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Summary
Here’s a roundup of the key developments today:
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Wales is delaying further easing of coronavirus restrictions for four weeks after seeing a spike in cases of the Delta variant of the disease first identified in India.
- Germany will reopen its borders later this month to non-EU nationals who have been vaccinated against Covid-19, the government announced Thursday.
- AstraZeneca can charge a higher price for its Covid-19 vaccine in dozens of poor countries once the pharmaceutical company decides the pandemic has ended, according to a copy of its contract with Oxford University seen by the Guardian.
- Travel in and out of the Lisbon metropolitan area is to be banned over coming weekends as Portuguese authorities respond to a spike in new Covid-19 cases in the region around the capital, officials announced.
- Nepal significantly reduced coronavirus infections after its worst outbreak, which overwhelmed the country’s medical system, but is in desperate need of vaccines, according to its health minister.
- Denmark will administer Covid-19 vaccines for those aged 12 to 15, broadcaster TV 2 reported, citing sources. Danish health authorities are due to hold a news briefing to about using the vaccines on that age group later today, amid concerns there is limited information about possible side-effects to children who have nothing to gain from such a move.
- Austria announced that revellers will be allowed to hit the dance floor legally again from next month as nightclubs reopen, in line with a broader easing of measures.
- France’s tourism sector is taking a further step toward normality with the reopening of Disneyland Paris, two weeks after the country reopened its borders to vaccinated visitors from across the world.
I’m handing over to my colleagues in Australia now. Thanks so much for joining me this evening.
Updated
Wales postpones relaxation of lockdown amid Delta variant spread
Wales is delaying further easing of coronavirus restrictions for four weeks after seeing a spike in cases of the Delta variant of the disease first identified in India.
First minister for Wales Mark Drakeford will make the announcement on Friday and is expected to encourage people to go for their second doses of the vaccine, PA news reports.
The nation is aiming to roll out more than half a million doses over the next four weeks.
The change comes after UK prime minister Boris Johnson announced on Monday that the final stage of England’s lockdown road map - which would have seen all restrictions lift and international travel resume on June 21 - would be delayed until July 19 due to a spike in cases.
Latest figures show there are nearly 490 cases of the Delta variant in Wales, while more than four out five new Covid-19 cases are the Delta variant, according to the Welsh government.
Two-thirds of these are not linked to travel or contact with another case, it added.
Drakeford said:
In the space of just a few short weeks, the Delta variant has entered Wales and quickly spread throughout the country. There is sustained and accelerating transmission, not just in north and south-east Wales but in all parts of Wales.
It is now the most dominant variant in new cases in Wales. We are once again facing a serious public health situation.
We have the lowest coronavirus rates in the UK and the highest vaccination rates for first doses. A four-week delay in relaxing restrictions could help to reduce the peak number of daily hospital admissions by up to half, at a time when the NHS is very busy supporting all our healthcare needs - not just treating coronavirus.
Cases of the Delta variant are spreading across Wales. In the space a few weeks, cases have been confirmed in all parts of the country.
— Mark Drakeford (@fmwales) June 17, 2021
We have reviewed all the evidence and will pause changes to the rules for 4 weeks.
More info in the thread below⬇️
Updated
The US has issued guidance easing the way for delivery of products such as face masks, ventilators and vaccines to combat the coronavirus pandemic to heavily sanctioned countries like Iran, Venezuela and Syria.
The US Treasury Department issued general licenses related to those three countries aimed at allowing more coronavirus-related transactions and activities, according to a statement, but stopped short of actually lifting any sanctions.
The move comes after Joe Biden, the US president, issued a national security memorandum on his first full day in office in January calling for his administration to undertake a review of US sanctions programs to evaluate whether they were hindering responses to the pandemic.
“Even though we have comprehensive humanitarian general licenses in all our programs, we did see some gaps,” a US treasury official told Reuters, adding that prior to Thursday’s move, obstacles were dealt with on a case-by-case basis that involved delay and cost.
“This is lowering that barrier,” the official said.
The previous administration of Donald Trump had been criticised by human rights groups for resisting any softening of sanctions rules against countries like Iran and Venezuela, which were targeted under “maximum pressure” campaigns, to ease pandemic-related hardship.
After Russia offered cars, Washington state spliffs, Indonesia live chickens and Hong Kong the chance of a £1.2m apartment, the latest country to reward people who show up for their Covid shots is the Netherlands – with soused herring.
Early batches of Hollandse nieuwe, or new-season Dutch herring, a traditional delicacy consumed to the tune of 75m a year, are being distributed to vaccination centres around the country as an encouragement for people to get their jabs.
The incentive is not, admittedly, quite as big as that in California, whose $116.5m (£83.5m) lottery draw offered 10 top prizes of $1.5m each to winning vaccinees, or New York’s Vax n Scratch, which gave away free state scratchcards with a chance to win a $5m prize.
Also in the US, Ohio ran a draw offering five full scholarships to any of the state’s universities or colleges, Maine gave away 10,000 fishing and hunting licenses and West Virginia tempted reticent recipients with hunting rifles and custom trucks.
In the race to reach herd immunity, some administrations are even more creative. Washington state’s Joints for Jabs scheme, which runs until 12 July, allows licensed pharmacies to reward over-21s who get their a first or second dose with a pre-rolled spliff.
Read the full story here:
Holidaymakers should not pin their hopes on a slew of extra countries being added to the quarantine-free green list when it is updated later this month, government sources have warned.
With ministers monitoring data daily on the spread of the Delta variant, after stage four of the reopening roadmap was postponed by a month to 19 July, Whitehall insiders say the mood remains extremely cautious.
Cases of the Delta variant are rising rapidly in the UK, with 11,007 new infections reported on Thursday – the highest figure since 19 February.
Portugal was the only mainstream European holiday destination on the original green list, and it was then removed on 3 June as the Delta variant spread.
The government has promised to update the list again by 28 June, with details likely to be announced next week to give travellers and holiday firms time to adjust their plans.
“My sense is that we’ll continue to be very cautious in thinking about how we take any steps that could increase transmission,” said a government source.
Read more by my colleagues Heather Stewart and Aubrey Allegretti:
A total of 41,143 people tested positive for Covid-19 in England at least once in the week to June 9, up 63% on the previous week, according to the latest Test and Trace figures.
It is the highest number of people testing positive since the week to March 3, PA news reports.
Germany will reopen its borders later this month to non-EU nationals who have been vaccinated against Covid-19, the government announced Thursday.
Beginning on June 25, non-EU nationals may enter Germany for whatever reason, such as tourism or studying in a university, the interior ministry said.
Currently, only those with exceptional reasons are allowed into the country, AFP reports.
But travellers will have to have been completely vaccinated at least 14 days prior to their arrival with a vaccine approved by the European Medicines Agency.
Travellers from countries where the circulation of the coronavirus is rampant will be barred, however.
Germany has seen a sharp drop in Covid-19 cases in recent weeks.
Today so far...
- AstraZeneca can charge a higher price for its Covid-19 vaccine in dozens of poor countries once the pharmaceutical company decides the pandemic has ended, according to a copy of its contract with Oxford University seen by the Guardian.
- Kuwait announced it is to allow foreigners who have been fully vaccinated against Covid to enter the country from 1 August, amid warnings that Covid passports will inevitably “disproportionately discriminate” based on race, religion, age and socio-economic background.
- Travel in and out of the Lisbon metropolitan area is to be banned over coming weekends as Portuguese authorities respond to a spike in new Covid-19 cases in the region around the capital, officials announced.
- The US embassy in Kabul had to shut down almost all its operations because of a Covid-19 outbreak that has killed one staffer, and left 114 infected and quarantined.
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The UK’s medicine regulator extended the emergency use approval (EUA) for Innova’s lateral flow Covid-19 tests, saying it was satisfied with a review of the tests after its US counterpart issued a warning about them.
