Military-ruled Myanmar on Tuesday allowed prisoners to have family visitors from outside, a right that had been suspended for 3½ years because of the coronavirus pandemic, the military’s information office and prison officials said.
The rule allowing visitors carries detailed conditions, but it’s the first opportunity for many of the thousands of political detainees who have been locked up for opposing the military’s 2021 seizure of power to meet with their family members.
Visitors must be able to provide proof of COVID-19 vaccinations and a household relationship to the prisoner being met. Further documentation is required from the visitors’ local administration offices and police precincts.
A family member of a prisoner convicted of incitement and high treason for protesting military rule told The Associated Press that she was allowed to meet her son for about 20 minutes in a large room after waiting for about two hours with more than 100 other visitors. She visited a prison in Thayarwaddy township in Bago region, about 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of Yangon, the country’s biggest city.
She said she was happy to see her son again after more than a year and to be able to bring him medicine and money, since she last saw him at his trial in August last year.
Visitors had to speak to the prisoners through two wire mesh dividers about a foot (30 centimeters) apart, the woman said.
She spoke on the condition of anonymity because of concern about being identified since the military prefers to be the sole source of information on sensitive subjects.
The mother said she was told by the prison authorities that the inmates would be allowed to receive visitors once a month. Before the pandemic, they were allowed to meet their families at least twice a month.
The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a group that keeps detailed tallies of arrests and casualties linked to the repression of the military government, said that 25,337 people had been arrested since the 2021 takeover, and 19,616 of them, including ousted national leader Aung San Suu Kyi, were still in detention as of Tuesday.
Tun Kyi, a senior member of the Former Political Prisoners Society, a mutual support group, said any easing of prison conditions should be regarded as an effort by the military government to score political points and ease international pressure. Many Western nations apply economic and diplomatic sanctions on the country’s ruling generals because of their 2021 takeover and record of human rights abuses.
“There is nothing to be happy or welcome about this case, which is intended to ease international pressure,” Tun Kyi said.
Family visitation rights were suspended after the coronavirus pandemic began in early 2020. Most sectors of society gradually reduced or dropped testing requirements and other virus-fighting measures since 2022, but family visits to prisoners had remained banned.
Although prisons, in Myanmar as elsewhere, saw the coronavirus spread easily because of crowding and poor hygienic conditions, the continuation of the ban on visits had been widely seen as meant to demoralize political prisoners and highlight the punishment awaiting those who challenge military rule. Protests against the army’s takeover were initially nonviolent, but after they were suppressed with deadly force, an armed resistance movement arose, which now operates throughout much of the country.
The total number of prisoners held in Myanmar, not only political detainees, isn’t publicly known. There are about 66 prisons and 48 labor camps in Myanmar. Prison Department officials from Yangon, Magway region and Mon state told the AP on Tuesday that the visits have already begun. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to release information.
The military’s information office said in a statement sent to journalists that the in-person meetings with inmates at the prisons have been allowed to begin, but visitors must have been vaccinated twice for coronavirus and must be included in the same official household lists as the prisoners. It said other details of the visiting rules are posted on signboards in front of the prisons.
A Florida man and his three adult sons were sentenced Friday for selling a toxic industrial bleach as a fake COVID-19 cure through their online church.
A federal judge in Miami sentenced Jonathan Grenon, 37, and Jordan Grenon, 29, to 12 years and seven months in prison, while Mark Grenon, 66, and Joseph Grenon, 36, each received five years, according to court records. A jury found all four guilty in July of conspiring to defraud the United States and deliver misbranded drugs. The Grenons represented themselves but declined to speak during the two-day trial.
Prosecutors called the Grenons “con men” and “snake-oil salesmen” and said the Bradenton family’s Genesis II Church of Health and Healing sold $1 million worth of their so-called Miracle Mineral Solution. In videos, it was pitched as a cure for 95% of known diseases, including COVID-19, Alzheimer’s, autism, brain cancer, HIV/AIDS and multiple sclerosis, prosecutors said.
