This blog is closing down now but you can pick up all the latest updates at our new blog with my colleague Martin Farrer here:
Updated
Brazil nears 4m cases
Brazil has recorded 42,659 new cases of coronavirus and 1,215 deaths in the past 24 hours, the health ministry said on Tuesday night.
Brazil has registered a total 3,950,931 cases of the virus since the pandemic began, while the official death toll from Covid-19 has risen to 122,596, according to ministry data, in the world’s worst coronavirus outbreak outside the US.
Updated
Summary
Here’s a quick recap of the latest coronavirus developments across the globe over the last few hours:
- Greece added to Scotland’s quarantine list. Travellers from Greece will be required to self-isolate at home for 14 days on arrival in Scotland from Thursday.
- Hungary closes borders again. The country has resealed its borders, implementing measures even stricter than those at the height of the pandemic in spring. For at least the month of September, the country is closed to almost everyone except Hungarian citizens and residents, and even they must quarantine on arrival.
-
Residential evictions halted in the US on public health grounds. The order, from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, lasts through 31 December and applies to individual renters earning no more than $99,000 in annual income.
- Greece delays school reopening. Greek authorities have delayed the reopening of schools by a week to 14 September because of a surge in Covid-19 infections, the government has said.
- United Arab Emirates records over 500 new Covid-19 infections for second successive day. The government’s communications office said there had been 574 new infections but no deaths in the previous 24 hours, following 541 new infections and two deaths reported on Monday.
- Holidaymakers returning to Wales from Zante asked to quarantine. Health and social services minister Vaughan Gething said public officials had identified “multiple separate clusters” linked to the popular holiday island.
- Household gatherings banned in parts of Greater Glasgow, Scotland. First minister Nicola Sturgeon has announced a ban on household gatherings in three local authorities in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde area for the next two weeks after a surge in coronavirus cases.
That’s all from me Jessica Murray, I’m now handing over to my colleague Martin Farrer.
Updated
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued an order temporarily halting residential evictions on public health grounds.
The order lasts through 31 December and applies to individual renters earning no more than $99,000 in annual income. The CDC said an eviction moratorium “can be an effective public health measure utilized to prevent the spread of communicable disease” like Covid-19.
Renters still owe rent and the order does not prevent the “charging or collecting of fees, penalties, or interest as a result of the failure to pay rent or other housing payment on a timely basis,” the CDC said.
US treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin told a US House of Representatives panel earlier the measure was to ensure people “don’t get thrown out of their rental homes” as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Mnuchin said the actions affect about 40 million renters. He said Congress should still approve rental assistance.
In July, a firm estimated more than $21.5bn in past-due rent is owed by Americans.
Over the spring and early summer, as unemployment surged to levels unseen since the aftermath of the 1930s Great Depression, a patchwork of federal, state and local eviction bans kept renters who could not make payments in homes.
The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed a bill in May that would extend enhanced jobless aid through January and allocated $100bn for rental assistance. It would also have extended the federal ban on evictions for up to one year. The bill has not been approved in the Senate.
Following the science on coronavirus was not enough to ensure the right decisions were made at the right time and the UK government should have better understood the limits of advice, a thinktank has said.
A report by the Institute for Government into the first responses to the pandemic concluded that ministers should have been prepared to act in the “absence of scientific certainty”.
The IfG also criticised the government’s ambition to reach 100,000 tests per day by the end of April, saying it had not been well thought through as the diagnostics industry and the NHS were not consulted before the decision was made.
It said the government “lacked a wider sense of strategy” at times, and accused the health secretary, Matt Hancock, of making the testing commitment “without a strong enough sense of how the government would use additional capacity”.
A government spokesman defended the response to the crisis, saying ministers “make no apology for being guided by the best scientific advice”.
The IfG report said:
Ministers made much of ‘following the science’. But it is not enough to use evidence: ministers and civil servants also need to understand the limitations of both the evidence base and the forums through which it is channelled, and, difficult as it might be, ministers must be prepared to act in the absence of scientific certainty.
Failure to do so now seems likely to have cost a significant number of additional lives, and contributed to the UK suffering the highest excess death rate in Europe over the period to the end of May.
The IfG also said that while school closures and social distancing measures were contemplated in February, some “key aspects of making them work – like remote learning arrangements for schools and guidance for police – were not considered until after decisions had been made”.
However, the report praised the successful rollout of economic support measures, which the IfG said showed that ministers and officials “can find fast ways to consult those who will be affected by a policy or programme and think through how it will be carried out, before making a decision”.
Alex Thomas, programme director at the IfG, said:
The best decisions are made when the government knows not just what it wants to do, but why it wants to do it.
At times, during its early response to the pandemic, the government lacked a wider sense of strategy. Greater focus on why it was taking decisions – ultimately to save lives – would have led to better outcomes all round.
A government spokesman said: “We make no apology for being guided by the best scientific advice during this unprecedented global pandemic – as the public would expect.
“We keep our response under constant review and have been prepared to adapt as new evidence emerges and we learn more about this virus.
“Working closely with the public and private sectors we rapidly built the largest diagnostics infrastructure in British history.”
Updated
The suggestion made by a leading doctor that Covid-19 could “fizzle out” has been criticised by other experts.
Prof Karol Sikora, dean of medicine at the University of Buckingham, said there were three potential outcomes for the outbreak, when he appeared on the BBC’s Politics Live on Tuesday.
Sikora, a leading oncologist and former chief of the World Health Organization’s cancer programme, said:
Number one is what we all want, the thing just fizzles out, it causes very few deaths, very few hospitalisations, nobody gets really ill, and it just gradually drifts into that sort of hinterland of a chronic viral infection, sits in the population and bubbles up now and again without too much problem, just like the flu, just like the common cold.
The second outcome is local spikes and the third outcome is full-blown second wave, we genuinely don’t know what’s going to happen.
I think, being positive about it, it’s got to be the first one, but there are other scenarios that we have to plan for, that’s the problem.
Sikora later said both human behaviour and the virus had changed during the pandemic.
He added: “It’s probably changed again, it wants to live with us, that’s the problem, it wants to actually be nice to us and go on forever living with us, and killing us is not a good way to start a relationship.
“It is trying to change, we’ve certainly changed – what we’ve heard about the schools trying to implement handwashing, social distancing, all the other things – that’s a change in our behaviour and that will drive the infection down.
“What the outcome is now, with local spikes, or second wave, or just fizzling out we have to see, but I’m the fizzling out brigade, I must say.
“It seems likely to me that the lack of hospitalisations is really good news.”
Dr Michael Head, senior research fellow in global health at the University of Southampton, said the Covid-19 pandemic is accelerating globally:
It would be very dangerous to promote the idea that the virus is ‘fizzling out’.
In the most recent (World Health Organization) situation report, there were 1.8 million confirmed new Covid-19 cases, an increase in the number of new cases from the week before, and bringing the total number of cases over the last six months to more than 25 million.
We are a long way from being anywhere near the concept of being able to say that Covid-19 is ‘fizzling out’.
Addressing Sikora’s discussion of how the virus had changed, Dr Stephen Griffin, associate professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Leeds, said it was “flawed” to think the coronavirus had become less pathogenic. He said:
Whilst the virus genome drifts gradually in sequence and some changes have become widespread, there is no evidence to suggest that the virus is in any way attenuated.
Whilst the number of deaths and hospitalisations has lessened in the UK, this is proportionate to case numbers and heavily influenced by the changes to patient demographics.
Overall, the rise and fall in cases correlates with non-pharmaceutical interventions, falling when they are implemented and potentially rising again when they are relaxed unless community transmission is halted.
This is not fizzling out in any sense. Minimising the seriousness of this disease risks resurgence on a troubling scale.
Updated
The US government will send an “overwhelming majority” of the rapid Covid-19 tests it purchased from Abbott Laboratories last week to governors of states and territories to support school reopenings and other critical tasks.
Other top priorities for the newly purchased tests include day care centres, first responders, and “critical infrastructure,” said Admiral Brett Giroir, assistant secretary for health at the US Department of Health and Human Services.
The tests will be distributed in collaboration with Abbott beginning in mid-September, Giroir said. Abbott said last week it will ramp up production to around 50m tests per month by mid-October.
The US government agreed to purchase 150m rapid antigen tests for Covid-19 from Abbott in a roughly $750m deal.
The portable tests can deliver results within 15 minutes and will sell for $5. They require no additional equipment, and can use a less invasive nasal swab than traditional lab tests.
Antigen tests are cheaper and faster than molecular diagnostic tests, but somewhat more likely to fail to identify positive cases of the virus than lab-based diagnostic tests.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly pushed for schools to reopen, but most of the largest US school districts have said they would start the school year with online classes.
Giroir also said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) still supports testing asymptomatic individuals for Covid-19 who are prioritised by local health officials or in high risk populations. Last week, the CDC sparked outcry among many public health officials when it said testing some asymptomatic people may not be necessary.
The United States has conducted 85m Covid-19 tests so far with a positivity rate of just over 5%, Giroir said. The mean turnaround time is 2.27 days.
The White House has pushed back on concerns expressed by the World Health Organization after a US health official said a coronavirus vaccine might be approved without completing full trials.
White House spokesman Judd Deere said in a statement:
The United States will continue to engage our international partners to ensure we defeat this virus, but we will not be constrained by multilateral organizations influenced by the corrupt World Health Organization and China.
