That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, for today.
Thanks for following along – this blog is now closed. I will be back in the morning for another day of Covid news from around the world.
In the meantime, you can catch up with the latest coronavirus coverage here.
Brazil records 530 more coronavirus deaths on Wednesday
Brazil registered 17,893 new cases of coronavirus on Wednesday and 530 additional Covid deaths, according to data released by the country’s health ministry.
In total, registered Covid deaths in Brazil have reached 599,359.
Tammy Abraham has become the first England football player to reveal that he is vaccinated against Covid, but the subject remains a sensitive one around the squad.
Although England’s players have taken a lead on social issues such as tackling racism and child poverty, they have been less forthcoming with their views on vaccination.
Fikayo Tomori, the Milan defender, declined on Wednesday to say whether he was jabbed and, with England’s manager Gareth Southgate revealing last weekend that he did know not how many members are vaccinated, it was notable that Abraham was open about his status.
Roma striker Tammy Abraham said:
It is a personal choice. People are entitled to do what they want to do with their bodies. For me it was a different situation. I am vaccinated. That is a personal choice.
I have contracted the virus before, I am in Italy and for me it is the right thing to do. Everyone is entitled to do what they want to do and what is personal to them. They should make the decision to what they want to do.
Jürgen Klopp, the Liverpool manager, launched a stinging attack on people who refuse vaccinations, comparing them to drink-drivers and arguing that they are to blame if people catch Covid from them.
It has become a difficult debate in football, with many Premier League clubs reportedly struggling to convince their players to get jabbed.
Updated
In the US, healthcare giant Kaiser Permanente has put more than 2,200 employees nationwide on unpaid leave who have chosen not to get vaccinated against coronavirus.
The employees have until 1 December to get vaccinated to be able to return to work and those who choose not to will be terminated, the company said. Kaiser’s overall vaccination rate stands at 92%, reported the Associated Press.
The company said in a statement:
We hope none of our employees will choose to leave their jobs rather than be vaccinated, but we won’t know with certainty until then.
We will continue to work with this group of employees to allay concerns and educate them about the vaccines, their benefits, and risks.
The Oakland-based company announced the vaccination requirement on 2 August. On 5 August, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued an order requiring all of the state’s roughly 2.2 million health care workers and long-term care workers to be fully vaccinated against Covid by the end of September.
The Oakland-based company employs about 216,000 nationwide. Since its vaccination requirement was announced, the inoculation rate among employees has gone from 78% to 92% as of Tuesday, the company said.
Mexico passed a milestone of sorts in September when the airport at the country’s biggest coastal resort, Cancún, surpassed pre-pandemic levels of passengers.
The Airports of the Southeast group, which runs the terminal at the Caribbean coast resort, said Wednesday it handled 1.66 million passengers in Cancun in September, 4.4% percent more than in the same month of 2019.
By January 2020, the coronavirus pandemic cut passenger numbers drastically, and only about 854,000 used the airport in September 2020, the Associated Press reported.
It is unclear, but highly possible, that passenger levels at Cancún airport for all of 2021 could equal or exceed the 2019 annual number.
Mexico never instituted any quarantine or testing requirements for incoming passengers, in part to avoid affecting the country’s tourism income.
Updated
Meanwhile, Los Angeles leaders approved one of the nation’s strictest vaccine mandates on Wednesday — a sweeping measure that requires the shots for everyone entering bars, restaurants, nail salons, gyms or even a Lakers game.
The City Council voted 11-2 in favour of the ordinance that will require proof of full vaccination starting 4 November, reported the Associated Press.
The move came after the council postponed a vote last week to deal with concerns ranging from who could be fined for violations to whether employees could end up in fist-fights when they have to serve as vaccine door monitors.
Some critics charge that a mandate would amount to segregation of those who cannot or refuse to be vaccinated. Others call it unenforceable.
Business trade groups have said the city mandate will sow confusion because Los Angeles County’s own vaccine rules — which apply both in Los Angeles and in surrounding communities — are less sweeping.
However, council members who support the ordinance said it is aimed at reducing the risk of new Covid surges. The nation’s second-most populous city faced a huge rise in infections and hospitalisations last winter and a smaller surge this summer linked to the spread of the highly contagious delta variant.
Mayor Eric Garcetti is expected to sign the ordinance into law. Garcetti expressed his support for a vaccine measure last week, saying: “I don’t want to bury another city employee, police officer, firefighter.”
In the United States, Idaho’s Republican governor, Brad Little, temporarily left the state on Tuesday on government business and his deputy, Lieutenant Governor Janice McGeachin, immediately began issuing rightwing orders while she was temporarily holding executive power – including a ban on coronavirus vaccine mandates.
That same afternoon, McGeachin issued an executive order – as acting governor – banning state officials from requiring what she called “Covid-19 vaccine passports” from employees, the Washington Post reported.
Little, who was in Texas meeting with nine other Republican governors over concerns about Joe Biden’s handling of migration at the US-Mexico border, promised to quickly reverse McGeachin’s order as soon as he returned to Idaho.
Little said in a statement shortly after arriving in Texas on Tuesday:
I am in Texas performing my duties as the duly elected governor of Idaho, and I have not authorised the lieutenant governor to act on my behalf.
I will be rescinding and reversing any actions taken by the lieutenant governor when I return.