What the Grenons were selling was actually chlorine dioxide, officials said. When ingested, the solution becomes a bleach that is typically used for such things as treating textiles, industrial water, pulp and paper, according to the Food and Drug Administration. Authorities said it is the same as drinking bleach and can be fatal.
A Miami federal judge ordered the church to stop selling the substance in 2020, but that was ignored.
Jonathan and Jordan Grenon were arrested in Bradenton, just south of the Tampa Bay area. Mark and Joseph Grenon fled to Colombia, where they were arrested and extradited back to the U.S.
Besides the fraud convictions, Jonathan and Jordan Grenon were also convicted of violating federal court orders requiring them to stop selling Miracle Mineral Solution in 2020. U.S. authorities agreed to drop those same contempt charges against Mark and Joseph Grenon as a condition of their extradition from Colombia.
It’s the end of an era for a once-critical pandemic document: The ubiquitous white COVID-19 vaccination cards are being phased out.
Now that COVID-19 vaccines are not being distributed by the federal government, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has stopped printing new cards.
The federal government shipped more than 980 million cards between late 2020, when the first vaccines came out, through May 10, according to the latest available data from the CDC.
Federal and local health officials don’t expect the discontinuation of the cards to be a particularly big change, since the days of keeping them tucked in purses and wallets to ensure entry into festivals, bars and restaurants are largely over. If you’ve held on to your card, it’s still valid as proof of vaccination. Otherwise, people who need their COVID-19 immunization records will need to request them just like any other vaccine.
In many cases, the clinic, pharmacy or health department that provided the shot can provide those records. Every state and some cities have an immunization registry, though rules vary on when records are included and options for obtaining copies of your records.
For example, Texas requires patients’ written consent to be included in the registry, San Antonio Metropolitan Health District spokesman David Andres Alegria said. Other places, including Wyoming and Philadelphia’s city-specific record system, require vaccine providers to log all vaccinations.
Many states offer digital vaccination records for individuals either online or through an app. Users can save a certificate or a QR code that proves they are vaccinated. And some websites will even track and alert patients when they’re due for another one.
“One of the positives (during the pandemic) was having increased autonomy on your patient record, especially the immunization record,” said Jeff Chorath, who manages the immunization information system in Washington state. Washington offers two digital options for obtaining vaccination records — a comprehensive list of all of a person’s vaccinations noted in the state database and one specific to COVID-19 vaccines.
Other states don’t have the same options, so it might take longer to get your records. There could also be gaps in state databases; for example, if you were vaccinated by a federal health provider, those records may be tracked in a separate system.
As for your old card — if you still have it — maybe don’t mail it off to the Smithsonian quite yet. You should save it like any other health record, Wyoming Department of Health nurse consultant Heidi Gurov said.
“It’s always good to keep those in a safe spot,” she said.
Four million people in the U.S. have received the latest COVID-19 vaccine since it was approved last month, CDC director Dr. Mandy Cohen said Wednesday, and a total of 10 million doses have been shipped to providers.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
U.S. regulators on Tuesday authorized another option for fall COVID-19 vaccination, updated shots made by Novavax.
Updated vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna began rolling out last month, intended for adults and children as young as age 6 months. Now the Food and Drug Administration has added another choice –- reformulated Novavax shots open to anyone age 12 and older.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention already has urged most Americans to get a fall COVID-19 vaccination, shots tweaked to protect against a newer coronavirus strain. Novavax said shots will be available “in the coming days.”
Protection against COVID-19, whether from vaccination or from an earlier infection, wanes over time. There’s already been a late-summer increase in infections, and health officials hope enough people get the new shots to blunt a winter wave.
Novavax makes a protein-based vaccine mixed with an immune-boosting chemical, a different technology than the so-called mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna.
While Pfizer and Moderna have shipped millions of doses, the fall rollout so far has been messy since, for the first time, the government isn’t buying and distributing the COVID-19 shots. Ordering confusion from drugstores and doctors’ offices, distribution delays and even bungled paperwork by insurance companies snarled early appointments.
