed the economy expanded in the third quarter after back-to-back contractions.
But it’s too early to get excited, because the Federal Reserve hasn’t given any sign yet that it is about to stop raising interest rates at the fastest pace in decades.
Below is a list of dividend stocks that have had low price volatility over the past 12 months, culled from three large exchange traded funds that screen for high yields and quality in different ways.
In a year when the S&P 500
SPX,
-0.40%
is down 18%, the three ETFs have widely outperformed, with the best of the group falling only 1%.Read: GDP looked great for the U.S. economy, but it really wasn’t
That said, last week was a very good one for U.S. stocks, with the S&P 500 returning 4% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-0.32%
having its best October ever.This week, investors’ eyes turn back to the Federal Reserve. Following a two-day policy meeting, the Federal Open Market Committee is expected to make its fourth consecutive increase of 0.75% to the federal funds rate on Wednesday.
The inverted yield curve, with yields on two-year U.S. Treasury notes
TMUBMUSD02Y,
4.540%
exceeding yields on 10-year notes
TMUBMUSD10Y,
4.064% ,
indicates investors in the bond market expect a recession. Meanwhile, this has been a difficult earnings season for many companies and analysts have reacted by lowering their earnings estimates.The weighted rolling consensus 12-month earning estimate for the S&P 500, based on estimates of analysts polled by FactSet, has declined 2% over the past month to $230.60. In a healthy economy, investors expect this number to rise every quarter, at least slightly.
Low-volatility stocks are working in 2022
Take a look at this chart, showing year-to-date total returns for the three ETFs against the S&P 500 through October:
FactSet
The three dividend-stock ETFs take different approaches:
-
The $40.6 billion Schwab U.S. Dividend Equity ETF
SCHD,
+0.15%
tracks the Dow Jones U.S. Dividend 100 Indexed quarterly. This approach incorporates 10-year screens for cash flow, debt, return on equity and dividend growth for quality and safety. It excludes real estate investment trusts (REITs). The ETF’s 30-day SEC yield was 3.79% as of Sept. 30. -
The iShares Select Dividend ETF
DVY,
+0.45%
has $21.7 billion in assets. It tracks the Dow Jones U.S. Select Dividend Index, which is weighted by dividend yield and “skews toward smaller firms paying consistent dividends,” according to FactSet. It holds about 100 stocks, includes REITs and looks back five years for dividend growth and payout ratios. The ETF’s 30-day yield was 4.07% as of Sept. 30. -
The SPDR Portfolio S&P 500 High Dividend ETF
SPYD,
+0.60%
has $7.8 billion in assets and holds 80 stocks, taking an equal-weighted approach to investing in the top-yielding stocks among the S&P 500. It’s 30-day yield was 4.07% as of Sept. 30.
All three ETFs have fared well this year relative to the S&P 500. The funds’ beta — a measure of price volatility against that of the S&P 500 (in this case) — have ranged this year from 0.75 to 0.76, according to FactSet. A beta of 1 would indicate volatility matching that of the index, while a beta above 1 would indicate higher volatility.
Now look at this five-year total return chart showing the three ETFs against the S&P 500 over the past five years:
FactSet
The Schwab U.S. Dividend Equity ETF ranks highest for five-year total return with dividends reinvested — it is the only one of the three to beat the index for this period.
Screening for the least volatile dividend stocks
Together, the three ETFs hold 194 stocks. Here are the 20 with the lowest 12-month beta. The list is sorted by beta, ascending, and dividend yields range from 2.45% to 8.13%:
Company Ticker 12-month beta Dividend yield 2022 total return Newmont Corp. NEM,
-0.78% 0.17 5.20% -30% Verizon Communications Inc. VZ,
-0.07% 0.22 6.98% -24% General Mills Inc. GIS,
-1.47% 0.27 2.65% 25% Kellogg Co. K,
-0.93% 0.27 3.07% 22% Merck & Co. Inc. MRK,
-1.73% 0.29 2.73% 35% Kraft Heinz Co. KHC,
-0.56% 0.35 4.16% 11% City Holding Co. CHCO,
-1.45% 0.38 2.58% 27% CVB Financial Corp. CVBF,
-1.24% 0.38 2.79% 37% First Horizon Corp. FHN,
-0.18% 0.39 2.45% 53% Avista Corp. AVA,
-7.82% 0.41 4.29% 0% NorthWestern Corp. NWE,
-0.21% 0.42 4.77% -4% Altria Group Inc MO,
-0.18% 0.43 8.13% 4% Northwest Bancshares Inc. NWBI,
+0.10% 0.45 5.31% 11% AT&T Inc. T,
+0.63% 0.47 6.09% 5% Flowers Foods Inc. FLO,
-0.44% 0.48 3.07% 7% Mercury General Corp. MCY,
+0.07% 0.48 4.38% -43% Conagra Brands Inc. CAG,
-0.82% 0.48 3.60% 10% Amgen Inc. AMGN,
+0.41% 0.49 2.87% 23% Safety Insurance Group Inc. SAFT,
-1.70% 0.49 4.14% 5% Tyson Foods Inc. Class A TSN,
-0.40% 0.50 2.69% -20% Source: FactSet Any list of stocks will have its dogs, but 16 of these 20 have outperformed the S&P 500 so far in 2022, and 14 have had positive total returns.
