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Brazil’s hospitals were running out of drugs needed to sedate Covid-19 patients on Thursday, with the government urgently seeking to import supplies amid reports of the seriously ill being tied down and intubated without effective sedatives.
Reuters reports:
Health minister Marcelo Queiroga said Brazil was in talks with Spain and other countries to secure the emergency drugs. Hospitals, he added, were also struggling to get enough oxygen.
Aid group Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said Brazil’s “failed response” had led to thousands of avoidable deaths and created a humanitarian catastrophe that could still get worse.
Sao Paulo blamed the shortage on the federal government. “The irresponsibility and neglect of Brazilian lives is unbelievable,” Sao Paulo Governor Joao Doria said on Twitter.
Médecins Sans Frontières said Bolsonaro’s government had not done enough to prevent the tragedy.
“More than one year into the Covid-19 pandemic, the failed response in Brazil has caused a humanitarian catastrophe,” said Christos Christou, a medical doctor and president of MSF.
The front page of Friday’s Guardian.
Guardian front page, Friday 16 April 2021: Urgent concerns over rapid tests as false positives soar pic.twitter.com/cRmM3jjWIs
— The Guardian (@guardian) April 15, 2021
Brazil registered 3,560 new Covid-19 deaths on Thursday and 73,174 further cases, according to data released by the country’s health ministry.
The South American country has now registered 365,444 total deaths and 13,746,681 cases, Reuters reports.
Anthony Fauci, the leading U.S. infectious disease doctor, hopes U.S. regulators will make a quick decision to lift a pause on the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and get that vaccine “back on track,” he said in an interview with Reuters.
His comments come after a panel of advisers to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) delayed a vote on whether to resume the J&J shots for at least a week, until it had more data on the risk.
The US earlier this week decided to pause distribution of the J&J vaccine to investigate six cases of a rare brain blood clot linked with low platelet counts in the blood.
Fauci said the pause was “an indication that the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration take safety very seriously. I hope they make the conclusion of this quickly, and get back on track,” he said.
“And I believe they will.”
Chile’s health authorities believe a dip in the record case numbers over the past week represents a “stabilisation” of a second Covid-19 wave thanks to strict lockdowns and a rapid vaccination program that has fully innoculated a third of the population, Reuters reports.
Health minister Enrique Paris said he hoped the 9,000 record daily cases reached last week represented the peak of the latest outbreak.
“Once we reach that peak, we expect not a reduction but a stabilization and then a return to smaller numbers of positive patients,” he said.
Chile has now vaccinated 50% of its 15 million-strong target population with at least one dose of the Pfizer or Sinovac-developed drugs, and given 32.7% two doses, Paris said.
Care homes in England are being “failed” by a flawed rollout of rapid-result tests, an expert has warned as analysis of a pilot found “poor” adherence and no impact on outbreaks.
The majority of staff in 11 Liverpool care homes carried out less than a third of the rapid-result lateral flow device (LFD) tests required over six weeks between December and January, according to a pre-print paper.
Researchers from the universities of Liverpool, Nottingham and Imperial College London found no significant difference in the proportion of care homes with outbreaks or the size of outbreaks when comparing the results with homes that were not participating in the pilot.
Factors linked to poor adherence included testing requirements adding to an already “excessive” work burden, being required to return to the workplace during time off for tests, concerns around accuracy and the implications it could have on income and workload.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “Around one in three people do not show any symptoms of infection and, as we navigate the road map out of the pandemic, rapid lateral flow devices and PCR tests are vital weapons in our arsenal, detecting under the radar cases and helping to keep our most vulnerable safe.
“The testing regime for care home staff uses both LFD and PCR, which combines the rapid results of LFD testing, with the higher sensitivity of PCR tests.
“We remain committed to the use of these rapid lateral flow devices in care homes, and we are in touch with care homes with lower-take up rates to provide additional support.”
Poland’s top vaccination official said he did not see any obstacle to the country’s inoculation program from the “moral” reservations expressed by the powerful Catholic Church about two vaccines.
Poland’s Episcopate bioethical team on Wednesday said the use of the AstraZeneca and the Johnson & Johnson vaccines raised “serious moral opposition.”
It said that was because their technology is linked to lines of cells derived from aborted fetuses.
Michal Dworczyk, the government official in charge of the national inoculation program, rejected the suggestion that the bishops’ move was a disappointment, Reuters reports.
A summary of today's developments
- A coronavirus variant with potentially worrying mutations that was first detected in India has been found in the UK. In total, 77 cases of the variant have been recorded in the UK up to 14 April, according to the latest update from Public Health England (PHE). Overall Covid-19 case rates have fallen in all regions of England.
- France’s coronavirus death toll passed 100,000 today. The country of 67 million is the eighth in the world to reach the symbolic six figure mark, and the third in Europe after the United Kingdom and Italy.
- Most regions in Portugal will enter the third phase of easing the Covid-19 lockdown next week, but stricter rules will stay in place in municipalities where transmission rates remain high, prime minister Antonio Costa said.
- The US is preparing for the possibility that a booster shot will be needed between nine to 12 months after people are initially vaccinated against Covid-19, David Kessler, chief science officer for president Joe Biden’s Covid-19 response task force, said.
- India’s daily coronavirus caseload has doubled in 10 days, with a record 200,000 new infections logged Thursday as authorities grapple with shortages of vaccines, treatments and hospital beds.
- Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is among a group of former world leaders and Nobel laureates calling on US President Joe Biden to waive intellectual property rules for Covid vaccines to accelerate global access to the jab.
- Ireland is on track to ease restrictions from 4 May to allow the phased reopening of all retail stores and hairdressers, and will also develop a plan for further reopenings in June and July, the deputy prime minister, Leo Varadkar, has said.
- Germany’s health minister Jens Spahn has again urged the country’s 16 federal states to impose tougher restrictions quickly to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus and not to wait until a national law on measures is passed.
- Thailand reported 1,543 new coronavirus cases today, the sharpest increase since the start of the pandemic and the fourth record rise this week, amid a third wave of infections in the south-east Asian country.
- Hong Kong authorities said the city’s vaccine scheme would be widened to include those aged between 16 to 29 years old for the first time, as they aim to boost the lacklustre demand for inoculations.
- A senior member of Japan’s ruling party has said that cancelling the Tokyo Olympics “remains an option” if the coronavirus pandemic continues to worsen.
- Spiralling Covid-19 cases have put Cambodia “on the brink of death”, its premier Hun Sen has warned, as the country imposed lockdowns in the capital Phnom Penh and a nearby city.
A coronavirus variant with potentially worrying mutations that was first detected in India has been found in the UK.
In total, 77 cases of the variant, known as B.1.617, have been recorded in the UK up to 14 April, according to the latest update from Public Health England (PHE), released on Thursday. Of these, 73 were recorded in England and 4 in Scotland.
It is the first time PHE has reported the variant in the UK.
The US is preparing for the possibility that a booster shot will be needed between nine to 12 months after people are initially vaccinated against Covid-19, Reuters reports.
While the duration of immunity after vaccination is being studied, booster vaccines could be needed, David Kessler, chief science officer for president Joe Biden’s Covid-19 response task force told a congressional committee meeting.
“The current thinking is those who are more vulnerable will have to go first,” he said.
People in Israel will no longer have to wear masks outdoors starting from Sunday as the number of virus infections plummets, health minister Yuli Edelstein said, AFP reports.
“The rate of infection in Israel is very low thanks to the successful vaccine campaign in Israel, and therefore it is possible to ease (restrictions),” Edelstein said.
He said however that masks will still be required indoors.
Most regions in Portugal will enter the third phase of easing the Covid-19 lockdown next week, but stricter rules will stay in place in municipalities where transmission rates remain high, prime minister Antonio Costa said.
Reuters reports:
These set of measures are neither prizes nor punishments,” Costa told a news conference.
“They are public health measures for the safety of the population, of people.”
Portugal, which imposed a lockdown in January to curb what was then the world’s worst Covid-19 surge, started lifting restrictions last month and has since reopened some schools, restaurant and cafe terraces, museums and hair salons.
Over the last two weeks, people have flocked out of doors to enjoy the warmer spring weather, to see friends and relatives, and enjoy a meal outside after more than two months stuck at home.
From Monday, high schools, universities, cinemas, shopping malls and indoor areas of restaurants will reopen in the vast majority of the 278 municipalities in mainland Portugal but under restrictions designed to reduce the risk of contagion.
