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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Harry Taylor (now); Mattha Busby, Caroline Davies, Martin Belam and Helen Sullivan (earlier)

Brazil records 2,468 new Covid deaths – as it happened

A medical worker prepares a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine in a vaccination centre in Saint-Nazaire, France.
A medical worker prepares a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine in a vaccination centre in Saint-Nazaire, France. Photograph: Stéphane Mahé/Reuters

This blog is closed. Follow the latest updates on the pandemic from around the world:

Bars at full capacity. No masks for vaccinated Disneyland goers. Fans sitting side-by-side at Giants and Dodgers games.

California rolled back its major public health restrictions on Tuesday, 15 months after it became the first state in the US to shut down to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

San Francisco may be first major US city to hit herd immunity, experts sayRead more

At the stroke of midnight, the state lifted most of its restrictions on social distancing and capacity limits. Vaccinated residents can now go without masks in most settings, with some exceptions – including on public transit, in healthcare facilities, homeless shelters and prisons, and indoors in K-12 schools and childcare facilities, since young children still have not been vaccinated.

Lois Beckett in Los Angeles and Peter-Astrid Kane in San Francisco:

Brazil records 2,468 new Covid deaths

Brazil has had its highest daily death toll since 9 June, after registering 2,468 deaths in the last 24 hours.

The country also recorded 80,609 new cases, Reuters reports.

More than 490,696 people have now died in Brazil, with 17,533,211 people having contracted Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic, according to health ministry data.

Alcohol sales are being limited and a curfew is being extended in South Africa, as its government tightens restrictions.

The country, the hardest hit by the pandemic on the continent, has seen the daily figures for new cases double over the past two weeks, according to AFP. Hospital admissions have climbed by nearly 60% in the last fortnight.

President Cyril Ramaphosa said: “A third wave of infections is upon us. We have to contain this new wave of infections.”

The curfew has been extended by an hour and will run from 10pm to 4am, while bars and restaurants will have to shut an hour beforehand.

Alcohol will only be able to be bought in shops during daytime between Monday and Thursday. Limits have also been put in place on public gatherings.

The country has recorded more than 1.76 million coronavirus cases since the start of the pandemic, with 58,087 deaths.

A nurse in PPE stares through the doors of a Covid ward in the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.
A nurse in PPE stares through the doors of a Covid ward in the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

Almost a third of patients admitted to hospital with suspected Covid-19 during the first wave of the pandemic in the UK had a “do not resuscitate” decision recorded before or on their day of admission, research suggests.

This is higher than the rates reported in previous studies of conditions similar to Covid-19 before the pandemic, according to a study from the University of Sheffield’s School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR), one of the first to quantify the use of such orders in the pandemic.

The research, published in the journal Resuscitation, found that 59% of patients with a do not attempt cardiopulmonary resuscitation (DNACPR) decision survived their acute illness and 12% received intensive treatment aimed at saving their life.

The study, funded by the National Institute for Health Research, found 31% of patients admitted to UK hospitals with suspected Covid-19 during the first wave of the pandemic had a DNACPR decision recorded before or on their day of admission to hospital.

Read more:

Updated

Covid jabs to become mandatory for care home staff in England

Covid vaccinations are to become mandatory for care home staff under plans to be announced by ministers, as they consider extending the move to all NHS staff.

The controversial measure sets up a likely battle with staff in both services and could see the government sued under European human rights law or equalities legislation for breaching the freedom of people who work in caring roles to decide what they put into their bodies.

The Guardian understands that ministers will confirm they are pushing ahead with compulsory vaccination for most of the 1.5 million people working in social care in England, despite employer and staff organisations in the sector warning that it could backfire and see workers quit rather than get immunised. Under the plans those working with adults will have 16 weeks to get vaccinated or face losing their jobs.

Protest leaders in Colombia will halt marches in the country’s biggest cities, partially in response to rising Covid rates in the country.

Associated Press reports that at least 50 people have died in the last seven weeks of antigovernment demonstrations.

Members of the national strike committee, a group of unions and student organisations behind the protests, said they will suspend the marches to stop the deaths and in the wake of an all-time high level of Covid deaths.

The death toll in the South American country stands at 96,366 and 588 deaths were recorded on Monday.

Updated

Johnson & Johnson will send 2 million vaccine doses to South Africa by the end of June, Reuters reports.

It’s the same amount that had to be destroyed by the firm’s producer in the country due to a contamination in a US-based ingredient supplier.

President Cyril Ramaphosa told the nation in a televised address that South Africa will move from an adjusted lockdown level 2 to a stricter level 3 amid a surge in infections.

Updated

The US has now given out nearly 311.9m doses of Covid-19 vaccines, according to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

The figures are up from 310.6m compared to Monday, with 145,786,367 people now fully vaccinated.

According to Reuters, the count includes two-dose vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer/BioNtech, as well as the one-shot Johnson & Johnson jab.

Good evening, Harry Taylor here taking over for the rest of the evening.

If you’ve got any Covid-19 comments, tips or suggestions you can contact me by email or Twitter, where my DMs are open.

Updated

Reuters has this from the Puskas Arena in Budapest, where a full house of 67,000 football fans watched Hungary fall 3-0 to Portugal in their European Championship opener.

The deafening roar will have been music to the ears of football fans around the world. Empty or only partly full stadiums have become the norm during the pandemic, often creating a sterile atmosphere for players and viewers alike.

But the Hungarian government has bucked the trend, allowing a full-capacity crowd at the newly built arena, at the behest of football-mad prime minister Viktor Orban.

The populist Orban, in power since 2010 but facing a unified opposition in tough elections next April, has relaxed social distancing regulations to allow fans to sit side-by-side.

Whatever the reasons, though, it made for a raucous atmosphere and gave a definite lift to the home side against their more fancied opponents, the reigning European champions.

Fans were able to gain entry to the stadium if they showed certification that they had been vaccinated against the virus, while entry times at the gates were staggered to try to keep large groups apart outside the venue.

Exhausted nurses in Australia are opting to take shifts in vaccination hubs instead of emergency departments and GP surgeries because they are paid more to deliver vaccinations and can also obtain much-needed respite from overcrowded public hospitals and clinics.

Meanwhile, Australians under the age of 40 without underlying health conditions and who don’t work in high-risk professions are being vaccinated against Covid-19, and are being encouraged to do so by some nurses who say they want to see vaccines in the arms of people willing to receive them as soon as possible.

Summary

  • Ireland will double the quarantine period for unvaccinated or partially vaccinated arrivals from Britain to 10 days but still plans to allow people to move more freely between the two countries from mid-July, transport minister Eamon Ryan said.
  • The pandemic saw corruption worsen across the EU, Transparency International said. The anti-graft watchdog said citizens have at times needed personal connections to get medical care and that some governments have used the crisis for their own gain.
  • China is on track to deliver 1 billion vaccine doses by the end of this week, after ramping up production and distribution networks in an ambitious drive to vaccinate 40% of the population by this month.
  • Slovenia ended its state of emergency declared due to the pandemic today after eight months, lifting most remaining restrictions. Cultural and sports events will be able to reopen at 75%-capacity for people who can demonstrate they have been vaccinated, tested negative or recovered from a previous infection.

New York: 900 people received expired jab as state further eases restrictions

After New York governor Anthony Cuomo’s declaration that the state would immediately ease many of its remaining restrictions due to 70% of adults receiving at least one dose of a Covid vaccine, it has emerged that nearly 900 of those people received an expired jab at a vaccination site in Times Square this month.

The 899 people who received doses of the Pfizer vaccine at the former NFL Experience building in Times Square between 5 June and 10 June should schedule another Pfizer shot as soon as possible, the New York City health department said according to Reuters.

ATC Vaccination Services, the company that administered the shots under contract to the city, said in a statement, “We apologize for the inconvenience to those receiving the vaccine batch in question and want people first and foremost to know that we have been advised that there is no danger from the vaccine they received.”

Health department spokesperson Patrick Gallahue said those who got the expired doses “have received e-mails, phone calls, and are also being sent letters to make sure they are aware of this situation.”

Updated

American Express will allow most employees to work from home for up to two days a week permanently, in a hybrid back-to-office approach in contrast to that of some major Wall Street banks.

Most of the US and UK staff of the credit card issuer will have the choice to work remotely on Mondays and Fridays starting from October, AmEx chief executive officer Stephen Squeri said in an internal memo.