- Nepal significantly reduced coronavirus infections after its worst outbreak, which overwhelmed the country’s medical system, but is in desperate need of vaccines, according to its health minister.
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Denmark will administer Covid-19 vaccines for those aged 12 to 15, broadcaster TV 2 reported, citing sources. Danish health authorities are due to hold a news briefing to about using the vaccines on that age group later today, amid concerns there is limited information about possible side-effects to children who have nothing to gain from such a move.
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Austria announced that revellers will be allowed to hit the dance floor legally again from next month as nightclubs reopen, in line with a broader easing of measures.
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France’s tourism sector is taking a further step toward normality with the reopening of Disneyland Paris, two weeks after the country reopened its borders to vaccinated visitors from across the world.
Kuwait has announced it is to allow foreigners who have been fully vaccinated against Covid to enter the country from 1 August, after a months-long suspension.
AFP reports that the Gulf country in February banned the entry of non-citizens in a bid to limit the spread of the virus, but has started to ease some of its Covid-19 restrictions in recent weeks.
Government spokesman Tareq al-Mizrem said foreign travellers will need to have been fully inoculated with one of the four vaccines that the Gulf country has approved - Pfizer/BioNTech, AstraZeneca, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson.
Passengers must also hold a negative PCR test conducted a maximum of 72 hours before travel, and undergo another test during a seven-day quarantine in the country, Mizrem told a press conference.
Covid passports have been criticised as devices which will inevitably “disproportionately discriminate” based on race, religion, age and socio-economic background.
Meanwhile, only Kuwaiti citizens who have been fully vaccinated will be allowed to travel abroad from 1 August, he said, although some exceptions would be made, such as for pregnant women. Previously, Kuwaitis were required to have had at least one jab in order to travel.
Mizrem also announced that Kuwait would allow access to large shopping malls, gyms and restaurants from 27 June only for those who have been fully inoculated. Kuwait has officially recorded 1,800 Covid-related deaths.
EU states must use all the vaccine options available to fight Covid, and it is too early to tell if a particular type is best, the European Medicines Agency said.
The comments come as several countries limit the use of so-called viral vector jabs like AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson due to a link with rare blood clots, and opt instead for Messenger RNA vaccines like Pfizer and Moderna.
“We are still in a pandemic, and it’s very important that in this fight against this pandemic we use all the options we have available,” said Marco Cavaleri, EMA head of vaccines strategy. It is “up to member states how they use them in the best interest of public health”.
The EMA earlier this week denied that Cavaleri had suggested in an interview with an Italian newspaper dropping the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine, even for people over 60 to whom it is currently limited in a number of states.
Cavaleri said the episode was “rather unfortunate and essentially was a misunderstanding on many aspects”. However, a full explanation and breakdown of how exactly the misunderstanding arose has not appeared to be forthcoming.
The EMA expert added it was “very difficult to say” which type of vaccine technology might prove the most dominant in future, and that all existing jabs had “already been saving thousands and millions of lives”.
“Whether in the future there will be a certain type of vaccine like the messenger RNA that will remain the main one or not, whether other platform technologies ... will remain as ancillary vaccine that could play an important role in controlling this coronavirus, is difficult to say right now,” he said. “We are just glad to have so many options.”
Earlier this month, Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, claimed that Europe had been slow to approve his country’s Covid vaccine because of a “battle for money” and that commercial interests were being put ahead of the welfare of European citizens.
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Vietnam has called on the World Health Organization to speed up its stuttering Covax vaccine drive as the country’s new daily infections hit a record high.
Reuters reports that a new outbreak has infected 8,914 people since late April, or 75% of the total cases over the pandemic, prompting calls for Vietnam’s government to accelerate its vaccination programme.
WHO should speed up vaccine delivery through the international sharing scheme, Vu Duc Dam, head of the country’s Covid-19 task force, said during a meeting with WHO’s regional director for the Western Pacific, Takeshi Kasai.
Dam also urged the WHO to accelerate the transfer of vaccine manufacturing technology so Vietnam can become one of the vaccine production hubs in the region.
The WHO said last month it was reviewing a proposal by an unidentified vaccine manufacturer in Vietnam to become an mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccine technology hub in the Southeast Asian country.
The country of about 98 million people has received nearly 4m doses of the vaccine, most of which came from the Covax programme.
Vietnam’s domestic inoculations started in March. At least 1.77 million people in Vietnam have had one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, while 72,325 have been fully vaccinated, according to official data.
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Travel in and out of Lisbon to be banned as Portugal fights cases spike
Travel in and out of the Lisbon metropolitan area is to be banned over coming weekends as Portuguese authorities respond to a spike in new Covid-19 cases in the region around the capital, officials have announced.
AP reports that the ban in the area where some 2.8 million people live comes into effect from 3pm local time on Friday, the cabinet spokeswoman Mariana Vieira da Silva said.
“We’re aware [the travel ban] isn’t easy and that it’s not what people want, but we feel it’s necessary to protect the rest of the country,” she said.
The travel restrictions are open-ended, pending periodic reviews. Flights out of Lisbon airport are exempt from the ban, as are work-related journeys.
Portugal is witnessing a rise in daily cases not seen since February. The authorities reported that 804 of the 1,233 new cases detected on Thursday were in the Lisbon region.
Experts believe there is community transmission of the highly contagious Delta variant in the Lisbon region.
The region this week crossed the red line established by authorities of a 14-day cumulative case notification rate per 100,000 people of 240. Today, Lisbon’s notification rate was 254. The national rate was 90.
Updated
The US embassy in Afghanistan has ordered a near-complete lockdown because of a spike in coronavirus cases among employees.
AP reports that the embassy in Kabul ordered those staffers remaining, amid the imminent withdrawal of American forces from the country, into virtual isolation to prevent the spread of the virus which has already killed at least one person, sent 114 into quarantine and forced several people to be medically evacuated.
The embassy said in a notice to employees that almost all group activities, including work meetings and recreational gatherings, are banned because intensive care units at military medical facilities in Afghanistan are at full capacity and the number of cases has forced it to establish temporary Covid-19 wards to care for patients requiring oxygen.
It said the restrictions would remain in place until the chain of transmission was broken. The notice said 95% of the cases involved people who had not been vaccinated or fully vaccinated against the virus and urged all staff to take advantage of available vaccines at the embassy.
“We must break the chain of transmission to protect one another and ensure the mission’s ability to carry out the nation’s business,” the acting US ambassador, Ross Wilson, said in the notice. “Restrictions will continue until the chain of transmission is broken ... We are all in this together and rely on your cooperation during this difficult time. We can only return to normal operations with the cooperation of everyone.”
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The US is devoting $3.2bn to advance development of antiviral pills for Covid-19 and other dangerous viruses that could turn into pandemics.
AP reports that Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, announced the investment at a White House briefing as part of a new “antiviral program for pandemics” to develop drugs to address symptoms caused by potentially dangerous viruses like Covid.
The pills for Covid-19, which would be used to minimise symptoms after infection, are in development and could begin arriving by year’s end, pending the completion of clinical trials. The funding will speed those clinical trials and provide additional support to private sector research, development and manufacturing.
Fauci said the new programme would invest in “accelerating things that are already in progress” for Covid-19 but also would work to innovate new therapies for other viruses. “There are few treatments that exist for many of the viruses that have pandemic potential,” he said. But he added, “vaccines clearly remain the center piece of our arsenal.”
The US has approved one antiviral drug, remdesivir, against Covid-19 and allowed emergency use of three antibody combinations that help the immune system fight the virus. But all the drugs have to be infused at hospitals or medical clinics, and demand has been low due to these logistical hurdles.
Updated
UK health secretary Matt Hancock’s mandatory Covid vaccine policy for care home workers in England will turn managers into jab “bouncers”, sector leaders have warned as growing numbers of staff say they would rather quit than be vaccinated.
Updated
It does seem rather convenient for politicians to blame surges in Covid cases on variants, rather than their own public health policies, though it may well be true – in the absence of firm evidence in many places insofar.
