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Summary
- South Africa has delayed reopening its schools amid a rapid resurgence of Covid-19 driven by a more infectious variant of the virus.
- There have been a further 38,598 lab-confirmed coronavirus cases in the UK, according to government data. This compares to 54,940 infections registered last Sunday and is the lowest number since 27 December.
- The United Arab Emirates has lowered the minimum age requirement to receive a Covid-19 vaccination to 16, from 18 previously, its ministry of health said.
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Israel’s prisons service has said they will begin vaccinating all incarcerated people against Covid-19, including Palestinians, following calls from right groups, Palestinian officials and Israel’s attorney general.
- Greece’s health authorities have announced 237 new infections, taking the country’s total 148,607 confirmed cases. Today’s figure is significantly lower than last Sunday’s, when 445 new cases were reported, and is the smallest daily increase since October.
- Over-70s and clinically extremely vulnerable people will begin receiving invitations for coronavirus jabs this week in a “significant milestone” for the vaccination programme, the UK government has announced.
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Brazil’s health regulator, Anvisa, has approved the emergency use of two coronavirus vaccines during a politically-charged televised meeting that Brazilians watched with bated-breath.
- Portugal’s public health system is on the verge of collapsing as hospitals in the areas worst-affected by a worrying surge in coronavirus cases are quickly running out of intensive care beds to treat Covid-19 patients.
- Schools in Malawi will be shut for at least 15 days while bars have been given an 8pm closing time under new coronavirus restrictions announced by President Lazarus Chakwera in a television address on Sunday.
Updated
Brazil had 33,040 new confirmed coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours and 551 fatalities, the first day in six the death toll has been below 1,000, the health ministry said on Sunday.
The South American country has now registered 8,488,099 cases since the pandemic began, and the official death toll has risen to 209,847, according to ministry data. It is the world’s third worst outbreak behind the United States and India.
Updated
Dealing with the deadly second wave of Covid has left the NHS in the most precarious position in its 72-year history, chief executive Sir Simon Stevens has warned, as ministers said they were aiming to get all adults in the UK vaccinated by September.
Stevens said the NHS was now giving 140 jabs a minute, as the race to vaccinate the public picks up, but warned of the stress the service was under.
“The facts are very clear and I’m not going to sugar coat them. Hospitals are under extreme pressure and staff are under extreme pressure,” Stevens said on Sunday.
Vaccinations begin for over-70s and clinically extremely vulnerable
Over-70s and clinically extremely vulnerable people will begin receiving invitations for coronavirus jabs this week in a “significant milestone” for the vaccination programme, the UK government has announced.
More than 3.8 million people – including over-80s, care home residents and NHS and social care staff – have already received their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, but from Monday it will begin to be offered to the next two priority groups.
The government said it would remain the priority to vaccinate those in the first two groups but sites that have enough supply, and capacity to vaccinate more people, will be allowed to offer jabs to the next two cohorts.
Updated
Ghana’s Covid-19 infection rates are skyrocketing and include strains of the virus not previously seen in the country, threatening to overwhelm the health system, President Nana Akufo-Addo said on Sunday.
Since 5 January, the number of active cases has risen to 1,924 from about 900, Akufo-Addo said in a speech. There are now 120 severe cases, up from 18 a week ago.
The president said that some people arriving from abroad had tested positive for “new variants” of the virus. Last week, Gambia recorded its first two cases of the highly infectious UK variant, in what appears to be the first confirmation of its presence in Africa.
Ghana is not yet close to the peak seen during the first wave of infections in the middle of last year, but could quickly reach that level if cases keep rising at the current rate.
If they do, the president said he would impose another partial lockdown, despite worries about what that would do to one of west Africa’s largest economies.
“Our Covid-19 treatment centres have gone from having zero patients to now being full because of the upsurge in infections,” the president said. “At this current rate ... our healthcare infrastructure will be overwhelmed.”
Across Africa, a second coronavirus wave is infecting twice as many people per day than at the height of last year’s first wave and has yet to peak, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
The rise has raised concern across the continent where, unlike in Europe and the United States, cash-strapped governments have been unable to secure supply deals with vaccine manufacturers, putting the onus for now on containment. Akufo-Addo said details about access to vaccines and a rollout plan would be announced “very soon”.
Updated
Malawi shuts schools for 15 days
Schools in Malawi will be shut for at least 15 days while bars have been given an 8pm closing time under new coronavirus restrictions announced by President Lazarus Chakwera in a television address on Sunday.
After reporting no positive cases for almost two months, the country has seen a sudden resurgence in coronavirus cases since the middle of last month.
The country of 19 million people has reported 12,470 cases of Covid-19 and 314 deaths since the pandemic began last year. Chakwera said a third of those deaths were reported in the past 16 days, forcing the government to seek additional funding to contain the pandemic at a time when the country is in 4.1tn kwacha ($5.37bn) of debt.
The new measures concerning schools and bars will take effect from Monday.
Chakwera also said the government has allocated an additional 1.6bn kwacha ($2.1m) in funds to be spent on recruiting frontline healthcare workers, 1,000 intensive care unit beds and 1,000 oxygen cylinders among other requirements.
Last week the government reported that two senior cabinet ministers and two other high-profile members of the government had died from Covid-19.
Updated
Workers in Melbourne are expected to return to city offices in large numbers on Monday, with research indicating most feel safe and ready to return after nine months of remote working.
Private workplaces in Victoria are able to return to 50% capacity from Monday, with public service offices permitted to ramp up to 25%.
A Roy Morgan survey of 503 city workers from late November to mid-December shows almost two-thirds were either willing to return to their central Melbourne workplaces (44%) or had already (15%).
The most commonly cited factors making workers feel safe to return were Covid-safe plans and adherence to health measures.
Updated
France reported a further 141 deaths from coronavirus on Sunday, taking the cumulative toll since March to 70,283, the public health authority said. It also reported 16,642 new infections within the previous 24 hours.
The infection figures on Sundays are usually lower because fewer tests are taken. The number of daily cases has been hovering around 20,000 for the last week.
The health ministry said in a separate statement that 422,127 people had now been vaccinated, up from about 413,000 on Saturday.
Eurostar has said it is facing an existential threat, as business leaders pleaded with the government to step in and save the “vital link” with Europe.
A 95% drop in passenger numbers has brought the cross-Channel train service to its knees, and the company reiterated on Sunday that while government loans had been extended to aviation, international high-speed rail had also been severely affected by the pandemic.