AmEx will begin bringing back employees to the office starting 13 September, with an aim to fully adopt the hybrid model in the week of 4 October. The final decision will, however, depend on local conditions and health authority guidance, the memo said.

Reuters reports that AmEx employees who worked full-time from home before the pandemic hit will continue to do so, while those who cannot “perform their jobs effectively” from home will be required to go to office daily, the memo added.

New York governor Andrew Cuomo has said that 70% of adults in the state have received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine, a threshold he said would immediately lead to the easing of many of its remaining social distancing rules.

“What does 70% mean? It means that we can now return to life as we know it,” Cuomo told an invitation-only crowd at the World Trade Center in Manhattan.

Effective immediately, he said, the state is lifting rules that had limited the size of gatherings and required some types of businesses to follow cleaning protocols or take people’s temperatures or screen them for recent Covid-19 symptoms.

AP reports that businesses will no longer have to follow social distancing rules, or limit how many people they can allow inside based on keeping people two meters apart.

Some rules will remain: New Yorkers, for now, will continue to have to wear masks in schools, subways, large venues, homeless shelters, hospitals, nursing homes, jails and prisons.

It remains unclear how many more people have to get vaccinated to reach herd immunity, which is when enough people have immunity that the virus has trouble spreading.

Just half of all 20 million residents in New York are fully vaccinated, according to federal data as of yesterday.

Over the past seven days, New York has been averaging around 450 new coronavirus cases a day, the lowest level since the pandemic began.

Nigeria is expecting a second shipment of nearly four million doses of Covid-19 vaccines by early August, and plans to resume giving out first doses, which had been halted to save its supply for second doses.

Africa’s most populous nation has so far given a first dose to only around 2 million of its 200 million people. Fewer than 700,000 have received a second dose.

Nigeria has been rationing the 3.92 million doses it has already received through the Covax global vaccine sharing programme in March, with its future supplies put in doubt by an export ban from India.

As of today, Nigeria, which has a population of more than 200 million, had 167,078 cumulative confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 2,117 deaths, though these figures are thought to be an underestimate.

Unitaid has announced it has struck deals with two of the world’s main medical oxygen producers to boost access to badly-needed supplies in poor countries fighting the pandemic.

AFP reports that the international organisation, which works on innovations to prevent, diagnose and treat major diseases in poorer countries, said it had signed agreements with Air Liquide and Linde.

Oxygen is vital in saving the lives of hospitalised Covid-19 patients, but the crisis has seen drastic shortages around the world.

Unitaid executive director Philippe Duneton said:

This is the first time such an agreement has been made to help facilitate equitable access to oxygen, an essential, life-saving medicine.

We hope that other oxygen suppliers will now follow suit and come to the table. There is a real opportunity to change the course of history - both for the Covid-19 pandemic, and for other areas where medical oxygen is so vital but has been often lacking.

Former Swedish prime minister Carl Bildt, the WHO’s ACT-A special envoy, said: “Without a much-improved supply of oxygen we will see the global numbers of people dying from Covid rising even faster. These pioneering oxygen agreements are urgently needed to save lives.”

Former White House Covid adviser Andy Slavitt has come under fire from the right for saying Americans could have avoided such severe losses if they had been prepared to “sacrifice a little bit for one another”.

Throughout the pandemic, Republicans have been less likely to wear masks and observe other public health measures meant to mitigate virus transmission. Donald Trump eschewed social distancing guidelines to hold rallies or events. His supporters are now more likely to say they will “definitely not” get vaccinated than Democrats or independents.

Slavitt left the Biden administration this month. His remarks on CBS yesterday echoed past comments about the importance of wearing masks and social distancing to protect essential workers.

We would have had a pandemic here in the US no matter what, but we can count the mistakes. We obviously had a set of technical mistakes with the testing and the PPE that we know about.

We all need to look at one another, and ask ourselves what do we need to do better next time, and in many respects being able to to sacrifice a little bit for one another to get through this and save more lives … I think that’s something we could have all done a little better on.

Updated

Here’s the full story on Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon suggesting a further relaxation of Covid controls across the country could be relaxed, from my colleague Libby Brooks.

An international cruise ship carrying German tourists docked today in Malaga, southern Spain, the first such arrival in more than a year.

On 7 June, Spain lifted a ban on international cruise ships that had been imposed at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020. “This is the first international cruise ship,” a spokesman for Spain’s port authorities told AFP after the Mein Schiff 2 docked in the southern resort.

The liner, which belongs to tour operator TUI, has 1,200 German tourists on board, a company spokesman said, saying all had passed “two obligatory Covid tests” before embarking. There are also 764 crew on board.

“After 15 months in which our ports have stood empty, of waiting for these ships, we’re all committed to making it an unforgettable experience for the passengers,” Carlos Rubio, president of Malaga’s port authority told RNE.

He said the visitors were being allowed off in organised groups, however, to ensure Covid safety regulations were adhered to.

“With these first cruises, the excursions are going to be in bubbles, meaning people won’t be able to walk around freely but I hope within a few months, as the vaccination progresses, things can get back to normal.”

Rubio said Malaga was expecting to receive around 50 stopovers this year, describing it as “a good start”.

German tourists disembark for sightseeing from the cruise ship after it was docked at dawn in Malaga port today.
German tourists disembark for sightseeing from the cruise ship after it was docked at dawn in Malaga port today. Photograph: Jon Nazca/Reuters

EMA denies official suggested dropping AstraZeneca jab

The European Medicines Agency has denied that a top official suggested dropping the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine, saying that he had been misinterpreted in an interview. However, it did not appear to provide a clarification.

Marco Cavaleri, the EMA’s head of vaccine strategy, was quoted by Italian newspaper La Stampa on Sunday as saying it could be worth dropping AstraZeneca including for the over-60s in favour of others like Pfizer and Moderna.

AstraZeneca has been dogged by reports of rare blood clots, as has its fellow “viral vector” vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson, which have led a number of countries to restrict its use to older people or drop it altogether. Pfizer and Moderna use Messenger RNA technology instead.

An EMA spokeswoman told AFP in an emailed statement that “Dr Cavaleri’s position was particularly misrepresented”.

In response to the specific question on the use of Vaxzevria above the age of 60, Marco Cavaleri never stated that such use should be discontinued. On the contrary, it is clear that the benefit-risk profile in individuals over the age of 60 is even more positive and Vaxzevria should continue to be used.

The position, clearly expressed by Dr Cavaleri during the interview, is that the Vaxzevria benefit-risk profile remains positive and that the decision on its use in different populations and ages is the prerogative of the EU member states, based on specific factors such as virus circulation and vaccine availability.

La Stampa later appended a clarification to the interview (paywall). The newspaper had quoted him as saying, when asked if it would not be better to ban AstraZeneca, including for the over 60s: “Yes, and it is an option that many countries, such as France and Germany, are considering in the light of the increased availability of mRNA vaccines.”

Cavaleri also said: “We leave the choice on the use of AstraZeneca to the individual states”.

Italy on Saturday restricted AstraZeneca to people aged 60 and over following concerns about the heightened health risks for younger people.

Nightclubs in Democratic Republic of the Congo must close and funeral wakes will be banned for two weeks in the face of a third wave of Covid cases, president Felix Tshisekedi has announced.

Speaking in the eastern city of Goma, Tshisekedi said he hoped the measures will be effective, notably against the “highly contagious” Delta variant first detected in India.

AFP reports that the vast central African country of at least 80 million people has had fewer than 40,000 cases and a total of 854 deaths since March 2020. But daily cases have risen with 250 new infections recorded on Tuesday including 218 in the capital Kinshasa.

Tshisekedi said a nighttime curfew from 10 pm to 5 am will remain in effect, “with military patrols, [and] violators will be severely punished.” Funeral wakes, a mainstay of Congolese social life, were also prohibited during the first wave of the pandemic in the former Belgian colony.

The increase in Covid cases has forced the authorities to postpone a tribute to Patrice Lumumba, a revolutionary figure who helped steer the former Belgian Congo to independence but was assassinated by US and Belgium-backed killers.

For more than a year, people who have wanted to get within breathing distance of Vladimir Putin have performed a ritual, two-week quarantine in Russian hotels and sanatoriums to protect the 68-year-old president from falling ill with coronavirus.