Pfizer will study the effectiveness of its vaccine against Covid by inoculating the whole population over the age of 12 in a town in southern Brazil, the company said.
The study will be conducted in Toledo, population 143,000, in the west of Parana state, together with Brazil’s National Vaccination Program, local health authorities, a hospital and a federal university.
Pfizer said the purpose was to study transmission of the coronavirus in a “real-life scenario” after the population has been vaccinated, Reuters reported. Pfizer added:
The initiative is the first and only of its kind to be undertaken in collaboration with the pharmaceutical company in a developing country.
A similar study was conducted by the Butantan Institute, one of Brazil’s leading biomedical research centers, in the smaller town of Serrana, in Sao Paulo state, to test the CoronaVac shot developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd.
In May, Butantan said mass vaccination had reduced coronavirus deaths by 95% in the town with a population of 45,644 people. The institute is considering extending the study for a third dose.
Record number of Covid cases recorded in Turkey today
The number of daily coronavirus cases in Turkey surpassed 30,000 on Wednesday, the highest number of infections since 30 April.
The country’s health ministry reported 30,438 new cases and 228 confirmed deaths. Fahrettin Koca, the health minister, says with the number of daily cases hovering between 28,000 and 30,000 since mid-September.
There were approximately 300,000 active cases in the country during a 10-day period, the Associated Press reported. Koca said:
We have to be aware that this situation presents a critical burden.
The fact that most of the current active cases are among the young means that our health system is not strained.
Still, such high numbers of infected people is not acceptable.
He urged people to get vaccinated. Nearly 73% of the adult population has been fully vaccinated, according to the ministry figures.
Updated
Coronavirus is “still running rampant” worldwide and the failure to ensure poorer countries can access vaccines risks more deaths and the emergence of potentially dangerous new variants, the creator of the Oxford jab has warned.
Pleading for immediate action to enable wider distribution of jabs across the world, Prof Dame Sarah Gilbert said the “ever-evolving” virus “continues to circulate unchecked”, and, as a result, every country in the world now faces the threat of “further Sars-CoV-2 variants” this winter.
“No one is safe until we are all safe,” said Gilbert. Even countries with high levels of vaccine coverage, such as Britain, could still face “an alarming future”, she warned, adding:
The virus has already adapted to increase transmission between humans, with the Alpha variant and then the Delta variant becoming dominant in many countries.
As the world grapples with the spread of the Delta variant, it is more crucial than ever that we do not forget the lives that could be saved by administering first and second doses to the most vulnerable populations worldwide and the opportunity that the global distribution of vaccine provides to protect all of us by reducing the selection of further Sars-CoV-2 variants.
Good evening, I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you the latest Covid news over the next couple of hours.
We start with the news that the Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau has said all domestic air travellers aged 12 or older will need to provide proof of full vaccination or a negative coronavirus test from 30 October.
Then from 30 November, travellers must be fully vaccinated and won’t have the option of a negative test, the Associated Press reported.
Meanwhile, officials say all core federal government workers, members of Canada’s national police force and the armed forces must be fully vaccinated by 29 October. Federal public servants who aren’t fully vaccinated and don’t obtain medical exemptions must take unpaid leave.
The new policy will affect more than 267,000 core public-service and Royal Canadian Mounted Police workers and apply to those who work from home and outside of the country.
Summary
Before I hand over to my colleague shortly, here is a quick recap of some of the main developments from the day so far:
- The UK government will slash England’s travel red list to about a dozen countries, but plans for replacing the requirement for a negative PCR test with a lateral flow one to avoid isolation hang in the balance. An announcement is expected on Thursday. Story here.
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The UK government has lifted its advice against non-essential travel to 32 countries and territories, including Bangladesh, Fiji, Gambia, Ghana and Malaysia. The UK will stop advising Britons to avoid all but essential travel to non-red list countries on Covid-19 grounds except in “exceptional circumstances” such as if the local healthcare system is overwhelmed, the FCDO added. This will make it easier for people visiting those locations to obtain travel insurance.
- Russia reported 929 coronavirus-related deaths on Wednesday, the largest single-day death toll it has recorded since the pandemic began, compared to 895 the day before.
- Canada’s federal employees who are not fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and are not exempt from getting the shots will be put on administrative leave without pay, officials said, while domestic air, train and cruise ship travellers and workers will soon have to show proof of vaccination.
- The UK reported 39,851 new cases of Covid-19 and a further 143 people were reported as having died within 28 days of a positive test.
- The Lithuanian government proposed to pay 100 euros to people aged 75 or old to take the Covid-19 vaccine, to boost the inoculation rate for the group, which lags in the European Union. About a third of over-75s in Lithuania remain unvaccinated, according to government data, one of the worst in the bloc, and two-thirds of the 4,965 Covid deaths in the country have been in this age group.
- Wales will press ahead with the introduction of a Covid pass for nightclubs and big sporting events despite only getting its policy through the Senedd because a technical issue meant an opponent could not cast his vote. Story here.
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Vietnam is planning from December to reopen key tourist destinations to vaccinated visitors from countries deemed a low Covid risk, the government, ahead of a full resumption targeted for June next year. It will from December allow tourists from approved countries to visit Unesco world heritage site Halong Bay and Hoi An, the highlands town of Dalat and beach destination Nha Trang.