This afternoon in Moscow, the mayor has said the situation with Covid-19 was unexpectedly and rapidly deteriorating, and that the city was probably facing new variants of the coronavirus that were more aggressive and infectious.
In televised comments, mayor Sergei Sobyanin said officials were rapidly increasing the number of hospital beds in the city to treat a possible influx of Covid-19 patients. He said there were currently enough beds available.
It comes after Moscow city authorities yesterday ordered all workers with public facing roles in the Russian capital to be vaccinated against Covid-19, one of the most forceful steps taken anywhere in the world to compel people to get shots.
A decree listed a range of jobs – from hairdressers, retailers and taxi drivers to bank tellers, teachers and performers – for which vaccination will now be obligatory, AFP reports. Deputy mayor Anastasia Rakova said the list covers more than 2 million workers in the city.
As China and Russia continue to face accusations of vaccine diplomacy from western nations, the US expects Covid-19 vaccines to be delivered “in very short order” to Taiwan.
A senior state department official said that it was working with Taiwanese regulators after Washington promised to donate 750,000 vaccine doses to the self-ruled island claimed by China.
“In very short order we do expect to have those vaccines on their way to Taiwan and hopefully into people’s arms shortly thereafter,” Jonathan Fritz, deputy assistant secretary of state for China, Mongolia, and Taiwan coordination, told a Senate hearing.
Asked if they would be delivered within weeks, Fritz said he hoped it would be “perhaps even sooner than that”, but that he couldn’t give a specific date, according to Reuters.
After Russia offered cars, Washington state spliffs, Indonesia live chickens and Hong Kong the chance of a £1.2m apartment, the latest country to reward people who show up for their Covid shots is the Netherlands – with soused herring.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has said it was not willing to impose a 50% efficacy threshold for Covid-19 vaccines, adding that full trial data was necessary for it to make a sound assessment on the benefits and risks of a shot.
German biotech CureVac NV said on Wednesday that its Covid-19 vaccine was only 47% effective in a late-stage trial, missing the study’s main goal and throwing into doubt the potential delivery of hundreds of millions of doses to the European Union.
“We will need to collect all the final data from this clinical trial, and have a good analysis of the outcome throughout different regions, age groups and according to different variants,” Marco Cavaleri, head of Biological Health Threats and Vaccines Strategy at the EMA, told reporters.
“So I think it is premature to enter into what this means (...) We always felt it was difficult to define upfront a threshold,” he said.
Updated
France’s tourism sector is taking a further step toward normality with the reopening of Disneyland Paris, two weeks after the country reopened its borders to vaccinated visitors from across the world.
Europe’s most frequented theme park in Marne-la-Vallee, east of the French capital, opened its doors on Thursday after nearly eight months of closure.
A crowd of smiling visitors was welcomed by Disney characters dancing to the sound of joyful music.
“Amazing,” said Debbie Tater. The Delaware resident travelled from the United States to visit her family, including her daughter and two granddaughters, who live in France and whom she hadn’t seen for a year and a half.
“Happiest place on earth,” she said, with tears in her eyes.
“We couldn’t miss the reopening,” said Elodie Piedfort, from Haute-Loire region in central France. “Because I’m a nurse it’s been a very difficult year and being here, together with my son, is great. And the reopening, moving on is great as well.”
Visitors must wear masks inside the park and other measures are in place, including a cap on visitor numbers to ensure distancing.
The British government has confirmed it is considering legislating to make working from home the “default” option by giving employees the right to request it.
Responding to reports that ministers could change the law, the prime minister Boris Johnson’s official spokesperson said a flexible working taskforce was examining how best to proceed.
“What we’re consulting on is making flexible working a default option unless there are good reasons not to,” they said. That would mirror the approach to other forms of flexible working, such as part-time hours.
However, they emphasised there would be no legal right to work from home, adding that the prime minister still believed there were benefits to being in the office, including collaboration with colleagues.
Updated
Nepal plea for vaccine doses
Nepal has significantly reduced coronavirus infections after its worst outbreak, which overwhelmed the country’s medical system, but is in desperate need of vaccines, according to its health minister.
“We have gone down from the red stage to the yellow stage, but are not yet able to reach the green zone,” health minister, Sher Bahadur Tamang, said in an interview with the Associated Press. “We are working very hard to get us there.”
Nepal has been under lockdown since April after new cases and deaths spiked following a massive outbreak in neighbouring India.
Close to 10,000 new cases and hundreds of deaths were reported daily in mid-May, when the surge was at its worst. There was an acute shortage of hospital beds, medicines and oxygen for patients.
In the capital, Kathmandu, doctors treated patients in hospital corridors, verandahs and parking lots, and ambulances were turned back due to a lack of space. There were long lines at oxygen plants to fill cylinders.
Updated
AstraZeneca price pledge omits some poor countries
AstraZeneca can charge a higher price for its Covid-19 vaccine in dozens of poor countries once the pharmaceutical company decides the pandemic has ended, according to a copy of its contract with Oxford University seen by the Guardian.
The British-Swedish drug firm has promised to provide the vaccine at a not-for-profit price to the developing world in perpetuity, but a review of a redacted version of its contract with Oxford University, obtained by the lobby group Universities Allied for Essential Medicines (UAEM), found the promise excludes many low-income and lower-middle income countries.
Among those left off the list are 34 countries classified by Unicef and the WHO as being in need of vaccine support, including Sri Lanka, Angola, Timor-Leste, Honduras, Zimbabwe and the Philippines, which could all be charged a higher price once AstraZeneca declares the Covid-19 pandemic has ended.
In contrast to its pharmaceutical competitors, AstraZeneca has forgone billions of dollars in revenue by providing its vaccine at cost price, a promise that was key to securing its partnership with Oxford’s Jenner Institute, where the formulation was developed.
Updated
Deaths in Madrid rose 41% year-on-year during pandemic
The number of deaths from all causes in the Madrid region, the epicentre of the pandemic in Spain, increased 41% in 2020 over the previous year, official figures show.
The region, home to about 6.7 million people, recorded a total of 66,683 deaths last year, up from 47,165 in 2019, Spain’s national statistics agency INE said.
AFP reports that deaths across all of Spain totalled 492,930 in 2020, an increase of 74,227 or 17.7% over 2019 and the biggest number of annual deaths since records began in 1941.
The Madrid region accounts for 14.3% of Spain’s population of about 47 million but it saw some 20% of the country’s total Covid-19 deaths.
Updated
The UK is considering easing travel rules for double-vaccinated people, a move that would placate airlines which have launched legal action against the government’s curbs on trips abroad.
Reuters reports that airlines are desperate for restrictions to be relaxed in time for July and the peak season when they make most profits, while the UK has for now stuck to quarantine rules that deter travel.
Europe’s biggest airline Ryanair teamed up with Manchester Airports Group (MAG) to launch legal action against Britain over its travel policy. Other airlines could join.
The pair filed papers for judicial review at England’s high court today, a spokesman for MAG said.
But the UK has indicated a possible relaxation, with the country’s department for transport saying today it was considering how vaccinations could be used for inbound travel.
More than half of British adults have received both doses of Covid-19 vaccine, putting it far ahead of Europe.
Updated
Health officials in Africa have called for an urgent acceleration in the supply of vaccines to the continent to curb a wave of Covid-19 infections and the evolution of new, potentially dangerous variants.
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The UK’s medicine regulator has extended the emergency use approval (EUA) for Innova’s lateral flow Covid-19 tests, saying it was satisfied with a review of the tests after its US counterpart issued a warning about them.
Innova’s tests have been approved for asymptomatic testing as part of England’s test and trace system. Last week the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) urged the public to stop using the test, warning its performance had not been adequately established.
“We have now concluded our review of the risk assessment and are satisfied that no further action is necessary or advisable at this time,” said Graeme Tunbridge, director of devices at the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency. “This has allowed us to extend the EUA to allow ongoing supply of these LFDs over the coming months.”
