Hug but be cautious, England to be told
State Opening of Parliament scaled back due to Covid In a normal year, tomorrow’s State Opening of Parliament would be the most colourful event of the parliamentary calendar – but pomp and ceremony has been reduced to prevent any spread of coronavirus. The Commons and...
Election results 2021: PM calls Covid recovery summit after SNP victory
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has invited the leaders of the devolved nations to a summit on how “Team UK” can recover from the pandemic. It follows the SNP’s fourth Scottish Parliament election win in a row and Labour’s win in the Welsh Parliament. The SNP’s...
India reports highest worldwide rise in daily Covid-19 cases
India reported 314,835 new Covid-19 infections on Thursday, the highest daily increase in cases worldwide since the pandemic began. The country also recorded its highest number of new Covid-19 deaths at 2,104 fatalities. The stark figures come as health care and other essential services across...
US official: Health authorities are taking reports of blood clots and J&J vaccine “seriously”
US health agencies are working to assess whether the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine is associated with a very small increased risk of rare blood clots, a federal official told CNN. “The CDC and the FDA are taking these concerns about blood clots and the...
Covid-19: France enters third national lockdown amid ICU surge
France has entered its third national lockdown as it battles a surge in cases of Covid-19 that threatens to overwhelm the country’s hospitals. All schools and non-essential shops will shut for four weeks, and a curfew will be in place from 19:00 to 06:00. On...
US continues to administer more than 3 million Covid-19 vaccine doses a day, according to CDC data
About 165 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine have been administered in the United States, according to data published Sunday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The CDC reported 165,053,746 total doses have been used so far — about 79% of the 207,891,295 doses...
South Korea reports 473 new coronavirus cases as health minister warns of fourth wave
South Korea on Monday reported 473 new Covid-19 cases in the previous 24 hours, bringing the national total to 105,752, according to a statement from the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA). Seoul’s metropolitan area accounted for 276 of the total cases. Among the...
India records more than 100,000 new Covid-19 cases – its most in a single day since the pandemic began
India recorded 103,558 new Covid-19 cases on Monday, its highest single-day rise in infections so far in the pandemic. The number of new daily cases in India has risen steadily since March 10, with the country also reporting 741,830 active cases on Monday – its...
Italy becomes sixth country to surpass 100,000 Covid-19 deaths
Italy’s coronavirus death toll topped 100,000 on Monday, according to Johns Hopkins University data, making it the sixth country to record a death count above six figures. Italian Health Ministry data showed the country registered a further 318 deaths in the 24 hours to Monday,...
Covid: Biden promises vaccines for all US adults by end of May
The US will have enough coronavirus vaccines for every adult by the end of May, President Joe Biden has said. This will be two months earlier than previously expected, but Mr Biden said the vaccination drive must be extended, too, and people convinced to take...
Brazil records highest daily number of Covid-19 deaths
Brazil reported 1,641 Covid-19 deaths on Tuesday — the highest single-day total of the pandemic, according to data from the country’s Health Ministry. The country has now recorded a total of 10,646,926 cases and 257,361 deaths, according to official data. Brazil has the second highest...
Kenya receives more than 1 million vaccines through COVAX
Kenya has received more than 1 million Covid-19 vaccines as part of the global COVAX program, according to a news release from the country’s Ministry of Health on Tuesday. A plane carrying 1.02 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine touched down just before midnight Tuesday...
Explosion reported near Covid-19 test center in the Netherlands
An explosion has been reported near a Covid-19 testing center in the Netherlands, police officers said Wednesday. No injuries resulted from the incident, which took place in the northwestern province of North Holland. The blast comes in the wake of several anti-lockdown demonstrations in the...
German Chancellor and state premiers to discuss extending Covid-19 lockdown
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is due to meet with 16 state premiers on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the next steps in combating the coronavirus crisis. Under discussion will be whether to extend the current lockdown till March 28, as well as the possibility of loosening...
Covax: Canada defends taking vaccines from sharing scheme
Canada has defended its decision to draw on a supply of coronavirus vaccines from a global inoculation-sharing initiative known as Covax. Covax pools funds from wealthier countries to help buy vaccines for themselves and low-income nations. The scheme has announced a plan to deliver more...