Since March 2020, powerful business people, regional governors, his pilots and medical staff, volunteers at an economic conference, and even second world war veterans have shut themselves away to meet the Kremlin leader or even stand in his general vicinity.

So it will be a rare sit-down when Putin jets into Geneva to meet Joe Biden, who has been on a whirlwind tour through Europe, attending the G7 summit in Cornwall and then flying to Brussels for meetings with EU and Nato leaders before travelling to Switzerland.

Putin has not publicly travelled abroad since the outbreak of coronavirus in early 2020, hosting foreign leaders in Moscow or Sochi and holding most of his meetings with government ministers and regional governors over videoconference.

At least seven people in five US states were infected with Covid weeks before those states reported their first cases, a new US government study has showed.

More than 24,000 blood samples taken for a National Institutes of Health research program between 2 January and 18 March 2020 were analysed and seven participants reported antibodies against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, Reuters reports.

The positive samples came from Illinois, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the researchers said.

Greenland has cancelled all flights and ship departures from its capital Nuuk after registering six cases of Covid-19, Greenlandic Sermitsiaq newspaper reported.

“We have a spread of infection in Nuuk and one infected in Ilulissat,” Greenland’s chief medical officer Henrik Hansen told a press briefing according to Sermitsiaq.

Slovenia is to end its state of emergency declared due to the pandemic today after eight months, lifting most remaining restrictions, the health ministry said.

Cultural and sports events will be able to reopen at 75%-capacity for people who can demonstrate they have been vaccinated, tested negative or recovered from a previous infection.

Some protection measures will remain in force, such as the requirement to wear face masks indoors in public and maintain a safe distance from others, said the state secretary in the health ministry, Franc Vindisar.

Today, Slovenia reported 112 new cases of Covid-19 and two deaths. Some 45% of Slovenia’s adult population has received one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, while 32% received two shots, Reuters reports.

Oman has announced that its doctors have detected a potentially fatal fungal infection afflicting some coronavirus patients, the first such known cases on the Arabian peninsula as the sultanate faces a surge in Covid-19 infections.

AP has the story:

The country’s Health Ministry reported that three Covid-19 patients in Oman have become infected with mucormycosis, a life-threatening condition commonly known as “black fungus,” which has spread quickly among virus patients in India. It was not immediately clear what condition the three patients were in.

Although the disease remains relatively rare, its sudden increase has stirred fears among doctors and health officials struggling to combat Covid-19 surges around the world.

Omani doctors warned earlier this week that the sultanate faces an acute shortage of beds amid the proliferation of highly transmissible coronavirus variants, a sputtering vaccine rollout and relaxed movement restrictions.

That medical workers complained about the dire shortfalls on state TV underscored the extent of the health crisis in Oman, where media is tightly controlled. Omani authorities said the infectious delta variant, first detected in India, is coursing through the Gulf Arab state.

Oman’s cases have more than tripled in the past month, with authorities recording over 2,000 new cases and 33 deaths today.

Mexico aims to gradually lift pandemic restrictions on its shared border with the US as it progresses in vaccinating its local population against Covid, Mexican foreign minister Marcelo Ebrard said.

Ebrard was speaking at a regular news conference ahead of meetings with US homeland security chief Alejandro Mayorkas in which the reopening of the border is due to be discussed.

Earlier today, Mexico received a consignment of some 1.35 million doses of Johnson & Johnson vaccines from the US that will go towards inoculating Mexican border residents aged 18 and above, the government said.

The goal is to ensure Mexico’s frontier cities have the same level of protection against Covid-19 as US cities so there is no longer an argument to uphold restrictions, Ebrard said.

Holiday bookings for summer 2022 are “significantly” ahead of normal, according to online UK travel agent On The Beach, as the prospect of a break in the sun this year recedes.

Scotland likely to postpone further easing of lockdown, says first minister

The Scottish government is likely to postpone the planned move to Level 0 of coronavirus restrictions on June 28 for three weeks, Nicola Sturgeon has announced.

In a statement at the Scottish parliament, the first minister said caution was needed to provide extra time to push ahead with vaccinations.

Given the current situation - and the need to get more people fully vaccinated before we ease up further - it is reasonable to indicate now that I think it unlikely that any part of the country will move down a level from 28 June.

Instead, it is likely that we will opt to maintain restrictions for a further three weeks from 28 June and use that time to vaccinate - with both doses - as many more people as possible.

Doing that will give us the best chance, later in July, of getting back on track and restoring the much greater normality that we all crave.

She said the decision would be confirmed at Holyrood next week, following a planned review of the current levels.

Earlier, Scottish government figures indicated Scotland has recorded two coronavirus deaths and 974 new cases in the past 24 hours. It brings the death toll under this measure, of people who first tested positive for the virus within the previous 28 days, to 7,683.

The daily positivity rate was 5%, down from 5.2% the previous day, according to figures published by the Scottish government today.

There were 137 people in hospital on Monday with recently confirmed Covid-19, up from 128 on Sunday. Seventeen people were in intensive care, no change on the day before.

So far 3,531,461 people have received the first dose of a Covid vaccination and 2,470,181 have received their second dose, of the 5.5 million population.

The World Health Organization has warned that Covid-19 is moving faster than the vaccines, and said the vow by G7 countries to share a billion doses with poorer nations was simply not enough.

“This is a big help, but we need more, and we need them faster. Right now, the virus is moving faster than the global distribution of vaccines,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists. “More than 10,000 people are dying every day ... these communities need vaccines, and they need them now, not next year.”

Israel and the UK were viewed as world leaders in their coronavirus vaccine campaigns but whereas the former is lifting almost all pandemic limitations, the latter is now glumly extending its restrictions in England amid a sharp rise in infections.

Despite starting its mass inoculation programme after the UK in December, Israel has sped ahead and reached a key milestone today, scrapping a requirement to wear face masks indoors, one of the final Covid limitations.

Vermont has become the first US state to reach its 80% Covid-19 vaccination goal and is now shedding all its statewide pandemic restrictions, including letting a state of emergency expire tonight.

State governor Phil Scott made the announcement yesterday and said he would drop existing physical distancing, crowd size restrictions and masking requirements.

“There are no longer any state Covid-19 restrictions. None,” the Republican governor announced. But Scott said he would allow municipalities and businesses to continue practices if they choose to do so.

A 12-year-old French boy, Perceval Gete, has become one of the youngest people in Europe to receive a Covid-19 vaccination.

Due to his young age, the nurse administering the jab had to use a special child-size needle. His mother brought him to a vaccination centre near Paris today, the first day the age eligibility in France was lowered to 12, Reuters reports.

“I wanted it to be done as soon as possible,” his mother, Melanie Gete, said at the vaccination centre in the suburb of Vitry-sur-Seine after he had the jab. She added that the more people get inoculated, the sooner restrictions can be lifted.

France’s government has made people from 12 years upwards eligible for the Covid-19 vaccination, provided they have parental consent, the lowest of any major EU state.

Nurse Aurelie Job, who administered the vaccine, used a needle which is around half the length of the standard size used for adults.

“Children have smaller arms so we need smaller needles to vaccinate children,” she said. “It prevents us from touching the bone while vaccinating children, and it’s less upsetting for them.”

China is on track to deliver 1 billion vaccine doses by the end of this week, after ramping up production and distribution networks in an ambitious drive to vaccinate 40% of the population by this month.

Chinese authorities have been encouraging people to take the free and voluntary doses with cash incentives, gifts and colour-coded signage to laud or shame businesses depending on vaccination rates, as well as the promise of protection against Covid-19.

The pandemic has seen corruption worsen across the EU, Transparency International (TI) has said.

The anti-graft watchdog surveyed more than 40,000 people in the EU’s 27 member states between October and December 2020. It said citizens have at times needed personal connections to get medical care and that some governments have used the crisis for their own gain.

On average, it found that 29% had relied on favours or well-connected friends and family to access public sector health services last year, while 6% of respondents resorted to paying an outright bribe, Agence France-Presse reports.

“Healthcare, in particular, has been a corruption hotspot as governments struggled to manage the Covid-19 pandemic,” TI said in its annual report of people’s experiences and perceptions of graft in the EU.

Bribery rates in the health sector were highest in Romania (22%) and Bulgaria (19%), while leaning on personal connections happened most often in the Czech Republic (54%) and Portugal (46%).

Many respondents also said their governments weren’t handling the pandemic in a transparent manner. In France, Poland and Spain, 60% of respondents or more felt that way.