The British prime minister, Boris Johnson, has said regular, asymptomatic testing has a big role to play in reopening the economy. However, some scientists have questioned the accuracy of the rapid tests being used in Britain, saying they might do more harm than good.
Reuters reports that Public Health England has said the tests undergo rigorous validation, and can help stop outbreaks by picking up undetected cases of Covid-19.
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Drought may be 'the next pandemic', warns UN
Water scarcity and drought are set to wreak damage on a scale to rival the Covid pandemic with risks growing rapidly as global temperatures rise, according to the United Nations.
“Drought is on the verge of becoming the next pandemic and there is no vaccine to cure it,” Mami Mizutori, the UN’s special representative for disaster risk reduction said.
AFP reports that droughts have already triggered economic losses of at least $124bn and hit more than 1.5 billion people between 1998 and 2017, according to a UN report published today. But even these figures, it said, are “most likely gross under-estimates”.
Global warming has now intensified droughts in southern Europe and western Africa, the UN report said with “some confidence”. And the number of victims is set to “grow dramatically” unless the world acts, Mizutori said.
Updated
Previous infection with coronavirus does not necessarily protect against Covid in the longer term, especially when caused by new variants of concern, a study on healthcare workers suggests.
Researchers at Oxford University found marked differences in the immune responses of medical staff who contracted Covid, with some appearing far better equipped than others to combat the disease six months later.
Scientists on the study, conducted with the UK Coronavirus Immunology Consortium, said the findings reinforced the importance of everyone getting vaccinated regardless of whether they had been infected with the virus earlier in the pandemic.
Updated
Greece has become the third EU country to secure the European commission’s approval for a recovery plan to be financed by the bloc’s coronavirus rescue fund.
AFP reports that European commission chief, Ursula von der Leyen, made the announcement on the third stop of a tour to highlight EU approval for packages presented by countries that have suffered severe economic fallout from the pandemic.
Financing is to come from an unprecedented €750bn EU fund that is to issue common bonds for the first time. Athens is to receive €17.8bn in direct grants, and €12.7bn in loans.
“Our approval today is an important milestone for disbursement of €30.5bn euros ($36.6bn) over the next years,” Von der Leyen said after meeting with Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, in Agora.
“Once the plan is approved by the European council we will be ready to disburse the first funds in July,” she added in reference to the EU body comprised of heads of state or government.
The Greek stimulus plan “represents a challenge but also a big, big opportunity,” Von der Leyen said. “The good thing today is that Europe and Greece are together in this endeavour.”
Updated
Covid vaccinations could become compulsory for health workers if they do not drop their resistance to getting the jab, France’s health minister has warned.
AFP reports that the threat came on the first day that people in France were authorised to be outdoors without wearing face masks, as vaccinations pick up and new Covid cases drop.
The vaccination rate among health workers in care homes, however, is lagging behind that of the general adult population, 60% of which have now received at least one Covid jab, health minister Olivier Veran said.
He made a “solemn appeal” to health workers, especially in care homes, to “take the plunge.” He told BFM television: “If by the end of the summer there is no improvement we will have to consider making vaccinations for those specific groups obligatory ... It is necessary and ethical to get vaccinated when you are in contact with vulnerable populations.”
Veran would not be drawn on a possible similar move for hospital staff, saying that “we’ll wait and see.”
The resort of Saint-Valery on the Bay of the Somme normally sees thousands of British and Belgian visitors, but this year its restaurants and hotels are half-empty.
Tanzania plans to request to join the Covax global vaccine-sharing facility, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.
It follows the death of its Covid-sceptic president in March, who had downplayed the pandemic in the country and expressed scepticism of vaccines. His successor, Samia Suluhu Hassan, has sought to gradually bring the country into line with the global orthodoxy.
The nation of more than 58 million people is one of four African countries that have yet to start vaccination campaigns, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We have received information that Tanzania is now formally working to join the Covax facility,” Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa, told a news conference.
Updated
The International Committee of the Red Cross has warned that the pandemic is spiralling in Afghanistan, with cases rising exponentially, hospitals filling up and medical resources quickly running out.
More than a third of tests last week came back positive, the ICRC said. “Afghanistan is at a crisis point in the battle to contain Covid-19 as hospital beds are full to capacity in the capital Kabul and in many areas,” said Nilab Mobarez, acting president of the Afghan Red Crescent Society, in a statement released by the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Reuters reports that the surge is putting intense strain on a country where millions already live in poverty and health resources are scarce.
Health authorities today registered 2,313 positive cases and a record 101 deaths from Covid-19 in the last 24 hours. Officials and experts have said low testing means those official figures are probably a significant undercount.
Major hospitals have closed their doors this week to new Covid-19 patients after an influx of cases left them with a lack of beds and oxygen shortages.
Around 700,000 doses of China’s Sinopharm vaccine arrived in the country last week, allowing authorities to start the next round of its vaccination campaign, but there is significant hesitancy among the population.
Updated
Here’s the full story on Japan preparing to ease its coronavirus emergency measures in Tokyo, just over a month before the Olympic Games are due to open, from our Tokyo correspondent Justin McCurry.
German scientists have found that a quarter of people who have suffered a severe course of Covid- 19 have gone on to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
The study for the University of Duisburg-Essen examined more than 30,000 patients between April 2020 and March 2021.
The symptoms of trauma were at their most intense 100 days after the patients were released from intensive care, the study found.
Patients suffered so-called “intrusions” or flashbacks, which were triggered by memories of the traumatic experience of not having been able to breathe, said Martin Teufel, director of the Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy at the LVR Klinik in Essen, who led the study.
He said an intrusion typically manifested itself “like a flashback, with a sudden, shooting, massive feeling of helplessness and of being at the mercy of someone else, an experience of loss of control”.
Teufel described how the dramatic experience of being on an intensive care ward was stored in an “unstructured emotion” in the subconscious mind. He said the condition was treatable with established trauma therapies, which were able to “bring the experience into the conscious mind, to recondition it, and reorganise it”.
Teufel said people with psychological preconditions, such as depression, anxiety or personality disorders, were more susceptible to develop PTSD following a Covid-19 infection. A large number of sufferers were women and younger people, he said.
The study was presented this week by the German Congress for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy.
Updated
A leukaemia patient has implored people not to mistake symptoms from other diseases as coronavirus after he assumed he was suffering from long Covid when in fact he has cancer.
Rob Hale, from Gloucestershire, England, told the BBC that he presented relatively late to doctors because he had thought he was only enduring after-effects of Covid, including extreme fatigue, tiredness and brain fog. But when he saw his GP he was diagnosed with leukaemia.
He is now set to have a bone marrow transplant using stem cells from his sister in September.
Dr Alison Wint, clinical lead for cancer at Bristol North Somerset and Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group, told the broadcaster: “Just because an illness is very common at the moment doesn’t mean that’s the only reason for the symptoms that you’ve got – it’s worthwhile just making sure it’s not something else”.
Updated
A system that values corporate profit over human life is hampering our ability to end this pandemic, write KK Shailaja, a member of Kerala’s legislative assembly and former health minister, Anyang’ Nyong’o, governor of Kisumu county, Kenya, and Rogelio Mayta, foreign minister of Bolivia
We have the technology, materials and productive capacity to vaccinate the world against Covid-19 this year. We can save millions of lives, protect billions of livelihoods and reclaim trillions of dollars worth of economic activity along the way.
But instead, our countries are now moving into the pandemic’s deadliest phase. Mutant strains are spreading into regions where the vaccines are not only scarce; they have barely arrived. At present rates of vaccination, the pandemic will continue to rage until at least 2024.
This is not a coincidence. The system of pharmaceutical patents at the World Trade Organization was designed to prioritise corporate profit over human life.
Updated
Indonesia’s president has ordered authorities to speed up the country’s vaccination campaign as the World Health Organization warned of the need to increase social restrictions in the country amid a fresh surge of coronavirus infections said to be caused by variants.
