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There is currently no political path for launching impeachment proceedings against Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, the head of the lower house said on Thursday, Reuters reports.
The comments by Arthur Lira, who has the power to decide whether to accept the impeachment proceedings, will come as a major relief to Bolsonaro.
He is feeling the heat for overseeing the world’s second-deadliest coronavirus pandemic, a high-profile Senate probe into his handling of the outbreak and a scandal over alleged graft in vaccine purchases.
Lira said impeachment required political conditions “which are not present at this moment, neither outside nor inside Congress.”
The Senate probe has unearthed alleged corruption, with health ministry insiders and pro-Bolsonaro lawmakers allegedly seeking to fast-track and overpay for an Indian vaccine developed by Bharat Biotech.
Federal prosecutors and the federal police have launched a criminal probe into the deal.
Brazil registered 65,163 new coronavirus cases and 2,029 deaths in the last 24 hours, the health ministry said on Thursday, Reuters reports.
The country has had over 18.6 million cases in total and more than 520,000 deaths.
Up to five million Britons could be denied European holidays because their vaccines are not recognised by the EU’s passport scheme, the Daily Telegraph reported.
Millions of vaccines administered here do not qualify for the European Union’s vaccine passport scheme as the jabs were manufactured in India and are not yet authorised by the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
The EU Digital Covid Certificate, which launched on Thursday, is designed to allow Covid-secure travel across the continent but does not recognise a version of the AstraZeneca vaccine called Covishield, produced by the Serum Institute of India (SII), because it is yet to receive approval in Europe.
Up to five million doses of this version of the vaccine have been administered in the UK and are identifiable by the vaccine batch numbers (4120Z001, 4120Z002, 4120Z003) included on recipients’ vaccine cards and in the Covid travel pass available via the NHS app.
A spokesman for the Department of Health said: “As we continue to cautiously reopen international travel, NHS Covid Pass will be a key service that allows people to demonstrate their Covid-19 vaccination status.”
He added that all AstraZeneca doses used in the UK appeared under the name Vaxzevria in medical records and on the NHS app, even if they had come from India. Only the batch numbers, also included in the NHS Covid pass, identify them.
“All AstraZeneca vaccines given in the UK are the same product and appear on the NHS Covid Pass as Vaxzevria.”
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The NHS in England is starting to plan a coronavirus booster jab programme from September for millions of people most vulnerable to the virus.
In a letter to senior leaders, GPs and hospital bosses, NHS England said health systems should prepare to deliver booster doses of Covid-19 vaccine between September 6 and December 17 as “quickly and safely as possible”.
It comes after experts advising the government published new interim guidance setting out the priority list for who should get a third jab if a booster programme is needed.
The priority groups in the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) interim guidance cover around 32 million people including over-70s, health and care workers, older care home residents, the clinically extremely vulnerable and people who are immunocompromised.
Final guidance from the JCVI will be set out before September, PA reports.
The NHS letter said results from a number of clinical trials are expected over the summer so plans will need to “flex as new information becomes available”.
It added: “Therefore, the core planning scenario systems should prepare for is to deliver booster doses of Covid-19 vaccine to the individuals outlined in the JCVI interim guidance above between September 6 and December 17 2021 (15 weeks), as quickly and safely as possible in two stages using supply available to us over that period.”
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A “bubble boat” carrying 118 students linked to a Covid mega-outbreak on Majorca arrived back on the Spanish mainland, ending their confinement in a quarantine hotel on the Mediterranean island.
Last week hundreds of youngsters across Spain tested positive after going to Majorca, prompting the authorities to quarantine some 250 students at a hotel in the capital Palma.
But a judge on Wednesday ordered that those students who tested negative could be released from quarantine in the Palma Bellver, which has been dubbed “Hotel Covid”, with a ferry laid on Thursday to bring them home.
The boat, which sailed from Palma, arrived in Valencia on Thursday evening, according to an AFP correspondent.
From there the students were to be picked up by health officials from their home regions who will decide whether to run a second test.
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Here is the latest on the coronavirus situation in Australia:
The South African Medical Association has threatened to take the government to court because scores of new junior doctors cannot find placements despite staff shortages during the pandemic.
SAMA said it was “scandalous” that, during a third wave of infections, 228 medical interns who graduated in March and April were waiting for the government to place them at public hospitals to complete their training.
“They (the interns) were supposed to all have been placed by today,” Angelique Coetzee, SAMA chairperson, told Reuters, adding that she would seek a court order if they were not.
She said the window was narrowing to find them internships because of how the training cycle works: “By July, if you don’t slot them in, they’ll be sitting at home for a year.”
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Czechs will be required to undergo a Covid-19 test when they return from summer holidays abroad if they are not fully vaccinated, health minister Adam Vojtech said.
The step is the government’s first to try to contain the more infectious Delta coronavirus variant which has now hit the Czech Republic.
The central European country has been harder hit than most others on a per capita basis since the pandemic hit in 2020, and reported 151 new Covid-19 infections on Wednesday, Reuters reports.
That is much lower than at the peak of the pandemic but it is the third consecutive week-on-week rise in cases. Also, the reproduction “R” number has risen above 1 for the first time since mid-April, signalling Covid-19 is on the rise again.
Under the new measures, people will need to have a test when they return from holidays abroad - with the exception of those who are fully vaccinated or who have recovered from COVID-19 within 180 days - and employers must refuse to allow workers back without a negative test.
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A summary of today's developments
- A night-time curfew will be imposed in several Portuguese municipalities, including the capital Lisbon and the city of Porto, as authorities scramble to bring under control a surge in Covid-19 infections, the government said. Reuters reports that the 11pm to 5am curfew, which starts tomorrow, will be in place in 45 municipalities deemed high-risk including popular tourist town Albufeira in the sunny southern Algarve region.
- Spain reported 12,345 new coronavirus infections and eight deaths on Thursday, with health ministry data showing daily increases this week at their highest levels since mid-April, in part due to the more contagious Delta variant.
- Germany’s vaccine committee recommended that everyone who received an AstraZeneca first dose switch to Pfizer or Moderna jabs for better protection against Covid. Studies show that the immune response is “clearly superior” when an AstraZeneca shot is combined with a second mRNA vaccine, compared with double AstraZeneca jabs, said the German public health vaccine committee.
- The African Union’s head of vaccine procurement has said “not a single” Covid jab has so far left the EU for Africa, hitting out at the bloc for hoarding supply. Strive Masiyiwa criticised the global effort meant to distribute vaccines to less developed countries, accusing Covax of withholding crucial information including that key donors had not met funding pledges – with “not one dose, not one vial, [having] left a European factory for Africa”.
- Dominican health authorities are to begin distributing a third dose of Covid-19 vaccines in an attempt to protect against more contagious new variants of the virus. Turkey also made a similar decision for people over-50 today, despite the World Health Organization saying there is no scientific evidence that more than two doses of Covid-19 vaccines were necessary.
- The Covid vaccine-sharing initiative Covax urged governments to consider equally all people inoculated with WHO-approved products to avoid creating a two-tiered travel and trade regime. It spoke out after an EU-wide Covid certificate took effect that recognises four vaccines but not others, notably the Covishield version of AstraZeneca’s jab widely used in Africa.
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New Covid cases in the World Health Organization’s 53-country European region rose 10% last week after falling for 10 straight weeks, the body has said, warning a new surge could come before autumn and calling for more monitoring of Euro 2020 matches.
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Israel, a world leader in coronavirus vaccinations, reported its highest daily infection rate in three months as it scrambled to contain the spread of the new Delta variant – though there has been no increase in deaths.
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Kazakhstan ordered mandatory vaccinations for a wide range of workers in sectors from the service industry to banking to entertainment who came into contact with others after cases of the Delta variant were discovered in the central Asian country. Otherwise they will be restricted from working face-to-face with others.
- A Pakistan province suspended 70 paramilitary troops without pay after they repeatedly refused to receive Covid-19 vaccines, officials said, after the national government advised all its employees to get vaccinated.
- Romania asked AstraZeneca to extend the shelf life of some 43,000 Covid-19 vaccines that expired on 30 June, as the country has been unable to administer them in time due to the low take-up by the public.
Tunisian authorities placed the capital Tunis and the northern town of Bizerte under a partial lockdown from Thursday in a bid to rein in record daily coronavirus cases and deaths, AFP reports.
Parties, sporting and cultural events and public prayers are banned until 14 July under the measures which cover Tunis and its surroundings, adding to similar measures in place for the coastal cities of Sousse and Monastir.
The measures also include an overnight curfew from 8pm (7pm GMT) until 5am and a ban on cafes and restaurants serving food except outdoors or by delivery.
Many Tunisian hospitals are at full capacity, and medics say they are unable to cope.
Four inland regions of the North African country, as well as the northern town of Bizerte, have also been under total lockdown since 20 June as cases have spiralled.
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Ministers are planning to remove all mandatory mask and social distancing restrictions in England on 19 July but national guidance may still encourage caution in high-risk areas such as public transport.
A number of key scientific advisers including England’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, and the government’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance, are said to behind ministers’ plans to lift restrictions, though they have cautioned that the NHS may come under pressure in the winter.
However, hospital bosses fear that the reopening date will lead to a new spike in Covid admissions, which NHS Providers – which represents hospital trusts in England – warned could lead to the cancellation of surgery and other care.