Outdoor events, weddings, christenings can also resume but under capacity rules. However, in municipalities where the limit of 120 cases per 100,000 people has been reached, the rules will be different.
The U.N. humanitarian chief has warned that the world’s largest humanitarian crisis in Yemen is getting even worse with the Covid-19 pandemic “roaring back” in recent weeks.
Associated Press reports:
In an update to the U.N. Security Council, Mark Lowcock said tens of thousands of people already are starving to death, with another five million just a step behind.
In order to stop the “unfolding catastrophe,” Lowcock called for urgent action on protecting civilians, access for humanitarian aid, funding, support for Yemen’s economic and progress toward peace.
In France, there were 38,045 new coronavirus cases on Thursday compared with 43,505 on Wednesday, bringing the total to 5.18 million.
Health ministry data also showed that 5,924 people were in intensive care units on Thursday, up from 5,902 a day earlier, Reuters reports.
Earlier it was announced that the Covid-19 death toll in the country had risen to more than 100,000.
Updated
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Argentina’s national government and authorities in the capital Buenos Aires are in disagreement over tightened Covid-19 restrictions and the closure of schools in and around the city.
Reuters reports:
The mayor of Buenos Aires slammed the national government over new measures that include a two-week closure of schools and restrictions on movement after 8pm in the populous metropolitan area that is a hot spot for new cases.
“Yesterday, the national government decided to break the mechanism of dialogue and consensus that we had for more than a year,” Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, head of the city government, told a news conference. “I want to be very clear: we were not consulted about any of the measures taken.”
Larreta, part of the political opposition, called for immediate talks with center-left Peronist President Alberto Fernandez and said his administration would take the matter to the country’s supreme court.
Argentina has recorded a total 2.6 million coronavirus infections, with 58,542 deaths.
The US administered 198,317,040 doses of Covid-19 vaccines in the country as of Thursday morning and distributed 255,400,665 doses, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday, Reuters reports.
Updated
The head of Pfizer has said the company’s Covid-19 vaccine, among the priciest on the market, is no more expensive than the cost of a meal and will not be sold to poor countries for a profit.
The head of the US-based company defended the cost of the jabs, which he said are saving lives and can help countries emerge from the pandemic.
Albert Bourla said in an interview with Les Echos in France, Germany’s Handelsblatt, Italy’s Corriere Della Sera and El Mundo in Spain:
Vaccines are very expensive.
They save human lives, they allow economies to reopen, but we sell them at the price of a meal.
Developed jointly with Germany-based BioNTech, the Pfizer vaccine is, along with Moderna, the vaccine that has cost the European Union the most, according to data released several months ago by a member of the Belgian government.
Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov warned earlier this week that Brussels was facing a huge price hike as it negotiates nearly two billion additional doses of the vaccine for the coming years.
“Pfizer was 12 euros ($14), then it became 15 euros. Contracts are now being signed... at a price of 19.50 euros,” Borissov said on Sunday.
The prices are in sharp contrast to the vaccine produced by British-Swedish drugmaker AstraZeneca, which vowed not to make a profit on its product during the pandemic and sold it to the EU for less than two euros a unit.
Bourla did not confirm the price of the Pfizer vaccine but admitted that it was sold at a higher price to developed countries like those in the EU or the United States.
He said:
In middle-income countries, we sell it for half the price. In poorer countries, including in Africa, we sell it at cost.
However, many observers doubted the Pfizer vaccine was being widely distributed in African countries because the product has to be stored in ultra-cold freezers of about minus 70 degrees Celsius (minus 94 Fahrenheit) or below.
Updated
In Northern Ireland, Stormont’s leaders announced a sweeping range of Covid-19 lockdown relaxations.
The reopening of the tourism and hospitality sectors were fast-tracked as part of a series of measures agreed by ministers on Thursday.
The plan signed off by the devolved executive includes three key relaxation dates, April 23, April 30 and May 24.
The measures were outlined by first minister Arlene Foster and deputy first minister Michelle O’Neill to a special Assembly committee on Thursday evening.
Under the plans, hairdressers can reopen on April 23, pubs and cafes can serve people outdoors from April 30 and indoors from May 24.
Hotels will be able to fully reopen on May 24 as well.
The May 24 date is indicative and subject to another Executive review earlier in that month.
After lengthy discussions through Thursday, ministers brought forward a series of reopening dates they had been initially considering.
With Northern Ireland having marked one million Covid-19 vaccines by last weekend and with other key health and scientific indicators going in the right direction, ministers have agreed the most significant steps out a lockdown that started just after Christmas.
Foster said:
This is a landmark day for Northern Ireland as we step firmly and with confidence on our pathway to recovery.
I am pleased and proud that through our collective efforts we have reached a point where we have established a good level of control over the virus.
We are now entering brighter and better times. This balanced package of relaxations will restore those familiar aspects of everyday life that have been missed dearly.
I urge everyone to stay with us and keep following the health advice so that we can continue with our plans to more fully open up our society over coming weeks.
Turkey recorded 297 deaths due to Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, the highest daily number since the beginning of the pandemic, data from the health ministry showed on Thursday, bringing the total toll to 35,031.
Data also showed 61,400 new cases were recorded in the same period, bringing the total number of cases since the beginning of the pandemic to 4,086,957, Reuters reports.
Turkey currently ranks fourth globally in the number of daily cases based on a seven-day average, according to a Reuters tally.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Tuesday announced several new restrictions and a “partial closure” for the first two weeks of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan to curb the surge in cases.
Updated
Scotland’s first minister receives first dose of AstraZeneca vaccine
Scotland’s first minister has said she was “emotional” after receiving her first Covid-19 vaccine, and paid tribute to NHS staff involved in the rollout.
Nicola Sturgeon became one of more than 2.5 million Scots to have received at least one dose of the vaccine on Thursday, being inoculated at the SSE Hydro in Glasgow.
💉 Just had my first dose of vaccine (AZ for anyone wondering). It truly is an emotional moment. Thanks to the wonderful vaccinator who put me so much at ease, and to teams across the country. Please get vaccinated as soon as you are able. It really will help us back to normal.
— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon) April 15, 2021
Allocated the Oxford/AstraZeneca dose, she said it would help to bolster her defence of the jab, which has caused concerns over some very rare instances of blood clots.
Speaking to the PA news agency after her vaccination, the first minister said:
It was totally pain free, I didn’t feel a thing. The lovely woman who vaccinated me made it all really easy.
I guess like many people I felt quite emotional, because it’s so important, this vaccination programme, in helping us all get back to normal.
My message to everybody – as soon as you get the invite to be vaccinated, come forward, be vaccinated, because it’s such an important part of our route back to normality,” she said.
Sturgeon also praised the work of those who are working to vaccinate the population.
She said:
Thoroughly impressed with the well-oiled machine I saw in there.
I just want to say such a huge thank you to everyone across the country who’s delivering this programme – they’re heroes, each and every one of them.
I’m actually quite glad I got AstraZeneca, because there have been concerns raised and I said that I’m confident it’s safe, but now I’m not just saying that, I’ve also had the AstraZeneca vaccine, so I’m glad about that.
Updated
Russia has extended a ban on flights to and from Britain until June as a measure against a variant of the coronavirus first detected there.
The news was reported by the Tass news agency on Thursday, citing a statement by Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency.
Updated
Venezuela has received a batch of 50,000 doses of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, the health minister, Carlos Alvarado, said on Thursday, as Covid-19 cases spike in the South American nation.
Venezuela had previously acquired 250,000 Sputnik V vaccines and 500,000 doses of the shot developed by China’s Sinopharm, which so far have been administered to public officials, health workers, teachers and some senior citizens, Reuters reports.
The new round of vaccines will also be administered to firefighters, civil protection personnel and workers who take oxygen to hospitals, said Alvarado.
“They are not part of the sector health, but they are exposed,” he said.
Venezuela has reported 178,094 cases of the coronavirus and 1,834 deaths, according to official figures.
Updated
A senior member of Japan’s ruling party has said that cancelling the Tokyo Olympics “remains an option” if the coronavirus pandemic continues to worsen.
“If it seems impossible to do it any more, then we have to stop, decisively,” Toshihiro Nikai, the secretary general of the Liberal Democratic party, said in a TV interview that has yet to be aired.
While Nikai did not call for the Games to be called off, his comments are at odds with the united front presented by the Japanese government, Tokyo 2020 organisers and the International Olympic Committee [IOC] – all of which insist that the delayed event will open as planned on 23 July.
The pandemic shows no signs of slowing in several parts of the world, while experts in Japan have warned that the country has entered a fourth wave of Covid-19 infections driven by mutant strains of the virus.
