no known cases of mccrone variant in california. mccraw may not be in the bay area but it's causing concern all over the u.s. the white house implementing travel bans for 8 countries in southern africa. >> a move that's drawing criticism from infectious disease. experts like doctor john swartzberg that's not going to help very much. it may help a little bit in terms of slowing the emergence of the virus around the globe. >> but it's not going to stop it. if the variant does spread to the u.s. he says worst case would be another shutdown, but that we already know the steps to avoid that masking social distancing not getting the other time to get a crime was first discovered by authorities in south africa. doctor monica gandhi with ucsf says the kron has around 30 mutations compared to the 11 mutations discovered with the delta variant. but that vaccine seem to be effective with those testing positive. anyone who says it's going to be the vaccines. it's not anyone they put a swab their nose. >> who who had the span of his very to thei

both say they're also developing vaccines for the mccrone variant right now on kron 4 dot com. you can stay up to date with the very latest. covid-19 headlines, including where you can get vaccines for yourself and your children along with booster. shots, just scan the qr code on your screen right now with your mobile devices and you'll be directed to our website. the kron 4 dot com kron 4 monitoring 3 developing stories at the 6 o'clock hour right now. oakland police investigating the city's 127th homicide of 2021 after shooting at lake merritt this afternoon that left one person dead. it happened around 3.30, along the embarcadero and lakeshore avenue. police say the victim is try to stop a car burglary from happening in progress. that's when this when authorities say the suspect shot the victim and fled that scene. the victim taken to the hospital where he died. anyone with information on the case now urged to call oakland police also happening right now, petaluma police are asking folks to shelter in place because of ongoing police activity. police asking folks to stay in t

pfizer, johnson and johnson say they're also developing vaccines for mccrone variant. robert covid-19, home testing kits are not readily available in the u.s. despite easy access in other countries. some blame the test shortages on the fda's hesitant to allow less accurate test on the market right now. there are more than 3,000 emergency use authorization applications pending at the federal agency tests that are available are often too expensive for the average american other countries, including the united kingdom of may test widely available for free. but the results are not as accurate. happening today. the community members plan to protest against a vaccine mandate from the west contra costa unified school district require students ages 12 to 18 as well as teachers. katie 12 to be vaccinated. protesters say the school district doesn't have the authority to impose a vaccine mandate and they claim the district is granting religious and medical exemptions for staff but not for students. the protest is set to start at 10:00am in front of the school district's building

canada's health officials say there are now 2 confirmed cases of mccrone variant in that country's capital city of ottawa. health officials are also looking into for possible cases. the new variant is affecting air travel plans for people all around the world. our kron four's charles clifford. he was at that as a foe today to see how it's impacting flights in and out of the bay area. >> well, here at sfo on monday. it was a very busy travel day despite the new travel restrictions put in place because of mccrone coronavirus variant starting on monday, non us citizens are banned from traveling to the u.s. from south africa botswana, zimbabwe and 5 other southern africa nations here at sfo. there are very few, if any direct flights from that part of the world most flights will connect through heathrow or jfk or another large airport. the emergence of this new coronavirus variant is very concerning because travelers are just now getting back to traveling the way they were before the pandemic. i talked to a couple of people here at sfo on monday who say they are concerned now it's become very s

. >> doctor gandhi says that south africa's vaccination rate of only 26% is a big part of why mccrone variant has spread so quickly in that region live in studio. i'm rob nesbitt kron. 4 news. thank you, rob and following the announcement travelers. as you can imagine, packed the airport in cape town, south africa today just hoping to catch a flight out health experts say the new strain name the on the kron variant, as we've been talking about it spreading through the southern part of africa. now people visiting that area. >> they're scrambling to return to their home countries. >> my family live in australia and i'm going back to see them before the kuz country shuts down. i don't know when i'll be able to to leave my job behind and getting on a plane today. >> according to south african officials, the new variant is likely responsible for the recent spike in covid infections in the country's busiest province that new covid variant put fears in the global stock markets causing steep drops. it was a shortened trading day at the new york stock exchange because of the thanksgiving holid

. >> i'm rob nesbitt kron. 4 news developing news tonight, the world health organization is warning mccrone variant represents very high risk to the global community. >> saying it could lead to surges with severe consequences and here in the bay area, infectious disease experts say that they, too are concerned. but their level of concern remains in a holding pattern until some key questions are answered kron four's. dan kerman reports. >> we didn't want to hear this news right now. none of the state. it's it's really terribly. disappointing. >> very infectious disease specialist speaking about the latest covid-19 threat. kron variant had to mean red flags that make me pretty concerned that is a rate of increase. >> that happened really overnight inside africa from going to from, you know, a few 100 cases. so few 1000 cases. and that, of course, is driven by the predominance of this very and whether or not it was the cause of it was is being associated with it. i remains to be seen. the second red flag for me was just a vast amount of mutations. and this new variant still infectious disease.