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Eight in 10 people with blood cancer have not been told they are not fully protected by the Covid-19 vaccine, a UK charity has warned.
An online survey by Blood Cancer UK of about 1,000 people found that 80% were not told by the NHS that their weakened immune systems lessened the chance they would have an immune response to the jab.
The charity said this means people with blood cancer are at a high risk of contracting coronavirus despite having both doses of a vaccine, and are also more likely to get severely ill, PA reports.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “The antibody response is only part of the protection provided by the vaccine and we remain committed to ensuring as many people as possible are protected from the virus and continue to safely receive treatment.
“For example, our new antivirals taskforce is working to identify effective treatments for patients who have been exposed to the virus to stop the infection spreading and speed up recovery time – including those who are immunocompromised.”
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The White House said it would send out special teams to hot spots around the US to combat the highly contagious Delta coronavirus variant, and urgently called on Americans who have not been vaccinated to get jabs.
White House Covid-19 senior adviser Jeffrey Zients told reporters the “surge response” teams would be ready to speed additional testing supplies and therapeutics to communities that were experiencing increases in cases, Reuters reports. The seven-day-average number of cases in the US has risen 10% since last week, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director (CDC) Rochelle Walensky said on Tuesday.
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The Delta variant of coronavirus is driving the pandemic forward in Africa at record speeds, the World Health Organization (WHO).
Infection numbers have increased in Africa for six weeks running, rising by a quarter week-on-week to almost 202,000 in the week that ended Sunday, it said. The continent’s weekly record currently stands at 224,000 new cases, AFP reports. Deaths rose by 15% across 38 African countries to nearly 3,000 in the same period. “The speed and scale of Africa’s third wave is like nothing we’ve seen before,” Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO’s regional director for Africa, said.
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Spain reported 12,345 new coronavirus infections and eight deaths on Thursday, with health ministry data showing daily increases this week at their highest levels since mid-April, in part due to the more contagious Delta variant.
The infection rate measured over the past 14 days rose to 134 cases per 100,000 people from 117 on Wednesday, accelerating a rise that began in mid-June after the rate hit its lowest level since August, of about 90 cases per 100,000, Reuters reports. Thursday’s numbers took the cumulative total of cases in Spain to 3,821,305 while the death toll reached 80,883. A record 747,589 people were vaccinated on Thursday, leaving nearly 38% of the population fully inoculated.
The US administered 328,152,304 doses of Covid-19 vaccines in the country as of Thursday morning and distributed 382,283,990 doses, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.
Those figures are up from the 326,521,526 vaccine doses the CDC said had gone into arms by June 30 out of 381,949,830 doses delivered, Reuters reports. The agency said 181,339,416 people had received at least one dose while 155,884,601 people had been fully vaccinated as of Thursday.
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Night-time curfew in Lisbon and Porto despite Portugal deaths in single-digits
A night-time curfew will be imposed in several Portuguese municipalities, including the capital Lisbon and the city of Porto, as authorities scramble to bring under control a surge in Covid-19 infections, the government has said.
Reuters reports that the 11pm to 5am curfew, which starts tomorrow, will be in place in 45 municipalities deemed high-risk including popular tourist town Albufeira in the sunny southern Algarve region.
Cases in Portugal, which faced its toughest battle against the coronavirus in January, jumped by 2,449 on Thursday, the biggest increase since mid-February. However, daily coronavirus deaths, in single digits, remain well below February levels.
“We are not in any circumstances to claim that the pandemic is in control,” cabinet minister Mariana Vieira da Silva told a news conference. “This is a time to follow the rules, avoid gatherings, avoid parties, and seek to contain the numbers.”
People living in Lisbon’s metropolitan area, where most new cases are concentrated, must still present a negative coronavirus test or a vaccination certificate to leave or enter the region at the weekend.
Across the 45 municipalities where the night-time curfew will be implemented, remote work is compulsory whenever possible, restaurants and cafes must close at 10.30pm and weddings may go ahead only under capacity rules.
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General practitioners in Australia say they are being “left to hold the mess” created by the confused and conflicting statements about the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is making it harder for them to obtain informed consent from patients.
The confused messaging around AstraZeneca continued on Wednesday after Christopher Blyth, the co-chair of the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (Atagi), said the vaccine should be considered for under-40s only in rare circumstances and Dr Jeannette Young, the Queensland chief health officer, continued to insist that under-40s in her state should not get AstraZeneca.
Both statements, and those of other state and territory leaders this week, sit uncomfortably with the suggestion of the prime minister, Scott Morrison, on Monday that those under 40 could now begin approaching their GPs to get AstraZeneca.
Arash of cases of a rare “black fungus” infection affecting thousands of critically ill Covid patients in India caused alarm last month. Now scientists are warning that other dangerous or even deadly fungal infections have spawned in critically ill coronavirus patients globally, including in the UK.
Today so far...
- Germany’s vaccine committee recommended that everyone who received an AstraZeneca first dose switch to Pfizer or Moderna jabs for better protection against Covid. Studies show that the immune response is “clearly superior” when an AstraZeneca shot is combined with a second mRNA vaccine, compared with double AstraZeneca jabs, said the German public health vaccine committee.
- The African Union’s head of vaccine procurement has said “not a single” Covid jab has so far left the EU for Africa, hitting out at the bloc for hoarding supply. Strive Masiyiwa criticised the global effort meant to distribute vaccines to less developed countries, accusing Covax of withholding crucial information including that key donors had not met funding pledges – with “not one dose, not one vial, [having] left a European factory for Africa”.
- Dominican health authorities are to begin distributing a third dose of Covid-19 vaccines in an attempt to protect against more contagious new variants of the virus. Turkey also made a similar decision for people over-50 today, despite the World Health Organization saying there is no scientific evidence that more than two doses of Covid-19 vaccines were necessary.
- The Covid vaccine-sharing initiative Covax urged governments to consider equally all people inoculated with WHO-approved products to avoid creating a two-tiered travel and trade regime. It spoke out after an EU-wide Covid certificate took effect that recognises four vaccines but not others, notably the Covishield version of AstraZeneca’s jab widely used in Africa.
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New Covid cases in the World Health Organization’s 53-country European region rose 10% last week after falling for 10 straight weeks, the body has said, warning a new surge could come before autumn and calling for more monitoring of Euro 2020 matches.
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Israel, a world leader in coronavirus vaccinations, reported its highest daily infection rate in three months as it scrambled to contain the spread of the new Delta variant – though there has been no increase in deaths.
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Kazakhstan ordered mandatory vaccinations for a wide range of workers in sectors from the service industry to banking to entertainment who came into contact with others after cases of the Delta variant were discovered in the central Asian country. Otherwise they will be restricted from working face-to-face with others.
- A Pakistan province suspended 70 paramilitary troops without pay after they repeatedly refused to receive Covid-19 vaccines, officials said, after the national government advised all its employees to get vaccinated.
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Romania asked AstraZeneca to extend the shelf life of some 43,000 Covid-19 vaccines that expired on 30 June, as the country has been unable to administer them in time due to the low take-up by the public.
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The European Medicines Agency has said two doses of Covid vaccine seem to provide protection against the rapidly spreading Delta variant of the coronavirus.
The EMA’s head of vaccine strategy, Marco Cavaleri, said the Amsterdam-based watchdog was “aware of concerns caused by the rapid spread of the Delta variant”.
“Right now it seems the four vaccines approved in the European Union are protecting against all the strains circulating in Europe, including the Delta variant,” he said, according to AFP. “Emerging data from real-world evidence are showing that two doses of vaccines are protective against the Delta variant.”
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A Pakistan province has suspended 70 paramilitary troops without pay after they refused to receive Covid-19 vaccines, officials said.
AFP reports that the group were suspended in southern Balochistan province on Wednesday. This came “after repeated written warnings and verbal requests” to get the jabs, said Habib Ahmed Bangalzai, a senior local official. “They will also not get their salaries,” Bangalzai added.
The troops from the Balochistan Levies make up a paramilitary force that assists police with law enforcement. The move comes after the national government advised all its employees to get vaccinated.
Balochistan authorities are due to implement a ban on unvaccinated people entering government offices, public parks, shopping malls and public transport.
Pakistan’s nationwide vaccination rollout has been ramped up in recent weeks, with more than 350,000 doses administered on most days.
In the capital, Islamabad, Pakistanis who want to work abroad have this week protested about a shortage of the Western-made vaccines AstraZeneca and Pfizer, an entry requirement for most Gulf countries.
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The Associated Press has this dispatch from Turkey, where they report men are playing cards and backgammon at their local coffeehouses again, movie theatres are being cleaned before their first evening screening and bars are serving beer and chips in Istanbul’s famous pedestrian avenue.
Turkey has eased nearly all pandemic restrictions on businesses and events starting today, and lifted nighttime and Sunday curfews as new infections remain steadily below recent record high levels.
“We no longer have the patience to stay at home in both the financial and the spiritual way,” 42-year-old gig worker Fatih Aydin said.
An interior ministry circular said restaurants, which re-opened weeks ago, and wedding parties no longer have to limit the number of guests but must still abide by social distancing rules. Only hookah shops are still closed.
Concerts and festivals can go ahead indoors and outdoors but music must end by midnight, even though there is no longer a curfew. Restrictions on public transport with passenger and age limits have also been curtailed.
Turkey’s mask mandate outdoors and in public places remains although, like elsewhere, many people are not using masks correctly. “We are sick of this masked life, I think we need to get back to normal life,” Huseyin Baytas, 24, said.
