Summary
Here the latest key developments at a glance:
- France reported 23,507 new confirmed coronavirus cases on Friday, down from 25,205 a week ago, but the number of people in intensive care with the disease reached its highest level so far this year, health ministry data showed.
- The arrival of Covid vaccines should not tempt countries to relax efforts to fight the pandemic, top World Health Organization officials said on Friday, citing particular concern about the situation in Brazil.
- More than 200,000 Russians diagnosed with Covid-19 have died since the pandemic began last April, Russia’s Rosstat statistics agency said on Friday, more than double the widely cited figure used by the government’s coronavirus task force.
- A variant of Covid-19 first identified in Britain now accounts for 25% of the reported cases in Poland, according to the country’s health minister.
- Italy will further tighten coronavirus restrictions in three of its 20 regions after health officials warned of the growing spread of new variants.
- Germany has expressed concerns over the EU’s vaccine export ban, as Australia asked for a review of Italy’s decision to “tear up the rulebook” and block export of 250,000 doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine to its shores.
- Belgian prime minister Alexander De Croo set out a roadmap for easing lockdown restrictions on Friday, even as Covid-19 infections rose, with restaurants, bars, gyms and cinemas set to reopen on 1 May.
- Saudi Arabia said on Saturday it will ease coronavirus-related restrictions on entertainment and events and reopen cinemas, gyms and sports centers starting 7 March.
- Paraguay’s minister of public health, Julio Mazzoleni, resigned on Friday as a record-breaking surge in coronavirus cases left medication in short supply and the country’s hospitals near collapse.
That’s all from me, this blog will close shortly. Thanks for following our coverage.
More than 28 million Americans fully vaccinated against coronavirus will have to keep waiting for guidance from federal health officials for what they should and shouldn’t do.
The Associated Press reports:
The Biden administration said Friday it’s focused on getting the guidance right and accommodating emerging science, but the delays add to the uncertainty around bringing about an end to the pandemic as the nation’s virus fatigue grows.
“These are complex issues and the science is rapidly evolving,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Friday. “We are making sure and taking time to get this right and we will be releasing this guidance soon.”
Such guidance would address a flood of questions coming in from people who have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19: Do I still have to wear a mask? Can I go to a bar now? Can I finally see my grandchildren?
The need has slowly grown since January, when the first Americans began to complete the two-dose series of Covid-19 vaccines then available.
Now, more than half of people 65 and older have received at least one shot, according to Andy Slavitt, a senior administration adviser on the pandemic.
[...]
Worried about persistently high case loads and deaths, the Biden administration has condemned efforts to relax states’ virus restrictions and pleaded with the public for several months more patience.The caution has drawn critics, who point to the administration’s own warnings that “fatigue is winning” as evidence that they need to be more optimistic about the path ahead to secure the cooperation of those who are yet to be vaccinated.
“I think it’s going to be overly proscriptive and conservative and that’s the wrong message,” former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb told CNBC Wednesday of the forthcoming CDC guidance.
“If we continue to be very proscriptive and not give people a realistic vision for what a better future is going to look like, they’re going to start to ignore the public health guidance.”
Dr. Jeremy Faust, an emergency physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the Division of Health Policy and Public Health, encouraged the CDC to be clearer about when and how it plans to produce guidelines for the vaccinated.
More than 55.5 million Americans have received at least one dose of vaccine, and slightly more than half of those — 28.7 million — have gotten the recommended two doses.
The single-dose Johnson & Johnson shot soon will add a couple million more Americans with questions about what new freedoms they can safely enjoy.
Paraguay’s minister of public health, Julio Mazzoleni, resigned on Friday after lawmakers the previous day urged him to step down as a record-breaking surge in coronavirus cases left medication in short supply and the country’s hospitals near collapse.
Reuters reports:
Mazzoleni is the latest of several top health officials forced from their jobs in recent weeks amid increasing anger across Latin America over the handling of the pandemic and slow rollout of vaccinations.
The embattled minister initially rebuked the Senate’s non-binding declaration asking him to leave, but hours later conceded following a meeting with President Mario Abdo.
“We have agreed together that I leave ... in order to generate that peace that we need to face this challenge,” Mazzoleni said.
Abdo later appointed Dr. Julio Borba, a vice-minister, to take Mazzoleni’s place. Borba told reporters he would begin tracking down medicine and supplies immediately.
Despite those promises, protesters took to the streets again late on Friday in the capital Asuncion as anger over shortfalls continued to simmer.
Paraguay is posting record numbers of cases daily, according to a Reuters tally, with 115 infections per 100,000 people reported in the last 7 days. The country has vaccinated less than 0.1% of its population, the data shows.
The US has administered 85,008,094 doses of Covid-19 vaccines as of Friday morning and delivered 114,133,115 doses, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
The tally of vaccine doses are for both Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech, vaccines as of 6:00 a.m. ET on Friday, the agency said.
According to the tally posted on 4 March, the agency had administered 82,572,848 doses of the vaccines, and distributed 109,905,530 doses.
The agency said 55,547,697 people had received one or more doses, while 28,701,201 people have received the second dose as of Friday.
A total of 7,306,425 vaccine doses have been administered in long-term care facilities, the agency added.
California health officials on Friday gave Walt Disney Co’s Disneyland and other theme parks the go-ahead to reopen at limited capacity from 1 April, after a closure of almost a year due to the pandemic, Reuters reports.
Updated
US Senate Democrats’ effort to advance president Joe Biden’s $1.9tn Covid-19 aid bill stalled on Friday as senators jousted over how long to extend enhanced unemployment benefits and how much to offer during the pandemic.
Reuters reports:
After the Senate defeated a last-ditch attempt by some of Biden’s fellow Democrats to raise the federal minimum wage, work on his first major legislative package since taking office in January ground to a halt for hours as senators met behind closed doors to find a way forward.
“We’re completely stalled out,” No. 2 Senate Republican John Thune told reporters.
Unemployment compensation was the focus on Friday, although it was just one of many battles ahead on the sweeping bill, as the Senate braced to deal with scores of amendments and a debate that could extend into the weekend.
The legislation currently calls for providing $400 per week in federal jobless benefits, on top of state benefits, through August 29 to help Americans who have lost jobs amid the economic trauma caused by the coronavirus.
A Democratic congressional aide said liberal and moderate senators have agreed a compromise that would set the federal benefit at $300 per week, on top of state benefits, through September.
But Republican Senator Rob Portman is pushing a competing plan that would put the benefit at $300, but only through July 18. Major business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and National Federation of Independent Business supported Portman’s plan.
Moderate Democratic Senator Joe Manchin, a pivotal vote in the closely divided Senate, had been pushing to lower the benefit from the bill’s current $400, the amount already approved by the House.
Republicans said Manchin was being pressured by Democrats to stick with their compromise and not support Portman’s plan.
[..]
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said the delay in the Senate was “to break somebody’s political arm” and that Biden’s promise of bipartisanship was ringing hollow.“To President Biden: Is this the new way of doing business?” Graham said to reporters.
Senator Dick Durbin, the chamber’s No. 2 Democrat, told reporters there were efforts under way to find “some common ground” between the Democratic and Republican proposals.
Saudi Arabia said on Saturday it will ease coronavirus-related restrictions on entertainment and events and reopen cinemas, gyms and sports centers starting 7 March, the state news agency reported, citing a source in the ministry of interior.
Authorities will increase inspection campaigns to ensure adherence to remaining measures such as restricting the number of gatherings in social events to 20 people only, Reuters reports.
Small and medium-sized business leaders in Berlin have called for an end to lockdown for the German capitals’ entire retail sector as well as the catering and hotel industry from April.
The Senate should allow the opening from 1 April “in compliance with clear, Berlin-wide regulations”, announced the Mittelstands- und Wirtschaftsunion Berlin, the capital’s SME representation body, on Friday evening, the German Press Agency reports.
The companies in these sectors were not only fighting for financial compensation from the federal and state governments, but a majority was now existentially threatened, the body said.
“The district associations and members of the state board receive shocking news every day from desperate entrepreneurs who can no longer cope with another month-long closure and who must be clear about the timing and requirements,” it said.
About measures recently decided by the federal and state governments, the body said:
The proposals discussed, for example for making appointments in retail, are out of touch with life and make any further business operations uneconomical for companies.
Incidence values should not be the only factor in assessing the health situation if severe disease progressions only very rarely occur in younger people.
Updated
Ecuador’s health ministry said on Friday it would allow municipalities to directly purchase vaccines against the novel coronavirus, provided they comply with requirements laid out in the central government’s vaccination plan.
Reuters reports:
The approval comes after the country’s largest cities of Guayaquil, Quito and Cuenca requested that president Lenin Moreno allow them to import vaccines due to the slow progress of the government’s plan.
