Taking a look at the weekly  Worldometer  numbers: Cases during the past week per million population, Singapore  2617 New Zealand  693 Russia 283 Germany 273 USA  146 Hong Kong 31 World  24 But, again, many countries have stopped reporting. HV.1 is now the dominant Covid variant  in the U.S.  It is of course a subvariant of Omicron, as are all the prevalent strains today. First appeared this summer. By October overtook EG.5 (also known as Eris), and is now responsible for one-third of all Covid-19 cases.  HV.1 is a sublineage of Omicron SBB.1.9.2, and a direct descendent of EG,5. #3 is FL.1.5,1, also known as Fornax. Eris, or EG.5, remains as the #1 world strain. Health experts say there is no reason to panic about HV.1, although it is good at spreading to others.  Does not produce more hospitalizations. Can be detected by standard tests.  And, by the way, health insurance plans are required to reimburse eight at-home Covid-19 tests PER MONTH.  But check the expiration date. The latest

My answer to the query above is no.  However, COVID-19 deaths are continuing to decline, and if you're fully vaccinated and boosted twice, and will take a third booster in the fall, traveling will very soon be no different than during the normal flu season.  Of course you should not listen to me.  Here is the latest  CDC travel map . Anticipating the best, we are looking forward to going to the Orient in late October, spending some Fall colors time in Japan, followed by a 12-day Celebrity Millennium cruise from Yokohama to Singapore.  Taking data from  Worldometer , here are the pandemic conditions on all our planned stops. Okinawa: My travel mate has been looking forward to the Okinawa  7th Worldwide Uchinanchu Taikai Festival  from October 30 to November 3. 6th gathering in Naha drew 7,353 people from 29 countries and 430,000 attendees. This is the 50th anniversary of Okinawa's reversion to Japan. Approximately 420,000 people from Okinawa have migrated to North and South Amer

Yesterday I focused on Ukraine President   Zelensky .  I have used this spelling, but   two years ago  ago, when he first attained that position, several other versions were mentioned:    Zelenskyi,   Zelenskiy   and   Zelenskyy .  Well, more and more I now see   Zelenskyy , and that could be because this appears to be the "official" spelling.  And who knew how to pronounce his name?  Note that   Kiev  also switched to   Kyiv   only more recently, and now I know how to pronounce it. Note yesterday I also pointed out how China was allowing Hong Kong to embarrass itself by being so free.  From the  New York Times : Another big reason for this uptick is government mistrust.  Nearly 40% of Hong Kong's population is not vaccinated.  More than half those over 70 are not.  This is the group that is dying.  Further, those who got inoculated received Sinovac, made in China, which is not as effective. What happened above jolted the national leadership, for it  locked down  Shenzhen