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Dominican health authorities are to begin distributing a third dose of Covid-19 vaccines in an attempt to protect against more contagious new variants of the virus.
The additional dose will be voluntary and will first be made available to medical professions, health officials said. The campaign will then move to older adults and those with health conditions that make them vulnerable to severe Covid-19, Reuters reports.
“The potential benefit far outweighs the possible collateral effects of a booster dose,” said health minister Daniel Rivera in a news conference.
People who received the AstraZeneca vaccine will get the third dose 12 weeks after their second shot. Those who received the Sinovac Biotech vaccine can get a third shot one month after their second dose.
The Dominican Republic is facing a new surge in Covid-19 cases that has strained hospitals. The country, however, has so far reported 3,822 deaths from Covid with a 1.18% fatality rate, one of the lowest in the region.
Turkey made a similar decision for people over-50 today.
But the Pan American Health Organization, the regional office of the World Health Organization, has said there is no scientific evidence that more than two doses of Covid-19 vaccines were necessary.
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Take Pfizer or Moderna second dose after AstraZeneca for better protection, says German committee
Germany’s vaccine committee has recommended that everyone who received an AstraZeneca first dose switch to Pfizer or Moderna jabs for better protection against Covid.
Studies show that the immune response is “clearly superior” when an AstraZeneca shot is combined with a second mRNA vaccine, compared with double AstraZeneca jabs, said Stiko. The commission therefore recommended the mix “regardless of age” and with a minimum gap of four weeks between the two jabs, AFP reports.
The vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna are based on the same novel messenger RNA technology, which trains the body to reproduce spike proteins, similar to those found on the coronavirus. When exposed to the real virus later, the body recognises the spike proteins and is able to fight them off.
Viral vector vaccines like AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson use a genetically engineered version of a common-cold causing adenovirus as a “vector” to shuttle genetic instructions into human cells.
Chancellor Angela Merkel received a Moderna second jab after getting an AstraZeneca injection for her first.
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Kazakhstan decrees compulsory jabs for workers in many industries
Kazakhstan has ordered mandatory vaccinations for a wide range of workers who came into contact with others after cases of the Delta variant were discovered in the central Asian country.
AFP reports that in a decree released by the government, the ex-Soviet nation ordered workers in sectors ranging from the service industry to banking to entertainment to be inoculated, or be restricted from working face-to-face with others.
The government said that the workers must receive their first vaccine dose by 15 July and the second by 15 August.
Only those who have been infected with Covid-19 in the previous three months or can prove they have medical conditions that do not allow them to receive a jab are excluded, the decree said. Unvaccinated workers must be tested for the coronavirus every week, it added.
The measure came after a recommendation last week by Kazakhstan’s coronavirus commission to make PCR tests mandatory for unvaccinated service sector staff and employees of major industrial enterprises.
Some 2 million people in the country of around 19 million people are fully vaccinated, the health ministry said, with Russia’s Sputnik V, China’s Sinopharm and Kazakhstan’s own vaccine, known as QazVac, among the jabs available.
Kazakhstan has recorded 425,573 cases of the coronavirus with 4,375 deaths from the disease, according to official figures.
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The Covid vaccine sharing initiative Covax has urged governments to consider equally all people inoculated with WHO-approved products to avoid creating a two-tiered travel and trade regime.
It spoke out after an EU-wide Covid travel certificate took effect that recognises four vaccines but not others, notably the Covishield version of AstraZeneca’s jab which is widely used in Africa, AFP reports.
The European Medicines Agency has only authorised vaccines produced by Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson. The agency estimates that differences in how Covishield is manufactured in India prevents it from qualifying for an EU seal of approval.
That means that EU countries along with Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland will be granted different travel access to those who have received the Covishield jab, notably people who live in Africa.
Covax, which was set up to ensure equitable distribution of vaccines, particularly to low-income countries, said that discriminated against them. “Any measure that only allows people protected by a subset of WHO-approved vaccines to benefit from the re-opening of travel into and with that region would effectively create a two-tier system,” a statement said.
That would widen “the global vaccine divide” and exacerbate “inequities we have already seen in the distribution of Covid-19 vaccines”, it added.
Covax has struggled to get donation-funded doses to poorer countries, and it argued that a rejection of Covishield would make it harder to convince people to become inoculated.
The African Union this week criticised as “inequitable” the decision not to include Covishield on the list of approved vaccines for a digital certificate for travellers in the bloc.
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US pharmacy chain Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc said it expects to administer fewer Covid-19 vaccines in the fourth quarter after inoculations peaked in the previous quarter.
Reuters reported that the fall in jabs had sent its shares down nearly 7%, since it had been relying on gains from administering Covid-19 vaccines to tide over losses from low prescription volumes and a weak flu season that had slowed over-the-counter sales of health and wellness products.
Overall, 25 million shots have been given to Americans through Walgreens, representing 7.6% of all US vaccinations.
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Italy has warned any fans from England not to use loopholes in Covid travel restrictions to sneak into the quarter-finals Euro 2020 clash between England and Ukraine in Rome on Saturday, even if they have a ticket.
Italy has introduced a five-day quarantine for travellers who have visited Britain in the previous two weeks, to curb the spread of the highly contagious Delta coronavirus variant. Short-stay business travellers and visitors in transit are exempt, but Reuters reported that the Italian embassy has warned that this “will not translate into permission to enter the stadium”.
The English Football Association said on Wednesday that it “will not be selling any tickets via the England Supporters Travel Club for this fixture” due to the travel restrictions.
The ban has proven a boon for Britons who live in Italy, who have found it easy to get tickets to the hotly anticipated match.
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Italy reported 21 coronavirus-related deaths on Thursday against 24 the day before, while the daily tally of new infections rose to 882 from 776, Reuters reports.
The daily data release from the Italian health authorities showed that patients in hospital with Covid-19 - not including those in intensive care - stood at 1,532 on Thursday, down from 1,593 a day earlier.
Italy has the second-highest Covid-19 death toll in Europe after Britain, standing at 127,587 deaths. The country has reported 4.26 million cases to date.
Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro is facing mounting pressure to resign following incendiary reports on allegedly corrupt deals to acquire Covid-19 vaccines and his mishandling of the pandemic response, Tom Phillips reports.
Tens of thousands of protesters are expected to return to the streets on Saturday to demand Bolsonaro’s removal from office – the third such mass demonstration in just over a month. On Wednesday a curious coalition of left- and rightwing opponents submitted a fresh petition for Bolsonaro’s impeachment after the Brazilian media published incendiary claims about supposedly dodgy dealings to acquire coronavirus vaccines.
Rachel Hall here taking over from Mattha Busby - please do send over any tips, thoughts or ideas to rachel.hall@theguardian.com.
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The New York Times reports on some turbulence amid the launch today of the EU’s travel certificate, which allows Europeans with proof of vaccination, a negative Covid-19 test or recovery from the virus to travel to other member states.
But Germany and Austria have not given airlines access to the verification devices they would need to scan the relevant QR codes, citing privacy concerns, while Ireland has yet to set up a verification system for the digital certificates following recent cyberattacks.
Echoing concerns within the travel industry, the European Commission has also noted that in the 27 EU member states there are more than 10 verification processes, the NYT said.
“The digital Covid-19 certificate is an important tool that ideally will give people confidence in the easing of travel restrictions,” Thomas Reynaert, the managing director of Airlines for Europe, told the paper. “But this can only work for travellers if member states implement it in a harmonised way.”
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Authorities and health experts in Spain have called for prudence and responsibility amid a surge in cases among young people who are still waiting to be vaccinated after more than 1,000 Covid cases across the country were traced back to an end-of-year school trip to Mallorca.
Although more than a third of Spain’s 47 million people have been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, case numbers have been rising over recent days – most notably among younger people still waiting to get their shots.
The EU’s travel certificate launched today, allowing Europeans with proof of vaccination, a negative Covid-19 test or recovery from the virus to travel to other member states.
The app-based “digital green certificate” gives travellers a QR code to allow them to avoid requiring to quarantine in other member states. The certificate was agreed by EU governments and MEPs in May and introduced after pressure from southern economies reliant on tourism and wanting the bloc to open as soon as possible.
“The European digital certificate is a symbol of an open and safe Europe that is opening cautiously putting the protection of the health of our citizens first,” said the EU Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, according to the FT.
Citizens from outside the EU can enter the bloc if they have been fully vaccinated with a jab recognised by the European Medicines Agency. But the African Union has criticised as “inequitable” the decision not to include Covishield, the Indian-made vaccine used by the global Covax programme, on a list of approved vaccines for a digital certificate for travellers in the bloc.
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The German interior minister, Horst Seehofer, has described as “absolutely irresponsible” Uefa’s decision to hold the Euro 2020 semifinals and finals in the UK, due to the prevalence of the Delta variant.
“I suspect that once again it’s all about commercial [interests],” Horst Seehofer told reporters in Berlin, according to the FT. “But commercial interests should not override the need to protect people from infections.”
The position taken by Uefa, European football’s governing body, was “absolutely irresponsible, because we are in a pandemic and precisely in countries like Great Britain we’re seeing a sharp increase in infections”, he added.
“[In such a situation], it is imperative to avoid contact and adhere to hygiene regulations if we are to stop infections [spreading].”