Here’s a graphic showing the number of vaccine doses US states have administered, courtesy of ourworldindata.org
Portugal's health system 'under extreme pressure'
Portugal’s public health system is on the verge of collapsing as hospitals in the areas worst-affected by a worrying surge in coronavirus cases are quickly running out of intensive care beds to treat Covid-19 patients.
“Our health system is under a situation of extreme pressure,” Health Minister Marta Temido told reporters on Sunday afternoon after a visit to a struggling hospital. “There is a limit and we are very close to it.”
The health system, which prior to the pandemic had the lowest number of critical care beds per 100,000 inhabitants in Europe, can accommodate a maximum of 672 COVID-19 patients in intensive care units (ICUs), according to health ministry data.
The number of people in ICUs with COVID-19 reached 647 on Sunday, according to health authority DGS. The Portuguese Association of Hospital Administrators said the number of coronavirus patients needing hospitalisation was likely to dramatically increase over the next week.
Three days into a nationwide lockdown, the country of just 10 million people reported 10,385 new cases and 152 fatalities on Sunday, bringing the total number of infections to 549,801, with the death toll increasing to 8,861.
According to ourworldindata.org, supported by Oxford University, Portugal had the highest number of coronavirus cases in Europe per capita over the last seven days.
Most new cases were concentrated in Lisbon, where many patients at the city’s public hospitals have already been transferred elsewhere, including to health units in the country’s second biggest city Porto.
Updated
The UK variant of the coronavirus has killed three residents at a retirement home in northwestern Belgium and infected 111 people including 39 staff members, its director Jurgen Duyck told AFP on Sunday.
The cluster represents two-thirds of the residents of the De Groene Verte home in the western Flanders city of Houthulst near the border with France.
Belgium has suffered one of the worst per capita death rates in the world during the epidemic with its nursing homes representing more than half of overall deaths from the disease, according to the Public Health Institute.
Mayor Joris Hindryckx said the outbreak prompted a halt to “all social and sporting activities” in the town of around 10,000 people.
The source of the contamination is unknown, but the mayor said the infection must have been “indirect” as none of those testing positive was known to have travelled to Britain.
Brazil approves emergency use of two vaccines
Brazil’s health regulator, Anvisa, has approved the emergency use of two coronavirus vaccines during a politically-charged televised meeting that Brazilians watched with bated-breath.
The vaccines produced by Oxford/AstraZeneca and China’s Sinovac will both now be permitted in South America’s biggest country, which has the world’s second highest Covid death toll with more than 209,000 deaths. The decision was taken on Sunday afternoon after three of Anvisa’s five directors voted for the move.
The ruling is a major victory for Brazil’s 212 million citizens - reeling from one of the worst epidemics in the world - but a stinging political defeat for the Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro. Bolsonaro has failed to acquire any doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine and as a result vaccination with Sinovac’s CoronaVac is likely to begin on Sunday in São Paulo state. São Paulo is governed by one of the president’s biggest political rivals, João Doria, who has championed the Chinese vaccine.
Doria will reportedly offer the first shot to a local intensive care nurse called Mônica Calazans on Sunday, making a high-profile pronouncement he hopes will cement his image as Brazil’s Covid saviour in the public imagination.
“Brazil is in a rush to save lives,” Doria tweeted on Sunday afternoon. Bolsonaro’s Twitter account remained silent.
Updated
Italy’s health ministry has issued a correction on the number of cases reported on Sunday – the figure is 12,545, not 12,415 as previously reported. I’ll amend the previous post showing the incorrect figure now.
Emerging from Holy Family hospital in New Delhi, Ram Verma, a sanitation worker, breathed a deep sigh of relief. As one of the first in India to receive a coronavirus vaccine on Saturday – marking the start of the world’s largest vaccination programmes – he had been feeling a little jittery.
“I must admit I was nervous,” said Verma, who had received his Covaxin jab in a centre set up in the hospital car park. “A lot of us were. I thought I might faint or have side-effects. After all, it is something totally new. But I’m fine. There is nothing to worry about.”
Read Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Amrit Dhillon’s piece on India’s vaccination drive as the country’s 3,006 centres began the mammoth task of inoculating 300 million people by August.
The number of people in the UK to have been given a first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine is 3,857,266 as of 16 January, according to government data published on Sunday – marking a rise of 298,087 from Saturday’s figures.
Some 140,559 first doses have been given in Northern Ireland, on top of the 3,365,492 in England, 126,375 in Wales and 224,840 in Scotland.
So far, 449,736 second doses have been administered in the UK, including 426,102 in England, 129 in Wales, 20,174 in Northern Ireland and 3,331 in Scotland.
The total number of jabs administered in the UK, including both first and second doses, is 4,307,002.
Updated
The WHO has outlined its key reasons for investigating the origins of the virus: to prevent the reintroduction of the virus into the population, to prevent similar pandemics in future and to help develop more efficient treatments and vaccines.
Why is it important for scientists to look for the origins of the virus? Learn more about the team which is looking for the origins of the #COVID19 virus ⬇️#ScienceIn5 pic.twitter.com/aCBu7rhBKd
— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) January 17, 2021
Updated
Public confidence in the NHS’s ability to manage the huge number of people left seriously ill by the coronavirus pandemic has fallen to its lowest level since the outbreak began, new polling shows.
Just six out of 10 people believe the health service is able to care properly for those with Covid-19, more than 37,000 of whom are now in hospital. That is the lowest percentage since pollsters Ipsos Mori began asking Britons about the subject in March.
The proportion of people who are not confident in the NHS’s ability has risen to 35%, just 1% below the March peak of 36%.
Greece’s health authorities have announced 237 new infections, taking the country’s total 148,607 confirmed cases.
Today’s figure is significantly lower than last Sunday’s, when 445 new cases were reported, and is the smallest daily increase since October.
A further 28 people have died bringing the toll to 5,469, compared to 36 last Sunday.
Updated
Italy reported a further 12,545 coronavirus cases on Sunday, its health ministry said, while the country’s death toll rose by 377.
This compares to 18,625 and 361 fatalities last Sunday.
Italy has registered 82,177 deaths from Covid-19 since the virus came to light last February, the second-highest toll in Europe and the sixth-highest in the world, from 2.38 million confirmed cases.
Updated
Israel’s prisons service has said they will begin vaccinating all incarcerated people against Covid-19, including Palestinians, following calls from right groups, Palestinian officials and Israel’s attorney general.
Israel has given at least one vaccine dose to more than two million of its citizens, a pace widely described as the world’s fastest per capita. But the country came under fire when public security minister Amir Ohana said Palestinian prisoners would be the last to get inoculated.