This President will spare no expense to ensure that any new vaccine maintains our own FDA’s gold standard for safety and efficacy, is thoroughly tested, and saves lives.
Cycling is undergoing a renaissance in the congested Mexico City, North America’s largest metropolis and home to over 20 million, as residents seek to social distance and avoid public transport amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
A chaotic network of metro trains and buses form the backbone of the city’s public transport system and was used on a daily basis prior to the pandemic by millions of commuters, often cramped elbow to elbow.
“Many people have opted to buy a bike and use it, out of fear of public transport, to get to work, to go out and about, to be active,” said Valentin Najjera, a bike shop owner. He says business is booming. “There has been an increase in sales since the pandemic.”
Mexico City’s local government has taken notice of the shift and implemented new urban planning projects, including a recent announcement for more than 40 miles (64km) of exclusive bike lanes.
While city dwellers around the world take some consolation in improved air quality thanks to the coronavirus pandemic, pollution from diesel-fuelled generators and nearby fossil fuel power plants, as well as frequent forest fires, has ensured Mexico City remains smog-filled.
Updated
The United Arab Emirates has recorded over 500 new Covid-19 infections for the second successive day, after a rise in cases in the Middle East financial hub.
The government’s communications office said on Twitter there had been 574 new infections but no deaths in the previous 24 hours, following 541 new infections and two deaths reported on Monday.
Schools in the UAE reopened this week, though some will continue with only remote learning after suspected cases among employees, state news agency WAM reported, citing the education ministry.
Daily infections are at their highest since 683 cases were recorded on 5 July. There have been periodic spikes in cases since daily infections peaked in May.
Businesses and public venues have reopened since a nationwide curfew was lifted on 24 June, and tourism hub Dubai reopened to foreign visitors on 7 July.
A government official said last month a curfew could be reinstated if there were a high number of infections.
The UAE has recorded 70,805 infections and 384 deaths from the coronavirus. The government does not disclose where in the country of seven emirates, or states, the infections or deaths occurred.
Updated
Holidaymakers returning to Wales from Zante asked to quarantine
Holidaymakers returning to Wales from the Greek island of Zante are to be asked to quarantine for 14 days and be offered Covid-19 tests, the Welsh government has said.
Health and social services minister Vaughan Gething said public officials had identified “multiple separate clusters” linked to the popular holiday island.
The first Tui flight affected will land tonight at Cardiff international airport and passengers will be given a letter asking them to self-isolate for two weeks.
They will also be offered a coronavirus test within 48 hours of their arrival home and a repeat test eight days after returning.
Gething said he was also asking for a meeting with the UK government and the other devolved nations to discuss further measures. He said:
There are currently six clusters amounting to over 30 cases in the last week from four flights, of which two of these flights landed in England.
There are concerns from our public health teams that the current advice and control measures for returning travellers are insufficient.
It is almost certain that travellers returning to Wales from areas of higher Covid-19 incidence will lead to further seeding of infections within Wales.
Travel into Wales from mainland Europe drove the first wave of Covid-19.
There is an obvious need for us to consider the potential for changes to the regulations in Wales which would require travellers arriving in the UK from Greece and possibly elsewhere to self-isolate on their return.
This is a dynamic situation and I will continue to review what measures may be required in the future.
The new measures follow reports that passengers on a flight from Zante to Cardiff last week did not adhere to coronavirus rules.
Public Health Wales has confirmed at least 16 cases of Covid-19 from three different parties who were on Tui flight 6215 to Cardiff on 25 August.
Seven of those were infectious at the time of flying and all 193 passengers have been told to self-isolate, it said.
One traveller claimed that the flight was full of “selfish ‘covidiots”’, with passengers not wearing their masks properly and disregarding the rules.
On Tuesday, Public Health Wales said one further person with coronavirus had died in Wales, bringing the total number of deaths there to 1,596.
There were a further 51 positive cases of Covid-19 reported, bringing the number of cases to 18,063.
Updated
Greece added to Scotland's quarantine list
Travellers from Greece will be required to self-isolate at home for 14 days on arrival in Scotland from Thursday.
It comes after a significant rise in cases of coronavirus being imported from the Mediterranean country, the Scottish government said
The measures will come into effect at 4am on Thursday.
Scottish justice secretary, Humza Yousaf, said:
We are in the midst of a global pandemic and the situation in many countries can change suddenly. Therefore, people should think very hard before committing to non-essential travel abroad.
With Scotland’s relatively low infection rate, importation of new cases from Greece is a significant risk to public health.
We continue to closely monitor the situation in all parts of the world and base the decisions we make on the scientific evidence available.
Regular discussions continue with the other three governments in the UK.
Requiring travellers arriving from a non-exempt country to quarantine for 14 days on arrival is vital to helping prevent transmission of the virus and to suppress it.
The Scottish government said evidence of virus importation, especially from the Greek islands, has led to the country being removed from the exemption list on public health grounds.
It is believed prevalence of Covid-19 in Greece remains lower than 20 per 100,000, but a number of cases in Scotland can be traced back to travel to the Mediterranean country.
Countries tend to be added to the quarantine list when the figure rises above 20 per 100,000.
Scotland’s chief medical officer, Gregor Smith, said:
There is a compelling public health risk around importation of the virus, especially given the number of imported cases linked to the Greek islands.
The flow of travel between Scotland and Greece, and the behaviour we have seen from some of those travellers, means that on public health grounds there is a strong case - supported by public health directors - to remove Greece from the exemption list.
All international travellers coming into Scotland, apart from a very limited number of individual exemptions, must complete a passenger locator form.
Those who do not complete it and present it when asked on arrival may be fined £60.
This can be doubled for each subsequent offence up to a maximum of £480.
Failure to comply with the requirement to quarantine may result in a fine of £480.
Updated
The morning flow of commuters arriving at Canary Wharf, London’s financial district, was a trickle on Tuesday rather than the torrent traditionally associated with the end of summer return to work.
Sparse numbers of suited and smartly dressed workers emerged from the underground station, clutching their morning takeaway coffees, destined for the corporate headquarters of banks, financial services companies and law firms.
It was, however, busier than it has been. “There were bigger numbers of people on the tube today,” said Gogoro Nwinia, an estate agent at LiFE Residential, who felt his morning commute was the busiest he had experienced since he returned to the office in early July.
The Canary Wharf Group, which owns the private estate in east London, is expecting more workers to return in September, but declined to speculate on numbers.
In July, it was estimated that under 10% of the 120,000 workers based in the area had returned to their desks, and the group’s executive chairman, Sir George Iacobescu, has called on businesses to return.
UK office workers have been far slower to return to their desks, than their European counterparts, according to analysis from US bank Morgan Stanley’s research unit AlphaWise.
Latest figures show that just over a third (37%) of white-collar workers in the UK are back at the office, compared with over three-quarters of employees in Germany, Italy and Spain, and 84% in France.
Zimbabwe will reopen primary and secondary schools this month for students preparing to sit their final exams, six months after they were closed due to the Covid-19 outbreak.
The first students to return, on 14 September, will be those taking Cambridge International exams. Those taking locally administered final exams will go back two weeks later.
“The ministry [of education] is working closely with other ministries and stakeholders to guarantee the safety of pupils and staff during the examinations period,” the government said.
The education ministry had previously said it would give priority to pupils taking final exams and has hinted that other students will not return to school until 2021.
Zimbabwe has recorded about 6,500 cases of Covid-19 and 202 deaths. Despite an increase in infections in the past six weeks, most cases were mild to moderate, with a recovery rate of about 80%, the government said.
Authorities are also looking at reopening airports to support the tourism sector, the government said. The plan is to start with the resumption of domestic flights and then to restart international flights, it added, but did not give a date.
Updated
Household gatherings banned in parts of Greater Glasgow
Nicola Sturgeon has announced a ban on household gatherings in three local authorities in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde area for the next two weeks after a surge in coronavirus cases.
Scotland’s first minister said the localised restrictions, which come into force at midnight tonight and will affect an estimated 800,ooo people, apply to those living in West Dunbartonshire, Glasgow and East Renfrewshire, where infection rates have risen in recent days.
Those resident in these three areas should not host people in their homes or visit someone else’s home, regardless of where they live. The only exception will be those “extended households”, that were established during lockdown where people who lived alone, couples who don’t live together, or single parents could join with one other household to provide mutual support.
Hi everyone, this is Jessica Murray, I’ll be running the coronavirus liveblog for the next few hours.
Feel free to get in touch with any story tips or personal experiences you would like to share.
Email: jessica.murray@theguardian.com
Twitter: @journojess_
Spain recorded 8,115 new cases of Covid-19 on Tuesday evening, 2,731 of them diagnosed in the previous 24 hours, according to the latest figures from the national health ministry.
The latest statistics bring the country’s total to 470,973 cases, of which 99,889 have been logged over the past fortnight. Over the past seven days, 159 people have died from the virus, bringing the death toll to 29,152.
Cuban authorities launched a strict 15-day lockdown of Havana on Tuesday in order to stamp out the low level but persistent spread of coronavirus in the capital.
Aggressive anti-virus measures, including closing down air travel, have virtually eliminated Covid-19 in Cuba with the exception of the capital, where cases have increased from a handful a day to dozens daily over the last month.