Nikai, a powerful party faction leader who was instrumental in electing Yoshihide Suga as prime minister last year, said cancellation was “of course” an option, telling the TBS network: “If the Olympics were to spread infections, then what are the Olympics for?”
Read more here:
Updated
The Brazilian government’s negligent response to Covid-19 has plunged the South American country into a snowballing “humanitarian catastrophe” that is likely to intensify in the coming weeks, the medical NGO Médecins Sans Frontières has warned.
“I have to be very clear in this: the Brazilian authorities’ negligence is costing lives,” the group’s international president, Christos Christou, told reporters on Thursday after Brazil’s official death toll rose to more than 362,000, second only to the US.
Meinie Nicolai, MSF’s general director, said the actions of the Brazilian government – which under its far-right leader, Jair Bolsonaro, has downplayed the epidemic, shunned containment measures and promoted treatments with no scientific basis – had made it “a threat to its own population”.
Nicolai said:
There is no coordination in the response. There is no real acknowledgment of the severity of the disease. Science is put aside.
Fake news is being distributed and healthcare workers are left on their own.
The government is failing the Brazilian people … All Brazilians can tell you that they have people around them that have been buried or intubated [in places] where there are no drugs and no oxygen. This is unacceptable.
Read the full story here:
Ukraine on Thursday launched a vaccination drive to innoculate its athletes against the coronavirus ahead of the 2021 summer Olympic and Paralympic Games.
A total of 30 athletes set to represent the country in Tokyo received their first jab of China’s CoronaVac vaccine in front of cameras at a hospital in the capital, Kiev.
Daria Tykhova, a 35-year-old sports shooter, said her team was waiting for the vaccine impatiently, hoping to return to their pre-pandemic life.
“Now everything is resuming and I want to have some kind of protection,” Tykhova told AFP.
When the Olympics were postponed in 2020 “it was a tragedy for athletes and coaches”, shooting coach Volodymyr Ivanchuk said.
Updated
Norway will take more time to assess whether it will resume the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine against Covid-19 or stop it altogether, the health minister, Bent Hoeie, has said.
Norway’s Institute of Public Health has recommended ending the use of the AstraZeneca jab, but the government needs more information before making a final decision, he said.
Authorities on 11 March suspended the rollout of the vaccine after a small number of younger inoculated people were hospitalised for a combination of blood clots, bleeding and a low count of platelets, some of whom later died.
Updated
New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, announced on Thursday that her country would donate the Covid-19 vaccine for 800,000 people via the Covax dose-sharing facility that aims to protect health workers and other vulnerable people in lower-income countries.
She was the first leader to pledge doses at the event held by the Gavi Vaccine Alliance, although European countries including Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden pledged new funds.
Updated
Africa’s top health official has said he wanted to believe that India will lift export restrictions on Covid-19 vaccines as soon as possible, warning that “India is not an island” and that some African nations still have seen no shots at all.
John Nkengasong, the director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, spoke as the African continent of 1.3bn people does not know when second doses of key vaccines will arrive, and as India sees a devastating resurgence in infections.
India is a major vaccine producer and a key supplier to the United Nations-backed Covax initiative aiming to bring shots to some of the world’s poorest countries.
“If you finish vaccinating your people before Africa or other parts of the world, you have not done yourself any justice because variants will emerge and undermine your own vaccination efforts,” Nkengasong said in a weekly press briefing.
He said the uncertainty around the arrival of second doses puts the African continent in a “very dicey situation.” Some countries have already exhausted their initial vaccine doses, including Ghana and Rwanda, he said.
Updated
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has used the reconstruction of the fire-ravaged Notre Dame Cathedral as a metaphor for the country pulling together after Covid-19 as France reached the symbolic mark of 100,000 deaths from the virus.
Macron, who is under pressure as locked-down France faces a third wave of the pandemic with many hospitals at saturation point, toured the upper levels of the Notre Dame site in a hard hat and overalls on the second anniversary of the fire that ripped through the roof of the Gothic masterpiece in 2019.
Workers talked to him about their efforts to secure and steady the site, despite difficulties due to lead levels and Covid restrictions.
Macron told Le Parisien that the damaged cathedral, which is expected to partially reopen in 2024, was “like a metaphor for what a lot of people are feeling and what we’re living”.
Read the full story here:
Updated
In England, 94.2% of residents at older adult care homes eligible to have their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine had received the jab by 11 April, according to figures from NHS England.
Residents are classed as eligible for the vaccine if they have not had Covid-19 in the previous 28 days. The equivalent figure for staff of older adult care homes is 79.4%.
The lowest region for uptake was London, where 69.1% of eligible staff of older care homes in are estimated to have received their first jab.
Updated
Coronavirus cases continue to fall in all regions of England
Covid-19 case rates have fallen in all regions of England, according to the latest weekly surveillance report from Public Health England.
In Yorkshire & the Humber, the rate of new cases stood at 57.4 per 100,000 people in the seven days to 11 April – the highest rate of any region, but down from 68.5 the previous week, PA reports.
The east Midlands recorded the second highest rate: 34.9, down from 44.4. South-west England recorded the lowest rate: 12.8, down very slightly from 15.3.
Updated
Public Health Wales said a total of 1,640,045 first doses of the Covid-19 vaccine have now been given in Wales.
The agency said 559,888 second doses have also been administered, PA reports.
Updated
Virus variants causing India's second surge, epidemiologists say
The second surge of Covid-19 cases in India has swamped hospitals much faster than the first because mutations in the virus mean each patient is infecting many more people than before, epidemiologists and doctors say.
India’s daily coronavirus caseload has doubled in 10 days, with a record 200,000 new infections logged Thursday as authorities grapple with shortages of vaccines, treatments and hospital beds.
The caseload has also skyrocketed more than 20-fold to more than 200,000 on Thursday since a low in early February.
The world’s hardest-hit country after the United States has reported about 950 cases of people contracting the variants first detected in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Brazil.
Epidemiologist Rajib Dasgupta of New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University told Reuters:
The point is that these variants of concern are still not on top of the discourse.
Even if it is a new variant, you need to do the same things” to control it and treat patients “but it requires a different urgency to recognise that.
Others point out that India let its guard down by allowing festivals, political rallies and crowds at cricket matches to go ahead, AFP reports.
Africa is “in a bind” over coronavirus vaccines, as some countries could run out without knowing when more doses will be available, the continent’s disease control body said Thursday.
Health officials hope to vaccinate at least 20 percent of the continent’s more than one billion people by the end of the year, AFP reports.
But many African countries are depending on AstraZeneca jabs produced in India and allocated under the Covax scheme, which aims to provide equitable access around the world and particularly in poorer countries.
India announced last month it was putting the brakes on vaccine exports as it battled a new wave of infections and a faltering inoculation drive at home.
“We are in a bind as a continent,” Dr John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), told a press conference Thursday.
He highlighted the case of Ghana, which he said had already administered “70 to 80 percent” of its current supply of shots, most of which came via Covax.
He said:
Access to vaccines has been limited for us as a continent and it’s affecting the way in which we roll out our vaccination programme.”
Even if Ghana had the money it would not know where to go get the vaccine.
We cannot predict when the second doses will come.
The African Union (AU) is also trying to secure shots bilaterally, outside the Covax scheme.
Johnson & Johnson announced last month it would make up to 400 million doses of its own single-shot vaccine available to Africa, though the first shipments were not expected to arrive until the third quarter of 2021.
South Africa is the only country to have acquired J&J shots of its own, but this week it suspended their rollout after US health authorities recommended a pause over blood clot fears.
No blood clots linked to J&J have been reported in South Africa, Nkengasong said.
As of Monday the AU’s 55 member states had acquired 34.6 million vaccine doses and administered 13.9 million, although 8.6 million of those were in Morocco alone, Nkengasong said.
In the UK, Downing Street said Boris Johnson felt the “heavy lifting” in reducing the coronavirus infection rate had been done by the lockdowns across the UK.
On Wednesday the prime minister raised eyebrows when he said easing lockdown will inevitably create a rise in coronavirus deaths because the lockdown rather than vaccines for “the bulk of the work” in reducing recent infection rates.
The prime minister’s official spokesman was asked by reporters today whether Johnson agreed with NHS boss Sir Simon Stevens that “vaccines are successfully reducing hospitalisations and deaths”.
He replied that Johnson had been “very clear that vaccines are having an impact”.
The spokesman continued:
I think the PHE (Public Health England) data shows they’ve saved around 10,000 lives, and that’s excellent.
