New coronavirus restrictions came into effect across Russia on Saturday with authorities looking to stem soaring infections and deaths in Europe’s worst hit country by fatalities.

Saturday’s government tally recorded 40,251 new cases, the highest figure for new infections since the beginning of the pandemic.

President Vladimir Putin last week ordered a paid holiday from Saturday to November 7 in a bid to break a recent chain of records in daily cases and deaths.

Russia has held back on imposing significant nationwide measures since ending a short lockdown at the beginning of the pandemic and instead placed its hopes on the rollout of several homegrown vaccines, including Sputnik V.

Even though several jabs have been freely available for months, just 32.5 percent of the population have been fully vaccinated, according to government statistics Saturday.

The Kremlin this week said epidemiologists had raised “concerns” after polls

Is the COVID-19 vaccine safe for children?

Yes, U.S. regulators authorized Pfizer’s vaccine for younger children after millions of 12- to 17-year-olds already safely got the shot, the only one available for children in the country.

Those ages 5 to 11 will get just a third of the dose given to teens and adults. The Food and Drug Administration cleared the kid-size doses Friday, and next the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will recommend who should get them.

A study found kid-size doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were 91{f771d91d784324d4be731abc64bffe0d1fd8f26504ceb311bcfd8e5b001778f4} effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19. The 5- to 11-year-olds developed virus-fighting antibodies as strong as teens and young adults who got regular doses, with similar or fewer annoying reactions such as sore arms, fever or achiness.

The FDA assessed the safety of the kid-size doses in 3,100 vaccinated youngsters.

(HealthDay)—Some parents may worry about whether playing high school football might put their kids at risk for depression and suicidal thoughts in adulthood, but new research suggests they can relax.

It included more than 2,300 U.S. males who enrolled in the study at average age of 15 and were assessed again at an average age of 29. At the start of the study, about 28{f771d91d784324d4be731abc64bffe0d1fd8f26504ceb311bcfd8e5b001778f4} of the participants said they played or intended to play football. As young adults, about 10{f771d91d784324d4be731abc64bffe0d1fd8f26504ceb311bcfd8e5b001778f4} of participants said they had been diagnosed with depression at some point during their lives, and nearly 6{f771d91d784324d4be731abc64bffe0d1fd8f26504ceb311bcfd8e5b001778f4} said they had suicidal thoughts over the past year.

But rates of suicidal thoughts and depression were not significantly different for young men who played football as teens. In contrast, the researchers found a strong association between mental health problems during the teen years and suicidal thoughts in young adulthood.