The government says it has administered the first dose of Pfizer Inc’s vaccine to some 53,000 people, namely healthcare workers in hospitals dedicated to treating Covid-19 patients, and the elderly living in nursing homes.
Cynthia Viteri, the mayor of Guayaquil, told reporters this week that the local government of the Andean country’s largest city had devoted a budget of some $15 million to a plan to buy doses of the AstraZeneca Plc, Sputnik V and Sinovac vaccines.
On Friday, the health ministry said municipalities seeking to import vaccines themselves must negotiate the purchases directly and “without intermediaries,” and said they should be distributed for free to residents of their respective jurisdictions.
Moreno’s government says it has negotiated some 20 million doses of vaccines with Pfizer, AstraZeneca, the World Health Organization’s COVAX initiative and Sinovac in an attempt to inoculate 60% of the country’s population over the age of 18 for free.
The South American country has reported 291,070 coronavirus cases and 15,997 deaths.
Brazil recorded 75,495 additional confirmed coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, along with 1,800 deaths from Covid-19, the health ministry said on Friday.
Brazil has registered nearly 10.9 million cases of the virus since the pandemic began, while the official death toll has risen to 262,770, according to ministry data.
The country’s seven-day average of new infections has been rising since 22 February.
Reuters reports:
Brazil’s daily Covid-19 death toll could reach 3,000 if serious action is not taken to halt the spread of the virus, according to a presentation made in a meeting of the government’s crisis response team, two sources present told Reuters.
The inter-ministerial task force, which includes the Health Ministry and the office of the president’s chief of staff, met on Thursday to discuss the current situation of the pandemic in Brazil where a brutal second wave is killing people faster than at any previous point.
The 14-day moving average is currently 1,250 deaths per day.
Despite the high death toll, the two sources said the Health Ministry does not see any chance of nationwide social distancing measures due to the resistance of President Jair Bolsonaro.
Updated
My colleague, Esther Addley, has written a piece about people suffering from long Covid.
A year into the pandemic, there are still stories emerging of the many thousands of people who have struggled for months with the mysterious illness, often alone and unsupported.
The British health secretary, Matt Hancock, says he is “acutely aware” of the seriousness of long Covid, and late last year, NHS England announced 69 new specialist multidisciplinary clinics for long Covid, bringing together a range of specialist medics, physiotherapists and occupational therapists to address a condition for which more than 200 symptoms have been identified, she writes.
But after months of what many feel is neglect by the healthcare system, it is clear that if specialist help is coming, it is yet to reach a great many long Covid sufferers.
Full story here:
The UK reported 5,947 new Covid-19 cases on Friday, down from 6,573 a day earlier, government data showed after a delay in the publication of daily statistics.
Earlier, the country’s health ministry had reported that over 21 million people had received a dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, and that there had been 236 deaths within 28 days of a positive test reported on Friday.
The seven-day average of infections in the UK has been falling since 22 February.
Canada is getting a fourth vaccine to prevent Covid-19 as the country’s health regulator has cleared a Johnson & Johnson shot that works with just one dose instead of two, officials said Friday.
The Associated Press reports:
Health experts are eager for a one-and-done option to help speed vaccination. Canada has also approved vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca and Health Canada is the first major regulator to approve four different vaccines, said Dr. Supriya Sharma, Health Canada’s chief medical adviser.
Like many countries, Canada does not have domestic production and has struggled with an immediate shortage of vaccines. The US so far isn’t allowing locally made vaccines to be exported, so Canada — like the other US neighbor, Mexico — has been forced to get vaccines from Europe and Asia.
Prime minister Justin Trudeau said Canada has an agreement with Johnson & Johnson for 10 million doses before September. It was not immediately clear when Canada would get its first shipments of those.
But Trudeau announced Pfizer would deliver an additional 1.5 million doses to Canada in March and another 1 million doses ahead of schedule in both April and May.
“We have reasons to be optimistic. We’re going to be able to move things forward,” Trudeau said. “But at the same time, we also know that these are global supply chains that are being set up and there’s always possibility for disruptions.”
The US approved Johnson and Johnson last month. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said J&J’s vaccine offers strong protection against what matters most: serious illness, hospitalizations and death. One dose was 85% protective against the most severe COVID-19 illness in a massive study that spanned three continents — protection that remained strong even in countries such as South Africa, where the variants of most concern are spreading.
Ukraine will impose financial penalties on the local pharmaceutical company Lekhim over delays in delivering Chinese-made Sinovac vaccines, the deputy health minister told Reuters, adding a decision on approving Sinovac’s use was still pending.
Lekhim declined comment but said this week that the first batch of the Covid-19 vaccine would be delivered on 15 March.
“They definitely do not meet the stated deadlines,” Ihor Ivashchenko told Reuters. “There will be penalties, which are specified in the contract.”
Ukraine had agreed to buy 1.9 million Sinovac doses and expected to receive the first 700,000 doses within a month of the vaccine being approved in China on 6 February.
Ivashchenko did not specify what the financial penalties would be, but according to a document seen by Reuters the government is entitled to fine Lekhim 0.1% of the value of the shipment for every day’s delay.
The government had turned down a request by Lekhim to be allowed to delay the shipment schedule and change the way the vaccine’s efficacy was measured.
Ukraine had stipulated that Sinovac had to have an efficacy rate of at least 70%.
Sinovac’s vaccine efficacy rates have varied in testing across several countries. Results from trials in Brazil found the vaccine to be only 50.65% effective but more recent data from Turkey this week pointed to an efficacy rate of 83.5%.
Ivashchenko said a decision to approve Sinovac would rest with the state agency Medical Procurement of Ukraine (MPU).
Ukraine started its vaccine rollout last month, but a resurgence in coronavirus cases in the country of 41 million prompted the government this week to warn of a possible return to a hard nationwide lockdown.
Chilean authorities have warned citizens to keep protecting themselves from the coronavirus despite the country’s highly successful vaccination programme amid fears that the end of the Southern Hemisphere summer and return to work and school could bring a fresh spike in cases.
Chile’s top public health official, Paula Daza, told Reuters in an interview that despite almost 26% of the population now having received a vaccine dose, Chileans should not lower their guard just yet.
Daza said:
Chile has a vaccination strategy under way that is very solid and has reached all corners of our territory and that is very good news.
You have to strike a balance, to give people hope because it has been a hard year for everyone ... but we also have to keep warning of the risks.
We ask people why they are getting vaccinated and they say: ‘With the vaccine all this is going to end, I will have more freedom’.
But you can have an increase in the number of cases at the same time as you advance with vaccinations. We are telling people to watch out, we are still in a pandemic.
Chile ranks sixth in the world for per-capita vaccine shots administered according to Reuters data, with just shy of 4 million people now having received at least one dose of the two-dose vaccines developed by pharmaceutical firms Pfizer/BioNTech and Sinovac Biotech Ltd.
But on Friday, daily confirmed cases of the virus in Chile hit their highest rate in eight months at 5,325, bringing warnings from authorities of potential fresh quarantines.
Daza said fatigue with lengthy restrictions on movement and strict sanitary measures coupled with the end of the Southern Hemisphere summer holiday meant cases ticking up since November could now spike.
Covax will distribute 14.4 million Covid-19 vaccine doses to 31 more countries next week, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Friday as it warned people not to waste, through complacency, the hope that vaccines bring.
AFP reports:
The Covax global vaccine-sharing facility shipped more than 20 million doses to 20 countries as the scheme aimed at ensuring poorer nations get access to jabs took off this week.
But the World Health Organization voiced fears that further waves of the coronavirus pandemic could be on the way if people think the roll-out of vaccines around the globe means the crisis is over.
“I really am very concerned that... we think we’re through this. We’re not,” WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan told a press conference.
“And countries are going to lurch back into third and fourth surges if we’re not careful.
“We should not waste the hope that vaccines bring... by dropping our guard in other areas.”
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus praised the first full week of the Covax roll-out, but said wealthy countries were nonetheless still leaving others behind in the vaccination rush.
Within Africa, Angola, the DR Congo, The Gambia, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sudan and Uganda have now received their first doses through Covax.
Elsewhere, Cambodia, Colombia, India, Moldova, the Philippines and South Korea have also taken deliveries.
Mozambique expects to inoculate 16 million high-risk people against the coronavirus by 2022, a top government health official said on Friday.
Mozambique will begin vaccinations next Monday after receiving a donation of 200,000 doses from the China National Pharmaceutical Group (Sinopharm) last week.
The government initially aims to inoculate about 60,000 health workers in the country of about 30 million, Reuters reports.
