QUICK LINKS for Busy People

–THIS WEEK'S CONVERSATIONS–

with International School Leaders from Around the World

Now that we're all well rested and ready to get back to the work of imagining the future, this Friday we will restart our deep dives into each of the New School Principles that we developed last year. This week, we start our interrogation of our Community Principle: “We co-create caring, engaged, and inclusive communities clearly defined by a common learning language, and a commitment to shared learning values.”

 

As always, we'll begin with some context, thinking about the role of community in this change moment we're living through, and then engage in discussions and some reflection to make sure we're clear on what we mean by the language within the principle. Next week we'll begin our brainstorm some strategies for implementing the Community Principle in practice. 

 

As we move into the final few weeks of our discussions, we're looking forward to having you join us for this important work. Hope to see you Friday. 

Editor's Note:  After a year of Covid-19, families continue coping with new school and work dynamics in search of the sweet spot for ensuring harmony and being productive at the same time. HBR has focused on working parents and new roles especially fathers and routines for successful family time.  Perhaps it is time to again provide fresh thinking to your international school families who face the same parenting dilemmas, whether they are in their home country or not.  School leaders also have an essential role to play in supporting those within the school workplace too.  

 

Once again, based on circumstance, we are in a time and place to reimagine what’s possible for families and our schools.

STAYING UP-TO-DATE ON CORONAVIRUS SCIENCE

In an extraordinary time, British health authorities are taking extraordinary measures to beat back Covid-19. But some experts say that, in doing so, they are also taking a serious gamble.

 

In recent days, the British have said they will stretch out the interval between the administration of the two doses required for Covid-19 vaccines already in use — potentially to as long as three months, instead of the recommended three or four weeks. And they have said they will permit the first dose and second dose for any one person to be from different vaccine manufacturers, if the matching vaccine is not available.

 

The moves are borne of a desire to begin vaccinating as many people as quickly as possible, particularly with Britain facing high levels of transmission of an apparently more infectious form of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19.

 

But they are also effectively turning that country into a living laboratory.

Coronavirus infections in part of the United Kingdom have rapidly taken center stage in the COVID-19 pandemic after researchers identified a variant of the virus that may be behind a recent spike in cases there.

 

On December 14, U.K. Health Secretary Matt Hancock first announced that the variant, called B.1.1.7, might be linked to faster spread that officials were seeing among people. In the days since, evidence supporting that hypothesis has emerged, prompting officials to put stricter public health measures in place to curb new infections — including restricting gatherings of people who don’t live in the same household.

 

Then on December 29, Colorado officials reported the first known case of a person in the United States who is infected with the U.K. variant. The man has no travel history and is in isolation, according to a tweet from the office of Colorado Governor Jared Polis.

 

Experts are closely monitoring the new variant, but they say, there’s no cause for alarm as of now. Here are a few things to know about B.1.1.7.

 

It’s common for new variants of viruses to appear.

Variants of viruses, including the novel coronavirus, are always popping up. As viruses replicate in cells and make error-prone copies of their genetic blueprints, the viruses naturally accumulate mutations.

 

The new U.K. variant seems to spread rapidly, but scientists don’t know for sure.

The U.K. variant does have more changes compared with its closest relative than most other coronavirus variants. “Nothing of what I’ve seen … is the single definitive, killer piece of evidence that this is definitely more transmissible,” says Aris Katzourakis, an evolutionary virologist at the University of Oxford. “But there is so much circumstantial stuff all pointing in that direction.”   

 

 

It’s unknown if it causes more severe or milder disease.

A mutation in B.1.1.7 leads to a shorter version of a viral protein called ORF8 than what’s seen in other variants. But it’s unclear what ORF8 does during an infection. Some modifications in ORF8 have actually been associated with less severe COVID-19 symptoms.

 

There’s currently no evidence to suggest the variant causes more severe disease.

There’s also no evidence that vaccines would be less effective against it. The U.K. variant is missing two amino acids that are targets of neutralizing antibodies, immune proteins that stop the virus from making it into a host cell. That, among a slew of other mutations in the B.1.1.7’s spike protein, could help the virus hide from some immune responses, including those induced by a vaccine.