And they are having an effect on hospitalisations and deaths.
The point the prime minister made very clearly – Chris Whitty (England’s chief medical officer) has made similar points – that at this stage, the reductions we have seen, the heavy lifting of that has been done by the excellent work of the British public to abide by the lockdown rules.
Obviously vaccines have played a part in that and that’s the point the prime minister was making.
The head of Germany’s disease control agency has called for “drastic” measures to curb the third wave of the virus which is hitting hospitals hard with intensive care beds filled to capacity in some areas.
It has also been announced that chancellor Angela Merkel, 66, is to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine on Friday. The jab is only recommended for over 60 year olds in Germany.
Lothar Wieler, director of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) said Germans needed to “drastically reduce contact” with each other in an effort to drive down the third wave, which he said was “dramatic” and would get worse as long as it remained “out of control”. The more infectious B117 mutation first detected in the UK, “as feared and predicted,” Wieler said, is now making up 90 per cent of infections and he expected the number of patients who needed to be treated in Intensive Care (ICU) would be higher than in the second wave, which reached its peak in January.
The RKI registered over 29,000 new infections on Thursday. Most of them are now of people in the 15 to 49 age group, Wieler said, much younger than those in the first two waves. Increasingly younger people are needing treatment in ICU, he said. The number of cases in the over 90s is also on the rise. Death rates have stagnated over the past two to three weeks, but have not gone down. Increasingly patients are having to be transferred between regions, to hospitals with more capacity, he said.
Almost 5000 ICU beds are currently being taken up by Covid 19 patients, a number expected to rise to 6000 by the end of the month. Eighty per cent of those in hospital currently on ECMO heart and lung replacement machines to keep them alive, are Covid 19 patients, Wieler said.
Almost 80,000 people have died from the virus.
Both Wieler and the health minister Jens Spahn, speaking at a joint press conference in Berlin, said they were in favour of a nighttime curfew proposed by Merkel to help quell the pandemic. Although imposed in other countries, Germany has so far not faced such a strict measure. It has been proposed as part of a controversial amendment to the federal infection protection law which was approved by cabinet on Tuesday and aims to bring more centralised control over measures to tackle the pandemic.
The law will mean that central government is able to impose a nationwide ‘emergency brake’ whenever the incidence rate is 100 cases per 100,000 over a seven day period or beyond. The amendment is due to be voted on in parliament next week. Currently Germany’s incidence rate is over 160, meaning a nighttime curfew is imminent. Lawmakers have said they will challenge it with numerous experts calling it unconstitutional.
Following a slow start, the vaccine campaign is finally gathering pace, with 500,000 to 700,000 jabs being administered daily, and 17.6 per cent of Germans having received a single jab so far.
Compulsory testing is also being introduced in schools from next week. But Wieler said that the two measures were not enough to “break the third wave”, not least because “the majority of the population is not inoculated”. Contact reduction remained the most effective measure, he said.
Major companies such as BASF and VW have begun in-house vaccine campaigns of their employees, with more companies due to start to do so from June. By next week the number of GP practices to join the vaccine campaign is due to rise to 50,000.
Spahn said the government was still confident that its promise that every adult would have received a vaccine appointment by the end of the summer could be delivered. He also said if the third wave could be controlled, he was optimistic that summer holidays would be on the agenda. “Whether everyone will be able to fly to the Seychelles, I don’t know,” he said. “But the North Sea coast is certainly within reach”.
In the UK, the NHS Confederation, a membership body for organisations that commission and provide NHS services, has issued a statement following the news earlier that the number of people waiting for routine operations and procedures on the NHS in England in February has hit its highest level since records began in 2007 [See 9.45am].
Danny Mortimer, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, attempted to strike an upbeat note about the services that had been able to continue during the pandemic, saying:
The latest performance figures demonstrate the huge range of services the NHS is able to provide, not just in caring for Covid patients. It is so much more than a Covid-only service, providing 1.9 million elective procedures and other care unrelated to the virus in January and February, alongside treatment for almost 140,000 Covid patients, thanks to the incredible efforts of our NHS teams. It is also good news that cancer treatment is in line with February last year, before the real disruption of the pandemic began.
He did, however have this note of caution to add, alongside a call for more robust resourcing:
We cannot ignore the scale of the challenge still facing the health service. There is still a major backlog in terms of diagnostic and elective activity as a result of Covid-19. As it stands, there are now 4.7 million people waiting for treatment, and nearly 390,000 have waited for over a year. There has also been a concerning increase in the number of people having to wait longer than 62 days after being urgently referred for suspected cancer.
There is a plan in place to tackle this backlog and through collaboration and innovation, our members are finding ways to improve throughput and efficiency. The £1 billion pledge in the Budget will go some way towards supporting this, but health leaders are clear that the NHS will be recovering for years to come, and this must be appropriately resourced in the long-term.
If you are a fan of stories which tell you that there is nothing new under the sun, you will enjoy this Scottie Andrew piece for CNN today entitled: The vaccine passport debate isn’t new. It started in 1897 during a plague pandemic
Vaccine passports have been touted by some as our ticket to normalcy – easily accessible proof of immunization and a reward for those who got their shots. They’ve also been called invasive and ineffective.
The debate over proof of vaccination as a requirement for entry dates back more than 120 years. The first time certificates of vaccines were required, health officials were fighting a plague pandemic.
In the 1890s, the Government of British India enacted a series of measures in an attempt to stop the spread of the plague, which included requiring travelers to prove they’d been vaccinated against the bacterial disease.
But colonized people living in India then saw government-mandated vaccine certificates as an invasive measure meant to curb travel and control citizens’ movements. Officials struggled to enforce the requirement as they were outnumbered by people traveling across the country.
Today’s concept of a vaccine “passport” isn’t much different: It’s proof of vaccination – either on paper or in digital form – that grants someone access or entry to venues, foreign countries and other locations. It’s meant to keep those who haven’t been vaccinated out of public areas where they could transmit the coronavirus – and reward people who’ve been vaccinated with a return to somewhat normal life.
Read more of this history lesson here: CNN – The vaccine passport debate isn’t new. It started in 1897 during a plague pandemic
Dr Hans Henri Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe, has been in Athens this morning, and he had this to say:
Last week, we surpassed 1 million confirmed Covid-19 deaths in the WHO European Region. The situation in our region is serious; 1.6 million new cases are reported every week. That’s 9500 every hour, 160 people every minute.
To date, some 171 million doses of 7 Covid-19 vaccines and products have been administered in the region. Nearly 13% of the European population have received 1 dose, while close to 6% have completed their series.
There are early signs that transmission may be slowing across several countries. Let me be clear, early signs of decline are not equal to low rates of transmission. Transmission must be driven down to low rates and kept low, by harnessing our energy and resilience to beat the virus.
He also addressed safety fears over blood clots that have been associated with vaccination, saying:
Globally there has been a very small number of cases of rare blood clotting disorders among the 200 million people that have received the AstraZeneca vaccine.
WHO takes safety events extremely seriously. For now, the risk of suffering blood clots is much higher for someone with Covid-19 than for someone who has taken the AstraZeneca vaccine.
Let there be no doubt about it, the AstraZeneca vaccine is effective in reducing Covid-19 hospitalization and preventing deaths. WHO recommends it to all eligible adults to gain protection from the SARS-CoV-2 virus, as quickly as possible.
We are also aware of reports of thromboembolic events with low platelets following vaccination with the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine. WHO is monitoring these reports closely and will communicate its findings in due course.
Today so far…
- Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is among a group of former world leaders and Nobel laureates calling on US President Joe Biden to waive intellectual property rules for Covid vaccines to accelerate global access to the jabs
- Northern Ireland’s power-sharing executive is expected to announce a series of measures to ease lockdown later today. It is likely to including a reopening of close-contact personal services from 23 April, with all non-essential retail following a week later.
- The number of people waiting for routine operations and procedures on the NHS in England in February has hit its highest level since records began in 2007. Covid sceptics have blamed the health service’s focus on the coronavirus, while opposition health spokesperson John Ashworth has described it as the result of ten year of government “underfunding, cuts [and] chronic staff shortages [which] left the NHS weakened when the pandemic hit.”
- Ireland is on track to ease restrictions from 4 May to allow the phased reopening of all retail stores and hairdressers, and will also develop a plan for further reopenings in June and July, the deputy prime minister, Leo Varadkar, has said.