You can click on the tickers for more about each company. Click here for Tomi Kilgore’s detailed guide to the wealth of information available free on the MarketWatch quote page.
Don’t miss: Municipal bond yields are attractive now — here’s how to figure out if they are right for you
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The $40.6 billion Schwab U.S. Dividend Equity ETF
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Large number of U.S. COVID deaths could be prevented if patients would take Pfizer’s Paxlovid, White House coordinator warns
A large number of U.S. COVID deaths could be prevented if patients would take Paxlovid, the antiviral developed by Pfizer
PFE,
-1.79%
that helps reduce the risk of hospitalization and death, according to White House COVID coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha.Jha told the New York Times that the average daily death count could be reduced to about 50 a day from 400 currently, if every American aged 50 and above that tests positive for the virus took a course of either Paxlovid or used monoclonal antibodies.
“The public doesn’t seem to understand that the evidence around hospitalization and deaths is really powerful,” Dr. Robert Wachter, chair of medicine at the University of California in San Francisco told the paper.
The issue seems to be a combination of worry about certain issues that Paxlovid can cause, including a strange metallic taste and the potential for “rebound COVID,” where patients quickly become reinfected after the five-day course of pills has been completed. That happened to both President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden recently.
The second reason is that many Americans — and Republicans, in particular — have refused to take COVID seriously and are not willing to take steps to reduce its impact. Trials have found Paxlovid to be effective across all age groups, but mostly among older patients. But as the COVID death rate for people under 50 is already close to zero, reducing it in a statistically significant way is difficult.
“I think almost everybody benefits from Paxlovid,” Jha said. “For some people, the benefit is tiny. For others, the benefit is massive.”
Yet a smaller share of 80-year-olds with COVID in the U.S. is taking it than 45-year-olds, Jha said citing data he has seen.
From the CDC: Stay Up to Date with COVID-19 Vaccines Including Boosters
The news comes as U.S. known cases of COVID are continuing to ease and now stand at their lowest level since late April, although the true tally is likely higher given how many people are testing at home, with data generally not being collected.
The daily average for new cases stood at 41,605 on Thursday, according to a New York Times tracker, down 25% from two weeks ago. Cases are declining in northeastern states including New York and New Jersey, while cases are rising in the western states Montana, Washington and Oregon.
The daily average for hospitalizations was down 11% at 27,021, while the daily average for deaths is down 8% to 391.
Coronavirus Update: MarketWatch’s daily roundup has been curating and reporting all the latest developments every weekday since the coronavirus pandemic began
Other COVID-19 news you should know about:
• Molnupiravir, the COVID pill developed by Merck
MRK,
+0.18%
and privately held Ridgeback Therapeutics, produced mixed results in two recent studies, the companies said Thursday. Early data from a trial conducted in the U.K. by the University of Oxford found no evidence of a difference when molnupiravir was added to usual care in reducing hospitalizations and death. A second study conducted in Israel found a benefit in patients who were 65 and older, but no benefit for 40- to 60-year-olds.• Homelessness is surging in the U.S. again as pandemic programs that halted evictions are being phased out, the Associated Press reported. The overall number of homeless people in a federal report to be released in the coming months is expected to be higher than the 580,000 unhoused before the coronavirus outbreak, the National Alliance to End Homelessness said. The AP tallied results from city-by-city surveys conducted earlier this year and found the number of people without homes is up overall compared with 2020 in areas reporting results so far.
• The idea was to have China in stable and tip-top shape when thousands of delegates gather in Beijing to usher in a historic third term in power for Xi Jinping, BBC News reported. However, the coronavirus is not playing nicely. In recent weeks, tens of millions of people have again been confined to their homes in lockdowns across 60 towns and cities, and this is bringing political pressure on the man who has become the most powerful Chinese figure since the first communist-era leader, Mao Zedong.
Covid-19 lockdowns, corruption crackdowns and more have put China’s economy on a potential crash course. WSJ’s Dion Rabouin explains how China’s economic downturn could harm the U.S. and the rest of the world. Illustration: David Fang
• A new COVID-19 wave appears to be brewing in Europe as cooler weather arrives, with public health experts warning that vaccine fatigue and confusion over types of available vaccines will likely limit booster uptake, Reuters reported. The omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 that dominated this summer are still behind the majority of infections, but newer omicron subvariants are gaining ground. Hundreds of new forms of omicron are being tracked by scientists, the World Health Organization said this week.
Here’s what the numbers say:
The global tally of confirmed cases of COVID-19 topped 620.5 million on Friday, while the death toll rose above 6.55 million, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University.
The U.S. leads the world with 96.6 million cases and 1,062,130 fatalities.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tracker shows that 225.8 million people living in the U.S., equal to 68% of the total population, are fully vaccinated, meaning they have had their primary shots. Just 110.5 million have had a booster, equal to 48.9% of the vaccinated population, and 24.8 million of those who are eligible for a second booster have had one, equal to 37.9% of those who received a first booster.
Some 11.5 million people have had a shot of the new bivalent booster that targets the new omicron subvariants.