“We will do everything so that the entire eligible population is vaccinated by 2022,” said Deputy National Director of Health, Benigna Matsinhe, who acknowledged it will take time given Mozambique’s financial difficulties.
In a more optimistic scenario, the vaccination target could be reached by the end of the first quarter of 2022 and in a more conservative scenario by the end of next year, Matsinhe added.
In addition to the donation from China, the low income southern African nation will also receive 100,000 shots from India as a donation.
In January, president Filipe Nyusi said Mozambique had applied for vaccines through the global distribution program COVAX co-led by the World Health Organization, giving it the option to acquire doses for at least 20% of its population.
Mozambique has recorded 61,529 coronavirus infections with 680 deaths during the year-long pandemic.
Belgium to lift most restrictions by 1 May, subject to infections not rising dramatically
Belgian prime minister Alexander De Croo set out a roadmap for easing lockdown restrictions on Friday, even as Covid-19 infections rose, with restaurants, bars, gyms and cinemas set to reopen on 1 May.
Reuters reports:
De Croo gave Belgians a glimpse of light at the end of a five-month period of restrictions that have only allowed schools, shops and, more recently, hairdressers to operate.
“The situation remains very delicate. We must remain cautious and we must do everything to keep the situation under control,” De Croo told a news conference after a meeting of ministers, health experts and regional leaders.
The government decided that from Monday, 10 people will be allowed to meet outside, from four now, and university students can attend 20% of lectures in person.
Belgium will also lift a ban on non-essential foreign travel on April 18, just after school Easter holidays.
The limit of one visitor allowed inside a home remains.From April 1, Belgians should be able to enjoy theme parks and amateur sport. Indoor activities will reopen on May 1.
If cases spike in the coming weeks, the calendar could be revised. Social distancing and mask-wearing rules remain in place and testing and vaccinations should accelerate
“The only real exit plan is the vaccination plan,” De Croo said.
New hospital admissions rose to a daily average of 155 on Thursday, from 125 in recent weeks. De Croo said the figure was likely to rise further but was not a reason to panic.
Around 22,000 people have died from Covid-19 in Belgium, among the world’s highest per capita fatality rates. But the coronavirus has been brought under more control than in neighbours Germany and the Netherlands and the number of deaths is falling.
Updated
Mexico reported 712 new fatalities from Covid-19 on Friday, bringing the total confirmed death toll in the country to 189,578.
The figures also showed the country added 6,797 confirmed coronavirus cases, bringing the total to 2,119,305.
Updated
France reports record number of intensive care patients with Covid-19
France reported 23,507 new confirmed coronavirus cases on Friday, down from 25,205 a week ago, but the number of people in intensive care with the disease reached its highest level so far this year, health ministry data showed.
Reuters reports:
The number of new cases compared to the same day a week earlier fell for a third day in a row, and the seven-day moving average of new cases fell by 243. However it remained above 21,000 for a tenth day, with a 6 p.m. curfew in place since mid-January so far failing to slow the infection rate.
On January 16, when the curfew was tightened from 8 p.m., the seven-day average of new cases stood just above 18,000. The cumulative number of cases increased to 3.86 million.
The number of people in intensive care units (ICU) with Covid-19 rose by 47 to 3,680, the highest number recorded so far this year, despite more than 82% of retirement home residents now having had their first vaccine against the coronavirus.
France has had to send ICU patients from overcrowded hospitals to other regions and the government has also imposed a weekend lockdown in three heavily hit coastal areas, including Calais and Nice.
After the first lockdown in early 2020, the number of people in intensive care dropped from a high of more than 7,000 to less than 400 in August.
It rose again to nearly 5,000 during a second lockdown in November, only dipping below 3,000 for a few weeks before rising again at the end of January.
The French health ministry reported 439 new Covid-19 deaths on Friday - including retirement home death tallies for three days - taking the total to 88,274.
I’m Jedidajah Otte and will be taking over for the next few hours. If you have any updates or tips, feel free to get in touch, you can either get me on Twitter @JedySays or via email.
Early evening summary
- Italy will further tighten coronavirus restrictions in three of its 20 regions after health officials warned of the growing spread of new variants.
- More than 200,000 Russians diagnosed with Covid-19 have died since the pandemic began last April, according to Russia’s Rosstat statistics agency.
- Amid warnings that Covid vaccines should not tempt countries to relax curbs, Mike Ryan, the World Health Organization’s top emergency expert, said: “Countries are going to lurch into third and fourth surges if we’re not careful.”
- A Covid variant first identified in Britain now accounts for 25% of the reported cases in Poland, health minister Adam Niedzielski said on Friday.
- Germany has expressed concerns over the EU’s vaccine export ban, as Australia asked for a review of Italy’s decision to “tear up the rulebook” and block export of 250,000 doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine to its shores.
- The Czech Republic has asked Germany, Switzerland and Poland to take in dozens of Covid patients as the situation in its own hospitals has reached a critical point, Prague’s health ministry has said.
- Kenya has reportedly begun vaccinating high-priority healthcare workers against Covid-19, with its director general of the health ministry, Patrick Amoth, the first to receive the jab.
Updated
Italy extends Covid curbs in more regions as cases increase
Italy will further tighten Covid restrictions in three of its 20 regions, the government said on Friday, after health officials warned of the growing spread of new, highly contagious variants.
Earlier, the health ministry announced 24,036 new daily cases of coronavirus, up from 22,865 the day before (See earlier post).
Over the last five days, new infections have increased by 23% by comparison with the same period last week.
“The virus is spreading rapidly across Italy,” said Silvio Brusaferro, chief of the Superior Health Institute (ISS), adding that a highly contagious variant first discovered in Britain was now prevalent.
Italy’s average reproduction number has risen to 1.06 - the first time it has moved above the threshold of 1 after seven weeks, the ISS confirmed.
An R number above 1 indicates infections will grow at an exponential rate.
Italy has established a four-tier colour-coded system (white, yellow, orange and red) with curbs calibrated according to the infection levels and revised every week, Reuters reports.
Campania, centred on the southern city of Naples, will join Basilicata and Molise in the strictest red zone as of Monday. Movement will be severely limited, and bars, restaurants and schools closed along with most shops.
Travellers who turn up at an airport without a form stating the reason for their trip face fines of £200, the UK government has announced.
From Monday, anyone who is going abroad from England will need to complete and carry a declaration to travel document that can be obtained from the government’s website.
Sarah Marsh, a Guardian news reporter, has the full story here:
Russia's Covid death toll surpasses 200,000 -Rosstat
Reuters reports:
More than 200,000 Russians diagnosed with Covid-19 have died since the pandemic began last April, Russia’s Rosstat statistics agency said on Friday, more than double the widely cited figure used by the government’s coronavirus task force.
The figures from Rosstat suggest Russia has had the third most Covid-19 fatalities in the world, behind only the United States and Brazil.
Rosstat, which releases its figures infrequently and with a time lag, said it had recorded 200,432 deaths through January.
The government coronavirus task force’s tally, updated daily, had recorded 88,285 deaths as of Friday.
France reported 23,507 new confirmed Covid cases on Friday, down from 25,279 the previous day and down from 26,788 on Wednesday.
The French health ministry reported 439 new Covid deaths, from 293 on Thursday, taking the total to 88,274. The total number of cases now stands at 3,859,102.
UK health secretary Matt Hancock has said that the mystery sixth case of the Brazilian P1 variant of coronavirus has been identified.
Hancock told a Downing Street news briefing:
Using the latest technology and with the dogged determination of our Testing and Tracing scheme, we have successfully identified the person in question. The best evidence is that this person stayed at home and there is no evidence of onward transmission but as a precaution, we are putting more testing in Croydon where they live to minimise the possibility of spread.
Countries could 'lurch into third and fourth surges' if curbs are hastily eased, WHO expert warns
The arrival of Covid vaccines should not tempt countries to relax efforts to fight the pandemic, top World Health Organization officials said on Friday, citing particular concern about the situation in Brazil.
“We think we’re through this. We’re not,” Mike Ryan, WHO’s top emergency expert, told an online briefing, according to Reuters. “Countries are going to lurch into third and fourth surges if we’re not careful.”
Record Covid deaths have been reported in Brazil this week and its hospital system is on the brink of collapse, driven partly by a more contagious variant first identified there.
On a global level, Covid case numbers reversed a six-week downwards trend last week despite the delivery of millions of doses of vaccines in recent weeks, WHO data showed.
“Now is not the time for Brazil or anywhere else for that matter to be relaxing,” Ryan added. “The arrival of vaccines is a moment of great hope but it is also potentially a moment where we lose concentration.”
Updated
The below tweet is from the World Health Organization.
Writing in the Guardian, its director, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said earlier that the world needs to be “on a war footing”.