–THE NEWS of COVID-19–

86,809,552 Cases Worldwide (Johns Hopkins CSSE)

The Variant Called B.1.1.7

For COVID-19 researchers, the new year brings a strong sense of déjà vu. As in early 2020, the world is anxiously watching a virus spread in one country and trying to parse the risk for everyone else. This time it is not a completely new threat, but a rapidly spreading variant of SARS-CoV-2. In southeastern England, where the B.1.1.7 variant first caught scientists’ attention last month, it has quickly replaced other variants, and it may be the harbinger of a new, particularly perilous phase of the pandemic. “One concern is that B.1.1.7 will now become the dominant global variant with its higher transmission and it will drive another very, very bad wave,” says Jeremy Farrar, an infectious disease expert who heads the Wellcome Trust. Whereas the pandemic’s trajectory in 2020 was fairly predictable, “I think we’re going into an unpredictable phase now,” as a result of the virus’ evolution, Farrar says.  (sciencemag.org)

 

 

WHO Criticizes China for Stymieing Investigation Into Covid-19 Origins

 

The World Health Organization took the rare step of criticizing China on Tuesday, using its first press conference of the new year to express disappointment that Beijing has still not given permission to United Nations investigators to probe the origins of the coronavirus pandemic.

 

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters that several scientists on the U.N. agency’s team researching the pandemic’s source had left their home countries on Monday and Tuesday, after the Chinese government had agreed to allow their entry. But while team members were en route, Tuesday, the WHO was told that Chinese officials had not yet finalized the necessary permissions for their arrival, Dr. Tedros said.

 

Some members were still waiting for visas, said Mike Ryan, executive director of WHO’s emergencies program, and at least one member has begun returning home. “I am very disappointed in this news,” said Dr. Tedros. “I have once again made it clear that the mission is a priority for WHO and the international team. I have been assured that China is speeding up the internal procedure.”

 

“We are eager to get the mission under way as soon as possible,” he added. (Wall Street Journal)

 

Chinese City in Lockdown as Hebei Province

Has Biggest Outbreak in Months

China has imposed a lockdown in its northern city of Shijiazhuang after Hebei province on Wednesday reported 63 coronavirus infections, the mainland’s highest daily number for months.

The whole of Shijiazhuang, which has a population of 11 million, was placed under lockdown measures, with passenger train services suspended to prevent further spread of the virus, according to state news agency Xinhua. Flights and coach services to Beijing, 300km (186 miles) northeast of Shijiazhuang, were cancelled.

 

The 63 infections – identified on Tuesday and announced on Wednesday – prompted a top Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official to warn that the tally might rise further in the coming days. (South China Morning Post)

 

Japan Emergency May Last Months as Critics Say Steps Too Narrow

Restrictions set to be imposed under Japan’s state of emergency could last months, with both government advisers and critics of its strategy calling for broader steps than current proposals.

Japan is set to declare an emergency as early as Thursday in Tokyo and three surrounding areas, with relatively narrow restrictions focused on reducing infections at bars and restaurants. But as in spring, the declaration may drag on if those moves fail to change people’s behavior, experts contend.

 

Lifting the state of emergency in less than a month would be “next to impossible,” Shigeru Omi, the head of the panel of experts advising the government, said on Tuesday. “It’ll need a little longer -- March or April, I’m not sure.”

 

Cases nationwide topped 5,000 for the first time on Wednesday, with Tokyo among a host of regions that saw record one-day increases. The ongoing surge will pose further challenges to the effectiveness of the expected measures.

 

Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has called for a more focused state of emergency than that which devastated the economy last spring. He’s seeking to tackle the spread of coronavirus infections at restaurants that have been a primary source of the current surge, while limiting the scope of the restrictions to reduce the economic harm.

 

“At a minimum it will take close to two months” to bring things under control, he told public broadcaster NHK. Nishiura published a model predicting that limiting steps to bars and restaurants would not sufficiently reduce the transmission number and would instead keep cases at their current level. Steps similar to the first state of emergency would cut cases in Tokyo to fewer than 100 by the end of February, according to the model. (Bloomberg)

 

The Virus Has Recently Infected

One in 50 People in England

As England re-entered lockdown on Tuesday, new figures showed that one in 50 people had recently been infected with the virus, and officials warned that some restrictions on daily life could still be needed next winter.

 

Speaking at a news conference, Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised to focus government efforts on rolling out its strained mass vaccination program intended to prevent a surge in infections of a highly transmissible variant of the virus from overwhelming the health service.

With more than a million confirmed cases in the week ending Jan. 2, or 2 percent of England’s population, Britain is in a race against time to distribute vaccines.