Israel’s attorney general Avichai Mandelblit wrote to Ohana condemning the comment as “tainted with illegality”, Israel’s Ma’ariv newspaper reported.
Israeli and global rights groups, including Amnesty International, as well as the Palestine Liberation Organization have also issued public calls for Israel to vaccinate the estimated 4,400 Palestinians held in its jails.
Health minister Yuli Edelstein announced last week that the first vaccine doses would be distributed to prisons over the coming days.
Around 250 Palestinians in Israeli prisons have tested positive for the coronavirus, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club.
Updated
The United Arab Emirates has lowered the minimum age requirement to receive a Covid-19 vaccination to 16, from 18 previously, its ministry of health said.
The UAE, made of up seven emirates, is offering all residents and citizens free of charge a vaccine manufactured by Chinese state-backed pharmaceutical giant Sinopharm.
UK reports 38,598 cases, 671 deaths
There have been a further 38,598 lab-confirmed coronavirus cases in the UK, according to government data. This compares to 54,940 infections registered last Sunday and is the lowest number since 27 December.
A total of 3,395,959 people have tested positive.
A further 671 deaths within 28 days of a positive test were reported, bringing the total to 89,261. There were 563 last Sunday.
Sunday figures are often lower because of reporting delays over the weekend.
While the weekly number of cases has fallen by 22.5% compared to the previous seven days, the weekly death toll has risen by 23.1%. There have been 323,614 infections reported and 7,830 fatalities since 11 January.
Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies for deaths where Covid-19 has been mentioned on the death certificate, together with additional data on deaths that have occurred in recent days, show there have now been 105,000 deaths involving Covid-19 in the UK.
Updated
Hello, I’ll be running the blog for the next few hours. As always, you can reach me by email or Twitter DM with any tips or suggestions for coverage. Thanks in advance!
The US infections disease expert Anthony Fauci has raised the prospect of American authorities having to make “modifications” to vaccines to take account of any impact from a variant of Covid-19 which was initially identified in south east England.
Fauci said in an interview with NBC News that British authorities had made it very clear that the variant was more contagious, adding: “They say that it isn’t more virulent.”
“But, you know, we’ve got to be careful because the more cases you get, even though on a one-to-one basis it’s not more virulent, meaning it doesn’t make you more sick or more likely to die, just by numbers alone the more cases you have, the more hospitalisations you’re going to have,” he added.
“And the more hospitalisations you have, the more deaths you’re going to have. The thing we really want to look at carefully is that does that mutation lessen the impact of the vaccine?”
If it does, he said, “then we’re going to have to make some modifications. But we’re all over that. We’re looking at that really very carefully.”
Guatemalan soldiers have been clashing today with a caravan of as many as 9,000 Honduran migrants at a point not far from where they entered the country seeking to reach the US border.
Most had entered the country on Friday without showing the negative coronavirus test that Guatemala requires.
On Saturday, troops started forming ranks across a highway in Chiquimula, near the Honduras border, to block the migrants.
South Africa delays school re-openings
Faced with a rapid resurgence of Covid-19 overwhelming the country’s hospitals and driven by a more infectious variant of the virus, South Africa has delayed reopening its schools.
The variant is having far-reaching consequences for Africa’s most developed nation as several countries trying to prevent its spread have stopped or reduced flights with South Africa, AP reports.
South Africa has the highest prevalence of COVID-19 in Africa with a cumulative total of more than 1.3 million confirmed cases, including 36,851 deaths.
In the last 24 hours, the country has recorded 13,973 new infections and 348 deaths.
South Africa’s 7-day rolling average of daily new cases has risen over the past two weeks from 22 new cases per 100,000 people on Jan. 2 to 26 new cases per 100,000 people on Jan. 16, according to Johns Hopkins University.
“Given the pressure experienced by the health system in the past few weeks, occasioned by increased COVID-19 infections which has led to the second wave, the council of education ministers in conjunction with the national coronavirus command council and Cabinet has taken the decision to delay the reopening of both public and private schools,” said basic education deputy minister Reginah Mhaule.
A further 631 people who tested positive for Covid-19 have died in England, bringing the total number of confirmed reported deaths in hospitals in England to 60,921.
Patients were aged between 29 and 103 years old, according to a new statement from the National Health Service (NHS).
All except 31 (aged 46 to 93 years old) had known underlying health conditions.
Date of death ranged from 5 November last year to 16 January 2021, with the majority being on or after 12 January.
100 million vaccine doses in 100 days "absolutely doable" in US - Fauci
Joe Bidens promise that US healthcare workers will administer 100 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine in his presidency’s first 100 days is “absolutely doable,” according to Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
Fauci told Meet the Press on NBC News : What the president-elect is going to do is where need be, to invoke the DPA [Defence Production Act] to get the kinds of things they need.”
“Whatever they may be, be they tests, be they vaccines or what have you. In other words, to just not be hesitant to use whatever mechanisms we can to get everything on track and on the flow that we predict. But the feasibility of his goal is absolutely clear, there’s no doubt about it. That can be done.”
Police in the northern English city of Manchester say a minority of people still believe they are “above the law” as they broke up a number of house parties over the weekend.
Officers have issued 110 fixed-penalty notices for Covid-19 regulation breaches since 3pm on Friday, bringing the total issued in the Greater Manchester region to 2,600 since August.
Fines were handed out on Saturday night to partygoers at an address in Peregrine Street, Hulme, and at a property in Greengate, Salford, where police responded to reports of 30 people attending.
In the early hours of Sunday, police were called to reports of a disturbance and a party of more than 40 people at a flat in Derby Street, Cheetham Hill.
Chief Inspector Carol Martin, of Greater Manchester Police, said: “The majority of people across Greater Manchester are following the Government’s guidance - we would like to thank them for doing their bit throughout the pandemic. However, there is a minority who think they are above the law.”
Police break up demonstration in Amsterdam
Water cannon and mounted police have been used to break up a demonstration in Amsterdam against lockdown measures and the government’s handling of the pandemic.
Thousands of people gathered in Museumplein a public space in the museum’s quarter of Amsterdam.
Dutch police had said they were limiing the number of participants to 500 people and moved the protest to another location, Westerpark, but thousands still turned up.
One of the organisers of the protest - billed as ‘The Netherlands in Resistance’ - told the Dutch broadcaster NH that he did not agree with the decision to restrict the event.
“From day one I consulted with the municipality and the police. I did what they asked. And that was really a lot. I didn’t want to budge on two points, namely that we were allowed to stand on the Museumplein and the number of people,” said Michel Reijinga did not agree with this decision.