- France’s coronavirus death toll is expected to pass 100,000 today. The country of 67 million will be the eighth in the world to reach the symbolic six figure mark, and the third in Europe after the United Kingdom and Italy.
- Germany’s health minister Jens Spahn has again urged the country’s 16 federal states to impose tougher restrictions quickly to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus and not to wait until a national law on measures is passed.
- Thailand reported 1,543 new coronavirus cases today, the sharpest increase since the start of the pandemic and the fourth record rise this week, amid a third wave of infections in the south-east Asian country.
- Hong Kong authorities said the city’s vaccine scheme would be widened to include those aged between 16 to 29 years old for the first time, as they aim to boost the lacklustre demand for inoculations.
- A senior member of Japan’s ruling party has said that cancelling the Tokyo Olympics “remains an option” if the coronavirus pandemic continues to worsen.
- Spiralling Covid-19 cases have put Cambodia “on the brink of death”, its premier Hun Sen has warned, as the country imposed lockdowns in the capital Phnom Penh and a nearby city.
People who have Covid have a much higher risk of having a blood clot in the brain than those who have received a Covid vaccine, researchers have revealed.
Earlier this month the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said that while not yet proven, there is growing evidence of a link between the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab and a rare syndrome involving certain blood clots together with lowered platelets (fragments in the blood that help it to clot). Meanwhile the European Medicines Agency (EMA) has recommended the syndrome be list as a very rare side effect of the jab. Concerns have since been raised about a similar syndrome occurring in a small number of people who have received the Johnson &Johnson Covid jab.
Some of these blood clotting events involved a type of blood clot in the brain known as cerebral venous sinus thrombosis or CVST.
Now researchers at the University of Oxford – who were not involved in the vaccine trials – have released results of an analysis of a database of 81 million people primarily in the US, highlighting that CVST is around eight to 10 times more common among people who have had Covid, than those who have had a vaccine against the disease.
Looking at cases of the brain blood clots among 513,284 people who were diagnosed with Covid, the team found a rate of 39 cases of CVST per million patients in the two weeks after diagnosis with Covid, with about 30% of cases occurring in people under the age of 30.
By comparison, the rate was just over four cases per million among 489,871 people who had received an mRNA vaccine (either the Moderna or Pfizer/BioNTech jab) in the two weeks after vaccination. The team also looked at the latest figures from the EMA, which said that there have been around 5 cases of CVST per million people who have had the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.
The team say the comparisons should be taken with caution, not least since at present the Covid vaccines have only been offered to particular groups and the analysis did not match patients for the age or other demographics. It is also important to note that CVST can occur naturally in an unvaccinated population – however the rate of such events is difficult to estimate.
It is worth noting that the new analysis has not yet been peer reviewed and does not look specifically at the syndrome that has been linked to certain Covid vaccines as the team say they do not have data on whether the CVST cases were linked to low platelets. However they say the new study highlights the risks posed by Covid itself.
“What we are showing is, with the absence of matching being a potential caveat, is that the risk [of CVST] is many fold higher after Covid-19 than after receiving a vaccine,” said Dr Max Taquet, NIHR academic clinical fellow in psychiatry, University of Oxford.
Updated
Here’s my colleague Sarah Marsh with a fuller report on the idea of using “garlic-breath distancing” to stay Covid-safe:
People should use the “garlic-breath distance” to decipher whether they are close enough to another person for coronavirus transmission to occur, an expert has said.
Dr Julian Tang, a consultant virologist at Leicester Royal Infirmary and the author of a new study published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), stressed that governments and health leaders should “focus their efforts on airborne transmission”.
The British Medical Association (BMA) said the UK government had clearly conveyed the “hands, face, space” message but more needed to be done to promote the importance of fresh air. Pubs, bars and restaurants, workplaces and other public settings should be given ventilation guidance as they prepare to bring customers indoors again, the BMA said.
An article in the BMJ emphasised the importance of aerosol transmission of the virus. The authors, from the University of Leicester, the University of Hong Kong, Edinburgh Napier University and Virginia Tech in the US, said the “tiniest suspended particles can remain airborne for hours”.
They added: “People are much more likely to become infected in a room with windows that can’t be opened or lacking any ventilation system.”
Read more of Sarah Marsh’s report here: Use ‘garlic-breath distancing’ to stay Covid-safe, says expert
Surge testing for Covid-19 variants to take place in Barnet, London
Home testing kits will be delivered door-to-door in the N3 postcode area of Barnet, north London, today, after a case of the South African variant of coronavirus was detected locally.
It follows more than half a million adults living in south London boroughs being offered tests, including 264,000 in Lambeth, 265,000 in Wandsworth, and 14,800 in the Rotherhithe ward of Southwark.
Prof Kevin Fenton, London’s regional director of Public Health England (PHE), said more genetic sequencing of positive coronavirus tests had identified cases of the South African variant in the capital.
The extra testing comes as new analysis revealed that Covid-19 rates dropped below 100 cases per 100,000 people in all local areas of UK for the first time since September.
According to figures compiled by the PA Media news agency, the highest Covid-19 rate anywhere in the country is currently 98.8 cases per 100,000 in Mansfield in Nottinghamshire; the lowest is just 1.0 in both Rother in East Sussex and North Devon, while the Orkney Islands and Western Isles are recording no cases.
The last time every local area of the UK recorded weekly rates below 100 was for the seven days to 1 September 2020.
Updated
Sylvie Corbet and Angela Charlton write for Associated Press this morning that France’s coronavirus death toll is expected to pass 100,000 today after a year of hospital tensions, on-and-off lockdowns and personal loss that have left families nationwide grieving the pandemic’s unending, devastating toll.
According to the Johns Hopkins University figures, the country has seen 5.2m cases and 99,936 deaths during the pandemic. The country of 67 million will be the eighth in the world to reach the symbolic six figure mark, and the third in Europe after the United Kingdom and Italy.
Experts say the 100,000 mark is likely an under-estimate, by at least several thousands. Analysis of death certificates shows that some Covid-19 cases are not reported when people die at home or in places like psychiatric units and chronic care facilities, they stress.
Lionel Petitpas, the president of the association Victims of Covid-19, told the Associated Press that the number of 100,000 deaths is “an important threshold.”
After months of people getting accustomed to the virus, the figure “is piercing a lot of minds. It is a figure we thought would never be reached,” he said. Petitpas, who lost his wife Joelle on 29 March last year from the virus, said families of victims “want the government to make a collective gesture to recognize our collective loss.”
Petitpas started a Facebook group last year for families of victims to share memories of their loved ones. Nearly every day, new testimonies appear.
“My wife, like so many others, was just put in a body bag,” he recalled. “It was like a luxury garbage bag. And then she was put in a coffin and sent to cremation.” He was not allowed to see her.
Petitpas said that despite a decree in January allowing people to see their deceased loved ones, many places still aren’t allowing it. “All these people who left us (are) like people with the plague, without human dignity, with nothing at all,” he deplored.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, told Le Parisien newspaper he thinks about all of the people who died in the pandemic and their families.
The pandemic was “so cruel” to individuals “who sometimes were not able to accompany, during the last moments and in death, a father, a mother, a loved one, a friend,” Macron said. Yet the crisis also shows “the ability of the French people to get united”, he added.
The French government spokesperson Gabriel Attal suggested it is too soon to set a specific date to honour those who died as the country is now fighting another rapid rise in confirmed cases.
“There will be an homage for sure, a national mourning for the victims of Covid-19,” Attal said Wednesday. “That time will come. Today, we throw all our forces in the battle against the epidemic.”
Updated
Here’s what PA Media says are the relaxation proposals they understands will be considered by Northern Ireland’s Stormont executive when it convenes later today. It’s unclear at present exactly when we can expect an announcement, but it is unlikely to be before late afternoon in Belfast. The list is:
From 23 April:
- Close contact services, hairdressers and beauty salons, reopen.
- Outdoors visitors attractions reopen.
- Driving lessons can resume. Theory and practical driving tests resume.
- Outdoor competitive sport will be allowed with numbers not exceeding 100. No spectators allowed.
- Equine assisted learning and therapy can take place outdoors, limited to ten people.
From 30 April:
- All remaining non-essential retail to reopen.
- Self-contained tourist accommodation, such as caravans and rented holiday homes can operate.
From 10 May:
- Licensed and unlicensed premises can serve customers in outdoors settings in groups of six from no more than two householders.
- Removal of curfews on takeaways and off licenses.
- Reopening of gyms.
From 14 May:
- Wedding receptions and post-burial events can take place in indoor hospitality venues, limited to 30 people.