Before a key meeting of the World Trade Organization next week on the anniversary of the declaration of the pandemic, he supports a patent waiver that would allow countries to make and sell cheap copies of vaccines that were invented elsewhere.
"We thank 🇿🇦 & 🇮🇳 for the proposal to @wto to waive patents on medical products for #COVID19 until the end of the pandemic. Next week, WHO & #COVAX partners will meet with partners from govts & industry to identify bottlenecks in production & discuss how to solve them"-@DrTedros
— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) March 5, 2021
Updated
Europe’s medicines regulator has said an antibody drug combination developed by Eli Lilly and Co can be used to treat Covid patients who do not require oxygen support and are at high risk of progressing to severe illness, Reuters reports.
The recommendation can now be used as guidance in individual European nations on the possible use of the combination of bamlanivimab and etesevimab, before a marketing authorisation is issued, the European Medicines Agency said.
The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, has triggered a wave of revulsion by telling citizens to stop “whining” about a coronavirus outbreak that has killed more than 260,000 people.
The far-right populist made the inflammatory declaration on Thursday, as Brazil’s already dire Covid situation deteriorated and its average daily death toll rose above that of the United States.
“Stop all this fussing and whining. How long are you going to keep on crying?” Bolsonaro asked supporters in the midwestern state of Goiás, where nearly 9,000 people have died.
Read more here:
Italy has reported 24,036 new Covid cases up from 22,865 the day before.
It also reported 297 more deaths – down from 339 people who were reported to have died from the virus on Thursday.
🔴 Coronavirus, il bollettino di oggi 5 marzo: 24.036 nuovi casi e 297 mortihttps://t.co/Jf23IMmObS
— Repubblica (@repubblica) March 5, 2021
Updated
One of Barcelona’s top music venues will hold a concert for 5,000 people later this month after no Covid cases were reported at a pilot project using same-day testing, Reuters reports.
No social distancing will be required at the show, headlined by Spanish indie band Love of Lesbian, and concert-goers will be able to buy drinks, said organiser Festivals for Safe Culture.
To avoid a potential super-spreading event, attendees must present a negative antigen test taken the same day, and wear FFP2 masks. The arena will be divided in zones of fewer than 1,800 people.
The gig, scheduled for 27 March in Barcelona’s Palau Sant Jordi, will serve as a pilot to establish “a new protocol for holding events in the current context,” the company said in a statement.
Organisers decided to go ahead with the event after receiving positive results from a scientifically monitored concert of two DJ sets and two live performances last December.
Pope Francis has arrived in Baghdad for the first ever papal visit to Iraq amid tight security and concerns about the impact of his trip on rising Covid infection rates.
His presence was “a duty towards a land that has been martyred for so many years”, Francis said shortly before landing. A Vatican spokesperson said the trip was “an act of love to a country that has suffered terribly over recent decades”.
Despite worries about the risks of his visit amid rising Covid rates in Iraq, a largely unmasked choir sang as Francis was greeted by the Iraqi prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi. Both men removed their face masks, shook hands and spoke sitting less than 2 metres apart.
The 84-year-old pope, his entourage and 75 media representatives travelling with the Vatican delegation have been vaccinated against Covid, but most Iraqis have not.
Read more here:
Health Canada has approved Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose Covid vaccine, the prime minister Justine Trudeau has confirmed.
Update on vaccines: @GovCanHealth has approved Janssen’s COVID-19 vaccine. This is the fourth vaccine to be deemed safe and effective by Canada’s health experts - and with millions of doses already secured, we’re one step closer to defeating this virus.
— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) March 5, 2021
The Janssen vaccine, which was found to be 66% effective in preventing moderate to severe Covid-19 in a global trial, has already been authorised for use in the US, with an EU decision due this month.
Italy registered more deaths in 2020 than in any other year since World War Two, according to data that suggest the virus caused thousands more fatalities than were officially attributed to it, Reuters reports.
Total deaths in Italy last year amounted to 746,146, statistics bureau ISTAT said, an increase of 100,525, or 15.6%, compared with the average of the 2015-2019 period.
📊QUINTO RAPPORTO #ISS-#ISTAT SU MORTALITÀ
— Istituto Superiore di Sanità (@istsupsan) March 5, 2021
⚫️ 746.146 decessi nel 2020: picco massimo in Italia da secondo dopoguerra
🦠 75.891 morti #Covid19 tra febbraio e dicembre (incidenza media nazionale del 10,2%)
🔎 I dati⤵️https://t.co/p7oa3L31Uc@istat_it #Covid19italia pic.twitter.com/DIWzuxLogs
Looking at the period from when Italy’s outbreak came to light on 21 February to the end of the year, the “excess deaths” were even higher at 108,178, an increase of 21% over the same period of the last five years.
The Istituto Superiore di Sanita, Italy’s top health institute, officially attributed 75,891 deaths to the new coronavirus last year, some 70% of this total excess mortality.
Italy has continued to register hundreds of Covid deaths per day this year. Its updated tally stood at 98,974 on Thursday.
Officially, Covid accounted for 10% of deaths in Italy last year with marked regional disparities.
It was the cause of 14.5% of all deaths in the northern regions where the outbreak was first reported in Italy. In central areas it was responsible for 7% of all deaths and in southern ones it accounted for 5%.
Of the 100,525 excess deaths last year, 76% of the total were among people over the age of 80 and 20% were among those aged between 65 and 79, ISTAT said.
Reuters reports:
France will no longer require proof of a negative coronavirus test result from hauliers travelling directly from Ireland, the Irish transport government said on Friday, citing very low positivity rates among commercial vehicle drivers.
Irish traders are increasingly shipping goods directly to and from European ports, rather than the once-speedier route via the so-called UK landbridge, as a result of red tape and delays after Britain’s exit from the European Union.
The Irish transport ministry said in a statement the French government had informed it of the decision.
Paris introduced the requirement in January after the B.1.1.7 variant first identified in Britain became dominant in Ireland.
Proof of a negative test will still be required for drivers travelling from Britain to France or the Netherlands, meaning any Irish hauliers entering either country via Britain must still have proof of a negative result.
Just 14 positive results were returned from 5,743 antigen tests carried out on drivers from 28 January to 4 March, Ireland’s transport ministry said, a positivity rate of 0.24%.
Update on earlier post:
Japan’s prime minister Yoshihide Suga has offered a “heartfelt apology” after a state of emergency in the Tokyo area was extended by two weeks to try and combat Covid-19.
“I am deeply sorry at not being able to lift the state of emergency by the previously-promised 7 March. I offer my heartfelt apology,” Suga told a news conference.
Health Canada will announce the approval of Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose Covid vaccine on Friday, CBC News reported, citing sources.
Updated
This is from the World Health Organization African Region account:
864,000 #AstraZeneca #COVID19 vaccines arrived in Kampala, Uganda🇺🇬 this afternoon.
— WHO African Region (@WHOAFRO) March 5, 2021
11 countries & over 11 million #COVID19 vaccines have been delivered across #Africa through #COVAX so far.
🇬🇭🇨🇮🇨🇩🇳🇬🇦🇴🇱🇸🇬🇲🇸🇸🇺🇬🇷🇼🇰🇪 pic.twitter.com/EoMgRyrlvU
UK variant accounts for quarter of Poland's Covid cases, minister says
A variant of Covid-19 first identified in Britain now accounts for 25% of the reported cases in Poland, according to the country’s health minister.
“At the start of January, the share of the British variant was around 5%... Now, the most recent tests show that the share has been systematically growing and for the last 21 days we have almost 25%,” Adam Niedzielski told a news conference.
Niedzielski also warned that next week the daily number of new Covid cases may rise to 18,000 or more compared to 15,829 reported on Friday, according to Reuters.
The minister said curbs would be extended by one week in the northeastern region of Warminsko-Mazurskie and would also be imposed in the northern Pomorskie Region.
Updated
Switzerland has unveiled a 1 billion Swiss franc plan to offer free Covid tests for its entire population as part of measures to ease the country’s exit from restrictions.
Under the proposals, each person would be given five self-test kits per months, as soon as reliable tests are available, the government said, while all tests at pharmacies and testing centres will be free of charge.
Companies and schools should carry our repeated tests using pooled saliva samples to improve prevention and detect outbreaks early, it added.
Workers at companies which test frequently could be exempt from quarantine requirements, Reuters reports.
Germany urges caution over blocking vaccine delivery to Australia
Daniel Boffey reports that Jens Spahn, the German health minister, has urged caution over blocking vaccine delivery to Australia: “With a measure like that, in the short term there’s a win... but we have to be careful that it doesn’t cause us problems in the medium-term by disrupting the supply chains for vaccines and everything that’s needed in terms of precursors.”