The protest comes in the wake of the resignation of the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and his entire Cabinet on Friday over a scandal involving investigations into child welfare payments that wrongly labeled thousands of parents as fraudsters.
In a nationally televised speech, Rutte said he had informed King Willem-Alexander of his decision and pledged that his government would continue work to compensate affected parents as quickly as possible and to battle the coronavirus.
NH, has footage here of events a little earlier in Amsterdam, and their aftermath.
Updated
Police have been breaking up anti-lockdown demonstrations in Amsterdam. Images and video are coming through on Twitter.
There was this from Manya Koetse, a Dutch journalist covering China:
Chaos in Amsterdam right now at #Museumplein, in front of Van Gogh Museum, as people protest against the covid19 measures in the Netherlands and its leadership. pic.twitter.com/csSSRWs60f
— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) January 17, 2021
Dutch authorities have been using social media to urge people to go home.
De driehoek kondigt per direct een noodbevel af. Dit betekent dat het voor niemand is toegestaan om op het Museumplein te verblijven.
— Gemeente Amsterdam (@AmsterdamNL) January 17, 2021
Ga naar huis en houd daarbij 1,5 meter afstand.
Updated
France is considering demanding Covid-19 tests for passengers from Ireland including truck drivers operating on a logistics route that has become key since Britain’s exit from the European Union, Ireland’s transport minister has said.
“They have indicated that they are looking for... anyone coming into France from Ireland would have to have” a PCR test, Irish Transport Minister Eamon Ryan told RTE radio, referring to a type of Covid-19 test that can take several days.
“They may go further. What they are looking at is the possibility that hauliers... would require an antigen test,” Ryan said, referring to another type of Covid-19 test that can give results in minutes.
An Australian Open tennis player has been warned for breaching strict isolation rules by “opening his door” to talk to his friends, as players complain about “insane” quarantine requirements ahead of the tournament.
Four people have now tested positive for Covid-19 on charter planes bringing players in for the competition, which has forced 47 players into strict isolation where they cannot train for 14 days. However, tournament director Craig Tiley has confirmed the year’s first Grand Slam will go ahead from 8 February despite anger from players forced into hard quarantine.
“We are reviewing the schedule leading in to see what we can do to assist these players,” Tiley told the Nine Network on Sunday.
“The Australian Open is going ahead and we will continue to do the best we possibly can do to ensure those players have the best opportunity.”
Earlier on Sunday, multiple players said they were misled about the rules for the tournament, were promised they would be allowed to train, and are risking injury ahead of the competition.
The Michelin Guide will tomorrow reveal its annual pick of France’s top restaurants despite criticism over its decision to hold the awards while establishments remain closed in the Covid-19 pandemic.
But three-star chefs can rest easy after Michelin said none will be demoted as the health crisis rages, the AFP news agency reports.
The industry bible’s boss Gwendal Poullennec defended inspections that led to 57 new stars overall, even though restaurants remain shuttered after lockdowns imposed last spring and again since October.
“It’s an important decision to support the industry, despite the current situation and perhaps even because of the situation,” Poullennec told AFP.
“All the establishments that have kept their star this year or won one are restaurants that fully deserve it,” he said.
Michelin has drawn fire for bestowing its verdicts as chefs rack up losses while adapting their menus for takeaway or deliveries - and food fans have little chance of booking tables anytime soon, with or without face masks.
The rival Best 50 list, based in Britain, cancelled its 2020 ranking last year, while France’s La Liste said this month that instead of rankings it would honour innovative chefs who have persevered amid the pandemic.
Michelin called off the lavish gala ceremony that was to be held in Cognac, southwest France - the first time outside Paris - and instead will announce the 2021 winners in a YouTube broadcast from the Eiffel Tower.
Michelin was challenged on social media about how the results would be formulated
Mais les restaurants en 2020 ont été fermés plus de la moitié de l'année ! Les résultats reposent sur quoi ?
— Le Chef Anto (@LeChefAnto) January 13, 2021
Updated
A leading British epidemiologist has criticised the UK government’s “pretty lax” approach to quarantining foreign arrivals and contacts of coronavirus cases, as ministers pledged to “beef up” checks.
Professor John Edmunds, a member of the Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said that if there is a quarantine policy it should be made “as effective as you possibly can”.
The Sunday Times reported that ministers were considering introducing quarantine hotels and using technology to ensure people isolate, amid concern over new strains of coronavirus arriving from overseas.
But Prof Edmunds told Times Radio: “If you’re going to have quarantine then you should probably make it as effective as you possibly can.”
“Ours has been rather lax, not just for visitors coming into the UK the vast majority of whom do not have covid but we’ve also been rather lax with our quarantine of individuals who have been in direct contact with a case; indigenous cases. We’ve been pretty lax about that.”
That’s it from me, Caroline Davies. Thank you for your time. Handing back now to my colleague Ben Quinn.
Lebanon finalised a deal with Pfizer on Sunday for 2.1 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine amid surge in infections that has overwhelmed the country’s health care system, Associated Press reports.
The doses are to arrive in Lebanon starting early February, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.
The government’s statement said the Pfizer vaccines will be complemented with another 2.7 million doses from the U.N.-led program to provide for countries in need. It gave no date for when those doses are expected to arrive but said the agreement was signed in October.
People in Wales have been urged to stick to coronavirus lockdown rules as the “significant task” of vaccinating adults continues.
Dr Eleri Davies, incident director for the coronavirus outbreak response at Public Health Wales, said people should adopt the “same mindset” for the current lockdown as they did in March 2020.
In a statement released on Sunday afternoon, Dr Davies said: “Vaccinating the adult population of Wales, to protect people from severe disease, is a significant task and the vaccine will take time to reach everyone
“The effects of the vaccines may not be seen nationally for some time and we must continue to follow the advice on keeping Wales safe.”
It comes following criticism of the Welsh government over the past week for vaccinating fewer people in proportion to its population than the other home nations.
The House of Commons Welsh Affairs Committee heard on Thursday that the ratio of people receiving the first dose of the vaccine per 100,000 was 3,215. This compared to 3,514 in Scotland, 4,005 in England and 4,828 in Northern Ireland.
In the UK, half of all over-80s have been vaccinated against coronavirus, health secretary Matt Hancock has Tweeted.
I'm delighted that over half of all over-80s have been vaccinated.
— Matt Hancock (@MattHancock) January 17, 2021
Each jab brings us one step closer to normal.