“We need vaccination acceleration in order to achieve communal immunity, which we hope can stop the Covid-19 spread,” president Joko Widodo said in remarks while visiting a vaccination centre just outside the capital, Jakarta.
Widodo said he ordered his cabinet ministers and local governments to increase the vaccination capacity to 1m doses per day by next month. He said Indonesia is currently vaccinating half a million people a day.
Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populous country, aims to inoculate more than 181 million of its 270 million people by March 2022, but authorities have only fully vaccinated 22 million people and partially vaccinated 12 million others.
National Covid-19 task force spokesman, Wiku Adisasmito, said the slow progress can be put down to limited global vaccine supply, the unpreparedness of the national health system and vaccine hesitancy. The government has received 92.2m vaccine doses so far.
Earlier we reported that more than 350 Indonesian doctors have contracted Covid-19 despite being vaccinated with Sinovac and dozens have been hospitalised, officials said, as concerns rise about the efficacy of some vaccines against more virulent virus strains.
Updated
Austria: nightclubs to reopen next month, with mass gatherings permitted
Austria has announced that revellers will be allowed to hit the dance floor legally again from next month as nightclubs reopen, in line with a broader easing of measures.
AFP reports that medical-grade masks also no longer need to be worn anywhere except for hospitals, with regular mouth-and-nose coverings once again allowed on public transport, in shops and other indoor places.
Crowd numbers will no longer be restricted at events, where people do not need to keep their distance or wear face coverings anymore. A midnight curfew will also be lifted from 1 July, allowing nightlife to return.
The only rule that remains is that those who attend an event, go to a nightclub or eat in a restaurant must show proof of either having received at least one vaccination shot more than three weeks ago, recovered from coronavirus or tested negative.
Nightclubs closed in March last year as the pandemic spread through Europe and were among the few venues that mostly stayed shut last summer during a lull in new cases.
Almost half of the population has already received at least one shot, while a quarter is fully vaccinated.
Here’s a quick snap from Reuters: Denmark will administer Covid-19 vaccines for children aged 12 to 15, broadcaster TV 2 reports, citing sources. Danish health authorities are due to hold a news briefing to about using the vaccines on that age group later today.
Hello to everyone reading, Mattha Busby here to take you through the next few hours of global Covid developments. Please drop me a line on Twitter or message me via email (mattha.busby.freelance@guardian.co.uk) with any tips or thoughts.
Updated
Australia has undertaken the second major shake-up of its Covid-19 vaccination program in three months, prompted by concerns the AstraZeneca vaccine can cause blood clots in rare cases.
Updated
Today so far…
- More than 350 Indonesian doctors have contracted Covid-19 despite being vaccinated with Sinovac and dozens have been hospitalised, officials said, as concerns rise about the efficacy of some vaccines against more virulent virus strains.
- Indonesia also reported 12,624 new coronavirus infections, the biggest daily increase since 30 January, health ministry data showed.
- Japan is set to announce a decision on Thursday to ease a coronavirus state of emergency in Tokyo and six other areas this weekend, with new daily cases falling just as the country begins making final preparations for the Olympics starting in just over a month.
- Japan has been struggling since late March to slow a wave of infections propelled by more contagious variants, with new daily cases soaring above 7,000 at one point and seriously ill patients straining hospitals in Tokyo, Osaka and other metropolitan areas.
- German biotech company CureVac, considered one of the contenders to deliver the first vaccine against Covid-19 a year ago, was dealt yet another setback after the company announced its mRNA-based jab was only 47% effective in a late-stage trial.
- The number of new cases in Russia continues at a higher level. Reuters report that today there are 14,057 new cases with 416 deaths recorded. That’s nearly twice the level of new cases that the country was officially recording a fortnight ago.
- Ukraine, which has maintained lockdown restrictions though the number of new Covid infections has fallen, has set a record for the daily number of coronavirus inoculations, the health ministry said.
- Abu Dhabi is beginning a trial administering China’s Sinopharm vaccine to children aged 3 to 17. The trial will monitor the immune response of 900 children “in preparation to vaccinate children in the near future”, the Abu Dhabi Media Office said.
- Taiwan has reported 175 new local cases and 19 new deaths. The number of cases related to household transmissions is declining, but there are a growing number of cases in aged care homes as well as hospitals.
- Some stocks of PPE in Scotland came within eight hours of running out at the height of the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a report by the country’s public spending watchdog.
- Football fans who do not have tickets for Euro 2020 games should not travel to London amid ongoing Covid restrictions, a senior police officer has warned before Friday’s match between England and Scotland.
- Covid-19 cases are rising exponentially across England driven by younger and mostly unvaccinated age groups, according to scientists.
- Ryanair and the UK’s largest airport group have announced overnight that they have launched a legal challenge calling for transparency in the UK government’s handling of its contentious “traffic light” travel system.
- Norwegian prime minister, Erna Solberg, will hold a news conference tomorrow regarding the post-pandemic reopening of Norwegian society.
- Early batches of 2021’s “Hollandse Nieuwe”, or new-season Dutch herring, are being distributed this year to vaccination centres around the Netherlands as an incentive for people to get jabbed.
Updated
Indonesia reports biggest daily case rise since January
Indonesia reported 12,624 new coronavirus infections, the biggest increase since 30 January, health ministry data showed.
Reuters note the total number of infections rose to 1,950,276, while the health ministry also reported 277 new deaths, taking total fatalities to 53,753.
Updated
Our Berlin bureau chief, Philip Oltermann, has the latest on that disappointing result for Germany’s CureVac:
German biotech company CureVac, considered one of contenders to deliver the first vaccine against Covid-19 a year ago, was dealt yet another setback after the company announced its mRNA-based jab was only 47% effective in a late-stage trial.
CureVac’s CVnCoV vaccine missed the study’s main goal, throwing in doubt the potential delivery of hundreds of millions of doses to the European Union. The EU last November struck a deal for 405m doses from the Tübingen-based company, whose early research was so promising that the former US president Donald Trump reportedly tried to lure its research department to the US in March 2020.
The German health ministry declined to comment on CureVac’s interim trial results, but claimed yesterday’s announcement would not have an impact on the speed of the vaccination rollout.
The Delta variant, meanwhile, is cause for concern among German scientists. They warn the mutation, which made up 6.2% of German cases in the first week of June, could soon come to dominate in the country. The coronavirus expert Christian Drosten said Delta “will surely dominate the field by the autumn”.
Updated
A quick update from Reuters here that the Norwegian prime minister, Erna Solberg, will hold a news conference tomorrow regarding the post-pandemic reopening of Norwegian society, the government has said.
Solberg, who is lagging in the polls before national elections in September, has so far implemented the first two stages of a four-step plan to remove social and economic restrictions imposed during the pandemic.
Updated
Scotland was eight hours from running out of some PPE in Covid first wave
Andrew Sparrow is doing UK Covid news on his live blog today, but I wanted to flag up to you this story from my colleague Libby Brooks who is our Scotland correspondent:
Some stocks of PPE in Scotland came within eight hours of running out at the height of the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a report by the country’s public spending watchdog.
Audit Scotland said centrally held supplies of key items ran “very low” in April 2020. At points, long-sleeved gowns came within eight hours of running out, there were only 24 hours’ worth of hospital-grade FFP3 masks, and two days’ worth of visors.
Opposition parties said the report demonstrated a “catastrophic failure” of preparedness, but the auditor general for Scotland, Stephen Boyle, said the Scottish government and NHS National Services Scotland “worked well together under extremely challenging circumstances.”
Boyle said the challenge now would be in “developing a longer-term approach to PPE supply and distribution that includes both business-as-usual needs as well as preparing for future pandemics.”
Read more of Libby Brooks’ report here: Scotland was eight hours from running out of some PPE in Covid first wave
Every Olympics there is a story about the distribution of condoms in the Olympic village for use when competitors are relaxing away from the arena of competition. You might have thought that Covid would have put paid to that tradition. It seems not.