It comes after Australia asked the EU to review Italy’s decision to block the export of 250,000 doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine to its shores.
The ban – the first such use of the controversial new power – was brought up during a discussion between Australia’s trade minister, Dan Tehan, and his European commission counterpart, Valdis Dombrovskis on Friday.
The EU has been engaged in a high-profile row with AstraZeneca after the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical company informed officials of a shortfall in deliveries this quarter due to a production problem in one of its EU sites.
Updated
Sweden, which has shunned lockdowns throughout the pandemic, registered 4,831 new coronavirus cases on Friday, health agency statistics indicated.
The country of 10 million registered 26 new deaths, bringing the total to 13,003.
Czech Republic asks other European countries for help with Covid patients
The Czech Republic has asked Germany, Switzerland and Poland to take in dozens of Covid patients as the situation in its own hospitals has reached a critical point, Prague’s health ministry said on Friday.
It said in a statement:
The large number of newly infected patients has intensified pressure on the healthcare system and the number of patients requiring hospitalisation is growing.
As of Friday morning, there were 8,153 Covid patients hospitalised, including 1,735 requiring intensive care, health ministry data showed.
“In some regions, the hospitals have exhausted their capacity and they are no longer able to provide appropriate care or to accept new patients without help from others,” health minister Jan Blatny said.
Updated
A temporary US ban on exports of critical raw materials could limit the production of Covid vaccines by companies such as the Serum Institute of India (SII), its chief executive said in a World Bank panel discussion.
SII, the world’s biggest vaccine maker, has licensed the AstraZeneca/Oxford University product and will soon start bulk-manufacturing the Novavax shot.
“There are a lot of bags, filters and critical items that manufacturers need,” Adar Poonawalla said. “The Novavax vaccine, which we are a major manufacturer of, needs these items from the US”.
He said the recent invocation of the US Defence Production Act to preserve vaccine raw materials for its own companies went against the global goal of sharing vaccines equitably, according to Reuters.
Italy’s central Lazio region, which includes the capital Rome, has asked the national government to consider producing Russia’s Sputnik V Covid vaccine once the EU regulator gives its green light.
The European Medicines Agency has said it has begun reviewing Sputnik V, a process that could lead to its approval for use in all 27 EU countries, although no talks are yet underway about buying Sputnik V shots.
“I have asked the government to consider producing in Italy the Russian vaccine Sputnik V,” Lazio’s health chief Alessio D’Amato said in a statement.
D’Amato added that he had met Russian scientists from Moscow’s Gamaleya Institute, which developed and tested the vaccine, according to Reuters.
Updated
Reuters reports:
A doctor who has spent the past year treating Covid-19 patients on Friday became the first person in Nigeria to be vaccinated against the disease, kicking off a mammoth campaign that aims to inoculate 80 million people this year.
Vaccinating all of Nigeria’s 200 million people and those in other developing countries is seen as key to stemming the global spread of the coronavirus.
“I am happy to be the first and I am happy I am not the last,” the doctor, 42-year-old Ngong Cyprian, told Reuters. “I want everybody to be vaccinated.”
Two other male doctors and one female nurse were also inoculated in white tents draped in green, the colours of the national flag, while cameras rolled and officials clapped and cheered.
Nigeria, with 157,671 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 1,951 deaths, has not been as hard hit by the pandemic as initially feared, but is aiming to vaccinate 40% of its people this year, and a further 30% in 2022.
It took delivery of 3.92 million doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine on Tuesday through the Covax scheme. Nigeria expects to receive 84 million doses of the vaccine from Covax this year.
Updated
Australia has asked the EU to review Italy’s decision to block the export of 250,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to its shores, as the French government said it too could impose bans in the future, Daniel Boffey, the Guardian’s Brussels bureau chief reports:
Updated
Here is a Guardian opinion piece by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization:
In it, Tedros says that the normal rules of business that protect the profits of vaccine manufacturers will have to be set aside if that is what it takes to ensure everybody is immunised against the coronavirus.
Updated
Swiss church bells rang out at noon on Friday and people observed a minute of silence to mark a year since the country’s first Covid death, Reuters reports.
President Guy Parmelin announced the measure last Sunday, urging citizens to honour the more than 9,300 people who have died from the disease in Switzerland.
At the Notre-Dame cathedral in Lausanne, a French-language Swiss city, watchman Renato Hausler rang the 16th-century ‘La Clemence’ bell.
In April, Hausler told Reuters he had resumed the practice of climbing the 153 stone steps to its tower to ring the bell at night in order to stir residents’ solidarity and courage.
Updated
Here is some more on Japan’s decision to extended a state of emergency for Tokyo and three neighbouring prefectures (see earlier post for details):
Governor Yuriko Koike told a video conference of governors of the affected area that the extension was essential.
She said:
We can’t have things rebound now, this is a really important time, and I think we all understand this. We’ll keep in close contact with each other and beat the virus.
Updated
Nigeria, Kenya (see earlier post) and Rwanda have begun Covid immunisation programmes under the Covax vaccine-sharing scheme, becoming the latest African countries to do so.
Health workers will be among the early beneficiaries of the AstraZeneca vaccination in all three, the BBC reports.
Updated
Hi everyone, this is Yohannes Lowe. I’ll be running the blog now. Please feel free to get in touch on Twitter if you have any story tips.
Updated
San Diego zoo has vaccinated nine great apes for coronavirus after an outbreak earlier this year. The great apes exhibited symptoms including runny noses, coughing and lethargy.
Four orangutans and five bonobos received Covid-19 vaccine injections in January and February. Three more bonobos and a gorilla were also expected to receive the experimental vaccine, which was developed by Zoetis, a firm that produces medicine for animals.
Eight western lowland gorillas at the zoo’s safari park contracted the virus in January, probably from a zookeeper, even though employees wear masks at all times around the gorillas.
And with that monkey business, I leave you in the hands of my colleague Yohannes Lowe.
Cambodian citizens face up to 20 years in jail for flouting coronavirus rules after the country’s parliament passed a strict Covid-19 prevention bill that has attracted the ire of human rights groups.
The law specifies a prison term of three years for breaking quarantine orders and up to 20 years in jail for any organised group intentionally spreading the virus.
Health minister Mam Bunheng called it “a strong legal base for the government … to protect lives and public health” after the bill won unanimous support in the legislature.
But US NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the law could be used to suppress dissent in a country that has seen successive crackdowns on opposition voices under Premier Hun Sen.
The law will “further erode the rights of activists and dissidents”, HRW’s deputy Asia director, Phil Robertson, said in a statement, calling on the Cambodian government to scrap the bill.
Updated
Kenya launches Covid vaccination campaign
Kenya has begun vaccinating high-priority healthcare workers against coronavirus, according to AFP.
Director general of the health ministry, Patrick Amoth, was the first to receive the jab, after the drugs arrived in the country on Wednesday. “I feel great that I have taken the Covid vaccine and I urge other health workers not to fear. The vaccine is safe,” he said.
Intensive care staff and final-year medical students working in hospitals will follow.
Kenya has recorded 107,000 cases and 1,870 deaths from coronavirus.
EU says pandemic has disproportionately affected women
Women in European Union countries have been “disproportionately affected” by the coronavirus pandemic because they make up the vast majority of workers in health and other frontline jobs, according to the EU’s annual report on gender equality.
The pandemic has also brought a rise in domestic violence against women, the EU’s annual report on gender equality said. Moreover, women have since had more difficulties finding new jobs.
The report said:
There is already ample evidence that the hard-won achievements of past years have been ‘rolled back’...progress on women’s rights is hard won but easily lost.
Women’s overrepresentation in lower paid sectors and occupations, such as hospitality, retail, or personal services, make them particularly vulnerable in the labour markets struck by the COVID-19 crisis.
In contrast, service sectors that were not as disrupted due to the nature of their activity such as information and communication, finance and insurance, primarily employing men, saw an increase in employment rates.
The Philippines has recorded 52 more cases of a highly contagious coronavirus variant first identified in South Africa, the health ministry said on Friday.
Reuters reports:
Out of the new cases of the variant, known as B.1.351, the health ministry said 41 were detected in Manila, while the origin of the others was still being verified. The Philippines first reported six cases of the variant on Tuesday.
The Southeast Asian country started its inoculation drive on Monday, but health experts worry the discovery of new variants could complicate its effort.
Health authorities also reported on Friday 31 more infections of a variant first identified in Britain, raising the total to 118.In addition to the two variants, the health ministry said it had detected 42 more cases of “mutations of potential clinical significance” in samples collected from Filipinos returning from overseas and residents in Manila and the central Philippines.
The Philippines’ health ministry on Friday reported 3,045 new COVID-19 cases, the highest daily increase in more than four months.