Stay at home. Protect the NHS. Save lives.
Joe Biden will sign a series of executive orders in his first days in office, attempting to roll back damage done at home and abroad by Donald Trump, whom the Democrat will replace as president on Wednesday.
Biden, 78, has already outlined plans to send an immigration bill and a Covid stimulus and relief package to a newly Democratic-controlled Congress. On Friday he said he would shake up the delivery of vaccines against Covid-19, mired in chaos under Trump.
Biden plans to return the US to the Paris climate accords and the Iran nuclear deal, overturn Trump’s travel ban against some Muslim-majority countries, restrict evictions and foreclosures under the pandemic and institute a mask mandate on federal property.
In a memo released on Saturday, incoming White House chief of staff Ron Klain said: “These actions will change the course of Covid-19, combat climate change, promote racial equity and support other underserved communities, and rebuild our economy in ways that strengthen the backbone of this country: the working men and women who built our nation.
“While the policy objectives in these executive actions are bold, I want to be clear: the legal theory behind them is well-founded and represents a restoration of an appropriate, constitutional role for the president.”
Read more:
Restrictions are “possible” next winter if other countries don’t reach sufficient vaccination levels, a UK leading scientist has warned. Imperial College’s Prof Azra Ghani told Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday:
It is possible. We are very much hoping that the vaccine will enable us really to go back to as normal a life as possible but we have to remember that the virus is still circulating globally and even if the UK is fully vaccinated, it is likely that we will get importations continue and that’s why it is also incredibly important that we support wider efforts to ensure vaccination is available to all countries.”
She said that cases in the UK are coming down:
We have started to see a small decline in cases in some areas and that certainly is positive news that the current restrictions that are in place are having the effect that we hoped.”
Asked if the restrictions which have brought this drop in cases are the national lockdown or previous Tier 4 rules, she said:
Both will have had some effect in slowing the growth in cases. The most important thing that we’re seeing now is actually a decline in case numbers and that’s what we really need to accelerate as far as possible because it is of course saving people’s lives and avoiding unnecessary illness for all of these individuals who have been infected.”
She also warned that the vaccine rollout may need to ramp up further:
We have obviously exceeded levels of around two million a week that we were initially aiming for and the hope is that the most vulnerable will be protected in the near term. We have to remember that once we get towards springtime, we also have to give those second doses out so essentially the numbers will need to double to ensure that people become fully protected.”
Updated
Today is a crunch day for Brazil with its health regulator set to decide whether to approve the emergency use of two vaccines that could help control one of the world’s most deadly coronavirus outbreaks.
Anvisa’s five directors will vote on whether to permit the use of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine and Sinovac’s CoronaVac shot at an extraordinary session starting at 10am local time (1pm GMT). The meeting, which could last up to five hours, will be broadcast live on social media in an indication of its massive political importance.
The decision comes at a critical moment. More than 209,000 Brazilians have died because of Covid-19, the second highest number after the US, and Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro is facing growing public anger over his response and failure to begin any kind of vaccination campaign. Latin American neighbours such as Mexico, Chile and Argentina have all started administering shots but Brazil has failed to do so, despite boasting a world-renowned immunisation program.
Last week’s deadly oxygen crisis in the Amazon city of Manaus has sparked renewed calls for Bolsonaro’s impeachment and loud pot-banging protests in major cities.
On Saturday, on the eve of Anvisa’s vote, demonstrators projected Bolsonaro’s image onto the regulator’s headquarters alongside slogans demanding the removal of a president they described as a “genocidal devil”.
Sunday’s decision puts Bolsonaro in a political fix. He had hoped to start vaccination next week using the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot - and had reportedly planned to do so at a ceremony in the presidential palace. But Brazil has failed to import those vaccines from India, despite trying to send a plane there last week. That means Bolsonaro’s only option, if it is approved today, will be to use the CoronaVac shot, which has been championed by his main presidential rival João Doria. Bolsonaro has repeatedly tried to undermine what he calls the “Chinese vaccine” but now may have no choice but to use it.
In the UK, the Labour opposition has urged government ministers to make May’s elections in England more Covid-secure, after the emergence of a Cabinet Office document which warned the pandemic could severely hamper the process and put millions off voting.
The paper raises the possibility that even if coronavirus infection levels are relatively low, it could be difficult to attract enough election staff, and that safety fears may “disenfranchise large proportions of [the] community”.
Labour is calling for safeguards such as the possibility of spreading voting over several days, or having an all-postal vote, options that have been prepared for elections to the Scottish parliament, also due to take place on 6 May.
Read more here:
Covid-19 has killed at least 2,022,740 people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019, according to a tally from official sources compiled by the AFP news agency on Sunday.
At least 94,450,660 cases of coronavirus have been registered. Of these, at least 57,561,300 are now considered recovered.
These figures are based on daily tolls provided by health authorities in each country and excludes later re-evaluations by statistical organisations, as has happened in Russia, Spain and Britain.
On Saturday, 13,870 new deaths and 658,387 new cases were recorded worldwide.
Based on latest reports, the countries with the most new deaths were the United States with 3,761 new deaths, followed by United Kingdom with 1,295 and Mexico with 1,219.
The United States is the worst-affected country with 395,851 deaths from 23,758,856 cases.
Hi. Caroline Davies here, taking over the blog for a short while. You can get in touch on caroline.davies@theguardian.com
The UAE reported a record number of Covid-19 cases for the sixth day in a row as health officials confirmed 3,453 infections on Sunday, the National reported.
It brought the total number of infections in the emirates to 253,261. UAE has embarked on a major vaccination drive, with the Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine approved for nationwide use on December 9.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was introduced two weeks later.
Local authority employees in Cape Town claim they have been denied the right to self-isolate after experiencing Covid-19 related symptoms, according to a report in the Weekend Argus.
An Independent Municipal Trade Union representative told the Cape Town newspaper that the employees reported for duty but experienced Covid-19 symptoms.
They were said to have informed their superiors but were told they could only self-isolate after producing a Covid-19-positive lab result.
The Canadian government has urged Pfizer-BioNTech to get the country’s Covid-19 vaccine delivery schedule back on track as quickly as possible as cases of the virus went past the 700,000 mark this weekend, the Globe and Mail report.
Canada reached that mark less than two weeks after recording 600,000 cases of the virus on 3 January. Seven provinces recorded 6,479 cases on Saturday, pushing Canada’s national tally over 702,000.
Anita Anand, the government minister heading up procurement, said on Twitter that she understood concerns about Pfizer’s decision to delay international vaccine shipments for four weeks as it undertakes an upgrade.
