JANUARY 8-11, 2022 Volume 32 - No. 2 • 2 Sections – 18 Pages
DATELINE
USA
FROM THE AJPRESS NEWS TEAM ACROSS AMERICA
CDC recommends COVID-19 booster for kids ages 12 to 15 THE United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) this week is recommending children ages 12 to 15 receive a booster shot five months after receiving their second dose of the PfizerBioNTech vaccine. The announcement on Monday, January 3 comes after the agency’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted 13-1 approving a booster dose for minors in this age group. The Food and Drug Administration on Monday also expanded the emergency use authorization to 12 to 15 year olds as schools begin to reopen after the holiday break and the omicron variant continues to spread throughout the country. “It is critical that we protect our children and teens from COVID-19 infection and
California extends mask mandate into February by AJPRESS AMID the surging cases of the omicron variant of the coronavirus, California is extending its statewide indoor mask mandate for another month. The state Department of Public Health announced on January 5 that masks should be worn in all indoor public settings, regardless of vaccination status, until February 15. The mandate went into effect on Dec. 15, 2021 with expiration on Jan. 15, 2022, but will be extended for another month. The move comes as the state has experienced an increase in seven-day average case rates by six
times and doubling of hospitalizations. “Omicron is here,” California Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly said on Wednesday, January 5. “We can’t abandon the tools that we’ve used to achieve our collective success throughout this pandemic.” The guidance recommends wearing well-fitted masks, such as surgical masks or higher-level respirators, such as N95s, KN95s and KF94s, be worn when in indoor public settings. Exemptions to mask requirements include those younger than two years old; individuals with a medical condition or disability that prevents wearing a mask; persons who are hearing
Comelec trims list of presidential bets by WILLIAM
DEPASUPIL ManilaTimes.net
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California ballot will be heavy on health care SACRAMENTO, Calif. — When Californians go to the polls later this year, they will confront contentious health care choices. Voters will weigh whether to overturn a state law that bans flavored tobacco products and will likely consider increasing the cap on medical malpractice awards. They may also vote on proposals that effectively legalize psychedelic mushrooms and regulating dialysis clinics. Two pandemic-related measures also could qualify for the Nov. 8 general election: One would tax California’s wealthiest residents to create an institute to detect disease outbreaks and bolster the state’s public health system. The other would limit government officials’ ability to shutter schools and businesses during a public health emergency. Although the election is about 10 months away, money is already pouring in from deeppocketed interests eager to defeat measures that would eat into their profits. Big tobacco has invested $21 million to overturn the ban on flavored products, and the health care industry has dropped $43 million to beat back the proposal to raise California’s cap on medical malpractice awards, according
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PLANE RIDE. Passengers gather at the check-in counter of the departure area at the NAIA Terminal 1 in Parañaque City on Friday, January 7. The threat of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 has disrupted domestic and international flights worldwide. ManilaTimes.net photo by Rene Dilan
Photo from his Facebook page
PARTIDO Federal ng Pilipinas (PFP) standardbearer Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. is now the only presidential candidate surnamed Marcos, based on the Commission on Elections’ (Comelec) final list of candidates for the May elections. The Comelec trimmed the number of presidential bets to 11 from 97 after the end of the filing of certificate of candidacy (CoC) on Oct. 8, 2021. Among the candidates dropped from the list were Maria Aurora Marcos, a businesswoman from Tarlac, and Tiburcio Marcos. The son of former president Ferdinand Marcos is listed as presidential candidate number eight. There are at least seven petitions with the Comelec seeking to disqualify Marcos as a candidate. Tiburcio Marcos was among the petitioners. He wanted Marcos declared as a nuisance candidate, claiming he was an impostor. The Comelec has junked Tiburcio Marcos’ petition. Another petition, filed by Danilo Lihaylihay, to
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Are omicron’s effects mild? What we know so far by MOMAR
G. VISAYA
AJPress
THE COVID-19 numbers are staggering and infections, particularly in the United States, are at an all-time high. Most of these new infections now are of the omicron variant. Since it is everevolving, it took a while before doctors and scientists found out that omicron is a mild variant, and those infected have a lower chance of getting seriously ill. A New York Times newsletter mentioned
three main reasons why omicron’s effects are generally mild: less hospitalization, milder hospitalization, and lower mortality rate. The report mentioned that somebody infected with omicron is “less likely to need hospital treatment than somebody infected with an earlier version of COVID.” It cited an analysis of patients in Houston, for example, found that omicron patients were only about one-third as likely to need hospitalization as delta variant patients. In u PAGE A2
Literary giant F. Sionil Jose dies at 97
National Artist F. Sionil Jose
impaired, or communicating with a person who is hearing impaired, where the ability to see the mouth is essential for communication; or persons for whom wearing a mask would create a risk to the person related to their work, as determined by local, state, or federal regulators or workplace safety guidelines. With the statewide guidance, Los Angeles County this week also announced that those who work indoors will be required to wear medicalgrade masks starting Jan. 17. The county’s Public Health Department modified its health order to reduce transmission risks for u PAGE A2
FILIPINO novelist Francisco Sionil Jose, whose widely translated works delved into the Philippines’ painful colonial past and social injustices, died Thursday, January 6, according to a literary guild he had founded. He was 97. In a prolific writing career spanning seven decades, Jose penned more than a dozen novels, several short story collections, essays and a regular newspaper column. He also owned a bookshop. He died at the Makati Medical Center in Makati City one day before he was to undergo an angioplasty, the Philippine Center of International PEN said in a statement on its Facebook page. His death was also announced by The Varsitarian, the student paper which he had edited at the University of Santo Tomas where he studied. A self-declared “agnostic,” the writer took to Facebook earlier Thursday in what
would effectively be his last words, thanking God as well as his “brave heart” for “this most precious gift” as he waited for his blood vessel procedure. “Now, that I am here in waiting for an angioplasty, I hope that you will survive it and I with it, so that I will be able to continue what I have been doing with so much energy that only you have been able to give,” he wrote. The son of a church minister and a dressmaker, Jose grew up in a poor rural village in Pangasinan — where he developed an early love for reading and later set many of his novels. His writing was deeply influenced by the national hero Jose Rizal, and he was best known for his “Rosales Saga.” The five-novel series follows several generations of two families over 100 years from the Spanish colonial period to martial
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AFTERMATH. Residents of Brgy. Trinidad, Surigao City, recover what’s left of their homes as Typhoon Odette flattens communities right before the holidays. Survivors also continue to clamor for food and water as supplies run dry. Photo by Erwin Mascariñas/Greenpeace
Odette damage breaches P13.4-B
MANILA — The damage caused by Typhoon Odette (international name: Rai) to the essential agriculture sector surged further to P10.8 billion as of Tuesday, January 4, the Department of Agriculture said as the National Electrification Administration said the damage to the facilities of electric cooperatives increased to P2.6 billion. Odette affected 356,486 farmers and fishers in the regions of Calabarzon, Mimaropa, Bicol, Western Visayas, Central Visayas, Eastern Visayas,
Zamboanga Peninsula, Northern Mindanao, Davao, Soccsksargen and Caraga. Production losses reached 239,656 metric tons while 399,531 hectares of agricultural areas were damaged. Meanwhile, Energy Undersecretary Felix William Fuentebella said the Department of Energy is monitoring the restoration of electricity before the agency provides a definite timeline for restoring electricity in areas affected by the typhoon. (Jordeene Lagare/ Inquirer.net)