President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday vouched for the safety of COVID-19 shots as he appealed to the public to get vaccinated as soon as possible, saying this was key to reopening an economy that posted its sharpest contraction in 2020.
Summary
Hello to those just joining me here on the global coronavirus live blog.
Here are some of the main stories we’ve seen so far:
- Australia to expand quarantine facility amid fears of Covid vaccine disruption. The Australian government has played down fears the vaccine rollout could be disrupted by Italy’s move to block exports to Australia, and has flagged plans to expand the Howard Springs quarantine facility for returning travellers by May.
- WHO to scrap interim report on virus origins – report. The Wall Street Journal reports that a World Health Organization team investigating Covid’s origins is planning to scrap an interim report on its recent mission to China amid mounting tensions between Beijing and Washington over the investigation and an appeal from one international group of scientists for a new inquiry.
- Japan to extend Tokyo state of emergency. The Japanese government plans to extend a state of emergency for Tokyo and three neighbouring prefectures to combat Covid until March 21, two weeks longer than originally scheduled, Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura said on Friday.
- Australia says Italy’s block on AstraZeneca vaccine frustrating but not crucial. The Australian government on Friday expressed frustration at Italy’s decision to block a shipment of AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccine, but stressed it would not affect the rollout of Australia’s inoculation program.
- China pledges to develop vaccines to cope with major infectious disease, part of its flurry of efforts to boost the competitiveness of its manufacturing sector, the government said on Friday in its development plan for 2021-2025.
Updated
Clea Skopeliti’s UK Covid live blog is now up and running. You can follow that here:
Paris will not be put under weekend lockdowns, the French prime minister, Jean Castex, announced at his weekly Covid-19 round-up on Thursday evening, reports the Guardian’s Paris correspondent, Kim Willsher.
The news came as a relief to Parisians, who feared they were heading for yet another restriction after the city and surrounding areas became one of more than 20 French departments on high alert following a rise in coronavirus contaminations and deaths. City mayor Anne Hidalgo had vigorously argued against a weekend lockdown, saying it was “inhumane” not to allow residents, many of them living in small flats, to spend time outside.
Nice, in the south of France, and Dunkirk, in the north, remain under weekend lockdown, which has been extended to the department around the Channel port.
The whole of France remains under a daily 6pm to 6am curfew.
Castex also announced a speeding up of France’s much-criticised vaccine rollout with pharmacies being allowed to vaccinate from 15 March. Vaccines will even be administered at weekends, he said, in the hope of getting 30 million French people inoculated by the summer.
However, there is concern that only 40% of France’s health workers have been vaccinated, despite having been eligible for the jab for weeks. French media reported that president Emmanuel Macron had suggested it be made obligatory for health workers, but Castex and the French health minister, Olivier Véran, stopped short of this and urged those in the health sector to get vaccinated to protect “themselves, their families and the people they care for”.
Castex warned another lockdown was “not inevitable” but also not ruled out if the situation worsens.
During a council of ministers meeting on Thursday – the equivalent to a Cabinet meeting in the UK – Macron was reported to have had a dig at the sluggish pace of vaccinations in France that has seen millions of doses still unused, telling ministers: “You’re great, but as long as there are vaccines sitting in fridges, I’m not locking people down again.”
Updated
Some people with asthma have been 'refused' the Covid-19 vaccine
People with asthma who are eligible for a coronavirus vaccine are being refused it by some GPs against government guidance, the BBC reports:
An NHS England letter sent to GPs in mid-February says people who have “ever had an emergency asthma admission” to hospital fall into priority group six, which is currently being vaccinated.
But some patients are being told a hospital admission within the past 12 months is required.
The Royal College of GPs say they look at various factors including age and ethnicity, as well as some degree of clinical judgement.
The main UK story from overnight this morning is that Cyprus will allow British tourists who have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 into the country without restrictions from 1 May.
Visitors would need to be inoculated with vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the second dose of a vaccine should be administered at the latest seven days before travel. Authorities would still reserve the right to carry out random tests on arrivals.
Updated
South Africa is in negotiations with the African Union (AU) for Covid-19 vaccines for at least 10 million people, a top health official said on Friday.
Reuters: Sandile Buthelezi, Department of Health director-general, said the government was seeking to conclude an agreement with the AU, Afreximbank and the Serum Institute of India over AstraZeneca vaccine doses it is selling to other African countries.
About 18 African countries would benefit from those doses, he added.
Moldova has become the first European country to receive Covid-19 vaccines from the global Covax scheme, according to the nation’s president Maia Sandu.
#Moldova is the first European nation to receive #COVID19vaccines via the #COVAX initiative - the first 14,400 doses arrived last night. Thankful to 🇩🇪 and other 🇪🇺nations,
— Maia Sandu (@sandumaiamd) March 5, 2021
🇺🇸, 🇬🇧, 🇨🇦, @EU_Commission, 🇯🇵 and others for solidarity, and to @WHO and @UNICEF
Updated
France’s health minister has said the country could block overseas exports of Covid vaccines, following a similar move from Italy.
Asked by BFM TV if France could follow Italy’s move on this, Olivier Véran replied: “We could.”
On Thursday, the EU blocked a shipment of AstraZeneca’s vaccine destined for Australia after the drug manufacturer failed to meet its EU contract commitments.
But Scott Morrison insisted the blocked shipment of the AstraZeneca jabs was understandable and would not affect Australia’s vaccine programme.
“This particular shipment was not one we’d counted on for the rollout, and so we will continue unabated,” Morrison said.
Updated
Prof Andrew Hayward, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at UCL and a member of the UK’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), told Times Radio this morning that “we left things far too late, in terms of taking more restrictive measures”.
Hayward also said we will “have to live with” a “substantial” degree of mortality but that we will “get back to normal”.
He does not think new variants of Covid-19 will completely evade vaccine immunity as “we have the technology to update the vaccines”.
“The vaccines will still take the sting out of it, if you like, and reduce the case fatality rates,” he said.
Updated
The French European affairs minister, Clément Beaune, has said the solidarity of the European Union would be affected if countries in the bloc chose Chinese or Russian Covid-19 vaccines which have not yet been approved, Reuters reports.
Beaune told RTL radio:
“If they went to choose the Chinese and/or Russian vaccine, I think it would be quite serious,”
“It would pose a problem in terms of our solidarity, and it also poses a health risk problem, because the Russian vaccine is not yet authorised in Europe. A demand for approval has been made but it is not yet authorised in Europe, and no demand has even been made yet for the Chinese vaccine,” added Beaune.
Updated
Covid vaccine ads aim to influence without alienating people
Government attempts to drive up vaccine acceptance will come under increasing scrutiny in the coming months as more jabs are made available. Public health experts say they have to walk a fine line between boosting trust and not being seen to force the jab on the public, reports Philip Olterman, Jon Henley and Tom Phillips.
Germany’s campaign, called “Germany Pulls Up Its Sleeves:”, has run across radio, regional newspapers and billboard posters. At a time when the public is being urged to stay at home and avoid commuting, the health ministry chose to spend more than half of its €25m campaign budget on outdoor advertising.
A new campaign aimed at spreading confidence among younger people is due to launch when the vaccine becomes more widely available.
In France, there has been no major mass information campaign. Instead, the prime minister, Jean Castex, the health minister, Olivier Véran, and the country’s “Monsieur Vaccin”, Prof Alain Fischer, who is overseeing the programme, give weekly televised press conferences to update on progress and announce when different groups will be eligible for a shot.
Updated
Morning, this is Alex Mistlin taking over the coronavirus live blog in London. First up this morning, Reuters report that Sinovac Biotech’s Covid-19 vaccine may not trigger sufficient antibody responses against a new variant identified in Brazil.
Reuters reports:
The emergence of variants of the new coronavirus has raised concern that vaccines and treatments that were developed based on previous strains may not work as robustly.
Plasma samples taken from eight people vaccinated with Sinovac’s CoronaVac failed to efficiently neutralize the P.1 lineage variant, or 20J/501Y.V3, researchers said in a paper published on Monday ahead of peer-review.
“These results suggest that P.1 virus might escape from neutralizing antibodies induced by … CoronaVac,” researchers at the University of São Paulo in Brazil, Washington University School of Medicine in the US, and a few other institutions said in the paper.
Updated
That’s it from me, Helen Sullivan, from Sydney:
I will break these in half and cook them in a cream-based sauce that I will call a “carbonara”, unless Italy agrees to release the 250,000 doses of AstraZeneca back to Australia pic.twitter.com/EJuOb8kX4X
— Naaman Zhou (@naamanzhou) March 4, 2021
Updated
The Australian government has played down fears the vaccine rollout could be disrupted by Italy’s move to block exports to Australia, and has flagged plans to expand the Howard Springs quarantine facility for returning travellers by May.