I understand and share the concerns of Canadians regarding the temporary delivery delay of Pfizer doses. Canada's shipment of Pfizer vaccines for the week of January 18 remains largely unaffected. (1/3)
— Anita Anand (@AnitaOakville) January 16, 2021
Updated
There were no tests at arrivals on Saturday morning at Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 2 – though that changes on Monday as stricter measures finally come into force.
Instead, little dribbles of bleary-eyed passengers from places as far afield as Mumbai, Frankfurt and Kigali slipped quietly through the somnambulant arrivals lounge and out into the soggy grey vista of England in January.
“Just like normal,” said Natalie Fernandes, flying in from India. “No problems at all.”
Serg Tswlnitsky, arriving from Warsaw, echoed much the same sentiment. “No tests or anything,” he said from behind his mask, with what may or may not have been a satisfied smile.
Nor, said a number of passengers, were they given advice on self-isolation or anything to do with Covid. There was an inconspicuous board at the end of the arrivals walk addressed to those who have “just arrived in the UK”. It advised people to stay indoors as much as possible and to stay alert.
But then there was also another board which announced that “One person only to meet arriving passengers”, and almost everyone ignored that, with groups of twos and threes waiting to greet arriving family and friends.
Oman is to close its land borders for one week from Monday to curb the spread of Covid-19, state news agency ONA said today.
The measure will come into effect from 6pm local time (1400 GMT) on Monday and can be extended for longer than the initial one week closure, ONA said, citing a decision by the Gulf state’s coronavirus emergency committee.
#عاجل
— وكالة الأنباء العمانية (@OmanNewsAgency) January 17, 2021
اللجنة العليا المكلّفة ببحث آلية التعامل مع التطورات الناتجة عن انتشار فيروس #كورونا كوفيد19 تقرر إغلاق المنافذ البرّية لـ #السلطنة لمدة أسبوع قابلة للتمديد بدءا من الساعة السادسة من مساء يوم غدٍ الإثنين. pic.twitter.com/7cnZ1TeGVM
Milan fashion week is virtual this year, but the fashion giant Fendi has a six-minute menswear showstopper focusing on lockdown comfort.
The first outfit in Fendi’s latest luxury menswear line-up was showcased on Saturday in a music video-style film streamed from a digital-only Milan fashion week.
It starred the padded olive silk inner lining of a coat – “the softest part”, said Silvia Fendi – with the smart, structured top layer removed.
“This is therapeutic fashion,” explained Fendi, the men’s and accessories creative director of the brand founded by her grandparents 96 years ago, speaking via Zoom from her Milan studio. “It’s impossible to talk about fashion and not to talk about what’s happening in the world right now. It changes the clothes and it changes the way they are presented.”
Vaccines can be “fixed” in a short period of time to cope with new variants of Covid-19, a professor of molecular biology at the University of Siena has told the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.
Synthetic vaccines of the type being used Italy and elsewhere can be re-modeled within two month, said Rino Rappuoli, who is co-ordinating a monoclonal antibody treatment to heal Covid-19 patients and prevent infection.
“We do not now know for sure if the vaccine also defends against variants, even if the scientific community is cautiously optimistic,” he told Corriere della Sera.
“Generally, it is good to reiterate it, vaccines guarantee a higher immunity than that derived from natural infection. We should therefore have a higher safety margin.”
Play charities are calling for councils to keep playgrounds open during lockdown in England, as many are closed due to fears that they encourage people to “congregate and socialise”.
In a letter from Play England to all local authorities in England, several experts who work with children say that playgrounds should stay open “to reduce the catastrophic impact of Covid and lockdown on children’s physical and mental health and wellbeing”.
Stevenage council closed 54 playgrounds last week after a rise in cases in the area, including among children and young people. Jim McManus, director of public health at Hertfordshire county council, said: “Nobody wants to do this but the virus is circulating so much we don’t have a choice.”
Three out of four ambulance staff in England are at “breaking point”, suffering low morale and calling for better protective equipment, a new study suggests.
The GMB union said almost two out of three of 2,000 of its members surveyed said they believed their PPE should be upgraded.
Three out of four respondents said ambulance workers were at “breaking point”, with the crisis much worse than when the lockdown first started last March. The responses included:
- “We had a taxi pull up in an ambulance bay with a dead male while his wife was shouting for help.- “It’s very scary for us all.”
“In 24 years in the ambulance service I’ve never ever seen staff sat on station at the start of the shift so frightened (almost to tears) to go out on an ambulance.”
Reaction has been coming today from Russian sources after Brazil’s health regulator said it was seeking further data on Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine before considering its approval for emergency use.
Documents supporting drugmaker Uniao Quimica’s application for emergency use of the vaccine have been returned to the company because they did not meet its minimum criteria, the watchdog said on Saturday.
In a statement on the Health Ministry’s website, regulator Anvisa said the request failed to provide adequate assurances on Phase III clinical trials and issues related to the manufacture of the vaccine.
Russia’s RDIF sovereign wealth fund, which is promoting Sputnik globally, on Sunday said that Anvisa had requested additional information that would be provided shortly.
Its statement said that such requests from regulators were standard procedure and do not mean the registration bid has been rejected. It also said that legislation going through the Brazilian Senate, if approved, would allow use of vaccines approved by other countries.
Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, who has said he will personally refuse any Covid-19 vaccine, has meanwhile cast doubt on the effectiveness and safety of a vaccination that will be rolled out in Brazil as the country’s death toll passed 200,000 this week.
While people over 75 living at home will be able to get vaccinated from Monday in France, there are concerns in the field that there are not enough doctors, Le Monde reports today.
Jacques Battistoni, president of MG France, a trade union for general practitioners, said: “We expect tensions and a difficult start to the week.”
France, which crossed 70,000 Covid-19 deaths on the weekend, is set to begin a campaign to inoculate people over 75 from Monday.
But the concerns about staffing come on top of worries about supply as Pfizer tried to ease concerns in Europe about deliveries of its coronavirus vaccine.
Worries have grown that delays in the delivery of Pfizer-BioNTech shots could hamper a European vaccine rollout which has already faced heavy criticism across the continent.
Work is ongoing at the Pfizer plant in Belgium to increase capacity, and the firm and its German partner BioNTech said Saturday it would allow them to “significantly” scale up vaccine production in the second quarter.
Deliveries would be back to the original schedule to the EU from January 25, they pledged.