Starting Tuesday, Havana is under a 7pm to 5am curfew. Most stores are barred from selling to shoppers from outside the immediate neighbourhood to prevent people from moving around the city. Gas stations cannot sell gas to privately owned vehicles, another measure meant to reduce mobility.
Police stationed on every road leaving Havana are charged with stopping everyone who doesn’t have a special travel permit, meant to be issued only in extraordinary circumstances. Some provinces that have had no new cases for weeks have detected them in recent days, often linked to travellers from Havana.
The start of the school year is also indefinitely delayed in Havana, even as schools open in the rest of Cuba.
Updated
Madrid’s city council has announced that the capital’s 3,800 parks and green spaces will be closed from 10pm until 6am in a move to halt the spread of the virus. The measure will come into force immediately.
Police in Madrid are also cracking down on botellones, or street drinking parties, which can facilitate the spread of the virus.
The Madrid region has accounted for about a third of the 96,000 infections recorded in Spain over the past two weeks.
Updated
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador defended his handling of the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic on Tuesday, arguing in a major speech that the economy has fared better than some of its peers.
The pandemic lockdown threw Mexico’s economy, Latin America’s second largest, into the deepest slump since the Great Depression, shrinking 17% in the second quarter.
“The economy’s contraction, despite the global disaster, was 10.4% during the first half of the year. But despite the collapse the damage was smaller than in Italy, Spain, France and the United Kingdom,” López Obrador said in his state of the union address from the ornate national palace.
López Obrador has resisted pressure to borrow to support the economy or bail out companies on the brink of collapse, while picking fights with some businesses.
“We have faced the pandemic and we are going to get out of the economic crisis without taking on additional external debt and without allocating public money to immoral bailouts,” he said.
In contrast, Brazil’s economy contracted 9.7% in the second quarter as its government launched a spending program to cushion the pandemic’s impact.
López Obrador has forecast that the economy will follow a V-shaped trajectory, meaning a sharp slump followed by an equally sharp recovery.
“Fortunately this is happening, the worst is over and now we are recovering. Lost jobs are already recovering, production is slowly returning to normal and we are already beginning to grow,” he said.
Updated
The French health ministry has reported 4,982 new confirmed coronavirus cases, up on the 3,082 reported on Monday, but below the highs of nearly 7,400 seen last week. The number of people who have died from Covid-19 infections increased by 26 to 30,661, and the cumulative number of cases now totals 286,007.
Updated
Colombia’s lockdown has been lifted, with highways and domestic airports across the South American nation opening for the first time since coronavirus restrictions were announced over five months ago.
The lockdown, like others across Latin America, was among the longest in the world. Leaders across the planet’s most unequal region shut their economies down in late March, in some cases when only a handful of cases had been confirmed. At the time, many were watching the collapse of health infrastructure in Italy and Spain.
On Tuesday many Colombians celebrated their regained freedom while calling on each other to continue to follow health guidelines, which include wearing a mask in public and maintaining social distancing where possible.
“The lockdown is over!” one person wrote on Twitter, echoing the
sentiments of many others on the platform. “God be with us for this
next stage.”
Another cautioned: “Quarantine is over but not the pandemic … please we must take care of one another.”
President Ivan Duque offered similar warnings in a televised address
on Monday night, ahead of loosening restrictions. “We must be clear
that the virus has not gone away, not here nor anywhere in the world, and for that reason we can’t let our guard down,” Duque said.
Though restrictions have been loosened, Colombia continues to be
rattled by the coronavirus. The country has confirmed 615,168 cases of Covid-19, while the confirmed death total will likely pass the grim
milestone of 20,000 by Wednesday night.
Some restrictions, such as the closure of gyms and places of worship,
will continue in cities where the infection rate is high, including
Bogotá, the capital, which has borne the brunt of Colombia’s outbreak. Others, such as second city Medellín, will see restaurants reopen.
Updated
Greece delays school reopening
Greek authorities have delayed the reopening of schools by a week to 14 September because of a surge in Covid-19 infections, the government has said.
The rise in coronavirus cases in recent weeks has forced Greek authorities to gradually reimpose restrictions to curb the spread of Covid-19, during the peak tourism season. The capital Athens and many popular islands have been affected.
Government spokesman Stelios Petsas said the extension was necessary for families to return to big cities from summer vacations and spend some time at home before children get back to class.
“We urge all parents to return with the children to their homes in the coming days and to make sure they stay safe ... until lessons resume,” Petsas said.
Mask wearing will be mandatory in all indoor spaces of schools across the country. Greece has reported 207 new Covid-19 infections since Monday, raising the total number to 10,524. It has recorded a total of 271 Covid-related deaths, including five since Monday.
Updated
Amazon owned Whole Foods Market, has opened its first delivery-only store in Brooklyn, New York, as the e-commerce giant looks to take greater advantage of a coronavirus-induced surge in online grocery shopping.
Amazon said it had hired hundreds of employees to work at the new store, which will deliver to customers only in the Brooklyn area.
Afraid to step out of home during the pandemic, people are using their phones and computers to order bread, milk, vegetables and daily household essentials. This has boosted online business of retailers such as Walmart Inc and Target Corp.
Grocery delivery is one of the fastest-growing businesses at Amazon, with online sales tripling in the second quarter this year.
The company bought Whole Foods in 2017 for $13.7 billion.
Updated
In the US, public tours of the White House, halted nearly six months ago because of the coronavirus outbreak, are to resume later this month with new health and safety policies in place.
Tours will begin again on 12 September, for two days a week instead of five, and for just a few hours a day, the first lady’s office has announced. The number of visitors will also be capped.
In order to ensure the safety and health of all visitors, there have been new policies implemented that align with the guidance issued by federal, state, and local officials, the White House said.
All guests over the age of two will be required to wear a face covering and practice social distancing. Social distancing dots will be placed on the ground to guide guests during check-in, and hand sanitizer will be available in multiple locations.
National Park Service workers, US Secret Service officers and staff from the White House visitors office along the tour route will wear face coverings and gloves, and encourage social distancing while interacting with guests.
Updated
Hungary closes borders again
Hungary has resealed its borders, implementing measures even stricter than those at the height of the pandemic in spring. For at least the month of September, the country is closed to almost everyone except Hungarian citizens and residents, and even they must quarantine on arrival. Previously, Hungary had a series of travel corridors with “green” EU countries, and the country’s tourism sector had begun to pick up in recent weeks.
Hungary has done better than many European countries at controlling the virus, with a total of just 6,257 cases as of Tuesday. However, new daily cases have risen from just a handful each day earlier in August to more than 100 a day over the past week.
Announcing the move over the weekend, prime minister Viktor Orbán said a second coronavirus wave is “knocking on the door” and that preventing it calls for “serious measures”. On Monday, the country made an exception for citizens of three other central European countries providing they have a negative coronavirus test. Citizens of all other countries cannot enter even if they have negative tests and are prepared to quarantine.
The move drew criticism from Brussels, where politicians have been moving away from blanket border closures towards more targeted travel bans combined with contact tracing. Some saw it as the latest in a series of attempts by Orbán to blame foreigners or migrants for Hungary’s troubles. “Maybe Mr Orban should consider if he wants to be a member of the EU. If you are a member of a team, you play by the rules,” Dutch MEP Sophie in’ t Veld told Euronews.
Updated
A person on a poorly ventilated Chinese bus infected nearly two dozen other passengers with coronavirus even though many weren’t sitting close by, according to research that offers fresh evidence the disease can spread in the air.
Health authorities had initially discounted the possibility that simply breathing could send infectious micro-droplets into the air, but did a U-turn as experts piled on pressure and evidence mounted.
The article published Tuesday in JAMA Internal Medicine explores the threat of airborne infection by taking a close look at passengers who made a 50-minute trip to a Buddhist event in the eastern Chinese city of Ningbo aboard two buses in January before face masks became routine against the virus.
Researchers believe a passenger, whose gender was not identified, was likely patient zero because the person had been in contact with people from Wuhan, the city where the contagion emerged late last year.
The scientists managed to map out where the other passengers sat, and also test them for the virus, with 23 of 68 passengers subsequently confirmed as infected on the same bus.
What is notable is that the sickness infected people in the front and back of the bus, outside the perimeter of 1-2 metres that authorities and experts say infectious droplets can travel.
On top of that, the sick passenger was not yet showing symptoms of the disease, such as a cough, when the group made their trip to a religious event.
Researchers also noted the airconditioning simply recirculated the air inside the bus, which likely contributed to spreading of the virus.
Updated
Hello, I am running the Guardian’s live feed bringing you the latest news and comment on coronavirus from around the globe.
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New York City public schools, the largest US school system, will delay the start of classes by 11 days to 21 September, under an agreement with education unions that had pushed for additional coronavirus safety measures, the city’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, has said.
Updated
Fears within the travel industry are growing that Britain will reimpose a quarantine for people travelling from Portugal, as coronavirus cases in the country fluctuate. Reuters reports:
It has been less than two weeks since Britain, Portugal’s leading source of tourism, lifted a 14-day self-isolation rule for travellers arriving from Portugal.
The announcement was a relief for the tourism sector, which struggled as restrictions kept visitors away over the summer. The number of passengers arriving from Britain has grown by 190% since Portugal was removed from Britain’s quarantine list. But a steady count of several hundred new cases per day over the last week raised fears Britain would put Portugal back on the list.