The progress of Australia’s vaccination rollout – including the impact of the sudden block on a shipment of 250,000 AstraZeneca doses to Australia – was high on the agenda for Scott Morrison’s meeting with state and territory leaders on Friday:
Summary
Here are the key developments from the last few hours:
- WHO to scrap interim report on virus origins – report. The Wall Street Journal reported that a World Health Organization team investigating Covid’s origins is planning to scrap an interim report on its recent mission to China amid mounting tensions between Beijing and Washington over the investigation and an appeal from one international group of scientists for a new inquiry.
- Japan to extend Tokyo state of emergency. The Japanese government plans to extend a state of emergency for Tokyo and three neighbouring prefectures to combat Covid until March 21, two weeks longer than originally scheduled, Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura said on Friday.
- New coronavirus variant under investigation in UK. Scientists have identified 16 cases of a new coronavirus variant in the UK, Public Health England announced. Cases of the variant, referred to as VUI-202102/04, were first identified on 15 February. The variant, which is understood to have originated in the UK, was designated a “variant under investigation” on 24 February.
- Survey shows UK parents’ concern over Covid effect on children’s activity. More than two-thirds of UK parents believe their children have become less active during the pandemic, new research has found, placing more pressure on schools before their reopening next week.
- Calls grow to prioritise Italy’s priests for Covid vaccination. Calls are growing in Italy to prioritise the vaccination of priests against Covid-19 as the death toll among members of the clergy, many of whom have assisted and comforted the sick since the beginning of the pandemic, approaches 270.
- Australia says Italy’s block on AstraZeneca vaccine frustrating but not crucial. The Australian government on Friday expressed frustration at Italy’s decision to block a shipment of AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccine, but stressed it would not affect the rollout of Australia’s inoculation program.
- China to develop vaccines against major infectious diseases. China pledges to develop vaccines to cope with major infectious disease, part of its flurry of efforts to boost the competitiveness of its manufacturing sector, the government said on Friday in its development plan for 2021-2025.
- Vietnam to launch vaccinations on Monday. Vietnam will launch its Covid vaccination campaign on Monday, the country’s health minister said, after the country received the first batch of 117,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last month.
- Papua New Guinea hospitals run out of funding as Covid cases surge. Papua New Guinea is battling to control a surge in coronavirus cases across the archipelago, just as hospitals are shutting their doors because they have run out of money.The country’s crowded capital, Port Moresby, is the epicentre of the latest outbreak.
- Australian experts warn Covid vaccines being sold on darknet likely to be scams. Three major Covid-19 vaccines are being advertised for sale on the darknet – the part of the internet not visible to search engines and which requires specialised software to access, an analysis of 15 marketplaces has found.
- Jacinda Ardern announces Auckland’s Covid lockdown will lift on Sunday. Auckland’s seven-day lockdown is due to lift on Sunday morning after no new cases of coronavirus were recorded in the community on Friday.
- ‘Fear of missing out’ boosting global acceptance of Covid jab. An international survey shows vaccine confidence is already on the rise even though relatively few countries have launched public awareness campaigns, with the fear of missing out on a jab suggested as one driver.
-
South Korea approved the Pfizer vaccine. South Korea’s drug safety ministry said on Friday it has granted final approval for the use of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine.
South Korea approves Pfizer vaccine
South Korea’s drug safety ministry said on Friday it has granted final approval for the use of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine.
The announcement came after the ministry approved a separate batch of Pfizer vaccines sent last month via the Cobax global vaccine sharing scheme, which are being used in the ongoing vaccination campaign. The ministry has also approved AstraZeneca’s vaccine.
Vietnam to launch vaccinations on Monday
Vietnam will launch its Covid vaccination campaign on Monday, the country’s health minister said, after the country received the first batch of 117,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine last month.
The vaccinations will initially be conducted in 18 hospitals treating coronavirus patients and areas with higher infection numbers, Minister Nguyen Thanh Long said in a statement on Friday.
Calls grow to prioritise Italy's priests for Covid vaccination
Calls are growing in Italy to prioritise the vaccination of priests against Covid-19 as the death toll among members of the clergy, many of whom have assisted and comforted the sick since the beginning of the pandemic, approaches 270.
Dozens of dioceses, religious groups and priests have in recent weeks expressed support for a call for priests to be prioritise from the archbishop of Reggio Calabria, Giuseppe Fiorini Morosini, who in January told an interviewer that the church was continuing to lose clergy to the disease:
'Fear of missing out' boosting global acceptance of Covid jab
Across the globe, governments are weighing up how they can convince sufficiently large numbers of people to take a Covid-19 vaccine in order to reach herd immunity.
But an international survey shows vaccine confidence is already on the rise even though relatively few countries have launched public awareness campaigns, with the fear of missing out on a jab suggested as one driver.
In the survey by Imperial College London, the share of respondents who “strongly agreed” to take a vaccine if it was offered to them has increased by eight percentage points or more in nine of the 14 countries surveyed between November and mid-February.
Vaccine confidence is exceptionally high in the UK, which has not just seen one of the globe’s smoothest-run immunisation rollouts but also a more proactive public information campaign than in other countries. As many as 70% of those surveyed expressed their eagerness to get a jab in the most emphatic way possible:
Ardern announces Auckland's Covid lockdown will lift on Sunday
Auckland’s seven-day lockdown is due to lift on Sunday morning after no new cases of coronavirus were recorded in the community on Friday.
The prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, said Auckland would go from alert level three to level two at 6am on Sunday, while the rest of the country would move down to level one.
A decision made to downgrade Auckland to level one would be made before the following weekend:
Mardi Gras protest march to go ahead in Sydney after last-minute Covid exemption
Sydney LGBTIQ+ rights protestors will march along Oxford Street while the city’s Mardi Gras is held elsewhere after New South Wales Health granted organisers an exemption from gathering restrictions.
The exemption means a court fight between NSW police, which sought to stop Saturday’s march, and the protesters will no longer go ahead.
Activist group Pride in Protest decided at the last minute to apply for an exemption to public health orders, approaching the NSW health minister, Brad Hazzard, on Thursday afternoon.
Shortly before the court hearing was due to begin at midday on Friday, the group announced it had secured the exemption after agreeing on better contact-tracing processes.
“This is a massive win for not only the right to protest but for the queer community to say that the fight against transphobia and homophobia cannot wait,” the group said in a statement:
Australian experts warn Covid vaccines being sold on darknet likely to be scams
Three major Covid-19 vaccines are being advertised for sale on the darknet – the part of the internet not visible to search engines and which requires specialised software to access, an analysis of 15 marketplaces has found.
Researchers at the global security company Kaspersky found advertisements for the Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Moderna vaccines, as well as sellers advertising unverified vaccines:
Papua New Guinea hospitals run out of funding as Covid cases surge
Papua New Guinea is battling to control a surge in coronavirus cases across the archipelago, just as hospitals are shutting their doors because they have run out of money.
The country’s crowded capital, Port Moresby, is the epicentre of the latest outbreak.
The city recorded just five cases for all of January, and 124 for February. But 108 cases have been confirmed in the first four days of March as community transmission accelerates.
PNG has reported only 1,492 confirmed cases for the entire pandemic, but the actual caseload is believed to be many times higher.
Fewer than 48,000 tests have been conducted across the country of nearly 9 million people since the beginning of the pandemic, and, in many remote parts of the country, there is no testing capacity at all. PNG has not yet begun a vaccination program.
Health authorities are also concerned about a spike in cases in PNG’s huge western province, which links the country to Indonesia, and has a sea border with Australia.
Travel between PNG and Australian islands in the Torres Strait is usually unrestricted but has been suspended for the pandemic:
Updated
California will begin sending 40% of all vaccine doses to the most vulnerable neighborhoods in the state to try to inoculate people most at risk from the coronavirus and get the state’s economy open more quickly, Governor Gavin Newsom said Thursday in the latest shake-up to the state’s rules.
AP: The doses will be spread among 400 ZIP codes where there are about 8 million people eligible for shots, said Dr Mark Ghaly, the state’s health and human services secretary. Many of the neighbourhoods are in Los Angeles County and the central valley, which have had among the highest rates of infection.
The areas are considered most vulnerable based on metrics such as household income, education level and access to health care. Newsom said that not only is this the right thing to do, it’s critical to opening up more of the state’s economy.
China to develop vaccines against major infectious diseases
China pledges to develop vaccines to cope with major infectious disease, part of its flurry of efforts to boost the competitiveness of its manufacturing sector, the government said on Friday in its development plan for 2021-2025, Reuters reports.
The country will concentrate resources to prevent emerging infectious diseases and biosafety risks, according to the plan.