is how much protection and doctors also point out even mccrone of aids the vaccine. >> it still may be effective in preventing severe disease and death. >> when we get the giving the message to the body to make antibodies that's only part of the immune picture. we also make a whole host of other unions sell not captured by these tests and they include t cells and memory b cells that would probably. not care the antibodies recognize it as well because they'll be there to kick the virus out of the body and prevents you from getting very ill infectious disease. experts say like everything else with covid-19. >> this is happening in real time and that means we're going to need to wait, probably 10 to 14 days to get those critical questions answered. in the meantime, they say take those extra steps to protect yourself. dan kerman kron 4 news. >> travel bans are now in place for non us citizens coming from 8 countries including south africa. here's a look at those countries. the white house first announced the restrictions last week in an effort to contain the spread of this new covid strain

there have been no known cases of mccrone variant here in california. >> experts say the vaccines response. the variant should put those who have gotten their shots at ease. almost 2 years into the pandemic and covid continues to mutate the on the kron is the latest strain the world health organization says it is highly transmissible. the announcement is affecting wall street dropping the dow nearly 1000 points. and the white house is implementing new travel restrictions who call this a variant of concern, the who did not call it a variant of panic. doctor john swartzberg has been an infectious disease specialist at uc berkeley for nearly 50 years. >> he says the white house's response of restricting travel from 8 countries in southern africa w%n't be that effective. that's not going to help very much. it may help a little bit in terms of slowing the emergence of the virus around the globe. but it's not going to stop it. if the variant does spread to the u.s. he says worst case would be another shutdown, but that we already know the steps to avoid that masking social distancing not getting

adult population is fully vaccinated has seen a sharp increase in covid infections, a majority with mccrone variance. south africa has acted in an exemplary. why i think it is that actually the right thing to share the information it has with the world. so far. the united kingdom is reporting 2 passengers arriving from south africa and testing positive with the new strain. several other countries have detected as well, including denmark the netherlands, australia austria, germany, belgium, italy and israel. where today passengers arrive to israel's largest airport before an expected 2 week ban on international arrivals begins with other countries looking had similar bans. i cut my. >> my vacation at this tumble. you know. so i took a new and last night. and they just come back in. don't think it of us about what's going on unvaccinated i had covid already. so i think everything should be fine. but the question is will the antibodies generated by the vaccines that we have all had or should have had. >> that enable us to be protected against this virus. i think there's good reasons to think i

back at the white house, where he's receiving a briefing from dr anthony fauci, the latest on the ah mccrone variant . the biggest question is whether biden will impose any new travel restrictions as new cases are cropping up. around europe. are you considering europe having a meeting with my medical team as i get back to the white house mortar say so far, no cases have been identified in the u. s but white house chief medical advisor dr anthony fauci said he would be surprised if it wasn't here already found, she says it's not yet clear whether new lockdowns will be necessary, but added that people should, as always prepare for the worst. president. biden received some criticism for his decision to impose a travel ban but not enacted for a full week. and it goes into effect tomorrow. biden said that was the advice of his medical team, led by fauci fauci defended the logic travel bans when you have a highly transmissible virus never completely would get the virus to coming prevented from coming into the country. no way that's going to happen, but what would you can do is you can delay it eno

issue, which is tough right he's took her down to the border she went to paris last week to talk to mccrone about you know repairin the relationship between the united states and france, so those are just two specific things that she has been able t accomplish in this first year. this is the first year. >> we know what time it is. with all due respect, when she went to france and faked that french accent or whatever, it's been a lot of fumbling. i like the nfl, but i like it best when they are winning, my team. i've got to let you go. president biden, and the chines president had three hours summi last night, and the way it started off is a lot of people paying attention. watch. >> good to see you, mister president in your colleagues fo it it's the third time for us t meet virtually although it's no as good as a face-to-face meeting, and very happy to see my old friend. >> out of the gate, he contradicted president biden an the press secretary on the leaders relationship. >> if they're going to become a time where you might call him old friend to old friends and ask him to open up china to

tonight, new cases of mccrone variant are creeping closer to the united states. >> just days after first being detected in south africa today. canadian health officials confirmed its first 2 cases of the variant. officials say those patients had recently traveled to nigeria. it's actually the first cases detected in north america today. new cases were also confirmed in the netherlands denmark and australia. meanwhile, in just a few hours, the united states will enact a travel ban from 7 african countries because of that variant threat. drug maker. moderna says it now has plans to tackle the only kron variant the company says it has been testing higher doses of the current covid-19 vaccine to determine its effectiveness company. officials also say it's working on vaccines to target the new variant moderna's chief medical officer says if needed a completely new vaccine could be available sometime early in 2022 pfizer and johnson and johnson. both say they're also developing vaccines for the on the kron variant and less than 30 minutes. we'll talk live with the experts about the variant, in

