The Latest: Germany sees steady rise in virus infection rate

New COVID-19 infections in Germany have reached their highest level in nearly three months amid a steady rise powered by the delta variant

Virus Outbreak Germany (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

BERLIN— New COVID-19 infections in Germany have reached their highest level in nearly three months amid a steady rise powered by the delta variant.

The national disease control center, the Robert Koch Institute, said Saturday that 51.6 new cases per 100,000 residents were reported over the last seven days. It’s the first time since May 25 that the infection rate has been above 50, but it has been increasing since hitting a low of 4.9 in early July.

The disease control center said that 8,092 new cases were reported over the past 24 hours -- up from 5,644 a week earlier. More cases are getting detected as summer vacations end and children return to schools in some parts of Germany.

German authorities have been trying to reinvigorate the country's COVID-19 vaccination drive, which has slowed considerably. Official figures showed that 63.8% of Germany’s population had received at least one vaccine dose as of Thursday and 58.5% was fully vaccinated.

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MORE ON THE PANDEMIC:

— Florida orders school board s to relax mask rules or risk pay

— San Francisco: Full vaccination needed to enter restaurants, bars

— AP-NORC poll: Vaccine requirements favored in U.S.

— South Africa opens vaccines to all adults to boost participation

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Find more AP coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-vaccine

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HERE’S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:

HANOI, Vietnam — Vietnam’s government says it is sending troops to Ho Chi Minh City to help deliver food and aid to households as it further tightens restrictions on people’s movements amid a worsening surge of the coronavirus.

The army personnel will be deployed to help with logistics as the city of 10 million people asks residents to “stay put” for two weeks starting from Monday, a report on the government website said Friday.

The move comes as Vietnam, which weathered much the pandemic with very few cases, recorded more than 10,000 new infections and 390 deaths on Friday. Ho Chi Minh City accounted for 3,500 of those infections.

Ho Chi Minh City has had strict coronavirus measures in place since June, including banning gatherings of more than two people in public and only allowing people to leave home for essential matters like buying food or going to work in certain permitted businesses. Under the new measures, people in high risk areas cannot leave home at all.

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HONOLULU — A hospital serving a Honolulu suburb on Friday has filled up as the community faces a surge of COVID-19 cases.

All 104 beds at The Queen’s Medical Center - West Oahu are full, said Jason Chang, the CEO of The Queen’s Health Systems.

The Ewa Beach hospital has sent some patients to its sibling facility in downtown Honolulu. It’s also asked staff from other parts of the Queen’s system to come help.

The city has set up a triage tent outside the hospital that has 25 cots. The hospital may also add beds in hallways and other makeshift areas but not all patients will get rooms.

Chang said the hospital had 63 patients in its emergency room at one time, which is a crisis given the hospital only has 24 ER beds. Twenty-six of those in the ER were there with possible COVID-19 infections.

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MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A federal team of health care workers has been deployed to a coastal Alabama hospital that is being ‘crushed’ with a surge of COVID-19 patients, the state health officer said Friday.

State Health Officer Scott Harris said the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is sending a task force team, that includes nurses, a doctor and others, to help at South Baldwin Regional Medical Center in Foley. Similar help had been sent to help in Louisiana and Mississippi.

Coastal areas have been particularly hard hit by the recent COVID-19 surge, and the team was sent to the area having the greatest need, state health officials said.

Alabama is seeing a surge in COVID-19 cases that medical officials say is being fueled by low vaccination rates and the highly contagious delta variant.

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MIAMI — Florida officials are threatening to withhold funds equal to the salaries of school board members if school districts in two counties don’t immediately do away with strict mask mandates as the state continues to battle through high hospitalization rates.

School boards in Broward and Alachua counties received a warning Friday from the State Board of Education giving them 48 hours to walk back their decisions to require masks for all students, only exempting those with a doctor’s note.

“We cannot have government officials pick and choose what laws they want to follow,” Commissioner of Education Richard Corcoran said in an emailed statement. “These are the initial consequences to their intentional refusal to follow state law and state rule to purposefully and willingly violate the rights of parents.”

Corcoran said the two districts are violating the Parents’ Bill of Rights and a late July executive order by Gov. Ron DeSantis that prompted rules limiting how far districts can go with mask requirements. DeSantis maintains masks can be detrimental for children’s development.

But board members in the two countries decided not to allow parents to easily opt out of the mandate as surging cases fueled by the delta variant strained hospitals.

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FRANKFORT, Ky. — Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear’s campaign for COVID-19 vaccinations gained a new voice with a highly personal testimonial — a one-time vaccine skeptic recounting his debilitating fight against the virus.