TI said:

Not only are Covid-19 sufferers in need of medical support, but governments across the EU are rolling out vaccinations to protect those most vulnerable to the virus and are creating plans to allocate billions of euros for post-pandemic recovery. Corruption threatens all these activities.

The report singled out Hungary and Poland as countries using the crisis as “an excuse to undermine democracy” by imposing regulations that weaken democratic institutions.

Other politicians saw it “as a chance to make a profit”, they said, pointing to lobbying for face-mask procurement and lobbying scandals that have ensnared several German lawmakers.

Updated

A veteran public health expert warned top Indian officials in early March that a new variant of the coronavirus was spreading quickly in a rural district in the heart of the country and that the outbreak required urgent attention.

Reuters has the story:

Federal health authorities failed to respond adequately to that warning, Dr Subhash Salunke, who has 30 years of experience in public health in India, Indonesia and the US, said.

The variant’s first impact was detected in the Amravati district of the western state of Maharashtra, where health authorities recorded a rapid increase in coronavirus infections in early February, even as cases fell elsewhere in India.

Salunke, a former WHO official advising the Maharashtra government, said he alerted some of India’s most senior health officials in early March, speaking on the telephone to prime minister Narendra Modi’s main coronavirus adviser, V.K. Paul, and the head of the National Centre for Disease Control, Sujeet Kumar Singh.

Salunke told Reuters he warned both Paul and Singh that the virus was showing signs of mutating in Amravati, that its transmissibility was increasing, and requested federal help in sequencing more samples to establish how the variant was behaving. “In spite of a public health person like me giving them a sound warning, they did not take heed,” Salunke said.

In response to Reuters’ questions, Paul said he spoke with Salunke, but described the conversation as Salunke conveying information rather than issuing a warning.

He rejected Salunke’s accusation that he did not take heed, saying he requested that India*s National Institute of Virology study the variant more closely, and told the Maharashtra state government to intensify its existing response to the virus.

A huge red banner welcomed more than 11,000 students in Wuhan for a massive graduation ceremony over a year after the city was hit by the first global outbreak of Covid-19.

AFP has the story:

Students in navy gowns and mortarboards sat in crowded rows, without social distancing or face masks, beneath the sign that read: “Welcoming the graduates of 2020 back home. We wish you all a great future.”

The city held limited graduation ceremonies last year, with Wuhan University hosting a mostly-online event in June last year, with the students and teachers who did attend all in masks.

More than 2,200 students at Sunday’s ceremony were graduates who could not attend their graduation last year due to tight virus restrictions.

Quoting a line of ancient Chinese poetry, the banner offered students advice for the future: “The ocean is boundless for leaping fish.”

The number of children absent from school in England with confirmed cases of Covid has shot up from 4,000 confirmed cases the week before the half-term break at the end of May, to 7,000 cases in the first week back in the classroom, official figures show.

The figures do not include cases among year 11 and year 13 students, most of whom have finished school for the term and so have not been counted.

The combination of the half-term closure for schools and colleges and the effect of around a million students not being counted may be behind the steep fall in the number of pupils absent with suspected cases, down from 19,000 to 11,000 on June 10.

The number of pupils self-isolating because of contacts within education shrank from 90,000 to 40,000. But the number self-isolating because of contacts outside school rose from 26,000 to 42,000.

Overall, 1.3% of pupils in state secondaries were absent for Covid-related reasons on 10 June, compared with 2% the week before half-term.

A Covid treatment made from a combination of two antibodies by AstraZeneca has failed in its main goal to treat symptoms in patients exposed to the virus, the company has said.

The pharma giant said that 1,121 unvaccinated adults had been exposed to an infected person as part of the trial. Treatment AZD7442 reduced the risk of developing symptoms by only 33%, which was “not statistically significant”, it added.

The treatment has been undergoing phase 3 or final clinical trials to assess its safety and efficacy. The company is nevertheless continuing trials to assess whether the drug can prevent Covid or treat more severe symptoms.

The US government has funded the development of AZD7442 and has agreements to receive 700,000 doses.

Updated

The Covid Delta variant, which experts estimate to be more infectious than other variants, currently represents 2-4% of confirmed cases in France, the country’s health minister Olivier Veran has said.

Veran added this meant France was registering between 50-150 cases a day of the Delta variant, highlighting the importance of measures to limit the spread of the virus.

“We are in the process of crushing the virus and crushing the pandemic, and we must in no way let the Indian variant get the upper hand so that it leads to another wave of the pandemic,” Veran told reporters at a Paris vaccination centre.

Yesterday, British prime minister Boris Johnson delayed plans to lift most remaining Covid-19 restrictions by a month, citing the dangers posted by the Delta variant, first recorded in India.

France’s Covid case numbers have steadily gone down over the last two months after the country eased its third, national lockdown.

Companies are hoping to cash in on what has become one of the inarguable winners in the pandemic economy – virtual healthcare – by offering subscriptions to circumvent the complex US health insurance system.

Pakistan has lifted a rule barring the use of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine for people below 40 years old, in a bid to help inoculate people who need to travel for education or jobs abroad, particularly Saudi Arabia, a health official has said.

The south Asian country, which receives a quarter of its total remittances from its expatriate workers in Saudi Arabia, has primarily used Chinese vaccines - Sinopharm, CanSinoBio and Sinovac - in its inoculation drive and, until now, only used AstraZeneca for those above 40.

Reuters reports that the Saudi authorities have not approved the Chinese shots, so people with only those vaccinations still need to quarantine, which is unaffordable for many, Faisal Sultan, a health adviser to the prime minister, said.

“From today, we have lifted the restriction for use of AstraZeneca for below 40 years,” Sultan told news channel Geo television.

There are danger signs lurking in the UK’s unemployment figures. For government ministers, cheered by the resilient jobs market, it may be a little premature to crack open the champagne. It is plausible that the current benign situation turns decidedly worse in the autumn.

The Serum Institute of India is preparing to produce Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine in the country, government official Vinod Kumar Paul has said.

The vaccine maker yesterday said its jab was more than 90% effective in a large, late-stage US-based clinical trial.

Mattha Busby here, to take you through the next few hours. Hello to everyone reading, and thanks to my colleagues Caroline and Martin. If you would like to share any thoughts or tips, please contact me on Twitter or via email on mattha.busby.freelance@guardian.co.uk

That’s it from me, Caroline Davies, for now. Handing over the blog a little earlier than I anticipated. My colleague Mattha Busby will take you through the next few hours. Thanks for your time.

Over-18s to be eligible for a jab in England from end of this week, says health boss

In England all adults should be able to book a coronavirus vaccination by the end of this week, Sir Simon Stevens, the NHS England chief executive, has said.

Stevens told the NHS Confederation annual conference:

It is now very important that we use the next four weeks to finish the job to the greatest extent possible for the Covid vaccination programme, which has been a historic signature achievement in terms of the effectiveness of delivering by the NHS - over 60 million doses now administered.

By July 19 we aim to have offered perhaps two-thirds of adults across the country double jabbed.

And we’re making great strides also in extending the offer to all adults - today people aged 23 and 24 are able to vaccinate through the national booking service.

I expect that by the end of this week, we’ll be able to open up the national booking service to all adults age 18 and above.

Of course, vaccine supply continues to be constrained, so we’re pacing ourselves at precisely the rate of which we’re getting that extra vaccine supply between now and 19 July.

Updated

EasyJet has moved aircraft from the UK to Germany in response to the countries’ differing approaches to coronavirus travel restrictions.
The PA news agency reports that a number of planes due to take holidaymakers from the UK to Palma on the Spanish island of Mallorca are departing from Berlin instead, the airline said.

EasyJet said in a statement:

“With 50% of easyJet’s flying intra-Europe, we are seeing European governments are progressively opening up using frameworks in place which enable travel and much of it restriction-free.

And this relaxation and removal of restrictions has sparked a positive booking momentum across Europe with the majority of our bookings showing a strong swing towards Europe when in normal times it would be a 50/50 split with the UK.

We are fortunate that we are able to redirect flying on our European network, for example we have moved capacity from the UK to Palma to Berlin-Palma flying, and over the past week we have added 150,000 further seats to our intra-European network.

Europe is demonstrating that a safe reopening of travel is possible and so we continue to urge the UK Government to do so urgently so our customers can reunite with loved ones or travel for a much-needed break.