mccrone variant has been classified as highly transmissible causing restrictions for travelers from southern africa and sending wall street into a frenzy on this black friday reporter jewel hillary has the story. the keys. >> get vaccinated, get vaccinated, get vaccinated. >> a crime makes headlines across the world. doctor damilola at a hammy and infectious diseases. doctor with swedish hospital has been monitoring the fast pace developments. what we know is that he has some changes which recalled mutations. believed to be associated with increased transmissibility and also re infection leaders at the world health organization are classifying. >> on the kron has a highly transmissible virus of concern. this is a variant that has been detected and reported to from our colleagues in south africa. there are fewer than a full genome sequences that are available. we don't know very much about this yet. the new variant is genetically distinct from beta and delta variant. but scientists don't know what the genetic changes. make it more transmissible or dangerous as international worry creeps n tra

and moderna says mccrone variant vaccine could be ready. >> in early 2022 jane king is live at the nasdaq with these stories and more. hi, jane. >> hi, darya. good morning to. we're also watching twitter today. cnbc is reporting that ceo jack dorsey will step down from that position. and in fact, twitter shares are halted on pending news. so we don't know exactly what that news is. the cdc is reporting that we don't know who a replacement potentially could be a twitter. the shares of twitter are up here this morning. course. he also runs square. the payment processing company. there's been some scrutiny of that running 2 major companies and of course, twitter as coming under a lot of public and regulatory scrutiny which could be stressful as well. so we'll continue to watch that story today. well, it chief medical officer paul burton says that vaccine the vaccine maker could have a reformulated vaccine against kron variant early next year. now it's not clear even if a new formulation is needed or if the current vaccines work moderna ceo said this morning. >> they'll take about 2 weeks bef

now new this morning, mccrone variant of covid-19 continues to spread around the world. the netherlands, france, japan. they've all confirmed their first cases. and while no case of the on the kron strain has been detected here in california state health officials say that they are on alert. ashley zavala explains. >> california. health leaders say they closely monitoring the omicron variant, the new covid-19 variant first found in south africa is not yet on the list of 10 variants. actively being tracked in california with no cases detected here yet or in the united states overall. but state health officials say it's only a matter of time. california has a public private sector partnership to analyze genomic sequencing called covid net that officials say will help detect on the kron variant early in the state. meanwhile at airports across california state officials say they're preparing to increase covid-19 testing from legal residents returning from some african countries. health leaders say they're also doubling down on covid-19 vaccine and booster shot efforts. well,

president biden is sounding the alarm as the spread of the new ah mccrone covid-19 variant accelerates. it's already been detected in more than a dozen countries. after first emerging in southern africa last week, and it's spreading more quickly than any strain we've seen before. in south africa. the positivity rate went from 2% to 9% in just six days. but most doctors say there is little risk of hospitalization or death for fully vaccinated people. the chances are very high that the vaccine will offer at least some level of protection. the white house says its containment strategy is based on making sure people roll up their sleeves for vaccines and boosters. and the travel ban to and from eight south african countries will also stay in place for now, saying it's the best way to stop a crime from spreading in the u. s gives us time to take more actions. to move quicker to make sure people understand you have to get your vaccine. there's also a plan b. moderna and pfizer are already working on vaccines specifically targeting the new strain. some companies are also exploring the possibi

he did that to angela merkel, he did that to mccrone and biden as well. we need to force him to recognize any threats against ukraine will impact any influences he has. we can't let that happen again because that is free reign on wherever putin wants to go. >> john: put in play slow pitch baseball. now back to china. what do you say that we are on the brink of a cold war with china and if so what sense does it make for us to get so many consumer and industrial goods from them? >> we are in a cold war, and they look at a long game plan. they look at 15 or 25 years, but we may need -- the economic power we have in the united states, that's what trump was trying to pull the stuff that we built back in the united states. the great example was ppe. personal protective equipment. 80% of that was made overseas. >> do you believe -- it's a real threat because they do not see, i think they will threaten him and coerce him and at that time they should have the ability to invade if they want to. >> it's going to be a rocking 2028. that is not a good forecast. >> no

i asked her to go to paris to meet with president mccrone and work on a few things. madam vice president, in a while after this is over, maybe we can talk and see how things are going? vice president harris: i would like that. thank you, mr. president. president biden: i have gathered my cabinet this afternoon at a moment of immense hope possibility for the united states. the american people sent us here to deliver. the american people sent us here to make our government work. and they sentenced her to make a difference in their lives. and i believe we are doing that. i believe that is exactly what we are doing. on monday, i look forward to signing into law the infrastructure act, the investment and jobs act, god willing at the weather holding. it was a lot of hard work to get it done, i know it was probably artwork for all the pressure that watched me trying to get it done. but i want to thank them for acknowledging that this was a bipartisan bill with bipartisan support, proving we can still come together. it is hard, but we can still come together to get something