 

Mr. Johnson was speaking on a day when the government said more than 60,000 new cases were recorded for the first time. Standing alongside him, Professor Chris Whitty, England’s chief medical officer, said that the number of daily deaths, now averaging around 530, was expected to rise and that if people did not observe a lockdown order to stay at home, the risk was “extraordinarily high.” (New York Times) 

 

More on the Deadliest Month in the USA

December was the deadliest month of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States with nearly 78,000 deaths, and health officials warned that even more people will likely die in January despite the rollout of vaccines. In the week ended Jan. 3, more than 18,400 people died from COVID-19, bringing the pandemic’s total to over 351,000 deaths, or one in every 930 U.S. residents, according to a Reuters analysis of state and county reports. The country reported nearly 1.5 million new infections last week, up 16.5% from the previous seven days. (Reuters)

 

The South African Variant Resistant to Vaccines?

The South African variant of coronavirus may be resistant to vaccines and more difficult to pick up through testing, scientists have warned, as they called for the immediate closure of borders. Health Secretary, Matt Hancock said he was "incredibly worried" about the new mutation saying it was "even more of a problem than the UK variant." The variant was picked up in Britain in December, and there are fears it may spread even more quickly than the Kent mutation which has caused an alarming spike in cases, hospital admissions and deaths. (The Daily Telegraph, Reuters)

UK Scientists Worry Vaccines May Not Protect

Against South African Coronavirus Variant

UK scientists expressed concern on Monday that COVID-19 vaccines being rolled out in Britain may not be able to protect against a new variant of the coronavirus that emerged in South Africa and has spread internationally.

 

Both Britain and South Africa have detected new, more transmissible variants of the COVID-19-causing virus in recent weeks that have driven a surge in cases. British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Monday he was now very worried about the variant identified in South Africa.

Simon Clarke, an associate professor in cellular microbiology at the University of Reading, said that while both variants had some new features in common, the one found in South Africa "has a number of additional mutations ... which are concerning".

 

He said these included more extensive alterations to a key part of the virus known as the spike protein - which the virus uses to infect human cells - and "may make the virus less susceptible to the immune response triggered by the vaccines".

 

Lawrence Young, a virologist and professor of molecular oncology at Warwick University, also noted that the South African variant has "multiple spike mutations".  "The accumulation of more spike mutations in the South African variant are more of a concern and could lead to some escape from immune protection," he said.

 

Scientists including BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin and John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine at the University of Oxford, have said they are testing the vaccines against the new variants and say they could make any required tweaks in around six weeks. Public Health England said there was currently no evidence to suggest COVID-19 vaccines would not protect against the mutated virus variants. Britain's health ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment. (Reuters)

 

Extending the Lockdown in Germany

The German government and the majority of Germany's 16 federal states have agreed to extend lockdown measures until January 31 to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, various German media reported on Monday.  The extension of the lockdown is expected to be officially announced today following a meeting  between Chancellor Angela Merkel and the 16 state premiers. "All except two states support the end of January," news agency Reuters reported, citing the negotiations team. (dw.com)

 

More on the UK Lockdown

Prime Minister Boris Johnson plunged England into its third national lockdown in a desperate attempt last night to prevent the NHS from becoming overwhelmed by the rising flood of Covid-19 cases. People will be required to stay at home for all but a handful of reasons until at least February 15 in the strictest set of restrictions imposed since last March. The laws will come into effect from the early hours of tomorrow and parliament will be recalled the same day. (Times of London)

Scotland on Full Lockdown

Scotland's mainland is to return to full lockdown for at least the rest of January after Nicola Sturgeon warned schools must stay shut and people stay at home if a "race" against the mutant Covid strain is to be won. The First Minister said the shutdown - "similar" to the one imposed last March - followed a massive surge in cases linked to the new variant that threatened to overwhelm the NHS within four weeks. From Tuesday, only two Scots from two households can meet outside, with the limit not including children under 12, and people are only allowed to leave their homes for a limited range of reasons such as food shopping. (The Daily Telegraph)

 

Los Angeles Ambulance Triage

The situation in Los Angeles County hospitals is so critical that ambulance crews have been advised to cut back on their use of oxygen and to not bring to hospitals patients who have virtually no chance of survival. Officials say they need to focus on patients with a greater chance of surviving. The measures were taken as circumstances are expected to become even worse in coming weeks, when patients sickened over the Christmas holiday will need treatment, leaving officials desperate for ways to increase capacity and triage care to focus on the sickest patients. (The Los Angeles Times)

Status of Vaccinations Around the World

(As of January 5, 2021)

–FROM JOHNS HOPKINS CSSE–

The Cultures of Dignity Resources for Supporting

Social-Emotional Wellness 

A Final Note: The AAIE COVID-19 Briefing is provided to support your leadership for the school community you serve. We encourage you to use these resources in any way, shape or form that helps you, your communications and toward furthering close relationships across your community.  – The AAIE Board