The Guardian’s Nicola Davis has compiled a useful up-to-date explainer on protection offered by vaccines against the Delta variant.

You can read it here:

Japan’s vaccine programme chief has said that the requirement for domestic clinical trials for Covid-19 vaccines cost it precious time in inoculating its population.

About 4.8% of the population has been fully vaccinated, according to a Reuters tracker, which is the lowest rate among large wealthy economies at a time when tens of thousands of visitors are poised to arrive for the Tokyo Olympics starting on July 23.

Reuters reports Taro Kono as saying:

If I could go back all the way to the beginning, I would have probably scrapped the clinical trial that we did.

It’s probably necessary for ordinary times, but in the case of emergency, or state of emergency, like COVID-19, I think we should have started the vaccination as early as possible.

Japan’s mid-February start of vaccinations lagged most major economies and was dependent on initially scarce doses of Pfizer Inc’s vaccine imported from overseas.

Kono, the administrative reform minister tapped to head the programme in January, said opposition parties pushed for domestic trials and media would have pilloried the government if accidents had happened without them.

But some public health experts have said the domestic trials, involving 200 subjects or fewer, were scientifically meaningless.

In recent weeks, the vaccine campaign has picked up steam and is set to accelerate now that thousands of companies have signed up to use government supplies to administer shots to employees and families.

Kono said he hoped daily vaccinations would hit one million by the end of June, up from about 700,000 now.

Hi. Caroline Davies here, taking over the blog for the next few hours. You can get in touch on caroline.davies@theguardian.com

That’s it from me, Martin Belam, this morning. My colleague Caroline Davies will be along shortly to take you through the next few hours of global coronavirus news. If it is UK Covid news you are after, then Andrew Sparrow has that over on his live blog. I’ll see you here again bright and early tomorrow.

Rates of vaccination in Russia 'leave a lot to be desired' – Kremlin spokesperson

Just a quick one from Reuters here, that the Kremlin said on Tuesday it was not satisfied by the slow rate of vaccinations in Russia, and that it saw inoculations as the only way to beat the coronavirus pandemic.

Russia has recorded a surge in coronavirus cases in the last week. Authorities reported more than 14,700 infections on Sunday, the largest one-day tally since February.

“We should probably all be unsatisfied with the rates of vaccination,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “They leave a lot to be desired.”

Russia was, of course, fast out of the traps in getting the Sputnik V vaccine developed and approved for use, but seems to have squandered that advantage for now.

Ireland to double quarantine period for unvaccinated or partially vaccinated arrivals from Britain to 10 days

Ireland will double the quarantine period for unvaccinated or partially vaccinated arrivals from Britain to 10 days but still plans to allow people to move more freely between the two countries from mid-July, transport minister Eamon Ryan said.

The change is due to the rapid spread of the more infectious Delta variant in Britain, which delayed plans to lift most remaining Covid-19 restrictions in England.

“It is just to reflect concern about the Delta variant and to try and hold back the development of that variant here as much as we can and give us time to get vaccines out to give us cover against it,” Ryan told reporters on Tuesday.

Ireland has the strictest travel restrictions in the EU and its advice against non-essential travel will remain in place until 19 July 19 when it adopts the European Union’s Covid-19 certificate and applies the same approach to Britain.

Padraic Halpin report for Reuters that unvaccinated arrivals must currently present a negative test and self-quarantine for five days until they take a second post-arrival test. Travellers from Britain will now have to take an additional test after quarantining for 10 days.

Ryan said he hoped the 10-day quarantine for unvaccinated or partially vaccinated arrivals from Britain would only be place until 19 July.

He added that falling Covid case numbers meant Ireland was still on track to loosen its economic restrictions from 5 July when pubs and restaurants are due to be allowed to serve customers indoors for the first time this year.

Today so far…

  • Several Russian regions tightened coronavirus restrictions and said they were increasing hospital capacity for an influx of patients after a steep rise in Covid-19 cases.
  • Japan will send a million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam, foreign minister Toshimitsu Motegi said, as the south-east Asian nation steps up vaccine procurement to fight a more stubborn wave of infections.
  • Dr Shi Zhengli, the scientist from Wuhan who has regularly featured in narratives that the virus originated from a lab leak there, has given some rare words to the New York Times, saying: “How on earth can I offer up evidence for something where there is no evidence? I don’t know how the world has come to this, constantly pouring filth on an innocent scientist.”
  • As the rate of coronavirus infections in Germany continues to fall, mandatory mask-wearing rules are set to be relaxed around the country.
  • Israel has told its citizens they could stop wearing masks indoors, ending one of its last main restrictions as new Covid-19 infections continued to wane even as vaccinations tapered off after a record rollout.
  • As cities unlocked, thousands of commuters crowded into underground train stations and shopping malls in India this morning prompting some doctors to warn it could lead to a resurgence in Covid infections.
  • Taiwan has reported 132 local cases, the third consecutive day with a daily figure below 200 in an outbreak which started in late April. Eight more people have died.
  • Hong Kong providers of shipping services are breathing a sigh of relief after authorities announced they would ease strict quarantine restrictions imposed last July on vessels calling at the Asian shipping hub, trade sources said.
  • Uganda has all but run out of Covid-19 vaccines and oxygen as the country grapples with another wave of the pandemic.
  • The UK’s unemployment rate has fallen again as more people returned to work as pandemic restrictions were eased.
  • Government minister Michael Gove has defended the UK’s delay in putting India on its ‘red list’ for international travel, saying it was done at “the earliest, appropriate opportunity on the basis of all the evidence that we had”. Gove also suggested the UK would have to learn to live with Covid deaths at a certain level.

Hong Kong providers of shipping services are breathing a sigh of relief after authorities announced they would ease strict quarantine restrictions imposed last July on vessels calling at the Asian shipping hub, trade sources said.

From Tuesday, crew of non-cargo goods vessels visiting Hong Kong for shipping services, including bunkering and provision supplies, will be exempt from the curbs, subject to conditions, the Marine Department told shipping firms in a letter.

“This is a long overdue relaxation as the trade had already demonstrated to the health authority here in Hong Kong that there is no human contact throughout the process,” Frankie Yick, a transport sector legislator, told Roslan Khasawneh at Reuters.

Hong Kong’s bunkering industry, which is among the world’s top 10, was hit hard by the strict 14-day quarantine requirement imposed on crew of vessels calling for reasons other than to load or discharge cargo.

Ship operators opted instead to refuel in neighbouring ports, such as China, Singapore and Taiwan, several industry sources said.

Yick said Hong Kong’s bunkering industry was “seriously affected” by last year’s restrictions, which took volumes down by about 70% from levels before the pandemic.

With cases 50% down on last week, mask rules set to be relaxed around Germany

As the rate of coronavirus infections in Germany continues to fall, mandatory mask-wearing rules are set to be relaxed around the country.

Berlin’s senate is today expected to announce that people will no longer have to wear face masks in busy shopping streets or zoos. Visitors to theatres, cinemas or opera houses will probably be allowed to wear simple cloth masks rather than medical FFP2 masks. A night-time ban on drinking in public spaces is also expected to be lifted in the German capital.

Some politicians are urging the government to scrap mask-wearing rules altogether. “While we have an incidence rate below 35, the state is no longer to impose wholesale restrictions on the fundamental rights of its citizens”, said Wolfgang Kubicki of the Free Democratic party (FDP).

Health policy expert Karl Lauterbach of the Social Democrats, junior partners in Angela Merkel’s coalition government, said it was important for people to continue wearing masks at indoor gatherings until more than 70% of the population had been vaccinated.

As of Tuesday morning, 48.7% of the German population has received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine. The country’s disease control agency reported 652 new infections on Tuesday – roughly 50% down on the same point last week – and 95 new deaths.

Updated

My colleague Andrew Sparrow has the UK live blog up and running for the day – so you can follow all the latest developments there. I’ll be continuing here with global coronavirus news.

Our community team would like to hear how you have been affected by the ending of all Covid restrictions in England being delayed for four weeks. You can get in touch with them here.

Scientists Gregory D Koblenz and Filippa Lentzos write for us this morning that whether Covid escaped from a lab or not, it’s time to talk about biosecurity:

The controversy has brought renewed attention to biosafety, biosecurity, “gain-of-function” and other “dual-use” research, along with consideration of the level of oversight that such labs should be operating under. Although this debate has become polarised and politicised, we should not lose sight of the importance of these issues, even if it turns out this lab had nothing to do with the emergence of the novel coronavirus. Concerns about whether labs are conducting their research safely, securely and responsibly are not new, or of relevance solely to labs in China – as revealed by a comprehensive study on global BSL-4 labs that we recently completed.