For the Euro 2020 matches held in Munich, he said authorities had enforced strict rules and only allowed 14,000 fans into a stadium that has a capacity of 80,000, the FT reports.
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Italy’s justice minister, Marta Cartabia, has ordered a report into conditions in the country’s prisons after the release of video footage showing guards brutally beating inmates at a jail near Naples who had demanded better coronavirus protections.
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Africa’s head of vaccine procurement hits out at EU for hoarding jabs
The African Union’s head of vaccine procurement has said “not a single” Covid jab has so far left the EU for Africa, hitting out at the bloc for hoarding supply.
Strive Masiyiwa criticised the global effort meant to distribute vaccines to less developed countries, accusing Covax of withholding crucial information including that key donors had not met funding pledges – with “not one dose, not one vial, [having] left a European factory for Africa.”
The situation could be very different had we known back in December that ‘Listen, this help is not coming, do for yourselves ... many countries were just sitting back saying, ‘the vaccines are coming.’ ... We as Africans are disappointed.”
He stressed that Africa has purchased 400 million vaccine doses and can buy more, but according to the AP he challenged donors: “Pay up your money ... We will no longer measure pledges, we will measure vaccines arriving at our airports.”
The entrepreneur and tech billionaire said Covax had promised to deliver 700 million vaccine doses to Africa by December. But at mid-year, Africa has received just 65 million doses overall. Less than 50 million doses via Covax have arrived.
“It became pretty clear by December that the hope that we would all as a global community buy vaccines together through Covax was not being adhered to, particularly by the rich and powerful nations,” he said.
He added that Covax’s decision to procure vaccines primarily from just one facility, the Serum Institute of India, was risky, Quartz reports. Covax aimed to provide 20% of Africa’s vaccine needs, with African nations stepping up for the rest, he said. But “it really doesn’t matter how much money your country has, they couldn’t buy vaccines ... I never saw presidents try so hard, calling chief executives.”
The vaccines have been hard to source as countries such as the US with manufacturing capabilities imposed controls on export sales in the interest of vaccinating their own citizens first, the AP reports.
Criticising the EU, he said: “When we go to talk to their manufacturers, they tell us they’re completely maxed out meeting the needs of Europe, we’re referred to India.” But the EU now imposes public health restrictions on people vaccinated with Covishield, the Indian-produced version of the EU-accepted AstraZeneca vaccine.
“So how do we get to the situation where they give money to Covax, who go to India to purchase vaccines, and then they tell us those vaccines are not valid?”
Some countries engage in so-called vaccine diplomacy and those bilateral donations are welcome, Masiyiwa said, but they’re not enough to “move the needle.”
Spokespeople for Covax did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the AP on matters raised. But it warned in a statement against turning away people “protected by a subset of WHO-approved vaccines,” saying it would “effectively create a two-tier system, further widening the global vaccine divide.”
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The European Commission is being urged to reject a coronavirus recovery plan for Hungary over concerns about fraud, corruption and the country’s stance on LGBTQ+ rights.
A cross-party group of left and liberal MEPs have written to the commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, demanding she send the Hungarian government back to the drawing board over its spending plans for a €7.2bn (£6.19bn) coronavirus recovery grant.
Hungary has requested €7.2bn in grants under the scheme, which it is thought would be the largest single transfer of EU funds since it joined the union in 2004.
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The policing of the Sarah Everard vigil in London and “kill the bill” demonstrations in Bristol breached fundamental rights to protest and involved unnecessary and disproportionate use of force, a parliamentary inquiry has found.
Multiple failings were committed by the Metropolitan police service (MPS) and Avon and Somerset constabulary (A&SC), including wrongly applying the lockdown regulations and failing to understand their legal duty to facilitate peaceful protest, the all-party parliamentary group on democracy and the constitution (APPGDC) found.
CureVac is to pursue European approval for its coronavirus vaccine candidate, despite disappointing overall efficacy results.
It announced preliminary data on 16 June from a 40,000-person trial, which showed that its two-dose vaccine was just 47% effective at preventing disease. But it argues that final analysis of its late-stage trial shows 53% protection against mild disease, 77% protection against severe disease and full protection against hospitalisation and death, the Financial Times reported.
The company said that the higher efficacy against severe disease meant it still had a pathway for approval from the European Medicines Agency.
“In this final analysis, CVnCoV demonstrates a strong public health value in fully protecting study participants in the age group of 18 to 60 against hospitalisation and death and 77% against moderate and severe disease – an efficacy profile, which we believe will be an important contribution to help manage the Covid-19 pandemic and the dynamic variant spread,” Franz-Werner Haas, chief executive, said.
The FT said that CureVac has argued that performance of its mRNA vaccine, which it is producing with the pharmaceutical giant Bayer, was lower because it dealt with 15 different virus variants.
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Greece will start vaccinating teenagers once it gets the go-ahead from experts, a government spokesperson has said, after Athens earlier this week offered those aged 18-25 cash and phone data in exchange for getting a shot.
Some 44% of Greeks aged over 18 have been vaccinated and the country has been easing restrictions as infections fall. But with concerns about the spread of the more contagious Delta variant rising, the government has introduced extra incentives to boost vaccination rates in the build-up to the holidays, Reuters reports.
A member of the country’s vaccinations committee said they were considering advising the government to target youngsters aged 15 to 17.
Tourists with a negative Covid test or a vaccination certificate can travel to the country without the need to quarantine.
Industry officials have said that the average occupancy rate at hotels across the country is 35% to 45% but bookings have frozen, and how the summer holiday season progresses will depend much on whether Britain will decide to allow its citizens to come without the need to isolate on their return.
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Government's decision to expand crowd size at Wembley for Euro 2020 semis and final 'recipe for disaster', say MEPs
The decision to allow 60,000 fans to attend the Euro 2020 semi-finals and finals at Wembley is “a recipe for disaster”, a committee of MEPs has said, urging a rethink because of the surging number of coronavirus cases in the UK.
The European parliament’s committee on public health wants Uefa and the British government to reconsider their decision to allow Wembley to host the matches at 75% of its 90,000 capacity.
Allowing so many fans to watch the three matches, scheduled for 6, 7 and 11 July, is “a health hazard and a clear unnecessary risk” states a letter from the European parliament’s committee on environment and public health, citing the 10-fold increase in UK coronavirus cases since early May.
The UK recorded 26,068 new coronavirus cases on 30 June, the highest total since January. But deaths are going up at a much slower rate, from a very low level.
The letter calls on the European parliament president, David Sassoli, to urge his fellow EU leaders to take the matter up with Uefa and the UK government.
Citing recent forecasts that show the more transmissible Delta variant is likely to account for 90% of all coronavirus cases in Europe by the end of August, the MEPs say Uefa should reconsider its decision to hold the matches at Wembley, or “at the least that Uefa and the UK authorities reassess health safety measures and the crowd capacity decision”. The MEPs do not propose an alternative number of spectators.
They write:
Despite the worrisome situation, the UK government decided to increase crowd capacity at Wembley. We consider this decision a recipe for disaster.
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Israel, a world leader in coronavirus vaccinations, has reported its highest daily infection rate in three months as it scrambles to contain the spread of the new Delta variant – though there has been no increase in deaths.
AP has the story:
Authorities are moving to vaccinate children and are considering tighter travel restrictions at the country’s main airport, though the rise has not led to an uptick in deaths from the virus. Just one has been recorded over the last two weeks.
The health ministry reported 307 new cases yesterday, the highest in nearly three months and a rise from 293 newly diagnosed cases a day earlier.
In recent months, Israel has reopened businesses, schools and event venues, lifting nearly all restrictions after it inoculated some 85% of the adult population. It’s now seen as an early-warning system of sorts for other nations.
The prime minister, Naftali Bennett, has announced a drive to inoculate thousands of children within a fortnight. In Israel, 5.1 million people, among its population of 9.3 million, have received the required double dose of vaccinations. Another 400,000 have received at least one dose.
Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported that officials are considering bringing back the “green pass” system that differentiates between vaccinated and non-vaccinated citizens in access to certain venues and activities – an “apartheid” system, according to some critics .
Israel was initially set to reopen its borders to vaccinated visitors today, after having largely closed the country during the pandemic. It had already started allowing groups of vaccinated tourists to enter in May. But after a rise in infections over the past 10 days, the government pushed that date to 1 August.
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Australia has weathered the pandemic far better than many nations — recording just a single coronavirus death since last October — but its success means many Australians are not in a rush to get vaccinated and that could delay the country’s return to normalcy, reports the Associated Press.
Concerns are growing about the economic cost to Australia of being left behind by countries that suffered far higher death tolls but urgently embraced vaccines and are increasingly opening up.
Most of Australia’s pandemic success, after all, can be attributed to the continued closure of the isolated continent’s border, something that is unlikely to change until far more than the current 6% of the population is vaccinated.
But with relatively few cases of the virus and so few deaths, many in Australia are questioning whether the slight health risks to young adults of the widely available AstraZeneca vaccine makes it worthwhile.
The AstraZeneca shot in Australia currently is recommended only for people older than 60 because of the risk of rare blood clotting in younger people. The only alternative registered in Australia is Pfizer which, unlike the locally made AstraZeneca, is imported and in short supply.
AstraZeneca had been recommended for all adults until a 48-year-old Australian died from blood clots in April. The vaccine was then recommended for people older than 50 - until a 52-year-old died in May.