Last Thursday, health authorities reported 401 new infections, the highest since early July. Cases have since dropped, with 231 on Tuesday, bringing the total to 58,243.
British ambassador Chris Sainty said on Monday the embassy has been working closely with Portuguese authorities to understand the situation but “things can change quickly”. He tweeted:
1/3 Since @grantshapps announced the decision on 20/8 to allow quarantine-free travel from 🇵🇹, thousands of British holidaymakers and Portuguese living in 🇬🇧 have travelled to 🇵🇹. It’s been great to see people reunited with their families and enjoying the summer in 🇵🇹.
— Chris Sainty (@ChrisSaintyFCO) August 31, 2020
British media reports said the number of daily cases in Portugal meant it may be forced back on to the quarantine list. A spokesman for the prime minister, Boris Johnson, declined to comment.
Eliderico Viegas president of Algarve’s AHETA hotel association said he was worried about the prospect of a new quarantine. He saidL:
If the news is confirmed it would have a huge impact on the number of tourists.
Updated
Interesting article from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health on the global push to develop a vaccine for coronavirus, which contains warnings from lead scientists that we are unlikely to get a vaccine until the end of 2021.
"A return to normal requires a vaccine for the novel coronavirus. What will it take to get one?" https://t.co/aSoV7QUS7v
— Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (@JohnsHopkinsSPH) September 1, 2020
Here’s an excerpt:
As reopening measures begin across the US and the world, it becomes increasingly clear that the road to normal – a time without social distancing, masks, and quarantines – will be a long one. Barring the discovery of an effective treatment, only a readily available and easily administered vaccine will allow a return to former ways of life.
The good news is that more than 125 vaccines are currently in development, according to the WHO. But most of these vaccines won’t make it to clinical trials, and many of those that do won’t be effective or safe enough to achieve licensure, says Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. He adds that predictions that a vaccine could be ready by the fall are unrealistic. “We won’t see our first Covid-19 vaccines until late 2021 at the earliest,” he says.
To make a vaccine, scientists must first understand the structure of the virus, how rapidly the virus mutates, and whether those mutations affect the immune response, says the Center for Immunization Research’s Kawsar Talaat, MD, an assistant professor in International Health. A potential vaccine must then undergo rigorous testing. The quickest a vaccine has been developed to combat a novel pathogen is four years. And there are still no effective vaccines for some pathogens, such as HIV.
Updated
More than 28,000 people died from #coronavirus in India during August.
— BBC World Service (@bbcworldservice) September 1, 2020
The worst areas for new cases are Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Orissa 👉 https://t.co/Hb38h8XLVF pic.twitter.com/yYM01FvU5s
AstraZeneca has expanded an agreement with Oxford Biomedica to scale up production of its potential Covid-19 vaccine, as the race continues to find an effective method of combatting the deadly virus.
Under the supply agreement, the Oxford-based cell and gene therapy firm said it would produce tens of millions of doses of AstraZeneca’s potential vaccine, AZD1222, for 18 months, which could be extended by a further 18 months into 2023.
It will be made at the firm’s three manufacturing suites at its new centre, Oxbox, in Oxford. Two of the suites will be ready to use in the next two months, earlier than expected. AstraZeneca will pay Oxford Biomedica £50m under the deal.
Updated
Tony Abbott, the former Australian prime minister tipped to become a UK trade envoy, has railed against Covid “health dictatorships”, saying politicians need to balance allowing more elderly Covid patients to die by nature taking its course, with the economic costs of an extreme lockdown.
He said it was costing the Australian government as much as $200,000 (£110,000) to give an elderly person an extra year’s life, substantially beyond what governments would usually pay for life-saving drugs.
He said not enough politicians were “behaving like health economists trained to pose uncomfortable questions about the level of deaths we might have to live with”.
Hello everyone. I am running the Guardian’s live feed today, bringing you the latest major headlines and news on coronavirus from across the globe. Please do share any questions, thoughts, comments or tips with me while I work. If you have a news story from where you are based then you can get in touch via any of the channels below. Thanks so much.
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Britain’s government will launch a media campaign this week to urge people to return to their offices, reinforcing Boris Johnson’s calls to get the economy back up to speed up after the hammering it has taken during the coronavirus lockdown.
Data has shown that only 17% of workers in British cities had returned to their workplaces by early August, and one of the country’s business leaders said last week that big urban centres looked like ghost towns.
“The next stage we’ll look at is specifically the guidance on how to get back to work safely and we expect to see that later this week,” the prime minister’s spokesman said, commenting on the government’s ongoing public information campaign.
Johnson’s message is that returning to work will help stimulate the economy, he added.
Updated
In Indonesia, officials in hazmat suits have paraded empty coffins through the streets of Jakarta to remind residents that coronavirus cases are still rising rapidly in one of Asia’s worst-hit nations.
A convoy of truck hearses and pallbearers snaked its way through crowded neighbourhoods, with some participants also donning headpieces depicting ghost-like figures known as pocong.
“We’re hoping this coffin parade will remind people to be more aware of the risk of disobeying health safety rules,” said Mundari, the head of south Jakarta’s Cilandak district, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.
“They can picture how things would be if they died of Covid-19,” he added.
The mock coffins got the attention of Cilandak resident Ahmad Soleh Suzany.
“It’s very scary because this shows the huge dangers we’re facing,” he told AFP.
The move comes as Indonesia’s coronavirus toll mounts, with the more than 100 frontline doctors dead and possibly hundreds of children.
The world’s fourth most populous nation has reported over 177,000 confirmed cases and 7,505 deaths, but with some of the world’s lowest testing rates the true scale is widely believed to be much greater.
Updated
The pandemic has shown how the Earth can recover if we allow it to rest and must spur people to adopt simpler lifestyles to help a planet groaning under the constant demand for economic growth, Pope Francis has said.
In his latest urgent appeal to help a fragile environment, Francis also renewed his call for the cancellation of the debts of the most vulnerable countries. Such action would be just, he said, since rich countries have exploited poorer nations’ natural resources.
In some ways, the current pandemic has led us to rediscover simpler and sustainable lifestyles, Francis said in a written message.
Already we can see how the Earth can recover if we allow it to rest: the air becomes cleaner, the waters clearer, and animals have returned to many places from where they had previously disappeared, he wrote. The pandemic has brought us to a crossroads.
The pontiff urged people to seize the opportunity to reflect on their habits of energy usage, consumption, transportation and diet.
Until now, constant demand for growth and an endless cycle of production and consumption are exhausting the natural world, the pope said, adding: “Creation is groaning”
Updated
The approval ratings of Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, have risen during the coronavirus pandemic, with a majority of surveyed voters applauding his campaign to crack down on political corruption, an opinion poll has shown.
López Obrador now holds a 65% approval rate, according to a nationwide survey of 1,000 voters in face-to-face interviews conducted by pollster Parametria from 26-30 August.
The rate rose from 54% in March, just as the coronavirus crisis took hold in Latin America’s second-largest economy. López Obrador will give a state of the nation address on Tuesday, as Mexico stands in fourth-place globally for most lives lost to the pandemic.
Parametria’s August poll was its first in-person survey since February, and comes a day after a door-to-door poll from newspaper Reforma showed the president’s approval fell to 56% in August from 59% in March.
When asked about the Reforma results at his daily news conference on Monday, Lopez Obrador said he suspected the newspaper had selectively chosen to interview his opponents. His own poll showed his popularity as high as 70%, he said.
According to Parametria, 46% of respondents said Mexico is “on the right path,” compared to 43% in a January-February poll.
In a ranking of López Obrador’s performance in more than a dozen areas, including education, poverty and jobs, he scored highest in the effort to root out corruption, with 67% of respondents classifying him as “good” or “very good.”
The fight against drug trafficking ranked the lowest, with just 43% of respondents giving him a positive score.
In all the areas he scored notably higher than his two predecessors.
Updated
Malaysia has said it would bar entry of long-term immigration pass holders from India, Indonesia and the Philippines from 7 September, in a bid to curtail imported coronavirus cases amid a spate of new clusters in the country.
Health authorities in south-east Asia’s third-largest economy have recorded over 9,300 cases and 128 deaths, with new cases found in clusters detected in at least four states.
The entry ban on pass holders from the three countries will include permanent residents, expatriates, students and those on spouse visas and participants of Malaysia’s My Second Home programme, senior minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said.
“The decision was made on the advice of the health ministry to clamp down on the spread of imported Covid-19 cases,” Ismail Sabri said in a televised news conference.
India is the third most affected country by the pandemic behind the United States and Brazil, with its coronavirus tally reaching nearly 3.7 million on Tuesday.
A total of 7,505 people have died of the coronavirus in Indonesia, the highest in the region, while the Philippines, which has reported over 224,000 cases, has seen a continuous rise in infections.
Updated
Hungary has decided to exempt tourists visiting from three neighbouring states from a lockdown of its borders that took effect on Tuesday, provided they test negative for Covid-19 beforehand, prompting a rebuke from the European Commission.
The EU executive said Hungary’s move to admit visitors from the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia but not from other EU member states amounted to discrimination and was illegal.
Hungary said last week it would close its borders to foreigners from Tuesday to curb a rise in coronavirus cases. Returning Hungarian citizens can leave a 14-day quarantine only if they provide two negative Covid tests.