- Limit on outdoor gatherings in domestic gardens increased to 15 people from no more than three households.
Not before 1 June:
- Licensed and unlicensed premises can operate indoors.
- Hotels reopen.
- Domestic mixing allowed in indoor settings.
- Indoors visitor attractions reopen.
- Return of indoor group exercise, with numbers limited to suit the size of venue.
Just a reminder, none of this is confirmed, and we won’t know for sure until later in the day, but this is what the PA Media news agency understands is being discussed.
Updated
You can already see that there will be several competing narratives about why the number of people waiting for routine operations and procedures on the NHS in England in February has hit its highest level since records began in 2007.
Dr David Bull, who is currently standing for election for London’s regional authority for the anti-lockdown Reform UK party, says it is the result of making the NHS a “Covid only service”.
This is the real cost of turning the NHS into a Covid only service . 4.7 million waiting for operations in England https://t.co/G3fnCYaGZd
— Dr David Bull (@drdavidbull) April 15, 2021
John Ashworth, who is the opposition party’s spokesperson on health, has laid the blame squarely at the door of a decade of under-funding by the current government.
Ten years of Tory underfunding, cuts, chronic staff shortages left the NHS weakened when the pandemic hit.
— Jonathan Ashworth 😷💙 (@JonAshworth) April 15, 2021
Patients pay the price with waiting lists at 4.7 million - highest since records began - & close to 400,000 waiting over 12 months for treatment.https://t.co/n6rQTBkNVc
Incidentally, if you want to keep an eye on the latest UK politics news, then my colleague Yohannes Lowe is running that live blog over here:
Thailand reports fourth record rise in daily Covid cases this week
Another grim update from Thailand. The country reported 1,543 new coronavirus cases today, the sharpest increase since the start of the pandemic and the fourth record rise this week, amid a third wave of infections in the south-east Asian country.
While Thailand has up to now managed to keep case numbers relatively contained compared to many other countries, the new outbreak comes as many have travelled during the country’s Songkran new year holidays and with vaccination rates still low.
Asked whether lockdowns would be imposed, the health official Chawetsan Namwat said measures were being formulated based on case numbers in each area and would be proposed to the coronavirus taskforce for approval on Friday.
“We have to divide up the areas based on seriousness, which is different and so measures have to be suitable for each area,” Chawetsan told a briefing.
Chayut Setboonsarng and Orathai Siring report for Reuters that authorities have already urged people to limit travel and begin working from home. Shopping malls will also close at 9 pm and the banking association said branches outside malls will shut at 3.30 pm and limit customer numbers.
Thailand’s last major lockdown was in late March last year, with a curfew imposed in April, before seeing months of relatively relaxed curbs as cases stayed mainly contained.
Of the new infections reported on Thursday, 409 were in Bangkok, the epicentre of the outbreak. The new cases took total infections to 37,453, with deaths remaining at 97.
In a statement, the government said there was sufficient space to accommodate patients, especially in Bangkok and nearby provinces, with more than 6,000 beds arranged and 2,200 more planned including in field hospitals.
Updated
People in England waiting to start hospital treatment hits record high
The number of people in England waiting to start hospital treatment has risen to a new record high.
A total of 4.7 million people were waiting to start treatment at the end of February 2021, according to figures from NHS England. PA note that this is the highest number since records began in August 2007.
The number of people having to wait more than 52 weeks to start hospital treatment stood at 387,885 in February 2021, the highest number for any calendar month since December 2007.
One year earlier, in February 2020, the number having to wait more than 52 weeks to start treatment stood at just 1,613.
Updated
Hong Kong widens vaccine scheme to include under-30s
Hong Kong authorities said today that the city’s vaccine scheme would be widened to include those aged between 16 to 29 years old for the first time, as they aim to boost lacklustre demand for inoculations in the Asian financial hub.
Hong Kong has seen a relatively slow take-up of vaccines since rolling out the scheme in February, with only around 8% of Hong Kong’s 7.5 million residents having been inoculated so far.
Patrick Nip, secretary for the civil service, said that the widening of the scheme would enable a total of 6.5 million residents to take part. “We appeal to the public to take the vaccine as soon as possible so Hong Kong won’t fall into the vicious cycle of wave after wave of outbreak,” he said.
Farah Master reports for Reuters the widening of the scheme comes three days after the city’s chief executive Carrie Lam said Hong Kong would loosen some coronavirus restrictions for residents who have been fully inoculated from late April.
The slow take-up of vaccines in Hong Kong has been driven by dwindling confidence in China’s Sinovac vaccine and fears of adverse reactions.
The city began vaccinating residents with doses from Sinovac in February and started offering a vaccine developed by BioNTech in March. Residents can choose which vaccine they take with the BioNTech shot seeing far greater demand. On a daily basis, two to three times more people booked inoculation with the BioNTech shot than with the Sinovac one, according to government figures.
Nip said residents aged 16 and 17 can only receive a BioNTech dose while those older than 18 years old can choose between the shot and the Sinovac vaccine.
Around 632,000 people have received their first vaccination dose, around 8% of the city’s population. The former British colony has recorded around 11,600 total coronavirus cases, far lower than other developed cities.
Updated
Varadkar: Ireland 'on track' to reopen retail stores and hairdressers from 4 May
Ireland is on track to ease restrictions from 4 May to allow the phased reopening of all retail stores and hairdressers, and will also develop a plan for further reopenings in June and July, the deputy prime minister, Leo Varadkar, has said.
Ireland shut most shops, building sites and hospitality in late December after a surge of Covid-19 infections. It began gradually unwinding economic restrictions this week, with housebuilding permitted and all students returning to schools.
Padraic Halpin reports for Reuters that the third shutdown in the last year has turned one of the world’s highest incidence rates of Covid-19 in January into one of Europe’s lowest. The number of cases per 100,000 people measured over the past 14 days has fallen to 132 this week.
“We’re on track to ease restrictions from 4 May. What we’re planning is allowing more outdoor activities, a phased reopening of retail and personal services but what we’ll also do at the end of April is develop the plan for June and July,” Varadkar told the national broadcaster RTE. “That’s looking good.”
The government said last month that it hoped to be able to reopen hotels in June but was criticised by restaurant and bar owners for not giving an indication of when they will be allowed to trade beyond just takeaway services.
Across the border in Northern Ireland, we are expecting an announcement from Stormont outlining their reopening plan later today. Off the back of a more advanced vaccination programme, it is expected to move faster than changes ordered by Dublin.
Updated
Incidentally, if you are curious or worried about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which is yet to be deployed in many countries but has been “paused” in the US, then my colleague Jessica Glenza has got you covered:
US health officials paused distribution of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine as scientists investigate the potential link between rare cases of blood clots and the potentially life-saving vaccine. Currently, the clotting “syndrome” appears to affect less than one in a million people who receive the vaccine.
Among more than 7.2m vaccine doses, scientists are investigating six cases of women between 18 and 48 who developed a rare blood clot, one that critically needs to be treated without heparin, a common blood thinner.
The pause has caused concern worldwide, among health professionals and ordinary citizens.
Read Jessica Glenza’s explainer here: Should I worry about side-effects from the Johnson & Johnson Covid vaccine?
The London regional director of Public Health England, Prof Kevin Fenton, has been on the media round this morning in the UK, talking about coronavirus variants and the need for surge testing.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “As we begin the process of unlocking and re-entering society and mixing, even small numbers of variants, when they occur, can have the potential to spread relatively quickly.
“And that is why we have such a proactive programme of screening for and testing for the new variants, and, where we have found, we surge. We need to get ahead of the infection and not keep following behind it.
“We’re finding cases because we’re doing more genetic sequencing of PCR positive tests of coronavirus which we’re seeing across the city. And that is identifying a low prevalence, a low number of cases, but we are finding cases of the South African variant. And in addition, we’re surging to identify additional cases belonging to the south London cluster, which we’re investigating in Lambeth, Wandsworth and Southwark. So we’re doing this very proactively.”
He said the low level of coronavirus infection in the UK capital means those involved in asymptomatic surge testing are able to “move about” afterwards.
Asked why this group are not being told to stay at home until they receive their results, PA reported that Fenton answered: “In part, because the level of infection that we are now having across the city [London] is actually quite low.
“The probability of you not having an infection is much higher, and, of course, we want to test individuals who may be asymptomatic, can be carrying the infection, so the risk of onward transmission is also much lower as well.
“So, the combination of factors, the timing of where we are in the phase of the epidemic, and the level of infections that we have, really means that we can allow people to continue to move about. But what’s really important is that we do do as much testing for asymptomatic infections as we can.”