That’s more than the single death from Covid-19 since last year, an 80-year-old man who died in April after being infected overseas and diagnosed in hotel quarantine. Many people are refusing to take their second AstraZeneca jab, recommended three months after the first, because of the evolving safety advice. Many have cancelled appointments for their first shots.
In most parts of the world, the risk-benefit assessment is stacked in favour of taking AstraZeneca, but that balance is different in Australia.
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Edward Snowden, the whistleblower who revealed the NSA’s mass surveillance programme, writes that “the greatest conspiracies are open and notorious” but they are normalised throughout society.
The greatest conspiracies are open and notorious – not theories, but practices expressed through law and policy, technology and finance. Counterintuitively, these conspiracies are more often than not announced in public and with a modicum of pride. They’re dutifully reported in our newspapers; they’re bannered on to the covers of our magazines; updates on their progress are scrolled across our screens – all with such regularity as to render us unable to relate the banality of their methods to the rapacity of their ambitions.
Most of the taxonomies of conspiracy thinking are based on the logic that most intelligence agencies use when they spread disinformation, treating falsity and fiction as levers of influence and confusion that can plunge a populace into powerlessness, making them vulnerable to new beliefs – and even new governments.
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Turkey is today making people aged over 50, and healthcare workers, eligible for third doses of a Covid vaccine, its health minister announced yesterday.
Dr Fahrettin Koca tweeted: “Our citizens aged 50 and over who have been vaccinated for two doses, as well as our healthcare professionals, will be able to make an appointment with the vaccine they want and the 3rd dose vaccine starting tomorrow.”
Researchers said earlier this week that there was no evidence that booster shots are necessary, especially given shortages in some countries, though an Oxford University study found that a third dose increases antibody and T-cell immune responses.
According to the Daily Sabah, Koca told a virtual press conference, following a meeting with the country’s coronavirus scientific advisory board, that:
Our people and health workers will be able to choose any vaccine they want regardless of what they received in the previous two doses.
People who have tested positive for Covid-19 had to wait six months to become eligible for a vaccine. That period has now been shortened to three months.
Following new scientific findings, the time period between the two doses of Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has been reduced from six weeks to four weeks.
Our vaccination campaign is being carried out in full force to make sure each and every one of our citizens receives a vaccine. We are one of the world’s leading countries with the number of daily doses administered exceeding 1 million.
The vaccines we have available in our country so far appear to be effective against mutations. But the only way to truly stop the pandemic is to complete the vaccination before giving any opportunity to mutations.
Several countries with high vaccination rates have reported increasing Delta variant cases. This should be a warning for us and it should be our cue to get a vaccine.
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Indonesia has announced it is to impose “emergency” coronavirus restrictions this week to battle a surge in infections,
President Joko Widodo said the new curbs, starting on Saturday, would last more than two weeks in the capital Jakarta, Java, and the holiday island Bali after infections surged to record levels.
“This situation has forced us to take stricter steps … I have decided to impose emergency restrictions.”
The new measures, expected to run until 20 July, include ordering all non-essential employees to work from home, while classes will be held only online. Shopping malls and mosques will also be shuttered in a bid to bring new daily cases to below 10,000 in the Muslim-majority nation, Reuters reports.
But public transit and domestic travel would still be allowed for people who have had at least one vaccine dose, and wedding receptions were still on the cards with limited guest numbers.
Daily cases almost reached 25,000 today, a new record for South-east Asia’s worst-hit nation, which logged 504 deaths in 24 hours, also a new daily record.
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Romania has asked AstraZeneca to extend the shelf life of some 43,000 Covid-19 vaccines that expired on 30 June, as the country has been unable to administer them in time due to the low take-up by the public.
Reuters reports that vaccine hesitancy is spreading in the EU member-state as a result of entrenched distrust of state institutions, misinformation campaigns and a lack of public awareness.
Authorities have opened appointment-free vaccination centres in markets, airports and concert halls, and are sending doctors door to door in villages, where scepticism is widespread. Left holding so many unused AstraZeneca shots, the government has asked the company to advise whether they can still be used after expiry.
“If the manufacturer provides us with data certifying long-term stability or longer than six months in the coming period … it is very possible that we will have this extension of the validity period,” said Valeriu Gheorghita, head of the government’s vaccination committee.
Canada’s health regulator said on 29 May it had extended the expiry dates of two lots of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine by 30 days to ensure that provinces and territories were able to use up their existing inventory.
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Cases in 53-country WHO European region rose 10% last week after sustained fall
New Covid cases in the World Health Organization’s 53-country European region rose 10% last week after falling for 10 straight weeks, the body has said, warning a new surge could come before autumn and calling for more monitoring of Euro 2020 matches.
While infection numbers continue to fall in many countries in the region, including in the EU, Katy Smallwood, WHO Europe’s senior emergencies manager, said some – such as Russia – were “recording their highest daily death rates of the pandemic”.
Driven by the more contagious delta variant combined with “increased mixing, travel, gatherings, and easing of social restrictions”, infections were rising while vaccination levels in the region were still not high enough, regional director Hans Kluge said.
Asked about whether the Euro championship was potentially acting as a “super-spreader” event, Kluge said: “I hope not … but this can’t be excluded.” Hundreds of cases have been detected among spectators, including Scots returning from London, Finns returning from St Petersburg and Delta variant infections in Copenhagen.
Smallwood warned that in a context of increasing infections, large mass gatherings in particular “can act as amplifiers in terms of transmission. It’s really important that local authorities implement a continuous public health risk assessment.”
Concerns were not limited to the matches and stadiums, Smallwood said, calling for increased monitoring of the mixing that happens around them:
How are people getting there? Are they traveling in large crowded buses? What’s happening after the games? Are they going into crowded bars and pubs?”
Kluge said the WHO was “definitely concerned” by the possibility that the tournament would help spread the Delta variant. “We know it is reported by a total of 33 countries out of the 53, including host countries and some host cities”, he said.
Individuals and governments had to assess risks and act accordingly, he said: “People have to do it by safely taking care of individual behaviour, but also governments, by strengthening health systems, increasing testing, contact tracing and sequencing.”
Smallwood stressed the region now had a “window of opportunity” while many countries were still seeing falling infections. Governments should not lift social measures while infections were rising, she said, or if they did, public health measures such as sequencing should be reinforced.
Continue to invest in testing, in contact tracing, in case investigation like Scotland, which has just announced really rapid analyses of where people are getting infected. Take strategic, targeted, swift action. And vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate.
Kluge said the Delta variant was “already translating into increased hospitalisations and deaths. By August, the WHO’s European region will be ‘Delta dominant’ – but it will also not be fully vaccinated, and it will be mostly restriction-free.”
That meant the three conditions for “a new wave of excess hospitalisations and deaths” were all in place, he warned: “New variants, deficit in vaccine uptake, increased social mixing. There will be a new wave unless we remain disciplined.”
Kluge said that despite huge efforts by many countries, it was “unacceptable” that across the region 63% of people were still waiting for their first vaccine dose, while half of older people and 40% of health care workers remained unprotected.
Smallwood said people who decided to travel abroad should ask:
What’s the risk to myself? Am I fully vaccinated? Where am I going, what’s the epidemiology? Am I going to be in crowded areas or hiking up a mountain, where the risk is much lower?”
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The first occurrence of Covid-19 in India was officially recorded on 30 January last year in the city of Thrissur in the southern state of Kerala, writes Namrata Joshi. Since then, Kerala’s capable handling of the pandemic has meant that it has been largely spared the brutal scenes and tragic images of the second wave of the pandemic elsewhere in India. Likewise, Kerala’s Malayalam-language film industry – the most dynamic of all India’s multiple regional producers – has seen a talented pool of young, new-wave film-makers deal superbly with the virus.
Where the Mumbai-based behemoth of Bollywood has barely chronicled this life-altering reality – the anthology Unpaused, released on Amazon Prime Video, is almost its only offering – Malayalam cinema is grappling with Covid with diverse film-making forms, styles and themes.
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Not 'strong enough' evidence to vaccinate children, says UK advisor
One of the UK’s leading childhood health experts has said there is not enough evidence to support vaccinating children against Covid, and the body that will make the decision on whether to jab under-18s has indicated it will take a cautious approach.
Speaking to BBC Breakfast in a personal capacity, Prof Calum Semple, a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) said not enough was yet known about possible damaging side-effects if children were given Covid jabs, my colleague Matthew Weaver reports.
“I’m not convinced that the evidence base there is strong enough to support vaccination of children, because we don’t have complete safety data for the vaccines that we would want to use,” he said.
It comes after a UK vaccine adviser yesterday made a significant intervention to the debate over whether to inoculate children against Covid, saying “it is not immoral to think that they may be better protected by natural immunity generated through infection than by asking them to take the possible risk of a vaccine”.
Prof Robert Dingwall, a sociologist on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said in a string of tweets that since teenagers were at an extremely low risk of Covid, “vaccines must be exceptionally safe” for there to be a significant benefit.
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Bangladesh’s 168 million people are from today under a strict military-enforced coronavirus lockdown following a surge in cases.
AFP reports that many of the streets of the south Asian nation were empty today, patrolled by the army and the police, with people confined to their homes except for emergencies and to buy essentials.
Many hospitals in Bangladesh are struggling, particularly in areas bordering India, where the strain was first detected. Some rural towns have recorded infection rates of 70%.