AFP report that organisers are still expected to hand out 160,000 at this year’s delayed Tokyo Games.
Games organisers say distributing condoms is meant to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS, and that the International Olympic Committee has asked for the handouts to continue this year, despite the pandemic.
“The distributed condoms are not meant to be used at the Olympic Village,” the organising committee told AFP.
Instead they are supposed to be “brought back by athletes to their respective home countries and to help them support the campaign to raise awareness”, they added.
The number of new cases in Russia continues at a higher level. Reuters report that today there are 14.057 new cases with 416 deaths recorded. That’s nearly twice the level of new cases that the country was officially recording a fortnight ago.
Andrew Sparrow has our UK politics and Covid blog up and running for the day – so head there for UK news. I’ll be continuing here for the next couple of hours with the latest coronavirus developments around the world.
Netherlands using soused herring as an incentive for people to get vaccinated
Get vaccinated, win a … soused herring. Early batches of 2021’s “Hollandse Nieuwe”, or new-season Dutch herring, are being distributed this year to vaccination centres around the Netherlands as an incentive for people to get jabbed.
The first barrel of the Dutch delicacy – young herring, caught from mid-May when their fat content is considered just right, then gutted, soused and consumed raw either whole or on bread, with chopped onion – is traditionally auctioned for a good cause.
Dutch vaccination centres offering free, er, soused herring to everyone who shows up for their shot ... pic.twitter.com/1qPSHpM7Gk
— jon henley (@jonhenley) June 17, 2021
For the second year running, however, no auction was possible this year due to Covid restrictions, so the barrel was presented “on behalf of the Dutch people” to the head of the municipal health services organising the Dutch vaccination campaign.
More barrels have been sent to vaccination centres around the country, where the fish – some 75m of which are eaten every year in the Netherlands, where their annual arrival on 15 June is celebrated with ceremonies and flag-waving – is being offered to both staff and to everyone who shows up for their shot.
Agnes Leewis, director of the Dutch fish marketing board, said the decision was only logical. Thanks to the centres’ staff, she said, “we can now hopefully trust that everyone in the Netherlands will feel like a ‘New Dutch’ in a very short time.”
As for recipients, she added: “A herring for a jab. Who could possibly resist?”
After a slow start, the Netherlands has fully vaccinated 4.5 million people. A further 3.8 million of the country’s 14m-strong adult population has had a first dose.
Updated
Ticketless Euro 2020 fans warned not to travel to London by police
Football fans who do not have tickets for Euro 2020 games should not travel to London amid ongoing Covid restrictions, a senior police officer has warned.
Metropolitan Police Deputy Assistant Commissioner Laurence Taylor told LBC radio: “We’re asking people to work with us.”
“We know people want to come and enjoy it, but all the events in London are ticketed only and, with the current Covid restrictions, spaces in pubs and bars will be limited.
“So if people don’t have tickets, we would ask them not to come to London.”
His comments came ahead of England facing off against Scotland at Wembley Stadium on Friday night.
PA report Taylor said events with large crowds, often where alcohol is consumed, create “policing challenges” but that the force has a “robust plan” in place.
Asked about fans potentially gathering in the capital, such as the scenes seen in Trafalgar Square in previous years, he said: “The fan zone is a ticketed event only and is only available for a small number of people to ensure that it is Covid-compliant and works within its risk assessment.
“People gathering around in larger groups outside of Covid restrictions can expect to be policed.”
Taiwan reports 175 new local cases with 19 new deaths
Taiwan has reported 175 new local cases and 19 new deaths. The top three sources continue to be New Taipei (87), Taipei (34) and Miaoli (31). All the cases reported in Miaoli, where authorities have been responding to outbreaks among factory workers, were individuals who had already been quarantined as close contacts of earlier cases.
The central epidemic command centre said 1.13 million of Taiwan’s 23.5 million residents have been vaccinated. More than 170,000 are aged over 75, according to local reporters translating the press conference.
The number of cases related to household transmissions is declining, but there are a growing number of cases in aged care homes - something seen in overseas outbreaks throughout 2020 - as well as hospitals.
Taiwan is currently four weeks into level 3 restrictions, which limit gatherings, discourage travel, and have closed all entertainment, adult, sporting and public venues as well as restricted restaurants to takeaway only.
The CECC won’t be drawn on whether it will be extended again beyond the current scheduled end of 28 June, instead saying they’ll make adjustments as they observe the situation.
The current outbreak in Taiwan is slowly declining, but numbers remain in the hundreds and authorities do not conduct mass testing, instead focusing on contact tracing for targeted tests. Having gone through 2020 largely untouched by the pandemic and drawing praise for its successful response, this is Taiwan’s worst ever Covid-19 outbreak.
Dr William Hanage is a professor of the evolution and epidemiology of infectious disease at Harvard, and he writes for us this morning saying that there was no excuse for UK health secretary Matt Hancock’s care homes strategy:
When the health secretary, Matt Hancock, appeared in front of MPs last week to answer questions about the government’s early handling of the virus, part of the questioning centred on the devastation that the virus had been allowed to wreak in care homes among residents and staff.
While it is genuinely hard to pick the worst failure of the UK’s pandemic response, this has to be a contender. The numbers remain to be fully catalogued and may never be fully known, because testing was in such short supply early on in the pandemic, but the Office for National Statistics estimates 42,000 care home residents in England and Wales have died of Covid. This outcome was entirely predictable in the absence of meaningful infection control.
Care homes are an example of what epidemiologists call a “congregate setting”. These are places where people are gathered together in tight groups, making a lot of contacts and with little ability to distance, guaranteeing the virus a captive audience. Other examples include prisons and cruise ships.
We worry a lot about respiratory viruses in care homes, because they are lethal. During the very early days of the pandemic in China scientists indicated that older people were especially vulnerable to the virus. As a result of these two facts, well known in January and February 2020, care homes were a disaster waiting to happen. However, until the middle of April last year UK hospitals were discharging patients into care homes without requiring that they be tested for Covid first, sparking goodness knows how many introductions, outbreaks and deaths.
Read more here: Dr William Hanage – The evidence is clear: there was no excuse for Hancock’s care homes strategy
Ukraine sets new national daily record for Covid vaccinations administered
Ukraine, which has maintained lockdown restrictions though the number of new Covid infections has fallen, has set a record for the daily number of coronavirus inoculations, the health ministry said.
Reuters report the ministry said 76,538 Ukrainians were vaccinated on Wednesday.
Ukraine, which has a population of 41 million, has been among the most-affected European countries, with around 2.23 million Covid cases and 51,902 deaths as of 17 June.
Yesterday the government extended lockdown measures until 31 August, but eased some restrictions.
A big topic on the UK media round this morning has been the future of working from home, in response to a leaked government paper that suggested it would play a part in our lives for the forseeable future.
Some people are horrified, with the Daily Mail carrying claims it could lead to “zombie UK”.
Thursday's Mail: Shock Plans To Work From Home For Ever #TomorrowsPapersToday #DailyMail #Mail pic.twitter.com/C9kv5miK50
— Tomorrows Papers Today (@TmorrowsPapers) June 16, 2021
Regular contrarian Iain Duncan–Smith has been on the airwaves saying he is “cynical about the idea people are going to stay at home instead of going to the office.”
It is just possible that being able to put your commuting costs on expenses might warp your perception of how excited people are about cramming back onto trains.
'I'm a bit cynical about the idea people are going to stay at home instead of going to the office'
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 17, 2021
Sir Iain Duncan Smith says remote working was in Conservative Party manifesto before the pandemic, so govt. is "bound" to look at the issue.#KayBurley https://t.co/f93VxM2meI pic.twitter.com/4euOy0GyIT
Opposition party Labour chair Anneliese Dodds has also been speaking on the topic, saying that the government has not been doing enough to provide clarity:
Around home working generally we need to have clarity, really as quickly as possible, so that employers know what the situation is. We’ve often had a lot of confusion. I think it’s very difficult, particularly for those parents who need to know what the situation is going to be, trying to plan now, and there’s still a lot of uncertainty for them.
