Coronavirus vaccine news, updates and information for 6-01-2021

<p>This is Vaccine 411, the latest coronavirus vaccine information for June 1st, 2021.</p><p><br></p><p>The World Health Organization announced from now on, coronavirus variants are to be known by letters of the Greek alphabet to avoid stigmatizing and discriminating against nations where they were first detected. The UK variant will be known as Alpha, the South Africa Beta, Brazil will be Gamma, and India Delta. They also considered naming the variants after Greek Gods.</p><p><br></p><p>New coronavirus cases leaped 73% in Washington in the week ending Sunday. With 2.29% of the country's population, Washington had 5.93% of the country's cases in the last week. Five states had more cases in the latest week than they did the week before. Washington has 56.5% of its residents at least partially vaccinated.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>Stocks in Malaysia fell after the government announced a nationwide two-week “total lockdown” to curb its rapidly rising daily infections. Last week, the country reported five-consecutive days of record increases in cases.</p><p><br></p><p>In Thailand, new reported cases surged yesterday to the highest level thus far. The country is redoubling efforts to stop the spread in labor camps, factories, and markets. Concern prompted the government to overrule a plan by Bangkok’s governor to ease some restrictions that was supposed to start today.&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>With the pandemic seemingly easing, some are taking stock of the various tolls its taken. For instance, a study shows as many as 43,000 children in the U.S. are estimated to have lost at least one parent to COVID-19 by February. That’s a dramatic 20% increase in parental bereavement compared to a typical year. The study also found Black children have been hit the hardest — they comprise 14% of children but represent 20% of those who lost a parent to the virus.</p><p><br></p><p>In the United States cases were down 46%, deaths are down 36%, and hospitalizations are down 19% over 14 days. The 7-day average of new cases has been trending