The latest Rates of vaccination for the coronavirus have plummeted to their lowest levels since the shots were rolled out in December 2020, even as some infectious-disease experts fear another case surge. The seven-day average number of doses reached fewer than 182,000 on Wednesday, with booster shots more common than first or second doses, according to data tracked by The Washington Post. The dwindling figure comes as the BA.2 omicron subvariant picks up steam and overall U.S. vaccination rates remain lower than those in many Western European countries. In all, about 65 percent of people in the nation are fully vaccinated and about 45 percent of those have gotten a booster — showing many have been reluctant to get a third shot. "This is an unforgivable liability that we did not get people boosted at a much higher level," Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in San Diego, told my colleagues. After falling rapidly beginning in January, infections in the United States have recently plateaued at about 30,000 per day. Whether or not BA.2 results in a significant uptick remains to be seen, but the pandemic's ripple effects continue to be felt across the nation. The pandemic was a significant factor in the dramatic slowing of U.S. population growth last year, according to new Census Bureau data. Nearly 75 percent of U.S. counties reported more deaths than births in 2021, fueling the smallest population increase in a century. Low fertility rates and a continuing demographic shift toward an older population also contributed to the trend. Kenneth Johnson, a sociology professor and demographer at the University of New Hampshire, called the fact that almost 2,300 counties had more deaths than births "unheard of in American history." Faced with fear, frustration and suffering, some people used alcohol to cope. A study has found that alcohol-related deaths surged almost 26 percent in 2020, the largest yearly increase in decades. More than 99,000 people died that year of alcohol-related causes. Researchers at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism had already been seeing steady 3 percent annual increases in alcohol-related fatalities but said they were surprised by the size of the 2020 increase. Despite ongoing hardships, many are still hopeful that life will increasingly look more like it did before the pandemic. Some international airlines, including Virgin Atlantic and British Airways, are lifting their mask requirements as countries remove entry rules for travelers and people increasingly book trips. Major global carriers may be slower to rescind those rules. In the United States, the chief executives of Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and United Airlines wrote to President Biden on Wednesday to urge him not to renew the federal mask mandate on airplanes expiring April 18. Other important news Pharmaceutical company Moderna plans to seek authorization for its vaccine for children age 5 and younger. Here's what the trial showed about the vaccine's safety and efficacy, as well as what comes next. The Chicago-based O'Hare Clinical Lab Services became one of the country's largest coronavirus testing providers, collecting $187 million in federal support, government records show. But last month, regulators suspended O'Hare's license to operate a lab and ceased federal payments following a string of safety concerns. The company's initial success illustrates how the federal government gave billions of dollars to private companies to provide testing to the uninsured, in some cases offering lucrative opportunities to companies with spotty records. The use of at-home coronavirus tests increased quickly between the infection waves driven by the delta and omicron variants, according to a new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report. But use was lower among people who were Black, age 75 or older, had lower incomes or had a high school education or less. John Brownstein, one of the study's coauthors, said the results mirror other aspects of the pandemic, with greater access to everything from testing to vaccination and therapies among White, wealthier populations. Frances Stead Sellers contributed to this report. | 
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