We are still very cautious about the virus but at least everything (bars, sports, stadiums, restaurants, stores, clubs,...) in Vietnam is working normal now. 

The key difference between us and other countries is the others see Covid as a small nuisance virus, while we see Covid as a lethal enemy who is trying to invade us.

About the vaccine, it will be a while to settle down for everyone in the world.

The global death toll passes 2 million:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Can we call the new variant "UK virus"?

UK should really close all of their wet markets.

More like all their pubs and night clubs, but I guess those are wet markets too in a sense.

Looks like restrictions in denmark are starting to show a healthly reduction.

Dec 18th we had a record high 4500 new cases in 1 day.
within a week that number was down to 3k.
Another week and its down to 2k pr day.
Now its been 4 weeks or so, and its down to around 650 new infections yesterday.

Our goverment are going all in though, prolonging restrictions until we re likely down a tiny managable amount.
They do not want the UK variant going out of controll here.

Sadly this also means we re gonna have to live with tough restrictions until sometimem feb. at a minimum.
Hopefully this is the last time.
If we beat this virus down to tiny amounts (so we gain a few months without rapamt spread), hopefully the vaccinations take care of the rest.
And eventually we re free of this issue.

UK and Southafrican strains are "bad" because 1 is more infectious (55-70% ) (UK version)
and the South African version makes younger people more sick as well (not just the elderly).

The WORST version though, is the new Brazillian mutation.

This one, is so differnt from the regular old covid19 we had last year, that people that "should be immune" because they had covid already, are getting sick again. (this also suggest the current vaccine wont work against this mutaton).  (UK have already done the senseable thing, and shut down all incomeing traffic from south america/brazil, and honesty europe should do the same (the sooner the better))

It's probably already here. These mutations need to infect a sizable number of people before they're "discovered".

If a muation happens and renders all vaccines useless, the only solution left would be a world-wide proper lockdown, you promise people equal money and food and shelter for a month or two, countries that succeed in break free can go back to "normal" earlier than the rest and get to choose when to re-open their borders and how.

Mind you, we don't know know if the current vaccines can prevent spreading of the infections or not in the first place, it's still being studied.

"People who get sick and recover from Covid-19 produce a ton of these more-specialized IgA antibodies. Because IgA antibodies occupy the same respiratory tract surfaces involved in transmitting SARS-CoV-2, we could reasonably expect that people who recover from Covid-19 aren’t spreading the virus any more. (Granted, this may also depend on how much of the virus that person was exposed to.)

But we don’t know if people who have IgG antibodies from the vaccine are stopping the virus in our respiratory tracts in the same way. And even if we did, scientists still don’t know how much of the SARS-CoV-2 virus it takes to cause a new infection. So even if we understood how well a vaccine worked to prevent a virus from replicating along the upper respiratory tract, it’d be extremely difficult to tell if that would mean a person couldn’t transmit the disease."

https://qz.com/1954762/can-you-spread-covid-19-if-you-get-the-vaccine/

Before approving the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, the FDA asked the vaccine manufacturers only whether their products protect people from COVID-19 symptoms. They didn't ask if the vaccines stop people who've been vaccinated from nevertheless spreading the virus to others. The emergency authorizations by the FDA that have allowed distribution of the two new vaccines cite only their ability to keep you — the person vaccinated — from becoming severely sick with COVID-19.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/01/12/956051995/why-you-should-still-wear-a-mask-and-avoid-crowds-after-getting-the-covid-19-vac

A genuine question:

Which vaccine would you go for, if given the choice?

Have you been reading up about the new vaccines? what have been tested and hasn't? side effects? what was studied and what is stil being studied?

That point is moot here, they've already established that you won't be given a choice in what vaccine you'll get. They might have to do if you're allergic to one or more of them.

It looks like the restrictions are starting to work, compared to 7 days ago, reported cases are down in most places. Reported deaths are still up but should peak next week if this really was the case peak. There's still the chance that last weeks numbers were simply elevated from the holidays, making this week look better than it really is. Couple more hours before this week's numbers are complete.

We're ending the week just shy of 3,000 new cases, 2,998 today. Down from 3,945 record on the 10th, long way to go to get back below 100 a day.

And just after announcing aiming for 1 million doses a week,
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/canada-s-coming-month-of-pfizer-covid-19-vaccine-shipments-will-be-reduced-by-half-1.5268222

Hopefully this will be the last big wave, yet if people get too confident, another big wave early fall is not off the table. May-June might see another small wave, but should be fine before the holidays and better weather.