Most restrictions imposed as part of a strict lockdown introduced in April had since been lifted. Now the government has ordered a week of tight controls. “No one will be allowed go out except in case of an emergency during this period,” the government said in a statement, adding army troops and law-enforcement agencies would be deployed to enforce the lockdown.
All offices and transportation will be shut during this period while factories, including the country’s prime garment export sector, will be allowed to remain open if they follow health protocols, it said.
Police have vowed to arrest anyone who comes out of their home without a valid reason. Tens of thousands of migrant workers left the capital, Dhaka, over the weekend amid a looming strict lockdown, but many were pictured gathering at markets on Tuesday.
Bangladesh sealed its border with India in April as a precaution against infection from the Delta variant, although trade continues. Bangladesh has seen a record surge in cases this week, with 7,666 new cases reported on Tuesday and 112 fatalities.
There have been 904,436 infections and 14,388 deaths reported in the country since the pandemic began.
Hello and greetings to everyone reading, wherever you are the in the world. Mattha Busby here to take you through the next few hours of global Covid developments. Thanks to my colleague Martin Belam for covering the blog up until now. Please feel free to drop me a line on Twitter or message me via email (mattha.busby.freelance@guardian.co.uk) with any tips or thoughts on our coverage.
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Today so far…
- The World Health Organization’s regional director for Europe, Hans Kluge, has said that a 10-week decline in the number of Covid infections in Europe has come to an end. Infections rose 10% last week, which Kluge ascribed to relaxed restrictions and increased travel.
- Russia reported 672 coronavirus-related deaths today, the highest official death toll in a single day since the pandemic began. The government coronavirus taskforce also confirmed 23,543 new Covid cases in the last 24 hours, the most since 17 January. Health clinics in Moscow will begin offering booster vaccine shots against Covid today.
- US president Joe Biden came up well short on his goal of delivering 80 million doses of coronavirus vaccine to the rest of the world by the end of June, as a host of logistical and regulatory hurdles slowed the pace of vaccine diplomacy
- ONS figures in the UK suggest that nearly 1 million people have suffered from long Covid, and that 634,000 people report it adversely affecting their day-to-day activities
- Indonesia has reported 24,836 new coronavirus infections and 504 deaths, both record daily highs. The government said it would tighten quarantine and boost testing and vaccinations for Covid and would extend emergency measures if infections did not decline within three weeks.
- The Thai island of Phuket has reopened to some foreign tourists, more than a year after the pandemic forced the country’s borders to close. About 400 international tourists were expected to arrive today, through a scheme that officials hope could help to revive the country’s tourism sector. Thailand on Thursday reported a daily record of 57 deaths from the coronavirus, the second day in a row of record-high fatalities as the South-east Asian country.
- Scientists in the Netherlands have found coronavirus is common in pet cats and dogs where their owners have the disease. While cases of owners passing on Covid-19 to their pets are considered to be of negligible risk to public health, the scientists say there is a potential risk that domestic animals could act as a “reservoir” for coronavirus and reintroduce it to humans.
- Fewer than than 40% of Australia’s oldest and most vulnerable citizens have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 more than four months into the rollout, new data shows.
- Police in Uganda have arrested two nurses and were hunting for a man who had posed as a doctor to sell and administer fake coronavirus vaccines to hundreds of people.
- India’s version of AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine is not authorised in the EU due to the possibility of “differences” with the original, Europe’s drug regulator said. The African Union yesterday criticised as “inequitable” the decision not to include Covishield, the Indian-made vaccine used by the global Covax programme, on a list of approved vaccines for a digital certificate for travellers in the bloc.
- The prime minister of Portugal, Antonio Costa, went into isolation, despite being fully vaccinated, after one of his aides tested positive amid a high in a new wave of infections blamed on the Delta variant.
Updated
Indonesia sets new record daily highs for Covid cases and deaths
A very quick Reuters snap here that Indonesia has reported 24,836 new coronavirus infections and 504 deaths, both record daily highs.
Elias Biryabarema reports from Kampala for Reuters that police in Uganda have arrested two nurses and were hunting for a man who had posed as a doctor to sell and administer fake coronavirus vaccines to hundreds of people.
The phoney doctor had persuaded several companies to pay for their employees to receive vaccines, charging £20-£40 ($28-$56) per shot, according to the head of a public health monitoring unit within the president’s office.
“This was a clear scam, this fellow was looking for money, just a common criminal. We suspect he was injecting people with water because it’s colourless, odourless and not dangerous,” Dr Warren Naamara told Reuters. “He is still on the run but we’re hunting for him. We have arrested two nurses whom he was employing.”
Documents seized in a raid of the premises used by the suspects showed at least 812 people had been vaccinated but Naamara said the number of victims could be more.
During a raid on the premises used by the suspects, investigators found vials whose seals had been tampered with and had bogus vaccine labelling and false shipping information, Naamara said.
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Almost 400,000 people in UK have had long Covid at least a year – ONS figures
The latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) data around coronavirus in the UK has been released, and the most striking headline figure is that long Covid was estimated to be adversely affecting the day-to-day activities of 634,000 people - around two-thirds of those with self-reported long Covid - with 178,000 reporting that their ability to undertake day-to-day activities had been “limited a lot”.
PA media report that fatigue was the most common symptom reported as part of an individual’s experience of long Covid (535,000 people), followed by shortness of breath (397,000), muscle ache (309,000) and difficulty concentrating (295,000).
An estimated 385,000 people in private households in the UK have experienced self-reported long Covid that has lasted for at least a year, new figures suggest. This is up from 376,000 in a similar survey carried out one month earlier.
The figures, from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), are based on responses collected in the four weeks to 6 June.
They also suggest a total of 962,000 people in the UK experienced long Covid in the period of the survey, defined as symptoms persisting for more than four weeks after their first suspected coronavirus infection.
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WHO: 10-week decline in number of Covid infections in Europe has come to an end
Just to note that there is a press conference at the moment by Hans Kluge, who is the World Health Organization’s regional director for Europe. My colleague Jon Henley will be bringing us a fuller report in due course, but the key lines to emerge so far:
- A 10-week decline in the number of Covid infections in Europe has come to an end.
- Infections rose 10% last week, which Kluge ascribes to relaxed restrictions and increased travel.
- Kluge says there will be a new wave in Europe unless discipline is maintained.
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Russia sets new daily record Covid death toll again
Just in from Reuters, Russia reported 672 coronavirus-related deaths today, the highest official death toll in a single day since the pandemic began.
The government coronavirus taskforce also confirmed 23,543 new Covid cases in the last 24 hours, the most since 17 January. That figure includes 7,597 in Moscow.
Russia has announced an immediate vaccination booster programme (see 8.41am). Reuters report that scientists recommended booster doses to keep the number of protective antibodies in the body at a high level considering the rapid spread of the Delta variant.
“We need to keep an eye on the strain, keeping antibody levels high through more frequent re-vaccination,” said Alexander Gintsburg, director of the Gamaleya Institute, which developed the Sputnik V vaccine.
“This is because memory cells are late to get to work ... they start to build up the right level of antibodies around the third or fourth day,” he was cited as saying by the Interfax news agency last week.
Updated
Andrew Sparrow has launched our UK live blog for today. There’s liable to be a big focus on the Batley and Spen by-election, but he’ll also be covering the top UK Covid lines. I’ll be carrying on here with the latest coronavirus developments from around the world.
Martin McKee, professor of European public health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and a member of Independent Sage, said he does not believe that annual coronavirus vaccinations will be given to people in the future.
PA media report he told Times Radio: “I suspect what we will find is that, over the next few years, we’ll have a couple of different variants of the vaccine and then that will probably be adequate. Then obviously younger people will have to be vaccinated as they come through the population.”
Prof McKee added that he feels it is important to vaccinate children from a “population perspective” due to the need for 87% of people to be vaccinated so that there is “population immunity” against the virus.
“Twenty percent of the population are under 18 and there’s a higher proportion in some communities so, therefore, it seems obvious from a population perspective,” he said.
“I think people in the JCVI, who are looking at this from the perspective of the individual child and looking at the risk/benefit balance, are less enthusiastic about vaccinating children, but I’m a public health physician. From a population perspective, it’s very clear that we have to vaccinate children.”
Indonesia to tighten quarantine if Covid numbers do not drop within three weeks
Indonesia will tighten quarantine and boost testing and vaccinations for Covid and would extend emergency measures if infections do not decline within three weeks, Reuters report its government said.
Authorities were working hard to boost oxygen supplies across Java island and aimed to test half a million people daily, health minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin told a joint news conference.
Labour: UK government decision to stick to original timetable for ending full furlough 'completely wrong'
In the UK, on Sky News the opposition Labour financial spokesperson Bridget Phillipson has been scathing of how the UK government has failed to extend additional support to businesses having pushed back the date for reopening the economy. She said:
It’s a double whammy for businesses. They’re seeing the reduction in furlough, but also the support that was there around business rates has been reduced down as well. We believe that public health measures should go hand in hand with economic support, and that isn’t happening here. We’ve had to delay the timetable around reopening because the government failed to secure our borders, and yet businesses are expected to pay the price.
Asked about the fact that furlough support was tapered rather then ending abruptly – from today businesses have to contribute 10% of the cost – she said:
It is tapered. But it’s tapered on the original timetable that the government had to push back. So, because of the frankly reckless approach that they’ve taken, where they left us completely exposed to this new variant, businesses are expected however to stick to the original timetable. That just seems completely wrong to me. If you’re going to push back the timetable around reopening, you should make sure that businesses are given that breathing space, aren’t expected to sink or swim, because the government have shifted the rules around them.