- Sweden will pause the use of Moderna’s Covid vaccine for people born in 1991 and later for precautionary reasons after reports of possible rare side-effects, such as myocarditis, the Swedish health agency said. “However, the risk of being affected is very small,” it added.
Updated
The UK government will slash England’s travel red list to about a dozen countries, but plans for replacing the requirement for a negative PCR test with a lateral flow one to avoid isolation hang in the balance.
Destinations including Brazil, Mexico and South Africa are expected to be moved off the red list on Thursday, meaning passengers returning from them will not have to isolate in a hotel for 11 nights at a cost of more than £2,000.
The move means restrictions at the border will be at their loosest since the third lockdown began nine months ago.
Brazil and South Africa have faced the toughest restrictions longer than almost any country, as they were both put on the red list in January owing to fears that the Gamma and Beta variants that were discovered in the two countries respectively were more resistant to vaccines. Pockets of Beta cases sprang up in the UK, but Delta was then imported from India and began to outstrip most other variants owing to its high transmissibility.
There are 54 countries on the red list, which include all of those in mainland South America and southern and eastern Africa. The London-based World Travel and Tourism Council, which represents industry firms, said the sector’s recovery would continue to be “sluggish” owing to policies such as the red list.
Full story here:
UK lifts advice against non-essential travel for 32 destinations
The UK government has lifted its advice against non-essential travel to 32 countries and territories, PA reports.
Bangladesh, Fiji, Gambia, Ghana and Malaysia are among the locations for which travel advice based on the risk of coronavirus has been relaxed, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said.
The UK will stop advising Britons to avoid all but essential travel to non-red list countries on Covid-19 grounds except in “exceptional circumstances” such as if the local healthcare system is overwhelmed, the FCDO added. This will make it easier for people visiting those locations to obtain travel insurance.
Before Wednesday’s changes, the FCDO advised against non-essential travel due to the virus to 117 countries and territories. Advice is expected to be lifted for more locations in the coming days.
The FCDO said the change in policy follows the “improved public health in many countries” and the “decreased risk to British nationals” as a result of the vaccine rollout. This comes amid an easing of the government’s rules for travellers entering the UK, with the traffic light system scrapped on Monday.
Fully vaccinated residents - and unvaccinated under 18s - from more than 50 countries and territories can now arrive without taking a pre-departure lateral flow test, a day-eight post-arrival PCR test, or self-isolating.
The foreign secretary Liz Truss said:
These rule tweaks will make travelling more straightforward, supporting businesses and families right across Britain - and allow more of us to see friends and loved ones with greater peace of mind.
We’re striking the right balance between keeping people safe which remains our priority and giving them the freedom to exercise personal responsibility, while supporting the travel sector as it continues to recover.
The full list of countries for which the FCDO has eased its travel advice is: Algeria; Armenia; Bangladesh; Belarus; Benin; Comoros; Tokelau and Niue; Djibouti; Equatorial Guinea; Fiji; Gambia; Guinea; Kazakhstan; Kiribati; Kosovo; Liberia; Madagascar; Malaysia; Marshall Islands; Micronesia; Nauru; Sao Tome and Principe; Senegal; Solomon Islands; Togo; Tonga; Tuvalu; Vanuatu; Congo; America Samoa; French Polynesia; and Ghana.
The FCDO will continue to advise against all but essential travel for all red list countries where the risk to British nationals is deemed to be “unacceptably high”.
Meanwhile, the government is expected to announce on Thursday that it will reduce England’s red list. There are currently 54 countries on the list, such as Mexico, Cuba, all of mainland South America, and southern and eastern Africa.
Anyone arriving in the UK from a location in the red tier must spend 11 nights in a quarantine hotel. This costs £2,285 for solo travellers, making such trips unaffordable for many people.
The devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland set their own travel rules but have recently mirrored announcements made in Westminster.
Updated
Brazil has lifted a restriction that blocked people coming from the UK, South Africa and India from entering the country due to the pandemic, according to a decision published in the country’s official gazette late on Tuesday, Reuters reports.
The country said the measure applies to travellers arriving by air. They will only need to show a negative Covid test, which means vaccination proof is not required.
According to Brazil’s government, foreigners coming by land will still be prevented from entering the country.
Russia reports record number of daily Covid deaths
Russia reported 929 coronavirus-related deaths on Wednesday, the largest single-day death toll it has recorded since the pandemic began, compared to 895 the day before.
The government coronavirus task force also said it had recorded 25,133 new cases in the last 24 hours, a slight increase from a day earlier.
I’m grateful to reader Anthony for flagging this.
Updated
Canada’s federal employees who are not fully vaccinated against Covid-19 and are not exempt from getting the shots will be put on administrative leave without pay, officials said on Wednesday, while domestic air, train and cruise ship travellers and workers will soon have to show proof of vaccination.
Federal employees will be required to show proof of vaccination through an online portal by 29 October. Workers and travellers on trains, planes and cruise ships operating domestically must show they have been inoculated by 30 October.
The introduction of these vaccine mandates was a cornerstone pledge by the Liberal prime minister Justin Trudeau during his campaign for re-election.
Canada’s vaccine policy will be one of the strictest in the world.