The updated vaccine versions are supposed to be free through private insurance or Medicare, and the CDC has a program to temporarily provide free shots to the uninsured or underinsured.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Britain’s inquiry into the response to the coronavirus pandemic and its impact on the nation entered its second phase Tuesday, with political decision-making around major developments, such as the timing of lockdowns, set to take center stage.
Much criticism preceded the start of the so-called Module 2, the second of four planned phases of the inquiry, as it was set to hear in person only from one bereaved family member. Representatives of the bereaved have said that the lack of more live testimonies is “deeply concerning.”
Chair Judge Heather Hallett insisted that the voices of the bereaved will not be ignored.
This stage of the inquiry will focus on the British government’s actions during the crisis between Jan. 2020, when it first became evident that the virus was spreading around the world, and June 2022, when the inquiry was set up. The first phase, which concluded in July, looked at the country’s preparedness for the pandemic.
“The focus of Module 2 will be on governance and key decision-making at a high level in the United Kingdom during the time when the pandemic was at its worst, and when it caused so much suffering,” said Hallett, who is a judge at Britain’s Court of Appeal in London.
After Hallett’s introduction, the inquiry heard emotional video testimonies from families who lost loved ones or whose children have suffered long-term physical and mental effects of the virus, so-called long COVID.
The U.K. had one of the world’s deadliest outbreaks, with around 230,000 coronavirus-related deaths up to Sept. 28, according to government statistics.
An array of experts and politicians are set to testify during the current phase. The decisions of Boris Johnson, who was prime minister during the pandemic, will be in particular focus. Johnson was forced to stand down as leader in Sept. 2022, partly because of lockdown-flouting parties in his office during the pandemic.
Hallett acknowledged calls for more bereaved people to be brought in as witnesses, but said there was not enough time to hear more.
“The need for me to reach conclusions and make recommendations to reduce suffering in the future when the next pandemic hits the U.K. is pressing,” she said. “I say when the next pandemic hits the U.K., because the evidence in Module 1 suggested it is not if another pandemic will hit us, but when.”
But the bereaved pressed on with their criticism.
“Only bereaved families know the true cost of the mishandling of the pandemic,” said Rivka Gottlieb, who lost her dad Michael in April 2020, at the peak of the first wave of the pandemic in the U.K.
“If the inquiry intends to learn lessons and save lives, it needs to hear from those who know, better than anyone, exactly how decisions made by the government failed on the ground,” said Gottlieb, who is a member of Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice.
The second phase of the inquiry hearings is to end on Dec. 14.
Two scientists won the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for discoveries that enabled the development of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.
The award was given to Katalin Karikó, a professor at Sagan’s University in Hungary and an adjunct professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and Drew Weissman, who performed his prizewinning research together with Karikó at the University of Pennsylvania.
“Through their groundbreaking findings, which have fundamentally changed our understanding of how mRNA interacts with our immune system, the laureates contributed to the unprecedented rate of vaccine development during one of the greatest threats to human health in modern times,” the panel that awarded the prize said.
Thomas Perlmann, secretary of the Nobel Assembly, announced the prize and said both scientists were “overwhelmed” by news of the prize when he contacted them shortly before the announcement.
Gunilla Karlsson Hedestam, part of the panel that chose the winners, said of their work that “in terms of saving lives, especially in the early phase of the pandemic, it was very important.”
The Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was won last year by Swedish scientist Svante Paabo for discoveries in human evolution that unlocked secrets of Neanderthal DNA which provided key insights into our immune system, including our vulnerability to severe COVID-19.
The award was the second in the family. Paabo’s father, Sune Bergstrom, won the Nobel Prize in medicine in 1982.
Nobel announcements continue with the physics prize on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday and the economics award on Oct. 9.
The prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million). The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1896.
The prize money was raised by 1 million kronor this year because of the plunging value of the Swedish currency.
The laureates are invited to receive their awards at ceremonies on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death. The prestigious peace prize is handed out in Oslo, according to his wishes, while the other award ceremony is held in Stockholm.