Based on open-source research, we have compiled a list of BSL-4 labs around the world in the form of an interactive website at globalbiolabs.org. Our research identified nearly 60 BSL-4 labs in operation, under construction or planned across 23 countries, including seven in the UK. Given recent concerns about biosafety, it is worth noting that three-quarters of these labs are located in urban areas. More than half are government-run, public health institutions. The remaining labs are evenly split between being housed at universities and located at government agencies involved in biodefence, with a small number of private labs in operation as well. Regardless of who runs them, they are used either to diagnose infections with highly lethal and transmissible pathogens, or conduct research on such pathogens to develop new medical countermeasures and diagnostics tests or to improve our scientific understanding of how these pathogens work.

Read more here: Gregory D Koblenz and Filippa Lentzos – Whether Covid escaped from a lab or not, it’s time to talk about biosecurity

If you missed Michael Gove’s various appearances on UK media this morning, here are the key points he made while defending the UK government’s decision to delay reopening the economy in England from 21 June to 19 July.

  • He denied that the government delayed putting India on the ‘red list’ for international travel because Boris Johnson wanted to make a trade trip to India. Pakistan and Bangladesh were put on the red list at a point when India had a higher number of infections per million people than either of them.
  • He said “what we want to do is make sure that when we do make that move that we don’t go back. The worst thing for any of us, would be to open up again and then to very quickly find that we had to reimpose restrictions.”
  • “It would require an unprecedented and remarkable alteration in the progress of the disease” for the date to be moved again, he said.
  • He didn’t sound optimistic about travel in the summer, saying he had not booked a holiday.

If you are really into the dates, stats and who said what when about the ‘red list’, there’s a decent fact-check from the BBC here.

Several Russian regions tighten coronavirus restrictions amid steep case rise

Several Russian regions tightened coronavirus restrictions on Tuesday and said they were increasing hospital capacity for an influx of patients after a steep rise in Covid-19 cases.

Authorities reported more than 14,700 infections on Sunday, the largest one-day tally since February. Over the weekend, St Petersburg, which is hosting matches in Euro 2020, and Moscow said they were imposing new curbs.

The local government in the far eastern region of Primorye said on Tuesday two hospitals would open in coming days in the cities of Ussuriysk and Vladivostok, and that they had created hundreds of new beds since April to treat Covid-19 patients.

“We’re now seeing a similar pattern to last year’s spring wave. First there was an increase in Europe, a few weeks later in central Russia, and 2-3 weeks after that in large cities of Primorye,” said the local health minister.

Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber reports from Moscow for Reuters that the region of Buryatia in eastern Siberia said it needed more intensive care beds after a rise in cases this month. Public areas including parks, squares and swimming pools would be closed until 1 July, authorities in Buryatia said. Sports in gyms and indoor and outdoor facilities were suspended.

In the oil-producing Siberian region of Yugra, authorities banned large public events of more than 20 people. It said workers returning to the region from 20 June would have to first test negative for Covid-19 or show they have been vaccinated.

In the Arctic region of Murmansk, restaurants were banned from working overnight and a third of state employees were told to work remotely, the RIA news agency reported.

Taiwan reports 132 cases – third consecutive day with a daily figure below 200

Taiwan has reported 132 local cases, the third consecutive day with a daily figure below 200 in an outbreak which started in late April. Eight more people have died.

The most cases were again in New Taipei with 65, followed by Taipei at 26 and Miaoli with 18. Miaoli is home to several factories which have recorded outbreaks among their employees with most cases linked to migrant workers who are housed in dormitories.

Taiwan is currently on level 3 restrictions, limiting gatherings, closing entertainment, sport and public venues, and restricting restaurants to takeaway. In some regions beaches and outdoor areas have been closed to the public. The order has been in place since 19 May and was extended to the end of this month.

Health and welfare minister Chen Shih-chung said the number of cases and deaths had started to drop, which was positive, but also flagged high rates of 10-15% positive infections expected as authorities start testing all migrant workers quarantined in Miaoli.

The issue of migrant workers in Taiwan, including the conditions they live in and the rights afforded to them, has been a hot topic in Taiwan in the past week or so. Local governments and some companies are enforcing restrictions and rules that go far beyond the requirements set by the central epidemic command centre.

The Guardian reported on Friday on one company which had ordered workers who lived in their own homes to return to the dorms or face penalties. The company has said it plans to move people out of dorms into hostels and other accommodations to reduce the risk of spread.

But human rights groups have criticised the order, which included a ban on anyone leaving their accommodation except to go to work. A similar order was made by the county government in Miaoli.

Critics pointed to the lack of any similar order on local employees who work alongside the thousands of migrant workers, accusing the local governments and companies of discrimination.

The CECC has reminded local governments to only follow their requirements, but there doesn’t appear to be any attempt to enforce this.

Authorities are currently inspecting migrant worker dorms across Taiwan, to ensure they meet disease prevention standards set for this outbreak. Chen told the press conference this afternoon that of the 1,164 dorms with more than 50 residents inspected so far, more than 80% were up to standard, while the rest needed to make changes, according to local media.

Neha Arora and Uday Sampath Kumar report from New Delhi for Reuters that thousands of commuters crowded into underground train stations and shopping malls in India this morning prompting some doctors to warn it could lead to a resurgence in Covid infections.

Major Indian cities have begun lifting strict lockdowns as the nationwide tally of new infections has dropped to its lowest level in more than two months. But disease experts and doctors have cautioned that a race towards resuming business as usual would compromise vaccination efforts as only about 5% of all 950 million eligible adults have been inoculated.

Doctors say Delhi’s near-complete re-opening is concerning. The city’s authorities have said they would reimpose strict curbs if cases rise.

“Delhi’s top mall saw a footfall of 19,000 people last weekend- as soon as it reopened. Have we gone totally mad?” Ambrish Mithal of Max HealthCare in New Delhi said on Twitter. “Wait for Covid to explode again- and blame the government, hospitals, country.”

In the early hours of Tuesday, Delhi’s underground rail network put out alerts on Twitter about peak traffic and longer waits, responding to angry commuters angry about long queues.

After a strict five-week lockdown in Delhi, authorities have fully re-opened shops and malls, and allowed restaurants to have 50% seating. Suburban rail networks can run at 50% capacity, and offices have been partially reopened.

Vaccinations have slowed, however; the city government said inoculation centres for people ages 18-44 would start shutting down on Tuesday, as doses were scarce.

“Delhi ought to have unlocked far more scientifically. We are inviting trouble!” Arvinder Singh Soin, a surgeon and leading liver transplant specialist, said on Twitter.

Nationwide, India reported 60,471 new Covid infections over the past 24 hours, the lowest number since 31 March, data from the health ministry showed.

UK opposition health spokesperson, Jonathan Ashworth, Labour’s shadow health secretary, has told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the reason why the nation was in the current situation was because the Government had not imposed travel restrictions sooner.

“Rather than red listing this variant, we essentially gave it the red carpet treatment as 20,000 people were allowed to arrive from India over a number of weeks in April, even though the warning signs were there,” he said. “That essentially seeded this Delta variant across the country.”

“Nobody wanted to be in this place and we could have avoided this if it was not for the Delta variant, and I’m afraid this is on Boris Johnson for his puny weak border policy, which was secure as a sieve.”

PA report he added that Labour would “collapse” the traffic light travel system, adding: “Essentially all those nations on the amber list we wouldn’t move to a red list. We would want to see more nations move on to the green list when it is safe to do so.

“But we would ask those returning from those red list countries to properly quarantine themselves at the borders - I understand this is an immense inconvenience for people, and I don’t want to put people in this situation, but we’ve got to protect ourselves from this very dangerous virus.”

Our Morwenna Ferrier writes about the rise of a new trend in the wake of the pandemic – the “vaxinistas”:

This summer’s trend is not a dish or a dress, but a clean bill of health posted on social media. There’s even a word for it: a “vaxinista” – a combination of “fashionista” and “vaccine” – is someone who has not only had both jabs, but wants to broadcast it via vaccine selfies, cards and even merchandise.