"There's still a lot of uncertainty."
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 17, 2021
Chair of the Labour Party, Anneliese Dodds tells #KayBurley the government must provide "clarity as quickly as possible" on the future of home working, particularly for employers and working parents.
Follow: https://t.co/f93VxM2meI pic.twitter.com/DLBdDi9Ag0
Our science editor Ian Sample has this analysis for us today, asking how do we learn to live with Covid?
Whatever the epidemic does, the overwhelming view among senior scientists is that coronavirus is here to stay. Siân Griffiths, emeritus professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, who co-chaired the 2003 Sars inquiry for the Hong Kong government, said it called for a new balance between knowing the virus was around and needed to be dealt with, and the knowledge that we needed to get back to a life that was not focused on the virus.
“I don’t think we’ll live in a restricted society. We’ll move into a more careful society, a more cautious society and one where we understand the science and the process and we have learned from the traumas of the pandemic,” she said.
Prof Dame Anne Johnson, president of the Academy of Medical Sciences, said: “There will be more deaths from coronavirus, with winter waves a particular threat, but learning to live with Covid is not about how many deaths society can bear. We see upsurges caused by respiratory viruses every winter. We don’t make an estimate of what deaths we can tolerate, we say we wish to minimise those deaths by having a vaccination campaign.”
Johnson said that we will not wake up one day and suddenly decide to face the virus. The process has already begun, with changes in behaviour adopted in the pandemic likely to carry on long after formal restrictions are lifted. “What we want is to do the things that least disrupt our lives and minimise the risk of infection without having to go into these awful lockdowns,” she said. Good hygiene, remote working, mask wearing, better ventilation, not going to work or mixing with people when we have symptoms, cycling rather than taking public transport, avoiding needless flights – all of these and more will play a part in the post-lockdown world, she said.
Read more of Ian Sample’s analysis here: How do we learn to live with Covid?
Healthcare workers in Indonesia contracting Covid despite vaccinations
More than 350 Indonesian doctors have contracted Covid-19 despite being vaccinated with Sinovac and dozens have been hospitalised, officials said, as concerns rise about the efficacy of some vaccines against more virulent virus strains.
Most of the doctors were asymptomatic and self-isolating at home, said Badai Ismoyo, head of the Kudus district health office in Central Java, but dozens were in hospital with high fevers and declining oxygen saturation levels.
Almost all have received the vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac, according to the Indonesian Medical Association (IDI).
Kudus is battling an outbreak believed to be driven by the more transmissible Delta variant which has pushed bed occupancy rates above 90% in the district.
Grappling with one of the worst outbreaks in Asia, with more than 1.9 million cases and 53,000 deaths, there has been a heavy toll on Indonesia’s doctors and nurses with 946 deaths.
Reuter report that many are now experiencing pandemic fatigue and taking an increasingly laissez-faire approach to health protocols after being vaccinated, said Lenny Ekawati, from LaporCOVID-19.
“That phenomenon happens quite often these days, not only within the community but also healthcare workers,” she said, “They think because they are vaccinated that they are safe.”
Across Indonesia, at least five doctors and one nurse have died from COVID-19 despite being vaccinated, according to the data initiative group, although one had only received their first shot.
In the capital Jakarta, radiologist Dr Prijo Sidipratomo told Reuters he knew of at least half a dozen doctors in the city who had been hospitalised with COVID-19 in the past month despite being vaccinated, with one currently being treated in ICU.
“It is alarming for us because we cannot rely on vaccinations only,” he said, urging people to strictly adhere to health protocols.
AFP this morning have an interview with a hospital cleaner in Kawasaki in Japan about what life has been like on the wards there as the country gears up for hosting the Olympics.
Naho, who did not want her surname published, is 21, and told AFP:
All the time, I am afraid of the possibility of catching it. At the beginning, there was a period where I found it really difficult. It troubled me not to be able to do anything for the patients who were suffering and groaning in front of me. Almost all the beds were occupied and nurses who should have finished at 5.00pm were doing three or four extra hours before going home. They would thank me because I was easing their burden a little.
She explained that at work, she puts on protective gear - two masks, a visor, gloves, a hairnet and plastic aprons over her clothes. She then disinfects the floor, beds and everything else, then leaves through a ventilated containment unit, disposing of the plastic items before unzipping the door and stepping out into the corridor.
Covid cases in England doubling every 11 days as Delta takes hold
Covid-19 cases are rising exponentially across England driven by younger and mostly unvaccinated age groups, according to scientists, report PA media.
A study commissioned by the government found that infections increased by 50% between 3 May and 7 June, coinciding with the rise of the Delta coronavirus variant that is now dominant in the UK.
Data from nearly 110,000 swab tests carried out across England between 20 May and 7 June suggests Covid cases are doubling every 11 days, with the highest prevalence in the north-west and one in 670 people infected.
Experts from Imperial College London said their findings showed a “rapid switch” between the Alpha variant and the Delta variant in the last few weeks, with the latter now accounting for up to 90% of all coronavirus cases.
Stephen Riley, a professor of infectious disease dynamics at Imperial and one of the study’s authors, said: “Prevalence is increasing exponentially and it is being driven by younger ages. It appears to be doubling every 11 days.
“Clearly that is bad news … but the key thing to point out here is that we are in a very different part of the epidemic in the UK and it is very difficult to predict the duration of the exponential phase.”
The scientists said their findings from the React study suggested that imminent expansion of the vaccine programme to people aged 18 and above “should help substantially to reduce the overall growth of the epidemic”.
Read more here: Covid cases in England doubling every 11 days as Delta takes hold
Jesse Norman is the UK government figure out on the media round again, and as sure as eggs are eggs, in the absence of any major developments in the battle against Covid, the subject of international travel restrictions has come round again.
Kay Burley on Sky News pressed Norman on whether it would be discriminatory to the under-30s to lift travel restrictions on those who have had two jabs, when by the very nature of the vaccine roll-out in the UK they are the least likely to have had them.
Norman said the UK government was “balancing the needs of all the people concerned,” adding:
I think that’s certainly a consideration to be borne in mind. Of course, the under 30s do not have anything like the same vulnerability to the disease that older people do, and as you will be aware, the government is accelerating the rollout of vaccinations as fast as it can. That’s been a very important part of the thinking over the last few days about how long this present period of restriction should last.
Does relaxing travel restrictions for Britons who have had both vaccines doses discriminate against under 30's? - #KayBurley
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 17, 2021
Jesse Norman says the government is 'balancing public health issues, economic issues and issues of equity and fairness.'
More: https://t.co/f93VxM2meI pic.twitter.com/LJOHcJ8qia
It should be noted of course that not everybody wanting to make an international journey is doing so to grab a couple of weeks in the sun – there are many families and loved ones who have been separated for over a year now by bans on international travel.
UK treasury minister Jesse Norman has backed under fire health secretary Matt Hancock. Asked if the prime minister Boris Johnson gave the impression he thought Hancock was “totally fucking hopeless”, Norman said on Sky News: “He [Johnson] gives me the impression of thinking that the Health Secretary is doing a very good job under very difficult circumstances and rightly so.”
The phrase came to light yesterday when former UK government advisor shared text messages he claimed were between himself and Boris Johnson.
Ryanair and the UK’s largest airport group have announced overnight that they have launched a legal challenge calling for transparency in the government’s handling of its contentious “traffic light” travel system.
The move by Europe’s biggest airline and Manchester Airports Group (MAG), which also runs Stansted and East Midlands airports, is backed by several other major UK carriers.
Ryanair and MAG argue that ministers have not been clear about how the government has made its decisions regarding the categorisation of countries as red, amber or green, undermining consumer confidence to book summer holidays.
Court papers are due to be filed today with both health secretary Matt Hancock and transport secretary Grant Shapps named as defendants.