'We've had to delay the timetable around reopening because the govt failed to secure our borders, and businesses are expected to pay the price for that.'@BPhillipsonMP criticises the govt over a reduction in #COVID19 support for businesses.#KayBurley: https://t.co/o44KPUbaYg pic.twitter.com/KbO0ERP7EX
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 1, 2021
Russia signals start of revaccination programme
Health clinics in Moscow will begin offering booster vaccine shots against Covid today, the city’s mayor said, as Russian officials scramble to contain a surge in cases blamed on the highly infectious Delta variant.
The health ministry on Wednesday said revaccination would begin on 1 July, news agencies including Reuters reported, making Russia one of the first countries in the world to officially launch a booster shot programme for people already fully vaccinated.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said revaccination was available with any of Russia’s four registered vaccines, but that Sputnik V and the one-component Sputnik-Light would initially be used at eight clinics across the city.
The health ministry issued new regulations that officially recommended revaccination yesterday.
Official figures in Russia had for months shown between 7,000 and 9,500 new Covid cases a day, but in recent weeks they have shot above 20,000 new cases a day, setting new records.
Phuket reopens to tourists one year after Covid forced Thai borders to close
The Thai island of Phuket has reopened to some foreign tourists, more than one year after the pandemic forced the country’s borders to close, devastating the economy.
About 400 international tourists were expected to arrive in Phuket on Thursday, through a scheme that officials hope could help to revive the country’s tourism sector.
The programme, known as Phuket Sandbox, aims to minimise the risk of transmission by requiring tourists to stay on the island for 14 days if they wish to travel elsewhere in Thailand.
Phuket residents have been prioritised for vaccination before the reopening, and at least 70% of the population have received one dose of either Sinovac or AstraZeneca – far more than the rest of the country, which is struggling with its most severe outbreak yet.
The scheme has been hampered by last-minute rules changes, with the final regulations approved days ago. Only fully vaccinated tourists from countries deemed to be low- and medium-risk will be allowed to travel to Phuket, and they will need to provide a negative Covid test as well as other documentation.
Travellers will be required to comply with various disease measures on arrival, including wearing a mask at all times when outdoors. They will also need to stay at special, certified hotels where 70% of staff have been vaccinated, and download a tracking app on their phone.
Read more of Helen Davidson’s report here: Phuket reopens to tourists one year after Covid forced Thai borders to close
Adrienne Matei wonders for us this morning, even as things begin to get back to something approaching normal in some countries, is this the end for casual hugging?
For teenage me, physical boundaries were an unfamiliar concept – partly because I was the product of a time and place where casual touch was the norm. But different people grow up with different norms, depending on where they come from and what they’ve experienced. And what’s considered ‘normal’ is always subject to change.
Like most norms involving close physical contact, hugging quickly stopped for safety reasons as Covid-19 took hold last year. In an instant, the pandemic offered a crash course in how to navigate each other’s comfort zones and personal space bubbles (at least, among those who gave a damn about following the rules). But the seeds of a hug-reckoning had already been planted, well before social distancing became a part of daily life.
Covid-19 arrived as conversations about touch and consent hit a tipping point. Millennials who remembered being expected to hug everyone at their childhood family reunions had begun reconciling their politics with their parenting, and introduced the semi-controversial idea that nobody – not even grandma and grandpa – is entitled to hug their kids without the children’s permission.
Taken altogether, we’re looking at a very different era for hugs than the night of my fateful fireside chat, so many years ago. In the time since, and especially during Covid, we’ve had an opportunity to reflect on our collective norms and social patterns. Now is the time to actually decide how we want to move forward with hugging as our communities reopen – and if we want to continue hugging at all.
Read more here: Is the age of casual hugging over?
[Please note: this live blogger has always been inclined to respond to any uninvited casual hug with a Hulksmash. *shudders*]
PA media report that Professor Adam Finn, from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), said experts were “very concerned” there will be a very large flu epidemic this winter and people needed to be able to get their Covid and flu jabs in the same visit, if the Covid jab was deemed ultimately necessary.
He told BBC Breakfast that regular, annual Covid vaccines could happen “but possibly not for everybody”.
He added: “And of course, uncertainty will reduce as time goes by and we’ll really see how much of an ongoing problem we have with this virus and how it behaves and evolves.
“But I think it’s highly likely that we’ll go on seeing people getting infection with this virus in the future, and the need to immunise people, particularly people who are vulnerable, to getting seriously ill with that, yes.”
The UK media round is being fronted for the government by business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng today. He’s confirmed that the government has no plans to rollout vaccinations to children until the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) gives approval. He told Sky News:
The JCVI have made very clear that they haven’t actually given the clearance for children to be vaccinated. We’ve successfully vaccinated something like 45m first doses for over-18s, but we’re still waiting for confirmation that we can vaccinate children. Until that happens, we’re not going to vaccinate children.
"We are still waiting for confirmation that we can vaccinate children."
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 1, 2021
Business Minister @KwasiKwarteng says the government is "not going to vaccinate children" until it is given clearance by the JCVI.#KayBurley #COVID19: https://t.co/VjjStQYnCM pic.twitter.com/LsKT0GVQwn
Cat or dog owners who have Covid-19 should avoid their pets while infected, experts have said.
Scientists in the Netherlands have found coronavirus is common in pet cats and dogs where their owners have the disease. While cases of owners passing on Covid-19 to their pets are considered to be of negligible risk to public health, the scientists say there is a potential risk that domestic animals could act as a “reservoir” for coronavirus and reintroduce it to humans.
Dr Els Broens, from Utrecht University, said: “If you have Covid-19, you should avoid contact with your cat or dog, just as you would do with other people.
“The main concern, however, is not the animals’ health – they had no or mild symptoms of Covid-19 – but the potential risk that pets could act as a reservoir of the virus and reintroduce it into the human population.
PA media report that fortunately, to date no pet-to-human transmission has been reported. “So, despite the rather high prevalence among pets from Covid-19 positive households in this study, it seems unlikely that pets play a role in the pandemic.”
Read more here: Covid common in pet cats and dogs whose owners have the illness, study shows
Good morning, it is Martin Belam here in London on the blog with you for the next few hours. On Sky News in the UK in the last few minutes, vaccinologist Prof. Jeffrey Almond has been asked about the mooted proposal for a booster jab programme in the UK for autumn and the winter. He said:
There are quite a number of vaccines that we use three doses – most of the childhood vaccines we give us three doses. It gives a boost to the immune system, raises the levels of antibodies, and makes that protection even more secure. So in principle, it’s a good idea. Of course, there are issues around supply, who gets it, and also questions about about the availability of vaccines into the winter, given that the world is still crying out for it. So, this is an ambitious programme. In principle, excellent. But practically, perhaps a bit more of a challenge.
'The world is still crying out for vaccines.'
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 1, 2021
Prof Jeffrey Almond tells #KayBurley that, in principle, giving third booster shots of #COVID19 vaccines is an "excellent" idea - but adds that supplying the jabs could be a "challenge".#Coronavirus latest: https://t.co/I5I1hXKEC8 pic.twitter.com/uFefOWVVtu
A booster jab programme in the UK would initially target:
- Adults aged 16 years and over who are immunosuppressed.
- Those living in residential care homes for older adults.
- All adults aged 70 years or over.
- Adults aged 16 years and over who are considered clinically extremely vulnerable.
- Frontline health and social care workers.
A second stage would see jabs administered to:
- All adults aged 50 years and over.
- All adults aged 16 to 49 years who are in an at-risk group for flu or Covid.
- Adult household contacts of immunosuppressed individuals.
You can read more about the NHS plans here: NHS draws up plans to roll out Covid booster jabs from September
Myanmar, which has been persecuting healthcare workers, turns to Russia and China for vaccines
Myanmar is negotiating to buy 7m doses of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, the head of its authoritarian military regime said, as the Southeast Asian country tries to tackle a new wave of coronavirus infections.
Reuters report that in an interview with Russia’s RIA news agency, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing said after initially planning to buy 2m doses, Myanmar was now looking to buy 7m.
“We have made negotiations to buy more from Russia,” Min Aung Hlaing was quoted as saying.
Having recently returned from a trip to Russia, he said neighbouring India, which had initially supplied the bulk of Myanmar’s vaccines, was unable to provide more doses due to its own outbreak.
“China has also sent some vaccines and we have used those as well. We will also continue negotiations with China,” he said.
Myanmar has officially recorded 155,697 cases and 3,320 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic, according to health ministry data, but reported infections have jumped in the last month.
Some health experts say the real rate of infection is likely to be far higher given a collapse in testing since the 1 February coup.
The regime has repeatedly targeted frontline medical staff in Myanmar for participating in protests against the coup. Earlier this month we carried on the website the testimony of a doctor from Myanmar, who withheld their name for fear of reprisals. They told the Observer:
The state is interfering with our Covid response in Myanmar. We procured thousands of vaccines to give to the public but the military took them all for themselves.
Forces are stopping us from providing treatment to Covid patients. A few days ago, we were notified of a Covid patient who was in respiratory distress at home. I dispatched a team to bring oxygen tanks to the patient. They were stopped on the way and asked to get out of the ambulance they were in and taken to the police station. An hour later, the patient died because of a lack of oxygen. He could have been saved had we been able to deliver oxygen and drugs.