Fiji in August forced public servants to go on leave if unvaccinated. If still not inoculated by November, they will lose their jobs. Later this month, Italy will require proof of vaccination, a negative test or recent recovery from infection for all the country’s workers.
Canada’s vaccine mandate for federal workers, first promised on 13 August, will be reassessed every six months and stay in place until the policy is no longer required, one official said.
For travellers, a negative test will not be accepted as a replacement for proof of vaccination after 30 November, officials said. Children under 12, who are not yet eligible for vaccination in Canada will be exempted from the travel mandate.
The number of new Covid infections has been dropping over the past month throughout the Americas, even though only 37% of the people in Latin America and the Caribbean have been fully vaccinated, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said on Wednesday.
However, Alaska has the most serious outbreak in the United States today that is overwhelming emergency rooms, and while South America is continuing to see a drop in infections, Chile has seen a jump in cases in the capital Santiago and port cities Coquimbo and Antofagasta.
PAHO has closed vaccine supply agreements with Sinovac Biotech Inc and AstraZeneca Plc for delivery this year and next and with China’s Sinopharm for 2022, the agency’s director Carissa Etienne told reporters.
UK reports 39,851 new Covid cases
The UK has reported 39,851 new cases of Covid-19, government data showed on Wednesday.
A further 143 people were reported as having died within 28 days of a positive test, taking the seven-day total down by nearly 15% from the previous week.
And a total of 49.04 million people had received a first dose of a vaccine against coronavirus by the end of 5 October and 45.05 million people had received a second dose.
Updated
The Lithuanian government on Wednesday proposed to pay 100 euros to people aged 75 or old to take the Covid-19 vaccine, to boost the inoculation rate for the group, which lags in the European Union.
“We are unable to convince them to vaccinate otherwise”, the prime minister Ingrida Šimonytė said during a televised government meeting.
Although 73% of all Lithuanian adults are vaccinated, in line with the EU average, about a third of over-75s remain unvaccinated, according to government data, one of the worst in the bloc. Two-thirds of the 4,965 Covid deaths in the country have been in this age group.
If parliament approves the scheme next week, the government will spend up to 27 million euros to pay over-75s who got their full vaccination between September and November.
The already vaccinated will get the payout if they take a booster shot until end of March next year.
“If this helps at least some people to take the right decision and avoid severe form of the disease, or death - this is an investment worth doing”, Šimonytė added.
During the two weeks until Sept. 27, the nation of 2.8 million had the worst rates of Covid spread in the EU, as well as the second worst mortality rate, with 646 new cases and 81 deaths per 10,000 people, a European Commission agency said.
In the United States, officials in the Houston metropolitan area said in August they would pay $100 to any person receiving a first dose of a Covid vaccine, after the president Joe Biden called for state, local and US territorial governments to provide such payments to boost inoculation rates.
The UK is sending an extra 245,000 vaccines to Indonesia, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has tweeted.
ADDITIONAL VACCINES TO INDONESIA 🇮🇩
— Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (@FCDOGovUK) October 6, 2021
The UK 🇬🇧 through our partners @crownagents has donated a further 245,000 vaccines to Indonesia to help the country tackle the pandemic & protect its population from the disease.
No one is safe until we are all safe. pic.twitter.com/BZAst6lkR8
Indonesia experienced more than 56,000 new daily cases at the peak of its recent wave in July but infection levels have since dropped dramatically and are now back below 2,000 a day.
Updated
In the UK, a Christian TV channel has been fined £25,000 by the broadcasting regulator for airing misleading and harmful statements about coronavirus, including that the rollout of 5G mobile networks caused the pandemic.
Programmes aired at the height of the first wave last year on LoveWorld, which holds a UK broadcasting licence and is beamed around the world, claimed there was a “global cover-up” over the technology being the cause of the health crisis.
Updated
The skin condition known as Covid toe may be a side-effect of the immune system’s response to fighting off the virus, according to a study.
The symptom results in chilblain-like inflammation and redness on the hands and feet, with the condition sometimes lasting for months at a time. It typically develops within a week to four weeks of being infected and can result in toes and fingers becoming swollen or changing colour.
Researchers behind the study, which has been published in the British Journal of Dermatology, examined 50 participants with the condition and 13 with similar chilblains lesions that arose before the pandemic.
They found one mechanism behind both types of the condition involved the body generating an immune response with high levels of certain autoantibodies, which mistakenly target and react with a person’s own cells and tissues as well as the invading virus. They also found an overlap with type I interferon, a key protein in the antiviral response.
In addition to the immune system, cells lining blood vessels that supply the affected areas also appeared to play a critical role in the development of Covid toes and chilblains.
Read more on this story here:
Pfizer Inc will study the effectiveness of its vaccine against Covid-19 by inoculating the whole population over the age of 12 in a town in southern Brazil, the company said on Wednesday.
The study will be conducted in Toledo, population 143,000, in the west of Parana state, together with Brazil’s National Vaccination Program, local health authorities, a hospital and the federal university.
Pfizer said the purpose was to study the behaviour of Covid-19 in a “real-life scenario” after the population has been vaccinated.
“The initiative is the first and only of its kind to be undertaken in a developing country in collaboration with a pharmaceutical company,” Pfizer said.