However, after talks with Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis on Monday, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban agreed to let Czech visitors who have already booked holidays in Hungary for September enter the country, the Foreign Ministry said.
The easing was subsequently extended to Poland and Slovakia, the ministry said in a statement. Visitors coming to Hungary have to produce a negative Covid test not older than five days, which Budapest says represents sufficient safety guarantees.
The EU Commission in Brussels said Hungary’s decision clashed with the bloc’s rules on free travel. “Any measures that do not comply with those fundamental principles of EU law should of course be immediately retracted,” European Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders said, adding he would raise the matter with Budapest.
Orban’s nationalist government, in power since 2010, has often been at odds with Brussels over what the EU and his critics in Hungary say is an erosion of the rule of law and the independence of the media and judiciary.
As of Tuesday, Hungary had reported 6,257 coronavirus cases with 616 deaths. The number of new cases has surged in recent days, just as Hungary prepares to start a new school year.
Its economy shrank by 13.6% year-on-year in the April-June period this year due to the pandemic and the lockdown it prompted. Authorities eased the lockdown measures in May.
Millions of students headed back to class in France, Belgium and England on Tuesday as European schools cautiously reopened amid rising coronavirus cases in several countries, with face masks often mandatory.
Officials have drawn fire from parents and teachers worried that strict social distancing and other protective measures will not be enough to prevent a second wave of Covid-19.
But many governments insist that the greater risk is young people losing out on crucial in-person lessons, and that keeping kids at home for distance learning puts too big a burden on working parents.
“I do not underestimate how challenging the last few months have been, but I do know how important it is for children to be back in school, not only for their education but for their development and well-being,” Britain’s Education Secretary Gavin Williamson said.
The UN’s education agency UNESCO warned that just half the roughly 900 million primary and secondary students restarting school from August to October will actually be allowed back in classrooms.
“Several generations are facing the threat of school closures, which concern hundreds of millions of students and have lasted many months,” the agency’s director general Audrey Azoulay said in a statement late Monday.
In France, some 12.4 million students returned Tuesday, with masks required for all teachers as well as students over 11.
“It doesn’t bother me to wear a mask, even if it does feel a little weird,” said Marie, who was starting her first year of middle school in the southern French city of Marseille.
But many teachers were less enthusiastic. “How can we connect with children when half your face is hidden behind a mask?” said Julie Siata, who teaches English at another Marseille school.
Hello everyone. I am running the Guardian’s live feed bringing you all the updates around Covid-19 globally.
Please do get in touch if you want to share any comments or news tips with me. Hope everybody is doing ok. Thanks for following.
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A summary of global updates
Below are some of the top headlines today:
India leads global rise in new weekly cases
India reported the most new Covid-19 cases of any country in the past week, its nearly half a million fresh infections pushing the global tally up by 1%, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.
Overall, global new deaths in the past seven days fell by 3% compared with the previous week, the WHO reported, adding that new infections around the world rose by 1.8 million.
The respiratory disease is also spreading in the Americas, which continues to account for more than half of reported cases and deaths worldwide, although there have been slight decreases in some areas, WHO said in its latest update.
Text books and face masks
Tens of millions of pupils returned to school across Europe, their rucksacks loaded with exercise books, geometry sets and, for many, face masks to protect them from the resurgent coronavirus pandemic.
Hand cleansing stations, social distancing and staggered play time will become the new normal as countries seek ways to get children back into the classroom safely and their economies functioning once again.
But they do so at a time when infections rates are spiralling upwards across the continent and there are widespread concerns that the return to schools and offices, the autumn flu season and excess mortality in winter could drive a second wave.
Hong Kong begins China-led mass testing
Hong Kong began free coronavirus testing for all residents in the Asian financial hub, as the mainland Chinese-led initiative faced scepticism from the city’s medical community and public, with some activists urging a boycott.
The initiative began with a 60-strong mainland team conducting tests. It is the first direct help from China’s health officials for the semi-autonomous city as it battles the pandemic. The scheme has emerged as a politically charged issue, with authorities in Hong Kong and China saying critics are trying to smear the central government.
AstraZeneca bolsters vaccine supply
AstraZeneca has expanded its agreement with cell therapy firm Oxford Biomedica to mass-produce its Covid-19 potential vaccine, as it looks to scale-up supply ahead of a possible US fast-track approval.
AZD1222 is among the leading candidates in the global race for a successful vaccine and it has entered late-stage trials in the United States, the British drugmaker said, as it targets 3 billion doses of the vaccine, globally.
Medical waste spills into Indonesian river
For residents along Indonesia’s Cisadane River, the coronavirus has brought not just deadly disease, but also a deluge of medical waste: a constant stream of syringes, masks and hazmat suits floating by.
As the virus has spread, medical waste had been piling up at Tangerang’s Cipeucang landfill. Then in May its walls collapsed, sending tons of garbage straight into the Cisadane’s khaki green waters.
Indonesia’s health ministry acknowledged the problem - saying 1,480 tons of Covid-19 medical waste was produced across the country from March through June - and admitted it lacked treatment facilities, but was working on solutions.
Updated
Germany expects the economic devastation caused by the Covid-19 pandemic to be less severe than originally feared this year, but it sees a weaker rebound for Europe’s largest economy next year due to sluggish foreign demand.
Presenting the government’s updated forecasts on Tuesday, economy minister Peter Altmaier said the economy was doing better than expected and was recovering quickly from the coronavirus shock thanks to a strong response from the state.
“Overall, we can say that at least for now, we are dealing with a V-shaped development,” Altmaier told reporters, adding that he did not expect authorities to impose another round of lockdown measures as in March and April.
Confirming an earlier Reuters report, Altmaier said Berlin had revised upwards its 2020 forecast to a decline of 5.8% from a previous estimate of 6.3%.
Still, this would represent the biggest economic slump since the end of World War Two. During the global financial crisis, the economy contracted by 5.7% in 2009.
For 2021, the government revised downward its growth forecast to an expansion of 4.4% from its previous estimate of 5.2%. This means the economy will not reach its pre-pandemic size before early 2022, Altmaier said.
The government expects exports to tumble by 12.2% this year before jumping by 8.8% in 2021. Private consumption is seen falling by 6.9% this year and then rising by 4.7% in 2021.
Updated
Coronavirus cases in Russia pass 1m
Russia’s coronavirus case tally passed the 1 million mark on Tuesday as schools and educational institutions reopened across the world’s largest country with new mandatory safety precautions in place.
Russia has the fourth highest case tally in the world after the US, Brazil and India, according to Johns Hopkins University, which has been tracking the virus since it was discovered.
But officials say more than 800,000 people have recovered from the disease, and that with just over 17,000 deaths, the death toll is lower than in many other European countries.
The coronavirus crisis centre said on Tuesday that the overall case tally stood at 1,000,048 after 4,729 new infections were reported. It said 123 new deaths had been confirmed in the last 24 hours, taking the official death toll to 17,299.
President Vladimir Putin, in a nationwide TV address, told school children and students to observe virus safety rules.
It is mandatory for teachers to wear masks in schools in Moscow, which has been harder hit by the virus than other parts of Russia. Teachers are allowed to take off their masks in classrooms when teaching however, provided they keep a safe distance from children.
Moscow schoolchildren are not required to wear masks in schools. But traditional ceremonies at the start of the school year were cancelled on Tuesday and the use of different classrooms will be limited to reduce infection risks.
“I’m not afraid of Covid of course, but I follow restrictions,” Daniil Ivanenko, a 9th-grade student, told Reuters TV at his school in western Moscow on Tuesday.
Russia said that 167,044 people are infected with the virus.
Updated
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Poland bans direct flights from 44 Covid-hit countries
Poland is banning direct flights from 44 countries including Spain, Israel and Romania in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in the central European country, the government said on Tuesday.
The US, Malta, Montenegro, Mexico, Brasil, Argentina and India are also on the list of countries, but local media reported that Russia and China had been removed from it.
The ban comes in tomorrow (Wednesday) and follows measures to reintroduce restrictions on public life in the worst affected parts of the country, as the government tries to tackle the spread of the virus without resorting to a complete lockdown.
Poles are, however, allowed to fly to and from any country they want if they choose indirect flights through countries that are not on the list, such as Germany.
Poland, a country of 38 million, has officially registered 67,922 Covid-19 infections and more than 2,000 people have died from the virus. On Tuesday, 550 new infections were registered, according to health ministry data.
Updated
Israeli children went back to school on Tuesday despite a high coronavirus infection rate, the threat of a teachers’ strike and a last-minute decision to keep pupils from more than 20 towns at home.
Sitting at a tiny table with first graders wearing face masks, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, did not wear a face covering as he grinned despite the tumultuous start to the academic year.
שלום כיתה א׳. בהצלחה! pic.twitter.com/QHJctxIsjl
— Benjamin Netanyahu (@netanyahu) September 1, 2020
Hours earlier, the government announced schools and nurseries in 23 towns would not reopen due to their high coronavirus infection rates.
The postponements are a coup for Israel’s coronavirus tsar, Ronni Gamzu, who last month warned Israel could “tear apart all that we have achieved” if schools are reopened too hastily.
After Israel’s initial coronavirus lockdown, pupils returned to the classroom in May and dozens of schools were subsequently shut as positive cases sprung up. The guidelines for September remain strict, with an emphasis on small classes and more distance learning for older children, but the coronavirus figures are now far worse than May.