Ethan Koehler, 28, spoke in stark terms of his journey from downplaying the pandemic to being laid low by excruciating pain, struggles to breathe and then “relearning” to walk without losing his breath as the coronavirus ravaged his health.

“I was very, very big on anti-COVID, anti-vaccine,” Koehler said. “I made Facebook posts, public posts, talked to people, made a big deal about it. Made a point to not wear a mask. Made a point to say that COVID wasn’t important. And I am eating crow on it, because I experienced it.”

Koehler’s video message was shown at Beshear’s media briefing Thursday afternoon. After months of imploring Kentuckians to take COVID-19 shots, the governor has turned increasingly to others to help make the case.

Koehler’s ordeal highlighted another alarming trend — growing infection rates among younger Kentuckians, who are less likely to be vaccinated.

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SAN FRANCISCO — San Francisco has become the first major city in the United States to require proof of full vaccination against the coronavirus for people to dine inside restaurants, work out in gyms or attend indoor concerts.

Restaurants and bars posted signs and added extra staff Friday to begin verifying people’s proof of vaccination before allowing them in.

The new rule goes beyond New York City which only requires people to be at least partially inoculated for a variety of indoor activities.

Local business groups in San Francisco have supported the new vaccine mandate, saying it will protect their employees’ and customers’ health and keep them from having to limit capacity indoors.

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RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina children now must get approval from a parent before receiving the current COVID-19 vaccine available to them under legislation that Gov. Roy Cooper signed into law on Friday.

The written consent requirement is contained in a broader measure that largely expands the medications or immunizations, including vaccines, that pharmacists trained to deliver shots can administer to consumers.

The measure received near unanimous support in the state's Republican-controlled legislature.

“This important legislation will help our state administer COVID-19 vaccines more quickly and efficiently,” Cooper, a Democrat, said in a news release announcing the bill signing.

Permission from a parent or guardian applies immediately to vaccines authorized by federal regulators for emergency use. The coronavirus vaccine produced by Pfizer is the only COVID-19 vaccine now available in the U.S. for children 12 and older.

North Carolina has given minors the ability on their own to be treated for certain health issues, including communicable diseases. That had included a COVID-19 vaccine if they showed “the decisional capacity to do so,” according to the state Department of Health and Human Services.

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OVERLAND PARK, Kan. — Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly is calling for school districts to require masks and says she is considering declaring an emergency as hospitals strain to handle increasingly young COVID-19 patients.

Kelly said that “we really want people to understand that this is no fooling around.”

The latest health department data shows 154 coronavirus clusters in schools, with a total of 1,889 cases.

Kelly noted that schools in other states have shut down completely over outbreaks. She says that until a coronavirus vaccine is approved for children under age 12, using masks can help curb the spread of infections.

The governor said more COVID-19 patients were admitted to Kansas hospitals Wednesday than any other single day during the pandemic and ICUs are at 100% capacity at six of the state’s largest hospitals, with two-thirds of the beds going to COVID-19 patients.

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ST. LOUIS — New COVID-19 hospital admissions in St. Louis are reaching winter surge levels and southeast Missouri hospitals are under strain due to a surge in coronavirus cases and a rise in deaths.

On Thursday, hospitals in St. Louis reported admitting 100 patients with COVID-19 — the most since Jan. 16. A total of 585 people were hospitalized, including 25 children. Twelve of the children are younger than 12 and not eligible for a coronavirus vaccine.

The number of COVID-19 patients hospitalized at Southeast Hospital and Saint Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau has increased more than 50% in the last week and a half.

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BATON ROUGE, La. — Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards is calling on parents to take seriously the coronavirus risks for children and to ensure students wear face masks.

Schools that resumed classes this month already have reported more than 5,300 students and 750 employees who have tested positive for the virus. Those numbers are expected to grow larger.

Edwards has enacted a statewide mask mandate that includes schools. That has prompted angry outcries from some parents who argue they should decide whether to put a mask on their children.

The governor said Friday: “Transmission is very high. Simply put, we cannot keep our schools open or our kids safe today without masks.”

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ORLANDO, Fla. — The mayor of Orlando, Florida, is asking residents to stop watering their lawns and washing their cars for a least a week, saying water usage needs to be cut back because of the recent surge of COVID-19 hospitalizations.

Mayor Buddy Dyer said said Monday that the liquid oxygen and other supplies ordinarily used to treat the city’s water have been diverted to hospitals for patients suffering from the virus.

The city-owned utility says it typically goes through 10 trucks of liquid oxygen a week but its supplier recently said it would be cut back to five to seven trucks a week to accommodate hospitals.

The utility says about 40% of the city’s potable water is used for irrigation so any strains on the water supply will be greatly reduced if residents stop watering their lawns, washing their cars or using pressure washers.