Updated
CNN’s Maggie Fox reports that Brazil is heading towards an “unimaginable loss of lives”:
Brazil is reporting some of the world’s highest new cases per day – and the country may be headed for even worse times thanks to a combination of political chaos and inaction, a team of public health experts said on Wednesday.
“In Brazil, the federal response has been a dangerous combination of inaction and wrongdoing, including the promotion of chloroquine as treatment despite a lack of evidence,” wrote the team in their report, published in the journal Science.
The report was led by Marcia Castro of the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, experts at the University of São Paulo and elsewhere.
“In Rio de Janeiro, political chaos compromised a prompt and effective response. Leaders were immersed in corruption accusations, the governor was removed from office and faced an impeachment trial, and the secretary of health was changed three times between May and September, one of whom was arrested,” they added.
Updated
Just a quick snap from Reuters here, noting that German health minister Jens Spahn has again urged the country’s 16 federal states to impose tougher restrictions quickly to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus and not to wait until a national law on measures is passed.
“We know from last autumn what happens when we don’t act quickly,” Spahn told reporters, adding that doctors expect there will be 6,000 patients in intensive care by the end of the month.
Germany’s top public health official has also urged policymakers to take tough action urgently to try and contain a third wave of the coronavirus.
“The situation in the hospitals is coming to a head, in some cases dramatically,” RKI President Lothar Wieler told a weekly news conference, adding the situation will be worse than during the second wave.
Updated
Peddlers of industrial bleach who urge Americans to drink the fluid as a “miracle cure” for cancer, HIV/Aids and other diseases have begun touting the product illegally as a treatment for the latest variants of Covid-19.
Chlorine dioxide, a powerful bleaching agent used in textile and paper manufacturing, is being compounded and sold out of a makeshift laboratory in Miami, Florida. The company, Oclo Nanotechnology Science, is playing on fears of the new strain of the coronavirus discovered in the UK, which is now spreading rapidly and widely through the US.
The UK variant, B117, is thought to be more transmissible and deadly than the initial form of the virus.
The Miami company is invoking B117 to drive up sales of its bleach products, which the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warns are potentially dangerous and can be life-threatening. The front page of Oclo’s website is dominated by a photograph of vials of its chlorine dioxide product billed as an “antiviral” treatment.
The image is superimposed with the words: “B117 … new variant of coronavirus, the most contagious and dangerous in the United States. Rescuing chlorine dioxide and its great curative potential against pathogens.”
The appearance of a new marketing push out of Miami by peddlers of the bleach “cure”, often referred to as “miracle mineral solution”, or MMS, signals the FDA’s uphill struggle in trying to control the potentially lethal trade. Since the start of the pandemic, the federal agency has been clamping down on fraudulent products which claim to treat or cure Covid-19.
It has also been using its enforcement muscle to move against chlorine dioxide dealers. Last August, the FDA arrested Mark Grenon and his four sons, who were among the most prominent “miracle” bleach peddlers in the US.
Members of the Grenon family claimed to be “bishops” of the Florida-based Genesis II “church” that sold bleach under the guise that it was a “sacrament”. They remain in jails in Miami and Colombia awaiting extradition to the US facing charges of conspiracy to defraud the US and to introduce a misbranded drug into interstate commerce.
Read more of Ed Pilkington’s report here: US company illegally peddling ‘miracle cure’ bleach for new Covid variants
“Garlic-breath distance” may be the new addition to your lexicon that you were not expecting today.
Dr Julian Tang is a consultant virologist at the Leicester Royal Infirmary and author of a new study published in the British Medical Journal that urges governments and health leaders to “focus their efforts on airborne transmission” of the coronavirus, and away from worries about transmission by touch.
PA report Tang’s appearance on Sky News in the UK this morning, where Dr Tang said: “The way this virus transmits is really through conversational distance, within one metre. When you’re talking to a friend or sharing the same air as you’re listening to your friend talking, we call it the garlic-breath distance.
“So if you can smell your friend’s lunch you’re inhaling some of that air as well as any virus that’s inhaled with it. And this is why we say that masking is fine, social distancing is fine, but the indoor airborne environment needs to be improved and that can be done with ventilation.”
Here’s the key paragraph in the intro to Dr Tang’s study, which can be read here:
It is now clear that SARS-CoV-2 transmits mostly between people at close range through inhalation. This does not mean that transmission through contact with surfaces or that the longer range airborne route does not occur, but these routes of transmission are less important during brief everyday interactions over the usual 1 m conversational distance. In close range situations, people are much more likely to be exposed to the virus by inhaling it than by having it fly through the air in large droplets to land on their eyes, nostrils, or lips. The transmission of SARS-CoV-2 after touching surfaces is now considered to be relatively minimal.
Our Justin McCurry in Tokyo has the latest on the possibility that the Summer Olympics could still be cancelled:
A senior member of Japan’s ruling party has said that cancelling the Tokyo Olympics “remains an option” if the coronavirus pandemic continues to worsen.
The pandemic shows no signs of slowing in several parts of the world, while experts in Japan have warned that the country has entered a fourth wave of Covid-19 infections driven by mutant strains of the virus.
No overseas spectators will be allowed to attend Olympic events, and a decision on whether to admit people in Japan to venues could come later this month.
Public opinion in the host nation is firmly opposed to the Games, with a recent poll showing that 39.2% thought they should be cancelled, and 32.8% calling for them to be postponed a second time – a move the IOC has said is unfeasible.
“Cancelling Olympics” was trending on Twitter in Japan on Thursday with more than 35,000 tweets. “If this person says it, Olympic cancellation looks like a reality,” one said in reference to Nikai’s comments.
Akira Koike, a Japanese Communist party MP, said holding the Games was already “impossible”, adding that a decision on cancellation should be made quickly.
Pressure on the IOC and Tokyo 2020 organisers increased after several medical experts questioned the decision to push ahead with the Olympics during the pandemic.
In an editorial in this weeks BMJ, Kazuki Shimizu, Devi Sridhar, Kiyosu Taniguchi and Kenji Shibuya said it would be a mistake to host large numbers of people from overseas in Tokyo this summer.
Read more of Justin McCurry’s report from Tokyo here: Cancelling Tokyo Olympics ‘remains an option’ says top Japanese politician
Germany sees biggest single day Covid case rise since January
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany has jumped by 29,426 to 3.073 million, the biggest daily increase since 8 January. The reported death toll rose by 293 to 79,381, while the number of new infections per 100,000 residents over seven days rose to 160.1, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed.
Caroline Copley reports for Reuters that it comes as the government seeks to push through tougher nationwide curbs to try to contain a third wave of the virus. Germany is grappling with a more transmissible variant of COVID-19 five months before a national election in which Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives are forecast to suffer major losses.
Frustrated by a failure of some regions to implement tougher restrictions despite rising cases, Merkel wants parliament to grant the federal government temporary powers to enforce coronavirus lockdowns in areas with high infections.
Earlier today, Vice Chancellor Olaf Scholz defended the changes to the Infection Protection Act which include curfews once the seven-day virus incidence exceeds 100,000.
“This has helped everywhere, it has been done in many countries around the world - and it has brought the incidence rates down,” he told ARD television, adding something had to be done to limit the spread of the virus. “We want to have strict rules.”
Northern Ireland expected to announce further lockdown easing measures today
The different coronavirus restrictions put in place, and the different pace of removing them, have perhaps been one of the most visible examples of how devolution works within the UK for years. In Northern Ireland today it is expected that we will get an announcement of a further easing of measures, and the timing for them.
David Young reports for PA that when Northern Ireland’s exit blueprint was first published at the start of March, the administration faced criticism for not including any indicative reopening dates. At the time, ministers insisted the health picture was too volatile to offer up provisional dates that ultimately might have to be scrapped.
The powersharing executive meets later today, and First Minister Arlene Foster, deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill and Health Minister Robin Swann have all already signalled the likelihood of a number of reopening dates being outlined.
With Northern Ireland having marked one million Covid-19 vaccines by last weekend and with other key health and scientific indicators going in the right direction, ministers have made clear they are now in a position where indicative dates can be provided. On Wednesday Swann said the “scales are tipping” in favour of accelerating the pace of lockdown exit.
Foster had already expressed hope opening dates for close-contact services, such as hairdressers and beauticians, and non-essential retail will be announced after today’s meeting. The hospitality sector is also hopeful that it might get some good news, particularly in respect of outdoor trading.