The latest figures show more than 2,100 positive test results registered over 24 hours, with 19 deaths on Tuesday, out of a population of 9 million.
While teachers went back to the classroom, they are threatening to strike within days. They are pushing for their colleagues to be allowed to stay at home on full pay if they are in a high risk category for contracting coronavirus.
Updated
AstraZeneca has expanded an agreement with Oxford Biomedica to scale up production of its potential Covid-19 vaccine, my colleague Julia Kollewe reports.
Under the supply agreement, the Oxford-based cell and gene therapy firm said it would produce tens of millions of doses of AstraZeneca’s potential vaccine, AZD1222, for 18 months, which could be extended by a further 18 months into 2023. Read the full story here:
Tourism to Spain down 75% year-on-year
The number of foreign tourists visiting Spain fell 75% in July from a year earlier, data showed on Tuesday, as the coronavirus outbreak shaved tens of billions of euros off the nation’s usual income from the sector.
Spain, usually the world’s second-most visited country after France with 80 million visitors a year, welcomed just 2.5 million foreigners in the normally brisk holiday month of July, Spain’s National Statistics Institute said.
Foreign holidaymakers spent €14.29 bn (£12.74bn) in Spain in the year to July, a gaping 73% below the €52.36bn (£46.7bn) they had spent by that point last year.
Plunging custom for hotels, bars and other services enjoyed by tourists has contributed to ravaging an economy of which it usually makes up about 12%, as virus cases climbed past 460,000.
The government said on Monday it expects a more than 10% rebound in the third quarter of the year after an 18.5% contraction in the second quarter.
Britons remained the biggest group visiting Spain during the first seven months, despite a 77% year-on-year decrease in their numbers. In July, when London imposed a quarantine on people returning from Spain, France was the biggest market.
Updated
The number of new coronavirus cases in Ukraine will continue to rise in September and could reach 3,000 a day by the end of this month, prime minister Denys Shmygal said on Tuesday.
Ukraine reported 2,088 cases on Tuesday and 2,141 on Monday. Last week, the daily number of confirmed coronavirus cases jumped to a record 2,481.
The increase comes after Ukraine last week imposed a temporary ban on most foreigners from entering the country until 28 September and extended lockdown measures until the end of October to contain a recent spike in cases.
The country has reported a total of 123,303 infections and 2,605 deaths from the virus.
Updated
The total number of coronavirus cases in Russia passed 1 million on Tuesday after 4,729 new infections were reported.
That brought the country’s total tally to 1,000,048. Russia’s coronavirus crisis centre said 123 new deaths had been confirmed in the last 24 hours.
Updated
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 1,218 to 243,599, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Tuesday.
The death toll rose by four to 9,302.
Updated
Summary
Good morning from Greater Manchester in England’s north. I’m Helen Pidd and I will be looking after this blog for a few hours today. Here is what has happened over the past eight hours on our Covid-riddled planet:
- The number of infections in the US surpassed 6 million.
- India has added nearly 2m coronavirus cases in one month, jumping from 1.64m infections at the end of July to 3.62m at the end of August.
- Spain has registered more than 23,000 new Covid-19 cases since Friday.
- France’s new Covid-19 infections surged by almost 50% in August, hitting 281,025 cases, versus 187,919 at the end of July.
- Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, who has consistently downplayed the severity of the coronavirus outbreak, said nobody will be forced to have the vaccine against Covid-19 once it is developed.
Updated
Hungary has decided to let tourists from its three eastern European neighbours, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, enter the country with a fresh negative coronavirus test, it said late on Monday, just as a lockdown on its borders took effect.
Last week, Hungary said it would close its borders to foreigners from Tuesday to curb a rise in coronavirus cases. Returning Hungarian citizens can avoid a 14-day quarantine only if they provide two negative Covid tests.
However, after talks with the Czech prime minister, Andrej Babiš, on Monday, the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, agreed to let Czech visitors who have already booked holidays in Hungary for September enter the country, the foreign ministry said.
The easing was subsequently extended to Poland and Slovakia, the ministry said in a statement. Visitors coming to Hungary have to produce a negative Covid test not older than five days, which Budapest says represents sufficient safety guarantees.
As of Monday, Hungary had reported 6,139 coronavirus cases with 615 deaths. The number of new cases has surged in recent days, just as Hungary prepared to start the school year.
The Hungarian economy plunged by an annual 13.6% in the second quarter. The country eased lockdown measures in May.
Updated
Accepting elderly Covid deaths 'moral bankruptcy': WHO
World Health Organization director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has taken issue with the opinion that high death rates from Covid-19 are not a major concern if it is mainly the elderly dying with the disease.
Accepting someone to die because of age is moral bankruptcy at its highest, and we shouldn’t allow our society to behave this way.
The WHO chief urged governments around the world to engage with people demonstrating against Covid-19 curbs and listen to their concerns, but stressed protesters needed to understand the virus was dangerous.
Tedros said it was important to “listen to what people are asking, what people are saying … we should engage in an honest dialogue”.
But he stressed demonstrators have a responsibility to ensure protests are safe.
“The virus is real. It is dangerous. It moves fast and it kills. We have to do everything to protect ourselves and to protect others.”
Updated
Hong begins mass testing programme, German protests, US surpasses 6m cases
Hong Kong began a mass coronavirus testing programme Tuesday overshadowed by fears that China is using the scheme to harvest DNA, while the number of infections in the US surpassed 6m.
The voluntary initiative is offering free tests to millions of Hong Kongers as authorities worldwide continue efforts to stamp out an illness that has killed almost 850,000 and infected more than 25 million.
But it comes as populations are increasingly wary of coronavirus curbs and distrust grows in governments’ handling of the pandemic, with protesters taking to the streets in a number of major cities in recent days.
German demonstrators against mask rules and other restrictions tried to storm parliament in the biggest of several European protests over the weekend.
Suspicions about government intentions have done much to undermine the testing programme in Hong Kong, where disillusionment with officials has been fuelled by China’s crushing of the city’s democracy movement.
The scheme is part of an attempt to stamp out a third wave of infections in the densely populated finance hub that began in late June and saw the city reimpose economically painful social distancing measures.
But the programme has been hampered by a limited response due to the involvement of mainland Chinese testing firms and doctors - and swirling public fears of the harvesting of data and DNA.
Since registration began on Saturday, 510,000 people have signed up to take the free tests. Health experts advising the government however have said as many as 5 million people might need to be tested for the scheme to end the current wave.
Updated
I reported earlier that India had added nearly 2m cases to its coronavirus case load in August … we now have today’s figures and the country has added a further 69,921 new infections on Tuesday, the lowest daily jump in six days, taking its overall total to 3.69m infections. This is based on more than 1m tests.
The country has had the single highest daily total of new cases for more than three weeks, according to a Reuters tally.
The death toll rose by 819 on Tuesday to 65,288.
Updated
How Covid-19 is impacting people’s dreams is the subject of a study being run by a cross-disciplinary team of academics from Australia, the UK and Finland.
“Pandemic dreams” are already the subject of a book of essays from Harvard research Deirdre Barrett, alongside reams of popular audience articles and social media posts.
“Certainly there were different lines of evidence that inspired this project,” says Dr Jennifer Windt, a senior research fellow in philosophy at Monash University, who will be working on the project alongside researchers from the University of Cambridge in England and Finland’s University of Turku. “People seem to be reporting weird dreams, but also generally they seem to be reporting that they’re dreaming more … and unfortunately often having more negatively toned dreams and nightmares. So that was part of it.”
Participants in the “Covid on Mind” study, which will be anonymous, will keep a dream log and undertake a “daily mind-wandering task” over a period of two weeks.
But first, they will be asked to complete a wellbeing questionnaire that examines their mental state, and “concerns related to coronavirus specifically” to give the researchers “some measure of how people are doing, how concerned they are about the virus, and changes related to the virus in their everyday lives”.
The cross-disciplinary project involves cognitive neuroscientists, psychologists and sleep and dream researchers, many of whom study how dreams reflect people’s mental states while awake. “We have people on the team who’ve done a lot of work on emotion and dreams … the pandemic seems to be an ideal opportunity to study that,” says Widnt.
She says there is already a body of research that suggests “negatively toned” dreams are associated with issues like anxiety and depression, and wonders, “Could changes in dreams be a marker to help identify people with mental health issues?”
“We’re not interested in interpreting the dreams in any sense,” she explains. “This is really a quite different approach that tries to get objective numbers … It’s really about quantifying changes in emotion, and relating them to measures of waking thought and emotion.”
Other researchers will be investigating the number of social interactions people report, both in their dreams and mind-wandering tasks. “Dreaming has been proposed to have a possibly evolutionary function in fine-tuning social skills,” she says. “We know that many of our interactions have gone virtual … does that have an impact on how people dream?”
“Dream bizarreness”, which Windt describes as “a technical word for all of the different ways in which dreams can be weird”, will also be a focus for Melbourne-based PhD student Manuela Kirberg.
In order to quantify how bizarre, social, positive or negative a dream is, independent raters read through dream reports and score them using established criteria. They rate the occurrence of “emotion terms” and “social content”. Any comments that do not form part of a dream’s description – for instance the dreamer’s own interpretation – are discarded, and raters talk to each other to ensure there is “sufficient agreement” in how they are scoring the dreams. “You need a lot of patience and sticktoitiveness to do that scoring, as well as training,” Windt says. “A lot of dreams are pretty mundane.”