MAG and Ryanair said the judicial review has been prompted by the lack of transparency in how the government made decisions in its first review of the traffic light lists which saw Portugal unexpectedly moved to amber earlier this month.
Read more here: Ryanair and airport group launch legal action over travel ‘traffic light’ system
Umar Sofi reports for Hindustan Times on the impact of Covid curbs on migrant workers in India. Sofi writes:
Localised restrictions due to the second Covid-19 wave and a lack of government response have dealt a body blow to a majority of the country’s workforce, Stranded Workers Action Network (SWAN), a voluntary group, has said in a report. It said the workers have been left in a lurch with almost no savings.
SWAN cited distress calls from over 8,000 people from 21 April 21 to 31 May and said 57% of the callers were left with less than two days of rations. “There was a severe decline in earnings for most workers and a resultant increase in poverty.”
SWAN said 66% of the workers its representatives spoke to reported that they did not receive their full wages for the previous month.
Read more here: Hindustan Times – Localised Covid-19 curbs dealt ‘body blow to most of country’s workforce’
Abu Dhabi begins trial of Sinopharm vaccine on children aged 3-17
Abu Dhabi is beginning a trial administering China’s Sinopharm vaccine to children aged 3-17. The trial will monitor the immune response of 900 children “in preparation to vaccinate children in the near future”, the Abu Dhabi Media Office said.
Some members of Abu Dhabi’s ruling family are participating in the trial, the emirate’s media office added.
The UAE in May approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for emergency use in children aged 12-15. Dubai, the second-largest member of the UAE federation, started inoculating that age group this month.
Ghaida Ghantous reports for Reuters that the Gulf state led Phase III clinical trials of the vaccine produced by China’s state-owned drugmaker Sinopharm and has started manufacturing it under a joint venture between Sinopharm and Abu Dhabi-based technology company Group 42.
Good morning, it is Martin Belam here in London taking over the live blog for the next few hours. Here’s my colleague Richard Adams on how school leaders in England have rejected the government’s catchup national tutoring programme:
The government’s flagship effort to help children in state schools catch up on learning lost during the pandemic is being rejected by headteachers in England, despite the tens of millions of pounds being spent on running it.
While more than two-thirds of school leaders in England polled by the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) said they supported using tutors for catchup, just 3% saw the government’s national tutoring programme (NTP) as a priority.
The lack of support comes after warnings that schools in some parts of the country have struggled to find tutors through the NTP, and fears over its future after a contract to run parts of the scheme was won by Randstad, a Dutch multinational.
The NAHT poll received responses from more than 700 headteachers in England, 70% of whom backed small group or one-to-one tutorials as the best use of government catchup funding, so long as it was run by the schools themselves. Nearly two-thirds (63%) said support for pupil mental health and wellbeing should also be a high priority.
Read more here: School leaders in England reject catchup national tutoring programme
Japan plans to lift Tokyos virus emergency on 20 June, one month before games
Japan is set to announce a decision Thursday to ease a coronavirus state of emergency in Tokyo and six other areas this weekend, with new daily cases falling just as the country begins making final preparations for the Olympics starting in just over a month, AP reports.
Japan has been struggling since late March to slow a wave of infections propelled by more contagious variants, with new daily cases soaring above 7,000 at one point and seriously ill patients straining hospitals in Tokyo, Osaka and other metropolitan areas.
Daily cases have since subsided significantly and Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is expected to downgrade the state of emergency when it expires on Sunday to less stringent measures.
Despite concerns by medical experts and the public over the potential risks of holding the Olympics, Suga has said he is determined to hold a “safe and secure” Games starting 23 July.
Holding the Olympics before elections in the fall is also a political gamble for Suga, whose support ratings have tumbled over dissatisfaction with his handling of the pandemic, a slow vaccination drive and a lack of explanation how he intents to ensure the virus doesn’t spread during the Olympics.
More on that CureVac study, via Reuters:
CureVac said at least 13 virus variants accounted for the infections among the study population.
The company added that the interim results suggest the vaccine is effective in younger participants but did not prove efficacy in those above age 60, the age group most at risk for severe Covid.
“While we were hoping for a stronger interim outcome, we recognize that demonstrating high efficacy in this unprecedented broad diversity of variants is challenging. As we are continuing toward the final analysis with a minimum of 80 additional cases, the overall vaccine efficacy may change,” said Chief Executive Franz-Werner Haas.
Dr. Amesh Adalja, in infectious disease expert at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said the variants did not completely explain the efficacy number and he still wants to see data specifically about CureVac’s ability to stop serious disease, hospitalization and death.
“If it can do that, even with a 47% efficacy in symptomatic disease, that’s still a very valuable thing. That’s all we’ve ever wanted vaccines to do,” he said.
Dr. Peter Hotez, a virologist and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, said it was not clear if the issue was variant-specific or the vaccine’s inability to create high levels of neutralising antibodies.
Germany’s CureVac jab shows just 47% efficacy
German biotech CureVac NV said on Wednesday its Covid-19 vaccine was only 47% effective in a late-stage trial, missing the study’s main goal and throwing in doubt the potential delivery of hundreds of millions of doses to the European Union, Reuters reports.
The disappointing efficacy of the shot known as CVnCoV emerged from an interim analysis based on 134 Covid-19 cases in the study with about 40,000 volunteers in Europe and Latin America.
The stakes for CureVac and prospective buyers of its vaccine in Europe had risen after age limits were imposed on the use of the Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca vaccines due to a link to extremely rare but potentially fatal clotting disorders.
CureVac’s shot was also expected to help in low and middle-income countries that have lagged far behind richer nations in the global immunisation drive.
As CureVac’s only major supply deals, the European Union in November secured up to 405 million doses of the vaccine, of which 180 million are optional. That was followed by a memorandum of understanding with Germany for another 20 million doses.
CureVac’s US traded shares fell 50.6% to $46.81 in after-hours trading following publication of the data.
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Summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.
Japan plans to lift Tokyo’s virus emergency on June 20, a month before the Olympics, the government announced Thursday as reports said only 10,000 spectators would be allowed at Games events.
Meanwhile German biotech CureVac NV said on Wednesday its Covid-19 vaccine showed just 47% efficacy in a late-stage trial, missing the study’s main goal and throwing in doubt the potential delivery of hundreds of millions of doses to the European Union.
Here are the key recent developments:
- MPs in England voted 461 to 60 to approve regulations that delay the easing of coronavirus restrictions in England to 19 July.
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South Africa’s Covid-19 infections jumped by 13,246 on Wednesday, the highest daily total in five months, its government said.
- US president Joe Biden said China was trying to project itself as a responsible nation in regard to the Covid-19 pandemic, but it remained unclear whether Beijing was really trying to understand the origins of the coronavirus.
- Johnson & Johnson is expected to miss its Covid vaccine supply target to the EU for the second quarter after millions of doses were banned for use in Europe over safety concerns, according to the European Commission.
- France and Spain are moving to ease rules around wearing face masks outside, in a development attributed by both countries to their Covid-19 vaccination campaigns.
- Australia’s second largest city will allow its five millions residents to travel more than 15 miles from home and end mandatory masks wearing outdoors from Friday.
- Ursula von der Leyen signed off on the first plans by EU member states to spend Brussels’ €800bn (£687bn) Covid recovery fund, as she sought to reverse the reputational damage inflicted on the bloc by the pandemic during a visit to Portugal and Spain.
- All care home staff in England will need to be fully vaccinated against coronavirus under a controversial new law, the government announced.
- Codogno, the town where the first domestic transmission of Covid-19 was detected in Italy, has registered zero infections among its inhabitants for the first time since February 2020.
- Companies in Germany will from the end of June no longer be forced to allow working from home, chancellor Angela Merkel’s chief of staff was quoted as saying.
- The Taj Mahal reopened to the public as India pushes to lift restrictions in a bid to revitalise its economy.