Updated
The Welsh government will press ahead with the introduction of a Covid pass for nightclubs and big sporting events despite only getting its policy through the Senedd because a technical issue meant an opponent could not cast his vote, Steven Morris reports.
Vietnam is planning from December to reopen key tourist destinations to vaccinated visitors from countries deemed a low Covid risk, the government said on Wednesday, ahead of a full resumption targeted for June next year.
Vietnam imposed tight border controls at the start of the pandemic in an effort to keep Covid vout, with some initial success, but that harmed its burgeoning tourism sector, which typically accounts for about 10% of gross domestic product.
Vietnam last month announced it would reopen the resort island Phu Quoc for vaccinated travellers from November.
It will from December also allow tourists from approved countries to visit Unesco world heritage site Halong Bay and Hoi An, the highlands town of Dalat and beach destination Nha Trang.
“We are only open when it’s truly safe,” the government said in a statement. “We are moving step by step, cautiously but flexibly to adapt to real situations of the pandemic.”
The move follows similar steps taken by neighbouring Thailand, which will next month expand locations in its pilot scheme to allow vaccinated visitors.
Foreign arrivals to Vietnam fell to 3.8 million last year down from 18 million in 2019, when tourism revenue was $31bn, equivalent to 12% of GDP.
The country is trying to speed up Covid vaccinations, with 13% of its 98 million people inoculated so far, one of the lowest rates in Asia.
Updated
Sweden pauses use of Moderna vaccine for younger age groups
Sweden will pause the use of Moderna’s Covid vaccine for people born in 1991 and later after reports of possible rare side-effects, such as myocarditis, the Swedish health agency said on Wednesday.
“The Swedish Public Health Agency has decided to suspend the use of Moderna’s vaccine Spikevax for everyone born 1991 and later, for precautionary reasons,” it said in a statement.
“The cause is signals of an increased risk of side-effects such as myocarditis and pericarditis. However, the risk of being affected is very small,” it said.
The health agency said it recommended the Comirnaty vaccine from Pfizer/BioNtech instead. People born 1991 or later that had received a first Moderna shot – 81,000 – would not get a second Moderna jab, it added.
Earlier this week, the Swedish health agency said people aged 12 to 15 would only get the Pfizer/BioNtech vaccine.
The European Medicines Agency approved the use of Comirnaty in May, while Spikevax was given the nod for children over 12 in July.
Updated
Kazakhstan has signed a deal to buy about 4m doses of Pfizer’s Covid vaccine, the healthcare minister Alexei Tsoi said on Wednesday.
The country’s government has said it will offer the Pfizer shots, at least initially, only to children aged 12 and older, and to pregnant women.
Updated
Updated
Ireland’s unemployment rate, including people receiving temporary Covid-19 jobless benefits, fell to a fresh pandemic low of 10% in September from 12.4% in August, the Central Statistics Office said on Wednesday.
Excluding recipients of the pandemic unemployment payment, which is being gradually phased out over the next five months, the rate fell to 6.4% from a revised 6.5%.
Ireland’s finance ministry forecast last week that unemployment would average 7.2% next year and fall to 6% in 2023 as the economy continues to recover from the pandemic.
Updated
When her two-year-old started feeling sick early last week, Tiffany Jackson didn’t think it might be Covid-19.
No one else in the family was sick. Adrian James just had a bit of a cough. She gave him cough syrup and put a humidifier in his room.
But by Friday he was sweaty and his breathing was laboured. Jackson took him to an emergency room in her small town of Mount Vernon, Illinois. Doctors and nurses there did a chest X-ray and swabbed him for Covid – and then airlifted the child to a children’s hospital in St Louis, about 80 miles away.
Jackson followed in a car, her grandmother at the wheel. They made the usually 90 minute-drive in about an hour. She told Reuters:
I didn’t know if he was going to make it or not. I was very emotional and just very upset.
Her boy is one of nearly 840,000 children under the age of four to contract Covid-19 in the US, according to statistics from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Vaccinations have not been approved for young children, and the US is being ravaged by a surge of cases driven by the highly contagious Delta variant, which Adrian has.
By late Tuesday night, he was intubated and heavily sedated, wrapped in his baby blanket with his favourite Paw Patrol stuffed animal at hand. Over the past couple of days, his lungs have been able to do more of the work of breathing, and it is possible that he may be removed from the ventilator soon.
The US crossed the milestone of 700,000 Covid deaths last week, and concern is growing over the number of infections among children. Transmission of the virus remains high in every state except California, CDC data show.
Adrian, who will be three years old next month, had developed pneumonia in his left lung. He was breathing fast, trying to gulp air with 76 respirations per minute, nearly twice the normal 40, Jackson said.
At the hospital, doctors and nurses wearing masks, face shields and protective gowns sedated him and put him on a breathing tube attached to a ventilator in the intensive care unit.
Jackson has been sleeping on a couch in his room in the ICU. She doesn’t know how her boy contracted the virus. She had Covid last summer; no one else in the family caught it at that time.
Jackson is not vaccinated because she has a rare auto-immune disorder called Guillain-Barre syndrome contracted as a result of a flu shot when she was 16. The syndrome, which is incurable, causes nervous system damage.
Adrian’s father, who is home with their younger child in Illinois, received one dose of a vaccine but not the second dose, she said. Maybe, she thinks, someone at work passed it to him, although everyone in the factory where he is employed is supposed to wear masks and practice physical distancing.