Despite a “stabilising” of infections in some parts of England, there is still an increase in infections among people over the age of 60 elsewhere, the chief executive of Britain’s National Health Service has said.
Simon Stevens also said in an interview on BBC 1 that despite “promising signs” of a steadying of infection rates they were still far too high and were on the up in some places.
A patient was being admitted to hospital with Covid-19 every 30 seconds, he told the BBC journalist Andrew Marr.
Asked if he was in favour of vaccines being delivered 24/7 - a subject of some debate in the UK - Stevens said the health service “would absolutely do that” once vaccine supplies made sense for that to happen.
Updated
Ireland is facing its longest lockdown yet, with more months of restrictions as the country’s health service struggles to cope with thousands of Covid-19 cases, the Sunday Independent reports.
The Irish government is only expected to allow schools and the construction sector to reopen before March, reports the Dublin-based newspaper, and even this is dependent on the number of new cases and the situation in hospitals.
A senior government source told the paper that there was “50-50” on whether there will be an easing of restrictions on the education and construction sectors next month.
A separate report said more than a hundred people have been handed on-the-spot fines for breaking lockdown travel rules this weekend in County Wicklow, a county neighbouring Dublin which has traditionally drawn weekend day-trippers.
The figure was close to triple the number of fines issued nationwide up to Thursday, according to Breakingnews.ie.
Irish police have been carrying out operations the uplands of Wicklow to prevent people going there to exercise and view snowfalls, despite a lockdown rule preventing people from travelling 5km from home.
Updated
Every UK adult to be offered first dose of vaccine by September - minister
Every adult in the UK will be offered a first dose of a coronavirus vaccine by September, Britain’s Foreign Minister has pledged.
Dominic Raab said it would be “great” if the rollout could be faster but that the Government was working to the early autumn target.
In an interview on Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday, Raab said: “Our target is by September to have offered all the adult population a first dose. If we can do it faster than that, great, but that’s the roadmap.”
He said that he hoped by the “early spring” some restrictions can be lifted “gradually” so the country can “get back to normal”.
Coronavirus outbreaks have spread through US immigration detention centres, with at least 8,000 reported cases.
The impact has been devastating for people like Alvaro Hernandes, who saw his wife and recently born twin daughters for the last time through a video call on 5 January before he was deported from immigration detention in Kansas to Guatemala, after living in the US for 12 years.
Shortly after Hernandes and his wife brought their two newborn daughters from the hospital in June 2020, he was detained for being undocumented and handed over to immigration customs enforcement by a local sheriff after he called 911 when he was unable to get in contact with his wife for a brief period of time and wasn’t aware there was a non-emergency number for the police.
Despite testimonials from family members, friends, his longtime boss and landlord, an immigration court in Kansas City, Missouri, ordered the deportation to proceed, citing a 2008 DUI conviction.
Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Hernandes’s family has only been able to speak with him through expensive video calls and collect phone calls. While imprisoned, Hernandes also contracted coronavirus.
Britain’s move to restrict travel corridors was taken so that it would not find its vaccine programme “was in peril” as a result of new variants of Covid-19 emerging in South Africa, Brazil and elsewhere, Britain’s Foreign Minister Dominic Raab also said in an interview with the Andrew Marr show on BBC 1.
Asked about reports that the UK is among countries facing delays in delivery of the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine, Britain’s foreign minister has said that he is “not aware there has been a delay beyond the flexibility” built into the vaccine programme.
The US pharmaceutical firm is increasing production at its plant in Puurs, Belgium, in an effort to produce more doses than originally planned for 2021, temporarily reducing deliveries to all European countries.
Shipments of the vaccine, produced in partnership with Germany’s BioNTech, to the UK are set to be affected this month. The UK has secured 40 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.
European governments have said the credibility of their vaccination programmes are at risk due to Pfizer’s decision.
“This situation is unacceptable,” the health and social affairs ministers of six EU states – Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia – said in a letter to the EU commission.
Moderna will deliver 7.5 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to Switzerland in batches in the months ahead, putting the country among the world leaders in inoculating its population, the head of Moderna’s European business said.
“We are working at full speed to steadily expand our production capacities. If everything goes as planned, just under half the population could be treated with our vaccine by the summer,” Dan Staner told the SonntagsBlick newspaper in an interview.
Staner said Switzerland would not get privileged treatment because it was the first country to chose Moderna as a supplier.
“Every country deserves equal treatment. We refrain from stockpiling vaccines and delivering them only when a country orders them. Every dose that is produced is delivered immediately, according to the contract,” he said.
“People are suffering in the same way all over the world. In times like these no one deserves special treatment.”
Swiss regulators have approved vaccines from Moderna and from Pfizer with partner BioNTech. They are still reviewing a vaccine from AstraZeneca.
Final results from the trials of Moderna’s vaccine against Covid-19 confirm it has 94% efficacy and nobody who was vaccinated with it developed severe disease, the company said in November.
On reports that every adult in Britain will get offered a vaccination by the end of June, Britain’s foreign minister said the plan was to get that done by September.
“If we can do it faster, then great” he told Sky News.
Quoting government sources the Sunday Telegraph reported today that officials were planning to vaccinate four to five million people a week within months.
Raab declined to confirm suggestions that a cabinet deal has been done to approve a three-point plan to begin lifting lockdown restrictions in England as soon as early March.
Asked about the report in the Sunday Times, Raab said the government hoped to be in a position to make those decisions in early Sspring, but he didn’t believe lockdown restrictions would be lifted in a “big bang.”
He believed that it would be done by phasing out the existing approach which is based on different tiers of restrictions applying to different areas at a given time.
Raab was also asked about whether people should be going on holiday at the moment and, after some pressing, said that they should not.
Current Covid-19 restrictions from the UK government says that members fo the public must not leave home or travel, including internationally, unless they have a legally permitted reason to do so.
Updated
UK government 'considering all measures' on quarantine for travellers
The UK’s foreign minister has said the government is considering “all measures” after he was asked to confirm a report today that plans are to be made for the creation of quarantine hotels for those arriving in Britain.
Dominic Raab said the UK government was responding to the new variants emerging from South Africa and Brazil, as well as preparing for others.
“We don’t quite know yet. We have got some of the best experts across the world but we need to check whether those new variants create new pressure on the NHS [Britain health service] or undermine the vaccine programme,” he told Sky News.
After Britain moved last week to close travel corridors, the Sunday Times reports today that Downing Street believes the biggest threat to opening up is the growing number of mutant viruses around the world — some of which might be immune to the three vaccines Britain has bought.