Kim Jong-un signal for help could mark a turning point in North Korea’s Covid fight
While North Korea’s state-controlled media have not officially reported any coronavirus cases, some analysts assume the virus has breached the country’s defences, prompting its leader, Kim Jong-un, to issue a coded request for outside help earlier this week.
If their interpretation is correct, it would mark a significant turning point in the North’s coronavirus response, after repeated claims by the regime that it has not recorded a single infection.
In what it called a fight for “national existence”, it severely curtailed cross-border traffic and trade with neighbour China, and banned international arrivals and sent diplomats and aid workers home. North Korean citizens already accustomed to restrictions on their freedom of movement have been subject to even tighter controls on domestic travel.
North Korea has told the World Health Organization it has not found a single coronavirus infection after testing more than 30,000 people. But on Tuesday, a visibly angry Kim Jong-un referred to “failed” pandemic measures and a “great crisis” in its efforts to control the pandemic.
“There is no possibility that North Korea will ever admit to an infection,” said Hong Min, a senior analyst at Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification. “Even if there have been mass transmissions, the North will definitely not reveal such developments and will continue to push forward its anti-virus campaign.
“But it is also clear that something significant happened, and it was big enough to warrant a reprimanding of senior officials. This could mean mass infections or some sort of situation where a lot of people were put at direct risk of infections.”
Read more of Justin McCurry’s analysis here: Kim Jong-un signal for help could mark a turning point in North Korea’s Covid fight
Australia vaccine rift grows
Australia’s finance minister has said the country is at the “back of the queue” for Pfizer vaccines, contradicting assurances from the prime minister Scott Morrison and the health minister that “our strategy puts Australia at the front of the queue”.
Simon Birmingham on Thursday said Australia has had supply challenges “because European countries and drug companies have favoured those nations who’ve had high rates of Covid for the delivery of vaccines like Pfizer”.
“Which has put countries like New Zealand and Australia at the back of the queue in terms of receipt of some of those vaccines,” Birmingham said.
“But they’re coming.”
The bulk of Australia’s Pfizer and other mRNA vaccines are expected to arrive in the third quarter of this year. On Wednesday, the state of Queensland warned that it would run out of Pfizer vaccines in eight days, after the federal government denied a request for more supply:
Fewer than than 8% of Australians fully vaccinated four months into rollout
Fewer than than 40% of Australia’s oldest and most vulnerable citizens have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 more than four months into the rollout, new data shows.
The federal health department finally released more detailed data on the status of Australia’s vaccine rollout on Thursday.
It shows 6,109,102 people over the age of 16 (about 30%) have had a single dose and just 1,633,434 people, or 7.92%, were fully vaccinated.
The data, which breaks down vaccination by age and gender, shows full vaccination rates are still below 40% for all age cohorts in their 80s and 90s.
About 35,000, or 67.1%, of those aged 95 and over have received a first dose and 20,311 (38.4%) have received a second dose.
Full vaccination rates for the 90-94, 85-89 and 80-84 age brackets were 29.8%, 20.2%, and 15.7% respectively.
The data also shows a continued low rate of two-dose vaccination for those aged in their 50s and 60s, compared with the younger cohort of people aged in their 40s.
Australia’s vaccine rollout began on 20 February. People over 50 have been eligible for vaccination since 3 May.
Read more of Christopher Knaus’ report here: Fewer than than 8% of Australians fully vaccinated four months into rollout
Thailand suffers second day of record deaths
Thailand on Thursday reported a daily record of 57 deaths from the coronavirus, the second day in a row of record-high fatalities as the Southeast Asian country struggles to quell a stubborn third wave of Covid infections.
The report came on the same day as Thailand is kicking off a programme to revive tourism on Phuket, which has seen far fewer cases than the mainland after Thailand prioritised vaccinations for the population of the resort island.
Under the plan, foreign tourists vaccinated against Covid can bypass quarantine requirements and freely move around the island. After 14 days, barring any coronavirus issues, they can travel elsewhere in the country.
Thailand lost about $50 billion in tourism revenue last year as foreign arrivals plunged 83% to 6.7 million, from a record 39.9 million in 2019. Phuket was hit particularly hard by job losses and business closings.
The new deaths reported on Thursday take Thailand’s total number of fatalities to 2,080 since the pandemic started last year.
The country’s Covid task force also reported 5,533 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of infections to 264,834.
Biden behind on global vaccine delivery
US president Joe Biden came up well short on his goal of delivering 80 million doses of coronavirus vaccine to the rest of the world by the end of June as a host of logistical and regulatory hurdles slowed the pace of vaccine diplomacy, AP reports.
Although the Biden administration has announced that about 50 countries and entities will receive a share of the excess Covid vaccine doses, the U.S. has shipped fewer than 24 million doses to 10 recipient countries, according to an Associated Press tally. The White House says more will be sent in the coming days and stresses that Biden has done everything in his power to meet the commitment.
It’s not for lack of doses. All the American shots are ready to ship, the White House said. Rather, it’s taking more time than anticipated to sort through a complex web of legal requirements, health codes, customs clearances, cold-storage chains, language barriers and delivery programs. Complicating matters even further is that no two shipments are alike.
One country requires an act of its Cabinet to approve the vaccine donation, others require inspectors to conduct their own safety checks on the US doses, and still others have yet to develop critical aspects of their vaccine distribution plans to ensure the doses can reach people’s arms before they spoil.
The White House declined to specify which nations were grappling with which local hurdles, saying it is working with recipient nations on an individual basis to remove obstacles to delivery.
The US recipients to date are Colombia (2.5 million Johnson & Johnson doses), Bangladesh (2.5 million Moderna), Peru (2 million Pfizer), Pakistan (2.5 million Moderna), Honduras (1.5 million Moderna), Brazil (3 million J&J), South Korea (1 million J&J), Taiwan (2.5 million Moderna), Canada (1 million Moderna, 1.5 million AstraZeneca) and Mexico (1.35 million J&J, 2.5 million AstraZeneca). All told, it’s enough vaccine to fully protect 15.9 million people.
Summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic with me, Helen Sullivan.
US president Joe Biden came up well short on his goal of delivering 80 million doses of coronavirus vaccine to the rest of the world by the end of June as a host of logistical and regulatory hurdles slowed the pace of US vaccine diplomacy.
Meanwhile Thailand on Thursday reported a daily record of 57 deaths from the coronavirus, the second day in a row of record-high fatalities as the Southeast Asian country struggles to quell a stubborn third wave of Covid-19 infections.
The report came on the same day as Thailand is kicking off a programme to revive tourism on Phuket, which has seen far fewer cases than the mainland after Thailand prioritised vaccinations for the population of the resort island.
Here are the other key recent developments from around the world:
- India’s version of AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine is not authorised in the EU due to the possibility of “differences” with the original, Europe’s drug regulator said. The African Union yesterday criticised as “inequitable” the decision not to include Covishield, the Indian-made vaccine used by the global Covax programme, on a list of approved vaccines for a digital certificate for travellers in the bloc.
- The prime minister of Portugal, Antonio Costa, went into isolation despite being fully vaccinated, after one of his aides tested positive amid a high in a new wave of infections blamed on the Delta variant.
- India’s disaster management agency was ordered by the country’s supreme court to establish guidelines for paying compensation to bereaved relatives of those who have died from Covid.
- Bangladesh will deploy soldiers tomorrow to enforce a strict lockdown amid a record spike in coronavirus cases driven by the Delta variant first detected in India, the government said.
- The Australian home affairs minister rejected calls to reduce caps on international arrivals amid outbreaks of the Delta variant, saying “we need to learn to live” with Covid.
- France ended most capacity limits imposed in April on restaurants, cinemas, stores and other public venues, although the measures were extended in parts of the southwest over the spread of the Delta variant as the doctor who heads president Emmanuel Macron’s coronavirus advisory panel said a “fourth wave” of cases was likely this autumn.
- Vladimir Putin said for the first time that he was inoculated with Russia’s own Sputnik V vaccine as he gave a careful endorsement of the country’s floundering campaign while distancing himself from tough new measures designed to pressure more Russians into taking the jabs.
- Switzerland is to give 4m doses of AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine that it has reserved to the vaccine-sharing programme Covax, the government has said with the country’s medical regulator, Swissmedic, yet to approve the shot, on grounds it has not received all necessary data from clinical trials.
- Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, fired a health ministry official who reportedly asked for a bribe in a vaccine deal, the latest graft accusation to rock the government amid investigations of its pandemic response.
- Dozens of Italian prison guards beat unarmed inmates with truncheons and fists in the aftermath of a coronavirus-related protest last year, video footage captured on surveillance shows, with fifty-two people working in the prison network facing arrest or legal action in the case this week
- A UK vaccine advisor made a significant intervention to the debate over whether to inoculate children against Covid, saying “it is not immoral to think that they may be better protected by natural immunity generated through infection than by asking them to take the possible risk of a vaccine.”
- Cases of Covid-19 are declining in North America, but in most of Latin America and the Caribbean an end to the pandemic “remains a distant future”, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) director Carissa Etienne said.
- Members of the US military who were vaccinated against Covid showed higher-than-expected rates of heart inflammation, although the condition was still extremely rare, according to a new study.
Updated