Jackson, 21, is profoundly grateful for the care her child has received. She is beginning to believe that it will save his life.
And she hopes that Adrian’s story will help people understand what it could mean to the pass the virus to young children and to people with vulnerable immune systems.
I just want people to realise it is serious.
Updated
Good morning from London. I’m Lucy Campbell, I’ll be bringing you all the latest global developments on the coronavirus pandemic for the next eight hours. Please feel free to get in touch with me as I work if you have a story or tips to share! Your thoughts are always welcome.
Email: lucy.campbell@theguardian.com
Twitter: @lucy_campbell_
I’m handing over to my colleague Lucy Campbell. Here’s a summary of this morning’s news:
- India’s school closures and its children’s lack of smartphone and internet facilities amidst the Covid-19 pandemic have worsened an educational divide, the UN is warning.
- Covid cases are high for another day in Russia, which has is in the middle of a fourth wave linked by experts to the Delta variant and a poor vaccine rollout. Less than 30 % of the adult population are vaccinated.
- Poland’s daily Covid-19 cases have risen by around 70% in the past week to over 2,000, with a government minister warning that the data is a “very fast flashing red light”.
- South Korea will begin taking reservations for coronavirus vaccines from pregnant women this week as the country accelerates its inoculation drive to reach its goal for immunising 80% of all adults by the end of the month.
- Media in Australia are reporting that a woman who tested positive for Covid had her car torched in a suspected vigilante attack after her infection resulted in restrictions being reimposed in parts of south Australia.
- Welsh first minister Mark Drakeford has been speaking about last night’s knife-edge vote that approved the introduction of Covid passes in Wales. Drakeford said the purpose of the Covid pass was “not to penalise any business, it’s to give that business an extra defence to allow it to continue to operate”.
- The Czech Republic reported more than 1,000 new Covid-19 cases in one day for first the time since 18 May, data from the health ministry said on Wednesday. On 5 October, tests identified 1,108 new cases in the country of 10.7 million, the figures showed.
- Almost one in 10 people in the UK will have diabetes by 2030, putting them at increased risk of a severe reaction to Covid.
- “Covid toes”, a chilblain-like inflammation of the feet and hands, may be a side-effect of the immune system’s response to fighting off the virus, a study has found.
Updated
India’s school closures and its children’s lack of smartphone and internet facilities amid the Covid-19 pandemic have worsened an educational divide, the UN is warning.
About 248 million students have been affected by school closures since March last year, the UN’s cultural agency Unesco said in a report. Many states have now started to return to normality as infections drop and vaccination rates rise.
Nearly 70% of students lacked smartphones or other devices to access classes online, while a majority grappled with poor internet facilities, or none, especially in rural areas, the report said.
With many still out of school, getting them back in the classroom is a priority. In poorer parts of the country, many parents can’t access remote learning.
Almost 40% of parents could not afford internet costs – widening the educational gap between different parts of society.
Unesco called for India to recognise teachers as “frontline workers” in the battle on the pandemic, and improve working conditions for them to ensure better outcomes in education.
“Quality of education is the core challenge of the next decade,” it said.
Updated
Covid cases are high for another day in Russia, which has is in the middle of a fourth wave linked by experts to the Delta variant and a poor vaccine rollout. Less than 30% of the adult population are vaccinated.
Today, 25,133 new cases have been reported for the last 24 hours. Yesterday it was 25,100.
Russia has reported a record number of Covid deaths for four of the past six days. On Monday, 883 deaths were reported, taking the official death toll to 210,000. Calculations based on publicly available mortality data suggest that the “excess death” toll between the start of the pandemic and July this year is nearly 600,000.
The pandemic has reached Russia’s leadership. Last month, Vladimir Putin was forced to go into self-isolation after “several dozen people” in the president’s inner circle tested positive.
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Poland's Covid cases rise by about 70% in one week
Poland’s daily Covid-19 cases have risen by about 70% in the past week to more than 2,000, with a government minister warning that the data is a ‘very fast flashing red light’.
Reuters reports that Poland’s health service was stretched to its limits in the spring by a third wave of the pandemic during which daily cases exceeded 35,000, but authorities believe vaccinations will help control the number of infections this autumn.
“Today’s data is a very fast flashing red light,” Waldemar Kraska, a deputy health minister, told public broadcaster Polskie Radio 1.
“This is the last moment when we should get vaccinated, because the fourth wave is definitely accelerating, and in those regions where the number of vaccinated people is the lowest.”
Poland has seen the pace of its vaccination programme slow in recent months, and many people in rural southern and eastern regions have decided not to get vaccinated.
However, Kraska said the government was not planning to return to the large-scale restrictions on public life seen during previous waves of the pandemic.
“We do not plan any restrictions on the economy, if we do, we will pinpoint them, on the level of counties, towns,” he said.
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South Korea will begin taking reservations for coronavirus vaccines from pregnant women this week as the country accelerates its inoculation drive to reach its goal for immunising 80% of all adults by the end of the month.
Reuters reports that authorities are warning that pregnant women have a greater possibility of serious illness and death if infected with Covid-19.