Fauci hopes Covid-19 vaccinations for older children can start in late spring or summer
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he hopes there will be data to support Covid-19 vaccinations for older children by the late spring or summer. “I am hoping we will have the data to support initiating COVID-19...
Italy recommends AstraZeneca vaccine for people under 55
Italy will administer the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine to people under 55 years old. They will start administering the vaccine to schoolteachers, army and police forces, prison staff and inmates. The decision follows a Wednesday meeting between the government and regional governors to discuss the country’s...
Africa will receive nearly 90 million vaccines from COVAX by February
Africa is to receive nearly 90 million Covid-19 vaccines in February in what will be the continent’s “largest ever mass vaccination campaign,” the World Health Organization announced in a statement on Thursday. In the statement, Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO Regional Director for Africa, said: “Africa...
Vaccine Rollout Gives U.K. a Rare Win in the Pandemic
Because the vaccine could only be refrigerated for three days once it reached the clinic, health care workers knew they had to inject 400 doses a day by Sunday to use up the supply. There was already a line of people waiting for “jabs,” so...
Coronavirus: Germany facing ’10 tough weeks’ of vaccine shortages
Germany is likely to face a shortage of coronavirus vaccines until at least April, the country’s health minister has warned. “We will still have at least 10 tough weeks with a shortage,” Jens Spahn wrote on Twitter. The pace of Germany’s rollout has been criticised,...
Covid: WHO probe team in China exits Wuhan quarantine
A World Health Organization (WHO) team has come out of quarantine and will start on-the-ground investigations into the origins of the coronavirus in the Chinese city of Wuhan. The scientists will begin interviewing people from research institutes, hospitals and the seafood market linked to the...
Coronavirus: Man killed at protest against Lebanon’s total lockdown
A man has died after protesters angry with a total coronavirus lockdown and dire economic conditions clashed with riot police in the Lebanese city of Tripoli for a third consecutive night. Omar Tayba, 29, was among 220 people injured during the unrest. His brother said...
Carlos Holmes Trujillo: Colombian defence minister dies with Covid-19
Colombia’s defence minister has died in hospital after contracting coronavirus, the government has announced. Carlos Holmes Trujillo, 69, was taken to hospital with Covid-19 earlier this month and had developed viral pneumonia. “Colombia has lost one of its best men,” President Ivan Duque said on...
Coronavirus: EU to tighten vaccine exports amid row with AstraZeneca
The EU has warned it will tighten exports of Covid vaccines produced in the bloc, amid a row with AstraZeneca over a cut in planned supplies. Last week, AstraZeneca told the EU it was falling behind on its supply target because of production problems. Pfizer-BioNTech...
Italian PM Conte to resign following pandemic criticism
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte is set to hand in his resignation on Tuesday, following criticism of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. More than 85,000 Italians have died with Covid-19. Mr Conte hopes to be given a mandate by the president to form a...
Japan’s daily coronavirus cases fall below 3,000 for first time since December
Japan confirmed 2,765 new coronavirus infections on Monday, falling below 3,000 new daily cases for the first time since December 28, according to the country’s Health Ministry. The country’s total number of cases now stands at 368,855, with the death toll rising by 74 Monday...
0.01% of people tested positive for coronavirus after two vaccine doses, Israeli data shows
About 0.01% of a large group of people who received two doses of Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine tested positive for coronavirus after their second shot — and those patients had only a mild illness, according to preliminary data from an Israeli health care system. Maccabi Healthcare...
Vaccination rates highlight stark differences between Israelis and Palestinians
Kafr ‘Aqab (CNN)Two young men work side-by-side in a butcher’s shop. They live in the same teeming and densely packed town. One is fortunate — he’s eligible to get an Israeli Covid-19 vaccination. The other isn’t. Both are Palestinian residents of Kafr ‘Aqab, a finger...
Coronavirus: EU anger over delayed Pfizer vaccine deliveries
Several EU countries are receiving significantly fewer doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine than expected, after the US firm slowed shipments. Six nations called the situation “unacceptable” and warned it “decreases the credibility of the vaccination process”. Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia urged...
Covid: UK variant could drive ‘rapid growth’ in US cases, CDC warns
A highly contagious coronavirus variant first detected in the UK could become the dominant strain in the US by March, health officials have said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warned of “rapid growth” of the variant in coming weeks. It said such...