The researchers are currently recruiting volunteers for the study – and anyone over the age of 18 who lives in the UK, Australia or Finland can participate. The study will be open for up to 12 months. The resulting dataset will feature well over 1,000 dreams and daydreams.
Windt is particularly curious about the dreams and mind-wandering of people in lockdown. “It’s obviously horrible what’s happening in Melbourne,” she says. But, “I do think it is a particularly interesting period to get people involved … How do their dreams relate to the changing outer circumstance?”
Windt’s own work as a philosopher focuses on “consciousness and cognitive science” – and she is particularly interested in the mind-wandering elements of the study. “There’s a large body of research that shows we spend 30 to 50% of waking life mind-wandering,” she says. “It really suggests that for much of waking life we aren’t in control of our thoughts and attention at all … That’s really interesting as a philosopher.”
Tens of thousands of girls across Asia are being forced into marriage by desperate families plunged into poverty because of the coronavirus pandemic, as campaigners warn years of progress tackling the practice is being undone.
Child marriage has long been common in traditional communities from the Indonesian archipelago to India, Pakistan and Vietnam, but numbers had been decreasing as charities made inroads by encouraging access to education and women’s health services.
These improvements are being eroded as the impact of the virus causes mass job losses leaving parents struggling to feed their families, experts say.
“All of the gains we’ve made in the past decade are really going to suffer,” said Shipra Jha, from ngo Girls Not Brides.
“Child marriage is firmly rooted in gender inequality and patriarchal structures. What’s happened is that it’s become compounded in the Covid era,” she said.
Poverty, lack of education, and insecurity, drive child marriage even in stable times, so periods of crises exacerbate the problem, the charity says.
Worldwide, an estimated 12 million girls are wed every year before the age of 18, according to the UN.
But the organisation has now warned that unless urgent action is taken to tackle the economic and social impact of the virus - an additional 13 million child marriages will take place in the next decade.
In Asia, charities report the snowball of forced unions has already begun, estimating tens of thousands are already affected - though hard data is yet to be collated.
“There has been an increase in child marriages during this lockdown period. There is rampant unemployment, job loss. Families are barely able to make ends meet, so they think it’s best to get their young daughters married off,” said Rolee Singh who runs India’s ‘1 Step 2 Stop Child Marriage’ campaign.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has consistently downplayed the severity of the coronavirus outbreak, said on Monday that nobody will be forced to have the vaccine against Covid-19 once it is developed.
The comments come after the government earmarked millions of dollars for the purchase and future production of vaccinations as Brazil suffers the second worst outbreak of the pandemic outside the United States.
“No one can force anyone to get a vaccine,” he said in response to a question from a supporter, a video posted on social media showed.
Brazil has become a hot spot in recent months, with 3,908,272 confirmed cases and 121,381 deaths from Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.
On Monday, the Health Ministry reported 45,961 new cases of the coronavirus and 553 deaths from Covid-19 in the past 24 hours.
Bolsonaro, who recently recovered from the coronavirus, has downplayed its severity, calling it a “small flu”, ignoring scientific recommendations and opposing quarantine efforts by Brazilian governors and mayors.
Despite this, his government earmarked 1.9 billion reais (US$346 million) in early August in funding to buy 100 million doses of the vaccine candidate being developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca PLC and to eventually produce it in Brazil.
The Sao Paulo state government is also working on a potential vaccine with China’s Sinovac Biotech. Brazil hopes distribution of doses of either vaccine can begin at the start of next year.
Bolsonaro’s acting health minister Eduardo Pazuello, an Army general, has appointed a veterinarian to lead Brazil’s vaccination program.
Lauricio Monteiro Cruz, who was working at the ministry on the control of the parasitic disease leishmaniasis, is a specialist in the prevention of diseases in animals, according to his CV on the ministry website.
Bolsonaro’s response to the virus outbreak has led to significant street demonstrations, and a billboard campaign accusing him of mishandling the pandemic, at the cost of people’s lives.
Children across Europe return to school
French pupils go back to school Tuesday as schools across Europe open their doors to greet returning pupils this month, nearly six months after the coronavirus outbreak forced them to close and despite rising infection rates across the continent.
Many teachers and parents are worried the reopening of schools will accelerate the spread of Covid-19, but governments have insisted it should go ahead.
French children return to school on Tuesday, after a two-month long summer break that followed two weeks of obligatory schooling just before the holidays.
Teachers and pupils between 11 and 18 will be required to wear masks both indoors and outdoors. Pupils in Belgium will also return to school on Tuesday, while those in Germany went back last month.
Masks will also be compulsory in Greece, where children are expected to return to school next Monday with a maximum of 25 children per class.
In England and Wales - where children return to school this week after a six-month closure - the government initially said masks in schools would not be necessary, but reversed its policy last Wednesday.
The new guidance advises secondary school students aged 11 to 18 and staff to wear face coverings in corridors and communal areas, in places with local virus restrictions.
The Spanish government has insisted all children over the age of six must wear masks at all times and wash their hands at least five times a day.
Children should maintain a distance of 1.5 metres from each other, and regional governments have hired additional teachers to reduce class sizes.
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South Korea cases pass 20,000
South Korea’s coronavirus cases have remained under 300 for a third day in a row. On Tuesday the CDC recorded 235 cases, including 222 local infections. It took the total number of cases recorded in the country over the 20,000 mark, to 20,182, since the first infection was reported on 20 January.
“It is worrisome that more than 30 percent of the confirmed COVID-19 patients over the past two weeks are those aged more than 60,” vice health minister, Kim Ganglip, said in a briefing. “The risk of dying due to the COVID-19 virus is highest among older people and those with underlying diseases.”
Of the new cases, 175 were in the capital area.
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India adds nearly 2m Covid cases in August
India has added nearly 2m coronavirus cases in one month, jumping from 1.64m infections at the end of July to 3.62m at the end of August. It’s the highest single-month rise recorded in any country in a month throughout the pandemic. The next highest monthly total is the US, which added 1.91m cases in July.
India also saw a surge in deaths in August of 28,859, which, according to figures from Our World in Data, was more than 50% higher than in July.
As we reported earlier, India on Monday reported it’s economy shrank by nearly 24% in the April-June quarter. It’s the biggest fall since the government began publishing quarterly statistics in 1996.
Updated
And we have just heard from the Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, who says when he announces his road map out of the Australian state’s six-week lockdown, there will be two roadmaps ... one for regional parts in the state and one for metropolitan Melbourne. Andrews said:
And ultimately, this is all about making sure that the sacrifice, the pain, the amazing work that Victorians have done counts for something.
It’s no good doing this too fast, opening up too much, too quickly, only to be open for just a few weeks and back in lockdown by Christmas time.
We don’t want that. We want to do everything we can to avoid that.
In Australia we are getting some more information about cases in the most populous state of New South Wales. The state has 13 new cases, 11 of which are locally acquired and linked to known clusters, including a cluster in the centre of the city, which now totals 41 cases.
WATCH: Dr Jeremy McAnulty provides a #COVID19 update for Tuesday 1 September.https://t.co/c7iWOsGmGL
— NSW Health (@NSWHealth) September 1, 2020
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China reports 10 new cases
China has reported 10 new Covid-19 cases, down from 17 reported a day earlier, the country’s health authority said on Tuesday.
The National Health Commission said in a statement that all new cases were imported infections involving travellers from overseas, marking the 16th consecutive day of no local infections.
The number of new asymptomatic cases rose to 34 from 19 a day earlier. China does not count symptomless coronavirus infections as confirmed cases.
The total number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in mainland China now stands at 85,058, while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,634.
New Zealand reports 14 new cases, nine in managed isolation
There are 14 new cases of COVID-19 to report in New Zealand today - nine in MIQ (managed quarantine) and five in the community, all related to the Auckland cluster. Yesterday Auckland dropped down from Level 3 to Level 2, despite more cases emerging.
There are 10 people with COVID-19 in hospital today, two of whom are in ICU care.
Forty-four thousand people have now been through managed isolation in New Zealand.
With today’s 14 new cases, New Zealand’s total number of active cases is 132. Of those, 33 are imported cases in MIQ facilities, and 99 are community cases.
Yesterday the country’s laboratories processed 8,599 tests for COVID-19, bringing the total number of tests completed to date to 766,626.
Quarantine minister Megan Woods said: “Covid is growing, not slowing around the world”, and New Zealand is no exception, with cases continuing to arrive at the border.
Private security guards are now being “phased out” of isolation facilities, and replaced by defence force personnel. Eventually, the deployment of defence force officers in managed isolation facilities would be larger than New Zealand’s entire deployment to East Timor.
Updated
We are about to get New Zealand’s daily media briefing on coronavirus cases, today hosted by minister for managed isolation and quarantine Megan Woods and Air Commodore Darryn Webb.
Local media is reporting that there are 14 new cases in the country, nine of which are in managed isolation, and five in the community. Our NZ correspondent, Eleanor Ainge Roy, will bring us the updates.
Hong Kong starts voluntary mass coronavirus testing
Hong Kong has started conducting mass coronavirus tests on Tuesday, a health scheme that has been swept up in the political debate dividing the city, where many remain deeply distrustful of both local leaders and China, Agence France-Presse reports.