“The vaccines are safe for pregnant women and can meaningfully decrease their risks of contracting COVID-19 and becoming critically ill,” KDCA director Jeong Eun-kyeong told a public briefing on Monday.
Of the 731 pregnant women infected with the virus in South Korea as of August, about 2% of them developed serious illnesses, more than six times that of women aged 20-45, according to the KDCA.
But officials have advised people with shorter than 12 weeks pregnancy to consult medical staff before getting a shot.
The government plans to begin vaccinating children aged 12-17 next month, and providing booster shots for people aged 75 or older and other priority groups next week, including those who live or work at nursing homes and care facilities.
Authorities are also mapping out a plan on how to live more normally with COVID-19, to be implemented in phases starting later this month to gradually ease distancing rules and restrictions, though masks will still be mandatory at least in the initial stages.
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Media in Australia are reporting that a woman who tested positive for Covid had her car torched in a suspected vigilante attack after her infection resulted in restrictions being reimposed in parts of south Australia.
Seven News in Adelaide reports that the car was found alight at her home late on Tuesday night local time. She and her children were not home at the time of the suspected arson attack.
Local press are reporting rumours relating to where the woman might have contracted Covid.
A COVID-positive woman’s car has been torched after her infection resulted in restrictions being re-imposed in the South East. The latest in 7NEWS Adelaide at 4pm and 6pm. #7NEWS https://t.co/GaqR8jrpHO
— 7NEWS Adelaide (@7NewsAdelaide) October 6, 2021
SA police commissioner Grant Stevens spoke out against the attack saying.
“People shouldn’t assume that they know what’s going on, it’s completely unnecessary, it’s unwarranted,” he said.
“They’ve committed a serious crime and if we do detect them we’ll deal with them appropriately but I’m just asking people to show tolerance.”
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Welsh first minister Mark Drakeford has been speaking about last night’s knife edge vote that approved the introduction of Covid passes in Wales.
Drakeford said the purpose of the Covid pass was “not to penalise any business, it’s to give that business an extra defence to allow it to continue to operate”.
Asked about the close vote in the Senedd – the Welsh parliament – on having Covid passes, he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “It was an extraordinary moment, but what was really extraordinary was the fact that opposition parties were not prepared to support this simple measure which will help to keep people safe from coronavirus.”
He added: “The vote is taken on the floor of the parliament, the way the vote is conducted is not for the government, that is for the parliament. It is members’ responsibilities to make sure they are in the chamber or on Zoom and 59 of 60 members managed to do that.”
On nightclubs, he said: “The point of the Covid pass is to allow businesses to stay open. If we don’t have this defence and coronavirus numbers rise over the autumn and the winter, then these are the venues which will be the first to be closed. So, the purpose of it is not to penalise any business, it’s to give that business an extra defence to allow it to continue to operate.”
The controversial plans to introduce a compulsory Covid pass for nightclubs and big sporting events were backed by only one vote.
On Tuesday evening, the Tories, Plaid Cymru, and the Liberal Democrats, all voted against the move but the plan squeezed through by 28 votes to 27.
The Labour-led government argued that the pass, due to come into force on Monday, was needed to drive down worrying rates of Covid-19 infection especially among young people in Wales.
They accused those who opposed it of “gross irresponsibility”.
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The Czech Republic reported more than 1,000 new Covid-19 cases in one day for first the time since 18 May, data from the health ministry said on Wednesday. On 5 October tests identified 1,108 new cases in the country of 10.7 million, the figures showed.
Local media reports that the health ministry will decide whether to tighten some Covid control measures due to the increase in infections.
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Almost one in 10 people in the UK will have diabetes by 2030, putting them at increased risk of a severe reaction to Covid.
About 5.5 million people are likely to be living with diabetes within the next decade, a crisis fuelled by obesity and putting them at risk of “devastating complications” including heart attacks, kidney failure, stroke, amputation and blindness, Diabetes UK said.
Chris Askew, the charity’s chief executive, said the country is “at the tipping point of a public health emergency” and action is needed “to stop it in its tracks”.
The charity is calling for action on several fronts, including enrolling more people in the NHS diabetes prevention programme. The programme aims to help people reach a healthy weight, learn to eat better and make regular exercise a part of life.
Diabetes UK also wants people who are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes to go into remission where possible through measures such as tailored weight-loss advice or gastric band surgery.
At the moment, almost 4.1 million people in the UK are diagnosed with either type 1 diabetes (which accounts for fewer than one in 10 cases) or type 2, which is heavily linked to obesity and can also be influenced by age, ethnic background and family history.
Prof Jonathan Valabhji, national clinical director for diabetes and obesity at NHS England, said: “Diabetes can have a marked effect on people’s lives, with higher risks of heart attacks, strokes, limb loss, many of the common forms of cancer, and more severe outcomes with Covid-19 but, thanks to better NHS treatment and care, the outlook for people with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes has improved considerably over the last few decades.”
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“Covid toes”, a chillblain like inflammation of the feet and hands, may be a side-effect of the immune system’s response to fighting off the virus, a study has found.
The condition typically develops within a week to four weeks of being infected and can result in toes and fingers becoming swollen or changing colour. There is evidence of it lasting sometimes for months at a time
Researchers behind the study, which has been published in the British Journal of Dermatology, examined 50 participants with Covid toes and 13 with similar chilblains lesions that arose before the pandemic.