Northern Ireland took some further gradual steps out of lockdown on Monday.
The remainder of post-primary students, years eight to 11, returned to schools while a limited number of outdoor-focused retail outlets, such as garden centres and car dealerships, reopened. The “stay-at-home” messaging was also replaced with “stay local” advice.
Other relaxations on Monday saw the number of people who can meet outdoors in a garden, including children, increase from six to 10. Click-and-collect services for non-essential retail also resumed. Outdoor sports training was allowed for recognised clubs, in groups of up to 15, provided all indoor facilities except toilets remain closed.
The number of people allowed to attend marriage and civil partnership ceremonies also increased, at a level informed by a risk assessment for the venue.
Good morning, it’s Martin Belam here in London to take you through the next few hours. One of the recent quotes to raise eyebrows from British prime minister Boris Johnson was his private remark that the record-fast development of Covid-19 vaccines was “because of capitalism, because of greed”.
Overnight Michael Safi reports for us on attempts to pin down exactly where the money came from to develop the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot that Johnson was boasting about – and it turns out it wasn’t private business at all.
At least 97% of the funding for the development of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine has been identified as coming from taxpayers or charitable trusts, according to the first attempt to reconstruct who paid for the decades of research that led to the lifesaving formulation.
Using two different methods of inquiry, researchers were able to identify the source of hundreds of millions of pounds of research grants from the year 2000 onwards for published work on what would eventually become the novel technology that underpins the jab, as well as funding for the final product.
The overwhelming majority of the money, especially in the early stages of the research, came from UK government departments, British and American scientific institutes, the European commission and charities including the Wellcome Trust. Less than 2% of the identified funding came from private industry, the researchers said.
You can read more here: Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid vaccine research ‘was 97% publicly funded’
That’s it from me, Helen Sullivan, for today. Over to you, Martin Belam.
Wishing a good rest of your day to everyone except Canada.
Cambodia’s Hun Sen says country on ‘brink of death’ from Covid surge
Spiralling Covid-19 cases have put Cambodia “on the brink of death”, its strongman premier Hun Sen has warned, as the country imposed lockdowns in the capital Phnom Penh and a nearby city.
The Southeast Asian kingdom has seen Covid-19 cases surge since February, when an outbreak was first detected among its Chinese expatriate community.
Authorities said last week that hospitals in Phnom Penh were running out of beds and that they had transformed schools and wedding party halls into treatment centres, while Hun Sen threatened quarantine-breakers with jail time.
Phnom Penh and adjacent city Ta Khmau were Wednesday night placed under lockdown for two weeks to curb the spread, effectively halting the movement of more than two million people.
“Please my people - join your efforts to end this dangerous event,” pled premier Hun Sen in a recorded address aired on state-run television late Wednesday night.
“We are on the brink of death already,” he said. “If we don’t join hands together, we will head to real death.”
Cambodia’s latest announced figures exceeded 4,800, but the premier said Wednesday that an additional 300 cases had been detected.
Phnom Penh and Ta Khmau residents are now barred from leaving their homes for two weeks except to go to the hospital or to buy medicine, while only two household members will be allowed out to buy food.
Cancelling Olympics remains an option, says Japan official
A senior Japanese ruling party official said cancelling this year’s Olympics in Tokyo remains an option if the coronavirus crisis becomes too dire, as a fourth wave of infections surges less than 100 days from the planned start of the Games, Reuters reports.
“If it seems impossible to do it any more, then we have to stop, decisively,” Toshihiro Nikai, secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party, said in comments to broadcaster TBS.
Cancellation is “of course” an option, Nikai said. “If the Olympics were to spread infection, then what are the Olympics for?” he added.
A key backer of Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, party heavyweight Nikai is known for his frank comments, which come as many other ruling party lawmakers have avoided discussing the hot button issue of a possible cancellation.
The world’s biggest sporting event has already been delayed by a year and is being held without international spectators.
Japan is grappling with rising coronavirus infections, with numbers trending higher in Tokyo after the government ended a state of emergency, and Osaka suffering a record number of cases.
The government is pushing ahead with preparations incorporating social distancing measures and other restrictions for the Games set to begin on July 23, with a scaled back torch relay underway.
“We’ll hold (the Games) in a way that’s feasible,” Taro Kono, a popular minister in charge of Japan’s vaccination drive, said on a separate TV programme, according to Kyodo News. “That may be without spectators,” he added.
Former world leaders urge Biden to waive intellectual property rules for vaccines to accelerate global access
Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown is among a group of former world leaders and Nobel laureates calling on US President Joe Biden to waive intellectual property rules for Covid vaccines to accelerate global access to the jabs, PA media reports.
Mr Brown is one of 175 former government heads and leading thinkers to co-sign an open letter to Mr Biden which says they are “gravely concerned” by the slow progress in making Covid vaccines readily available to people in low and middle income countries.
The letter, which also includes former French president Francois Hollande and Nobel laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz among its signatories, urges the president to support a proposal from the South African and Indian governments at the World Trade
Organisation (WTO) to temporarily waive intellectual property rights related to Covid-19 vaccines and treatments.
This would allow for an urgently needed “scale up” in the manufacturing and supply of vaccines around the world.
The letter says a small number of countries, including the US, UK and EU, are currently blocking the move.
It states: “A WTO waiver is a vital and necessary step to bringing an end to this pandemic. It must be combined with ensuring vaccine know-how and technology is shared openly.
“These actions would expand global manufacturing capacity, unhindered by industry monopolies that are driving the dire supply shortages blocking vaccine access.
“Nine in 10 people in most poor countries may well go without a vaccine this year. At this pace, many nations will be left waiting until at least 2024 to achieve mass Covid-19 immunisation, despite what the limited, while welcome, Covax initiative is able to offer.”
Mr Brown said the waiver should be accompanied by a “global multi-year burden sharing plan to finance vaccines for the poorest countries”.
He added: “President Biden has said that no-one is safe until everyone is safe, and now with the G7 ahead there is an unparalleled opportunity to provide the leadership that only the US can provide and that hastens an end to the pandemic for the world.
“This would be in the strategic interests of the US, and of every country on the planet.”
Downing Street has been approached for comment.
Summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic with me, Helen Sullivan.
Here are the key recent developments:
Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown is among a group of former world leaders and Nobel laureates calling on US President Joe Biden to waive intellectual property rules for Covid vaccines to accelerate global access to the jabs.
Meanwhile senior Japanese ruling party official said cancelling this year’s Olympics in Tokyo remains an option if the coronavirus crisis becomes too dire, as a fourth wave of infections surges less than 100 days from the planned start of the Games.
“If it seems impossible to do it any more, then we have to stop, decisively,” Toshihiro Nikai, secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party, said in comments to broadcaster TBS.
Cancellation is “of course” an option, Nikai said. “If the Olympics were to spread infection, then what are the Olympics for?” he added.
- Turkey recorded 62,797 new coronavirus cases and 279 deaths in the last 24 hours, health ministry data showed on Wednesday, registering the highest daily death toll and rise in cases since the beginning of the pandemic.
- Portugal’s parliament extended on Wednesday a state of emergency for 15 days as health experts warned that a gradual relaxation of strict lockdown rules now underway could soon lead to a significant jump in coronavirus cases.
- Mexico’s government reported 5,113 new confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 518 more fatalities, according to data from the health ministry on Wednesday. It brings the country’s total to 2,291,246 infections and 210,812 deaths, Reuters reports.
- An NHS trust in England is planning to make Covid-19 vaccinations part of staff contracts, it has been reported. A letter from the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital Foundation Trust in London that is set to go out to staff is said to state: “We will be making Covid vaccination mandatory for all our employees and it will form part of the employment contract.”
- Russia has announced the start of production of its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine in Serbia, the first European country outside Russia and Belarus to begin manufacturing the jab.
- France will use Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine as planned despite its suspension in the US, a government spokesman said, adding France had received a first shipment of 200,000 doses.
- The pace of Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine production is unlikely to speed up markedly in the next few months, though the drugmaker expects its manufacturing capacity to expand significantly by 2022, chief executive Stephane Bancel said during an investor call, Reuters reports.
- Sweden’s Health Agency said it would pause plans to start vaccinations using Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine following reports of rare blood clots similar to those reported for the AstraZeneca shot.
- EU countries will receive 50 millionm Covid-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer and BioNTech by the end of June, the head of the EU commission said on Wednesday, as deliveries expected at the end of the year will be brought forward.
- Denmark will permanently cease to administer AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine, broadcaster TV 2 reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.