This interest in pharmaceutical merch has now reached a strange new frontier: used pharma memorabilia. On eBay, old mementoes branded with Pfizer and AstraZeneca logos are selling for tens and hundreds of pounds. AstraZeneca paperweights and ballpoint pens are going for £150 and £50 respectively. Bids for a Pfizer lab coat begin at £106, a “pre-loved” Pfizer denim shirt at £100 and a Disneyland Pfizer conference T-shirt at £144. Meanwhile, newspapers from the day the vaccine was announced are selling for more than £40.

One seller of a Pfizer-branded pen told the Guardian he had listed the item “years ago but no one was interested”. This time, about 20 people have been in touch asking to “buy it now” rather than bid on the site.

Read more here: Got the jab, bought the T-shirt: ‘vaxinistas’ and the rise of pandemic merchandise

Japan to send 1m AstraZeneca doses to Vietnam this week

Japan will send a million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to Vietnam, foreign minister Toshimitsu Motegi said, as the south-east Asian nation steps up vaccine procurement to fight a more stubborn wave of infections.

With a population of about 98 million, Vietnam’s tally of infections stands at 10,241, and only 58 deaths, since the pandemic began.

The shipment of AstraZeneca vaccines produced in Japan is due to arrive in Vietnam on Wednesday, Motegi told reporters.

Japan is considering additional vaccine donations to Vietnam and Taiwan, and plans similar shipments to Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand from early July, Motegi added.

Updated

Prof Graham Medley, from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) advising the government, has been on the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, and here are some of the key quotes:

Although the numbers of deaths are low at the moment, everyone expects that they will rise. The question is really as to what level they will rise, and at the moment there is a lot of uncertainty in what’s going to happen over the next couple of months.

Remember the government risks are not the same as individual personal risks. My kind of risks are about whether or not I get ill or whether or not I die, government risks are primarily based upon the healthcare, and whether the healthcare can continue to function.

And so they’re really focused very much on how many people end up in hospital, how many people end up in high dependency in hospital, and it’s really that is the focus of their risk and thinking about what should the government do to prevent those bad things happening.

PA Media reports that pressed on the notion that the nation could return to seeing hundreds of deaths each day, he added: “I think that’s quite possible it’s not a certainty. There is a lot of uncertainty, but I think that’s quite possible.”

On the border issue, he said the Delta variant “would have ended up in the UK at some point” even if the borders had been closed sooner. “The newer Delta variant is now quite common around the globe so it would have ended up in the United Kingdom at some point but perhaps it would have been delayed.

“It’s really the competition between the virus and the vaccine so had the variant arrived in the country when we’d had more people vaccinated, then it may well not have grown in the same way that it has. It is now the predominant virus in the United Kingdom. And so it got a good start. A lot of cases introduced.”

Updated

'How on earth can I offer up evidence for something where there is no evidence' – Wuhan scientist

If you missed it, overnight the New York Times carried some rare words to the media from Dr Shi Zhengli. She is the scientist from Wuhan who has regularly featured in narratives that the virus originated from a lab leak there. Amy Qin and Chris Buckley write for the New York Times:

Shi has denied these accusations, and now finds herself defending the reputation of her lab and, by extension, that of her country. Reached on her cellphone two weeks ago, Dr Shi said at first that she preferred not to speak directly with reporters, citing her institute’s policies. Yet she could barely contain her frustration.

“How on earth can I offer up evidence for something where there is no evidence?” she said, her voice rising in anger during the brief, unscheduled conversation. “I don’t know how the world has come to this, constantly pouring filth on an innocent scientist,” she wrote in a text message.

In a rare interview over email, she denounced the suspicions as baseless, including the allegations that several of her colleagues may have been ill before the outbreak emerged.

The speculation boils down to one central question: Did Dr Shi’s lab hold any source of the new coronavirus before the pandemic erupted? Dr. Shi’s answer is an emphatic no.

A 2017 photo of Shi Zhengli working with other researchers in a lab at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
A 2017 photo of Shi Zhengli working with other researchers in a lab at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Photograph: AP

Read more here: New York Times – A top virologist in China, at center of a pandemic storm, speaks out

Incidentally, our episode of the Today in Focus podcast on the Wuhan lab leak theory is a really good listen if you want to understand what the theory is, why it was initially so discredited, and how it has come back in vogue.

Updated

Israel to drop indoor mask mandates

Israel has told its citizens they could stop wearing masks indoors, ending one of its last main restrictions as new Covid-19 infections continued to wane even as vaccinations tapered off after a record rollout.

Children headed to school and adults to work without masks for the first time in more than a year. Israelis have not had to wear masks outdoors since April.

About 55% of Israel’s 9.3 million population are fully vaccinated – a turnout largely unchanged by this month’s expansion of eligibility to include 12- to 15-year-olds.

Dan Williams reports from Jerusalem for Reuters that Israel has this month logged either zero or one daily Covid deaths, health ministry data shows. New infections have been in a steady but gentle decline after a steep drop-off in February and March.

The ministry said masks would still be required of unvaccinated patients or staff in medical facilities, of people en route to quarantine and of passengers on commercial flights.

Updated

Michael Gove is on the UK media round this morning, and pretty much saying the same thing everywhere. He’s been pushing this line that 19 July is the new “terminus date” for ending restrictions in England, although with the events of the last couple of days, you’d be forgiven for thinking that roadmap had been saved on government computers as final_FINAL_revised_v2.doc.

Updated

Vaccines and oxygen run out as third wave hits Uganda

Uganda has all but run out of Covid-19 vaccines and oxygen as the country grapples with another wave of the pandemic.

Both private and public medical facilities in the capital, Kampala and in towns across the country – including regional hubs in Entebbe, Jinja, Soroti, Gulu and Masaka – have reported running out or having acute shortages of AstraZeneca vaccines and oxygen. Hospitals report they are no longer able to admit patients to intensive care.

Several vaccination centres and hospitals across the country have suspended programmes, throwing into doubt efforts to vaccinate 21.9 million high-risk people.

Yonas Tegegn Woldemariam, the World Health Organization’s representative to Uganda, confirmed that as of Monday, the National Medical Stores, Uganda’s central distribution hub for all public health facilities, had run out of vaccines.

The Uganda Medical Association (UMA) said the situation was dire, as the country records week-on-week increases in new cases. The WHO reported 1,735 confirmed cases on Sunday 13 June, compared with 60 cases on 13 May– an increase of nearly 2,800%. As of Monday, the total number of confirmed cases stood at 60,250 with 423 deaths.

Last week, the WHO warned of a third wave of the pandemic across Africa, with 90% of countries likely to miss a vaccination target of at least 10% of their populations by September.

Read more of Samuel Okiror’s report from Kampala: Vaccines and oxygen run out as third wave of Covid hits Uganda

UK unemployment rate falls as people return to work as pandemic restrictions eased

The UK’s unemployment rate has fallen again as more people returned to work as pandemic restrictions were eased.

New figures released by the Office for National Statistics this morning show that 197,000 people joined company payrolls in May, the sixth monthly increase in a row.

That follows the reopening of non-essential shops, leisure and hospitality venues in April, and the resumption of indoor services in pubs and restaurants in May.

The latest figures “suggest that the jobs market is showing signs of recovery”, the ONS says – although there are still more than half a million fewer people on payrolls than before the pandemic.

But the delay to the final easing of Covid-19 restrictions in England was announced yesterday could lead to job losses, businesses fear, unless the government provides more support.

The UK’s largest trade bodies joined hospitality businesses and trade unions in urging the government to change its mind and come up with new support measures, warning that businesses will be driven to the wall otherwise.

Tony Danker, the director general of Britain’s most powerful business lobby group, the CBI, said the government “must urgently revisit the support available”, including the tapering of business rates relief and a moratorium on landlords’ right to collect commercial rent.

You can follow reaction to this news on our business live blog…

Michael Gove defends India 'red list' delay

Speaking of Michael Gove, it looks like he is up front and centre today in the UK government’s media operation to justify the way they have handled the delay to lifting restrictions in England.

On Sky News, asked by presenter Kay Burley about the Labour claim that the UK government “should have moved at lightning speed” to close the borders with India, as was done with Pakistan and Bangladesh, and that the delay was caused by Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s desire for a “trade deal photo op”, Gove denied this.