The voluntary tests are part of an attempt to stamp out a third wave of infections that began in late June and saw the densely populated city reimpose economically painful social distancing measures.
The programme has been hampered by a limited response due to the involvement of mainland Chinese testing firms and doctors – and swirling public mistrust of local authorities as Beijing cracks down on the city’s democracy movement.
Since registration began on Saturday, 510,000 people have signed up to take the free tests – around 7% of the city’s 7.5 million population.
More than half of all 141 community test centres across the city are fully booked for their first day on Tuesday.
Hong Kong has recorded just over 4,800 infections since the virus first hit the city in late January but about 75% of those cases were detected since the start of July.
Tests will run for between a week and two weeks depending on public demand with numbers limited each day to reduce the risk of infection.
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Brazil reported 45,961 new cases of the novel coronavirus and 553 deaths from the disease caused by the virus in the past 24 hours, the health ministry said on Monday.
Brazil has registered 3,908,272 cases of the virus since the pandemic began, while the official death toll from COVID-19 has risen to 121,381, according to ministry data, in the world’s worst coronavirus outbreak outside the United States.
Mexico’s health ministry on Monday reported 3,719 new confirmed cases of coronavirus infections and 256 additional fatalities, bringing the total in the country to 599,560 cases and 64,414 deaths.
Spain records more than 23,000 cases since Friday
Spain has registered more than 23,000 new COVID-19 cases since Friday, health emergency chief Fernando Simon said on Monday, suggesting the infection rate had declined slightly from an 21 August peak, Reuters reports.
Health ministry data showed 2,489 new cases were diagnosed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total since the onset of the pandemic to 462,858.
“Of course we are worried because we have to stabilise and bring down the infection chain,” Health Minister Salvador Illa told Catalonia’s regional TV channel 324 late on Monday, adding that the goal is to avoid pressuring hospitals.
Illa said that the situation is not comparable to the pandemic’s first peak in March and April, noting hospitals now have greater capacity. He said that nothing can be ruled out but it would be unlikely Spain would need to close schools again or impose a new state of emergency to try to tackle the virus.
Since bringing the first wave largely under control through a strict lockdown that ended in June, Spain has been hit by a sharp resurgence of infections as measures were relaxed and mass testing began.
On 21 August, daily infections hit nearly 10,000, their highest level since the peak of the epidemic in late March. They have come down to about 9,000 to 8,000 per day last week, updated health ministry data showed.
Back to India and the former Indian president, Pranab Mukherjee, a senior leader of the Congress party who served in multiple cabinets during five decades in politics, has died. He was 84.
Mukherjee had emergency surgery for a blood clot in his brain on 10 August after a fall. The hospital said he tested positive for Covid-19 after the surgery and his condition was critical.
He remained in a coma after the operation. The hospital said his health began declining on Monday after a lung infection resulted in septic shock.
The government has announced a week of mourning. Prime minister Narendra Modi, who leads the rival Bharatiya Janata party, tweeted that Mukherjee “left an indelible mark on the development trajectory” of India. “His wise counsel on key policy matters will never be forgotten by me,” he said.
You can read our full story below:
Updated
Australia's state of Victoria reports 70 cases, five deaths
Australia’s southern state of Victoria has recorded 70 new cases and five new deaths. The state has been in a strict stage four lockdown, which has seen new infections fall and I believe 70 is the lowest case number in nearly two months. The premier, Daniel Andrews, said he the roadmap out of the lockdown would be outlined on the weekend.
Victoria has been the centre of cases in the past two months, but concerns are held for a growing cluster linked to Sydney’s central business district, and on Tuesday the north-eastern state of Queensland reported two new cases. The state’s southern border with New South Wales will remain closed through September.
You can stay up to date on all of the developments on our Australian live blog.
#COVID19VicData for 1 September, 2020:
— VicGovDHHS (@VicGovDHHS) August 31, 2020
There were 70 new cases and sadly 5 deaths reported in Victoria yesterday. Our thoughts are with the loved ones of all those affected.
We'll have more information for you later today in our media release. pic.twitter.com/by6mfDDWxx
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India's economy shrinks nearly 24%
India’s economy growth suffered a historic 23.9% contraction in the April-June quarter, as the strict coronavirus lockdown hit businesses.
It was the biggest fall since the country started publishing quarterly statistics 1996. On Monday the government warned the figures could be revised further since the pandemic had also affected the ability to collect accurate data on economic activity.
“The entire quarter was spent in lockdown and it was a complete washout for the Indian economy,” Mumbai-based economist Ashutosh Datar told Agence France-Presse.
India’s sudden shutdown from late March prompted a huge exodus by millions of migrant workers who fled cities for their villages due to a lack of food and money. Many factories struggled to cope with labour shortages, even after lockdowns lifted.
Construction activity was halved, while manufacturing plummeted by nearly 40% compared to the previous year.
India has the fastest growing rate of coronavirus infections, with 3.62m infections and 64,469 deaths. It ranks as the third worst affected country on both counts, behind the US and Brazil.
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France's total Covid infections jump 50% in August
France’s new Covid-19 infections surged by almost 50% in August, hitting 281,025 cases, versus 187,919 at the end of July.
New cases in August increased on average by a record 3,003 every day, a figure four times higher than July’s average increase of 746 per day.
The seven-day moving average of new infections, which smoothes out reporting irregularities, stood at 5,167, reaching a new record for a fourth day in a row, versus a low of 272 on 27 May, two weeks after the country ended its two-month long lockdown.
The surge of new cases has led authorities to re-impose some containment measures, such as making face masks mandatory in the streets, shops and public transportation of almost all the country’s main cities.
And, as of Tuesday, masks will also be compulsory in workplaces.
But, as the new school year starts this week, French president Emmanuel Macron and prime minister Jean Castex have been saying they will do everything to avoid a new national lockdown.
WHO boss says countries can't 'pretend pandemic is over'
The World Health Organization has urged governments to engage with people demonstrating against Covid-19 restrictions and listen to their concerns, but stressed protesters needed to understand the virus was dangerous.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus voiced understanding for the growing frustration felt as people continue to have to deal with restrictions eight months into the pandemic.
“We understand that people are tired and yearn to get on with their lives. We understand that countries want to get their societies and economies going again,” he said.
The UN health agency, he stressed, “fully supports efforts to re-open economies and societies... but we want to see it done safely.” But he also insisted that “no country can just pretend the pandemic is over”.
“If countries are serious about opening up, they must be serious about suppressing transmission and saving lives,” he said, insisting that “opening up without having control is a recipe for disaster”.
Tedros took issue with the opinions voiced by some that high death rates were not really a concern if it is mainly the elderly who are dying.
“Accepting someone to die because of age is moral bankruptcy at its highest, and we shouldn’t allow our society to behave this way,” he said.
“Every life whether it is young or old is precious. And we have to do everything to save it.”
Asked about recent demonstrations in a number of countries against coronavirus restrictions, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said it was important to “listen to what people are asking, what people are saying”.
“We should engage in an honest dialogue,” he told reporters, stressing though that demonstrators have a responsibility to ensure protests are safe.
“The virus is real. It is dangerous. It moves fast and it kills,” he said, insisting “we have to do everything to protect ourselves and to protect others”.
Speaking about the broader protests, the WHO emergencies chief Michael Ryan pointed out that “epidemics and emergencies create strong emotions, and acceptance of measures is always very, very tough.
“It is really important that governments don’t overreact to people protesting against measures,” he told the virtual briefing.
“The real important thing to do is to enter into a dialogue with groups.”
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s continuing live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic, with me, Alison Rourke.
The World Health Organization’s boss, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, says “no country can just pretend the pandemic is over”, warning that “opening up without having control is a recipe for disaster”.
But Tedros urged states to understand the the growing frustration people felt over the pandemic: “We understand that people are tired and yearn to get on with their lives. We understand that countries want to get their societies and economies going again,” he said.
His emergencies director, Michael Ryan, called on governments not to “overreact to people protesting against measures,” saying that “epidemics and emergencies create strong emotions, and acceptance of measures is always very, very tough”.
In other developments:
- France’s new Covid-19 infections shot up by 50% in August. France saw its highest monthly tally since the beginning of the outbreak earlier this year, while hospitalisations for the disease seem to be creeping up again.
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Spain infections rise more than 23,000 since Friday. Health ministry data showed 2,489 new cases were diagnosed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total since the onset of the pandemic to 462,858.
- The United States passed 6m coronavirus infections, according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker. The milestone comes amid rising infection in some Midwestern states, including Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota.
- Hong Kong will start conducting mass coronavirus tests on Tuesday. The voluntary tests are part of an attempt to stamp out a third wave of infections that began in late June and saw the densely populated city reimpose economically painful social distancing measures.
- India’s former president Pranab Mukherjee died after testing positive. He was 84. Mukherjee had emergency surgery for a blood clot in his brain on 10 August at New Delhi’s army hospital research and referral after suffering a fall. The hospital said he had tested positive for coronavirus after the surgery and his condition was critical. The news came as the country’s economy shrank nearly 24% in the last quarter.
- The United Arab Emirates recorded more than 500 daily Covid-19 infections, the highest number over a 24-hour period in nearly two months. The Gulf Arab state has reported 541 infections and two deaths, the highest since 683 cases were recorded on 5 July.
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