Senate Democrats on Thursday came out with their version of the $1.9 trillion Covid relief bill. A look at some of the major changes in the bill now being considered by the Senate versus what passed the House last week, AP reports.
Here is what has changed:
Who gets a check
- President Joe Biden and Senate Democrats have agreed to tighten eligibility for the $1,400 payments.
- Most Americans will still be getting the full amount under either bill. The median household income was $68,703 in 2019, according to the US Census Bureau.Roughly 8 million fewer households will get a check under the Senate bill compared with what the House passed, according to an analysis from the Tax Policy Center.
$15 minimum wage removed
- The Senate bill does not include an increase in the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025.
- The Senate parliamentarian ruled that the minimum wage increase violated strict budget rules limiting what can be included in a package that can be passed with 51 votes rather than the 60 needed to overcome a filibuster.
Money for state and local governments
- The Senate bill also provides $350 billion for state and local governments but adds the stipulation that the money can only cover costs incurred by the end of 2024. The Senate bill also prohibits states from using the money to offset tax cuts, nor can it be used to shore up a pension fund.
Health insurance help
- Workers who lose their job can remain on their company’s health plan for up to 18 months under a law known as Cobra, but they typically must pay the full monthly premium.
Updated
Australia began its inoculation programme two weeks ago, vaccinating frontline health staff and senior citizens with Pfizer’s Covid vaccine though doses of that vaccine are limited amid tight global supplies.
Reuters: Officials on Friday administered the first AstraZeneca vaccine to a doctor in South Australia state.
Australia has ordered 53.8 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which was developed in conjunction with the University of Oxford. Local pharmaceutical company CSL Ltd has secured the rights to manufacture 50 million of those doses in Australia.
Those doses will provide the backbone of Australia’s inoculation programme, which it hopes to complete by October.
Australia is under less pressure than many other countries, having recorded just under 29,000 Covid cases and 909 deaths. The lower infection and death tallies have been helped by strict lockdowns, speedy tracking systems and border closures
Australia says Italy's block on AstraZeneca vaccine frustrating but not crucial
The Australian government on Friday expressed frustration at Italy’s decision to block a shipment of AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccine, but stressed it would not affect the rollout of Australia’s inoculation program, Reuters reports.
Italy, supported by the European Commission, blocked the planned export of around 250,000 doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine after the drug manufacturer failed to meet its European Union contract commitments.
“The world is in unchartered territory at present, it’s unsurprising that some countries would tear up the rule book,” Australian Finance Minister Simon Birmingham told Sky News.
“This is a demonstration of really how well Australia continues to do compared to the desperation of other countries.”
Health Minister Greg Hunt said Australia had already received 300,000 doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccine, which would last until local production of the vaccine ramps up.
“This is one shipment from one country,” Hunt said in an emailed statement. “This shipment was not factored into our distribution plan for coming weeks.”
AstraZeneca did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
China reported 9 new coronavirus cases in the mainland for 4 March, compared with 10 cases a day earlier, the country’s health commission said on Friday.
All of the new infections were imported cases originating from abroad, according to a statement by the National Health Commission.
The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, fell to 12 from 14 cases a day earlier.
The total number of confirmed Covid cases in mainland China now stands at 89,952, while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,636.
Survey shows UK parents’ concern over Covid effect on children’s activity
More than two-thirds of UK parents believe their children have become less active during the pandemic, new research has found, placing more pressure on schools before their reopening next week.
A survey by the leading charity the Youth Sport Trust found 78% of parents said their children were doing less than the government’s recommended 60 minutes of activity a day, while 11% of parents said their children are doing no physical activity at all. The total who said the amount had decreased in the past year was 68%, while only 15% said it had stayed the same:
Japan to extend Tokyo state of emergency
The Japanese government plans to extend a state of emergency for Tokyo and three neighbouring prefectures to combat Covid until March 21, two weeks longer than originally scheduled, Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura said on Friday.
Reuters: Nishimura, who is in charge of the government’s coronavirus response, made the comment at the start of an early-morning meeting with advisers to seek approval for the move.
Tokyo, Chiba, Kanagawa and Saitama prefectures, which make up 30% of the country’s population, sought the extension past the originally scheduled end date of 7 March as new coronavirus cases had not fallen enough to meet targets.
Still, new case numbers are at a fraction of their peak in early January, when the state of emergency took effect. Tokyo reported 279 cases on Thursday, compared with a record high 2,520 on 7 January.
Nationwide, Japan has recorded some 433,000 cases and 8,050 deaths from Covid as of Wednesday.
New coronavirus variant under investigation in UK
Scientists have identified 16 cases of a new coronavirus variant in the UK, Public Health England (PHE) has announced.
Cases of the variant, referred to as VUI-202102/04, were first identified on 15 February through genomic horizon scanning. PHE said on Thursday that all individuals who tested positive and their contacts have been traced and advised to isolate. The variant, which is understood to have originated in the UK, was designated a “variant under investigation” (VUI) on 24 February.
Variants of Covid-19 can be identified as VUIs or “variants of concern” (VOCs). New variants emerge regularly and experts are conducting frequent analysis to see which are of concern, and which are not.
The latest identified variant, also known as B.1.1.318, contains the E484K mutation, which is found in two other VUIs present in the UK, but it does not feature the N501Y mutation that is present in all VOCs, PHE said.
The findings mean there are now four VUIs and four VOCs being tracked by scientists in the UK. Other VUIs include one from Brazil, known as P2, which has had 43 probable or confirmed cases identified in the UK, but is not causing scientists serious concern. PHE said that, as of Wednesday, a total of 26 cases of P2 had been found in England where no travel links could be established.
Two further VUIs – dubbed A.23.1 with E484K and B.1.525 – have seen 78 and 86 probable or confirmed UK cases detected respectively. Both were first detected in the UK in December.
WHO to scrap interim report on virus origins – report
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that a World Health Organization team investigating Covid’s origins is planning to scrap an interim report on its recent mission to China amid mounting tensions between Beijing and Washington over the investigation and an appeal from one international group of scientists for a new inquiry.
It reports that a group of two dozen scientists have written an open letter calling for a new international inquiry, claiming that the WHO team that was in Wuhan last month had insufficient access to investigate conceivable sources of the virus, including a possible laboratory leak.
In Geneva, WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said in via email: “The full report is expected in coming weeks”.
No further information was immediately available about the reasons for the delay in publishing the findings of the WHO-led mission. China refused to give raw data on early Covid-19 cases to a WHO-led team probing the origins of the pandemic, Dominic Dwyer, one of the team’s investigators said last month, potentially complicating efforts to understand how the outbreak began.
The WHO team all but dismissed the suggestions that the virus may have leaked from a laboratory in a press conference after their mission. But later that week the WHO director-general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said “all hypotheses remain open and require further analysis and studies”.
Summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic with me, Helen Sullivan.
The World Health Organization is planning to scrap an interim report on the investigation into the virus origins in Wuhan, China, the Wall Street Journal reports, amid a call from scientists to begin a fresh inquiry. More on this shortly.
Meanwhile in the UK, scientists have identified 16 cases of a new coronavirus variant, Public Health England (PHE) has announced.
The variant, which is understood to have originated in the UK, was designated a “variant under investigation” (VUI) on 24 February.
Here are the other key developments from the last few hours:
- Sweden and Germany extended their recommendation for the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine to cover people aged over 65 after previously said lacked sufficient data, until recent studies.
- Russia expects several EU countries to approve the use of its Sputnik V vaccine this month and Moscow could provide vaccines for 50 million Europeans starting from June if the shot wins EU-wide approval, Russia’s RDIF fund said.
- Italy halted a shipment of the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine due for Australia. It came after the EU introduced new rules governing the shipment of vaccines outside the bloc, although this is the first intervention of its kind.
- Cuba has begun late-stage trials of its most advanced experimental Covid-19 vaccine, edging closer to a potential home-grown inoculation campaign after shunning foreign jabs.
- Brazil’s second biggest city of Rio de Janeiro will be the latest to adopt new Covid restrictions from tomorrow, including a night curfew, in a bid to stall a second wave of the virus.
- Italy and Germany will administer just a single coronavirus vaccine dose to people who have been infected with the virus up to six months beforehand, amid a scramble to save shots.
- More than four in 10 over-80s in England may have met with someone outside of their support bubble within three weeks of receiving the first jab, an official survey suggested.
- France criticised a push by Austria and Denmark to coordinate with Israel on developing new Covid-19 jabs, as EU unity frays even further over its troubled vaccine rollout.
- The San Diego zoo gave nine orangutans and bonobos an experimental coronavirus vaccine, the first known non-human primates to receive a Covid-19 vaccine in the US.