They found one mechanism behind both types of the condition involved the body generating an immune response with high levels of certain autoantibodies, which mistakenly target and react with a person’s own cells and tissues as well as the invading virus. They also found an overlap with type I interferon, a key protein in the antiviral response.
Senior author of the study, Dr Charles Cassius, said the research provided a deeper understanding of the condition. “The epidemiology and clinical features of chilblain-like lesions have been extensively studied and published, however, little is known about the pathophysiology involved,” he said. “Our study provides new insights.”
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Good morning I’m Harriet Grant and I’m taking over the liveblog from my colleague Samantha Lock.
Los Angeles set to enact strict vaccination mandates
Los Angeles is poised to enact one of the US’s strictest vaccine mandates, which will require residents to be vaccinated in order to enter a variety of indoor public spaces including bars, restaurants, nail salons and gyms.
The ordinance is intended to reduce the risk of new Covid-19 surges after the nation’s second-most populous city faced a huge rise in infections and hospitalisations last winter and a smaller surge this summer linked to the spread of the highly contagious delta variant.
Mayor Eric Garcetti expressed his support for a vaccine measure last week, saying: “I don’t want to bury another city employee, police officer, firefighter.”
The county will require proof of one dose as of Thursday, while proof of full vaccination will be required by 4 November.
Of the county’s roughly 10 million residents, 78% have received at least one Covid-19 vaccine dose and 69% are fully vaccinated, according to public health officials.
A growing number of places across the US, including San Francisco and New York City, are requiring people to show proof of vaccination to enter various types of businesses and venues.
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Immunocompromised Australians could start receiving Covid booster jabs
Australians with compromised immune systems could start receiving Covid-19 booster shots this year before third jabs are rolled out more widely in 2022, AAP reports.
Health authorities are closely monitoring overseas programs with the US, the UK, Israel and France among countries offering boosters.
Vaccine rollout coordinator John Frewen said science was not yet settled on third jabs, but the health department was working on a strategy.
“It’s possible we may see a third dose for those people who have compromised immune systems in some way, maybe later this year,” he told the Seven Network on Wednesday.
“But otherwise I think that the plan for the boosters will either be later this year or more likely into next year when it will all become a bit like the flu shot.”
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China has reported 26 new Covid-19 cases on the mainland for 5 October, the same as a day earlier, the national health authority confirmed.
Two of the new infections were locally transmitted and the rest imported, the National Health Commission said, as reported by Reuters.
It reported zero new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, while one such case was reported the day before. No new deaths were reported.
Covid surge pushes Alaska’s health care system to brink
The highly contagious delta variant is spreading across Alaska, driving one of the nation’s sharpest upticks in infections and posing concerns for those who may not be able to reach medical care, the Associated Press reports.
Alaska’s health care system largely relies on hospitals in Anchorage, the state’s largest city, and experts worry that remote outposts like Tanacross - where the closest hospital is hours away - are at risk.
The state’s largest hospital, Anchorage’s Providence Alaska Medical Center, is said to be overwhelmed with patients and declared crisis-of-care protocols, meaning doctors are sometimes prioritising care based on who has the best odds of survival.
Health care providers worry for those needing higher levels of care who live in rural areas, concerned no beds may be available.
Alaska has contracted nearly 500 medical professionals to help over the next few months but health officials say hospital staffing is still limited and blame rising Covid-19 infections and low vaccination rates in the state. About 60% of eligible residents in the conservative state are fully vaccinated.
According to data collected by Johns Hopkins University, one in every 84 people in Alaska was diagnosed with COVID-19 from 22 September to 29 September, the nation’s worst diagnosis rate in recent days.
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Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the coronavirus outbreak.
I’m Samantha Lock and I’ll be giving you a rundown of the latest coronavirus updates as they happen.
England has been urged to step up the distribution of Covid booster shots and second vaccinations for teenagers to avoid a surge of the virus over winter, a senior scientist advised.
Prof Neil Ferguson, the head of the influential disease modelling group at Imperial College London, said even a moderate rise in infections could put the NHS under pressure.
The head of the International Monetary Fund said the most serious obstacle to a full recovery was the vaccine divide between rich and poor nations and warned the global economy could suffer a cumulative $5.3tn loss over the next five years unless it was closed.
Here is a round-up of all the day’s leading coronavirus news stories.
- A former athlete warns of the debilitating effects of long Covid. Will Smith, now 24 years old, caught Covid-19 in March 2020 and has been battling long Covid ever since.
- The UK reported 33,869 new coronavirus cases and 166 deaths on Tuesday. The official figures showed that 348 out of every 100,000 people have coronavirus.
- The World Health Organization is still reviewing whether Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine can be approved by the UN health agency for emergency use against coronavirus.
- Norway will soon offer a third dose of Covid vaccines to people aged 65 and older, the health minister Bent Høie said on Tuesday.
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Spain has approved administering of third doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which are based on the same mRNA technology, for people aged 70 or over, the health ministry said.
- A Republican senator in the US was booed and catcalled when he told a party audience in South Carolina to think about getting a vaccine against Covid-19.
- More than 100,000 children in England are off school with confirmed cases of Covid, according to Department for Education figures. The proportion of children at school has fallen below 90% – worse than this time a year ago.
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