It’s not true. No. We closed our borders, we put India on the “red list”, at the earliest, appropriate opportunity on the basis of all the evidence that we had. In fact we put India on the “red list” before we knew that this Delta variant was a variant of concern.

It is worth noting that on 9 April Pakistan had a seven-day average of 21 cases per million people, Bangladesh had twice as many and India had four times as many. Pakistan and Bangladesh were put on the red list at that point. India was not added until 23 April, after Johnson’s planned trip to India was cancelled on 19 April.

There’s also these couple of bits on Twitter from this Michael Gove appearance.

I’m sure we’ll be hearing more from him through the rest of the morning.

Updated

By the way, with the way the 21 June date has been dominating the news, you’d be forgiven for thinking this had been a UK-wide change of plan, rather than just one affecting England. My colleague Peter Walker noted yesterday evening what the situation is in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland:

Public health is a devolved matter, and so varies in each of the UK nations – although Michael Gove, the Cabinet Office minister, has discussed the latest plans with the leaders of the other UK nations. Scotland has varying restrictions, from level 0 to level 2, and does not have a 21 June-style date to consider further reopening. In Wales, restrictions eased on 7 June to allow more people to meet indoors and outdoors, and to permit some mass outdoor gatherings, but some unlocking measures were delayed. Northern Ireland has similar unlocking measures to the rest of the UK, with a review under way into, for example, allowing outdoor events beyond the current cap of 500 people.

US total Covid death toll stands at 599,945 – Johns Hopkins University figures

The total death toll in the US from Covid has reached 599,945, according to the tally by Johns Hopkins University, which is the source that the Guardian has been throughout the pandemic.

Scott Gottlieb, a former commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, said at the weekend that “We have the tools to control this and defeat it,” Gottlieb said. “We just need to use those tools.”

The vaccination tracker at the Washington Post states that 174.2 million people in the US have received at least one vaccine dose, with 144.9 million people fully vaccinated.

Updated

Good morning. It’s Martin Belam here in London picking up the live blog baton. Fifteen months can be a long time in a pandemic. In March 2020, British prime minister Boris Johnson was telling the public that the UK could turn the tide of coronavirus in 12 weeks and “send coronavirus packing in this country”. It is June 2021 and he’s just had to push back his cherished reopening date from 21 June to 19 July.

You can expect the morning media round in the UK to be dominated by this decision, with questions about the timing of the announcement, the risk posed to the entertainment and hospitality sectors by an extra four weeks having to operate under onerous conditions or remain shut, and why the announcement was leaked to the press at the weekend, rather than being addressed in parliament first.

There will also be a steady hum of discontent. I noted last night Covid sceptic Allison Pearson saying that the presentation used percentages rather than raw numbers because the caseload and numbers of people are actually very low. It’s still a wilful decision to pretend not to understand that a small number doubling every couple of days gets you to a large number very, very quickly.

Here’s my colleague Peter Walker with our Q&A all about it, if you need to catch-up: What we know about the delay to ending Covid lockdown in England

Updated

Bolsonaro asks Pfizer to speed up vaccine delivery

Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro on Monday asked Pfizer to bring forward planned delivery of Covid-19 vaccines, a government source said, aiming to speed up a slow national inoculation programme, Reuters reports.

The request is a turnaround for Bolsonaro who last year ignored offers of vaccines from Pfizer, according to testimony to a Senate commission investigating delays in vaccinating the country with the world’s second-deadliest outbreak.

Bolsonaro, his chief of staff and ministers of health and foreign affairs, held a conference call with Pfizer Brasil chief executive Marta Diez and Pfizer Latin America chief executive Carlos Murillo, the president’s office said on social media.

Bolsonaro, Bolsonaro, a vaccine skeptic who opposed lockdown and social distancing, asked the Pfizer executives if deliveries for later this year could be brought forward to June, from the fourth quarter, a government official with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Pfizer Brasil declined to comment on the meeting.

Almost half a million Brazilians have died from Covid, yet only 10.3% of the country’s 210 million people have received a first vaccine dose, and just 25% have been fully vaccinated, mainly with vaccines developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd and AstraZeneca Plc.

Updated

More on the WHO’s comments, from AFP: While people in many wealthy nations are enjoying a return to a sense of normalcy thanks to high vaccination rates, the shots remain scarce in less well-off parts of the world. In terms of doses administered, the imbalance between the G7 and low-income countries, as defined by the World Bank, is 73 to one.

Many of the donated G7 doses will be filtered through Covax, a global body charged with ensuring equitable vaccine distribution.

Run by the WHO, the Gavi vaccine alliance and CEPI, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, it has to date shipped more than 87 million vaccine doses to 131 countries - far fewer than anticipated.

The WHO wants at least 70% of the world’s population vaccinated by the next G7 meeting in Germany next year.

“To do that, we need 11bn doses. The G7 and G20 can make this happen,” said Tedros

Updated

WHO warns virus quicker than vaccines after G7 doses pledge

The WHO warned Monday that Covid-19 was moving faster than the vaccines, and said the G7’s vow to share a billion doses with poorer nations was simply not enough, AFP reports.

Global health leaders also warned the pledge was too little, too late, with more than 11bn shots needed.

Faced with outrage over disparities in jab access, the Group of Seven industrialised powers pledged during a weekend summit in Britain to take their total dose donations to more than 1bn, up from 130 million promised in February.

“I welcome the announcement that G7 countries will donate 870 million (new) vaccine doses, primarily through Covax,” World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists.

“This is a big help, but we need more, and we need them faster. Right now, the virus is moving faster than the global distribution of vaccines.

“More than 10,000 people are dying every day … these communities need vaccines, and they need them now, not next year.”

Updated

Summary

Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic with me, Helen Sullivan.

The WHO warned on Monday that Covid-19 was moving faster than the vaccines, and said the G7’s vow to share a billion doses with poorer nations was simply not enough. Global health leaders also warned the pledge was too little, too late, with more than 11bn shots needed.

Meanwhile, the US is poised to pass the dark milestone of 600,000 deaths over the course of the pandemic, with 599,945 fatalities confirmed currently on the Johns Hopkins University tracker.

Here are the other key recent developments:

  • Boris Johnson announced a four-week delay to the lifting of coronavirus restrictions in England. He said the extra delay could prevent thousands of deaths by allowing more vaccinations. No 10 said data indicated two doses of a vaccine were needed for protection against the Delta variant causing a rise in cases.
  • The main impacts of that delay in England will be pubs and hospitality remain restricted to table service and with social distancing measures in place, people should still work from home where possible, theatres and entertainment venues will have their capacity held at 50% and nightclubs will have to remain closed. The limit of 30 people at weddings and receptions has been lifted though, and also for wakes – although there are still some restrictions in place on what you can do.
  • The Delta variant has been detected in 74 countries and is continuing to spread, prompting fears it will become the most dominant strain globally. There is also concern that while data is being shared, countries with weaker monitoring systems may not have detected the strain’s presence.
  • Indonesia said it fears rising cases will not peak until July, despite hospitals in the capital Jakarta and other parts of Java already coming close to full capacity. The country is trying to increase hospital capacity and turn hotels into isolation centres.
  • Russia reported 13,721 new coronavirus cases, including 6,590 in the capital, Moscow. Authorities in St Petersburg, which is hosting a series of Euro 2020 matches, said on Monday they were tightening anti-coronavirus restrictions in an effort to curb a new spike in infections. Food courts and children’s play areas in shopping malls in Russia’s second city will be closed, and no food will be sold at Euro 2020 fan zones.
  • South Africa has had to bin 2m Johnson and Johnson doses because of a potential contamination of ingredients traced back to the US. It is another setback for the country’s vaccination campaign with the doses planned for health workers and over-60s.
  • A WHO official said Africa will get priority treatment for the 870m vaccine doses pledged by the G7 because it has emerged as one of “the most vulnerable, under-served (areas)”.
  • The two main hospitals in Afghanistan dealing with Covid-19 have had to turn away patients, saying they have no more beds and are short on oxygen and medical supplies.
  • Thailand’s recently launched coronavirus vaccination campaign was hit by confusion after at least 20 hospitals in Bangkok postponed Covid-19 inoculation appointments set for this week, citing delays in vaccine deliveries. A series of coronavirus outbreaks in Thai factories is also raising concerns that the export sector could be hit hard, threatening to further undermine an economy as it struggles to recover from the pandemic’s crippling blow to the crucial tourism industry.

Updated

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