It reported that civil servants were ordered to study New Zealand’s policy of “directed isolation” where everyone arriving is charged for a stay at an airport hotel and forced to remain in isolation for two weeks.
Updated
Russia has reported 23,586 new coronavirus cases today, including 4,012 in Moscow, which plans to reopen public schools on Monday after an extended New Year break.
Russia’s coronavirus crisis centre confirmed 481 deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the national Covid-19 death toll to 65,566.
Austria will extend its Covid-19 lockdown until 8 February the country’s APA news agency reported, citing sources familiar with negotiations between the federal and regional governments on Saturday.
The curbs on public life were supposed to end on 24 January, but health officials have warned that infection rates remain too high to start easing restrictions at this stage.
The government has scheduled a news conference for 1000 GMT to discuss its latest measures.
Austria, a country of 8.9 million people, is in its third lockdown, with only essential shops open. The country has reported nearly 390,00 coronavirus cases and almost 7,000 Covid-19-linked deaths since the pandemic began last year.
Along with believing that takeaway coffee shops, cafes and children’s nurseries should be shut in England, a majority of voters now say lockdown rules should be tightened on outside exercise with a ban on people walking or exercising with anyone from a different household.
The findings are in line with a growing view among voters that the government is not responding fast or strongly enough to the virus.
The proportion who think ministers are under-reacting is now 51% (+7 points) compared with a week ago, while the proportion who think they haven’t reacted quickly enough is 75%, (up 3) on last week and the highest Opinium has recorded. This latter figure includes 60% of people who voted Conservative at the last general election in December 2019.
Some 51% believe takeaway coffee shops and cafes should close while 61% say it is time for nurseries to shut. There are broadly similar majorities in favour of tighter rules on outside exercise (53%), with 55% supporting the suspension of click and collect services in all but essential shops.
Good morning from London where this is Ben Quinn picking up the live blog now to continue brining you global coverage as well as news here in UK.
Amid figure that continue to be grim, the British government is also insisting t that there are positive developments with the health minister, Matt Hancock, saying that the UK is “nearly on the home straight.”
Some 324,000 doses of coronavirus vaccines have administered in the space of 24 hours, he said, while ten further mass vaccination centres are due to open in England this week with more than a million over-80s invited to receive their coronavirus jab.
But new research this weekend suggests that a “significant” proportion of frontline doctors in England face “ongoing distress” after working in the high pressure conditions of the coronavirus pandemic’s first wave.
The UK’s largest academic union has meanwhile warned that lecturers will not resume “unsafe” face-to-face teaching this academic year, and any attempt by the government or vice-chancellors to reopen campuses in February will fail.
The question of whether restrictions should be tightened further is also likely to continue to be debated today. Most people now believe takeaway coffee shops, cafes and children’s nurseries should be closed in a further tightening of the national lockdown, according to the latest Opinium poll for the Observer.
You can flag up any news stories which you think we’re missing today by contacting me on Twitter at @BenQuinn75
I’ll be handing over to my colleague, Ben Quinn, shortly. Here is a short summary of the latest developments.
- UK university lecturers will not resume “unsafe” face-to-face teaching this academic year, and any attempt by the government or vice-chancellors to reopen campuses in February will fail, the country’s largest academic union has warned.
- Indonesian authorities began a vaccination drive in Jakarta on Thursday, aiming to reach 7.9 million people – more than 75% of the population, while India kicked off one of the world’s largest drives, aiming to inoculate 300 million people by July.
- Joe Biden will sign a raft of executive orders immediately once he’s in office, including several relating to the US Covid-19 epidemic.
- Brazil recorded 61,567 new coronavirus cases on Saturday and 1,050 further deaths, marking the fifth consecutive day with more than 1,000 fatalities, the health ministry said on Saturday.
- It took just six weeks for the world to report the most recent 500,000 deaths from Covid-19, after death rates began to rise sharply in November 2020 in both Europe and North America, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
- Australia is investigating reports Norwegian authorities are concerned about the safety of the Pfizer vaccine after a number of elderly people died after being inoculated.
- In Australia the health minister is nudging state governments to ease internal border restrictions as he declared the removal of the last Covid-19 hotspot in Australia.
-
The UK government posted the third-highest daily death toll from coronavirus on Saturday, but the number of new infections dropped to its lowest level this year.
- Denmark has registered its first case of infection with a more transmissible coronavirus variant, first found in South Africa, known as B.1.351/501Y.
- France on Saturday implemented a 6pm curfew intended to help stem the spread of infections, after the country’s death toll rose to over 70,000, the seventh highest death toll in the world.
In the first of a new series, leading Cambridge professor David Spiegelhalter measures Covid-19’s impact.
How many people have died because of the pandemic? How does this vary across countries? These are two of the most common questions I get asked and yet they are remarkably difficult to answer.
We could start by looking at the number of Covid deaths listed on a website and compare countries by Covid deaths per million population. But this assumes the way countries record a death as “Covid” is consistent and ignores any deaths caused by lockdown measures and disruption to health services. It’s fairer to look at what has happened to the total number of deaths.
Thousands of workers feel pressured to return to their jobs when they still risk spreading coronavirus, and employers who breach Covid guidelines are avoiding serious punishment, according to evidence of major weaknesses in England’s lockdown measures.
One in 10 of those doing insecure work, such as zero-hours contracts and agency or gig economy jobs, said they had been to work within 10 days of a positive Covid test, according to research seen by the Observer. For workers overall the proportion is around one in 25.
More than one in nine workers said they had been ordered back to their workplace when they could have worked from home, according to the survey, carried out for the Royal Society for Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA).
Read more:
Thailand reports 374 new Covid cases
Thailand reported 374 new coronavirus cases on Sunday, taking its total infections to 12,054.
No death was reported, while 10 of the new cases were imported from abroad, Thailand’s Covid-19 taskforce said at a briefing. Thailand has recorded 70 coronavirus-related deaths since a year ago.
Updated
UK lecturers warn of strike over 'unsafe' teaching
In the UK university lecturers will not resume “unsafe” face-to-face teaching this academic year, and any attempt by the government or vice-chancellors to reopen campuses in February will fail, the country’s largest academic union has warned.
The University and College Union will ballot its members to strike against the resumption of in-person teaching, should any university attempt to organise the return of its staff to campuses over the next six months while staff feel it is unsafe.
The move comes as the National Union of Students demands that universities stop charging students fees and offer them rent rebates while they are unable to use their accommodation, with thousands planning rent strikes.
Updated
Tokyo reports 1,592 new Covid cases
Tokyo reported 1,592 new coronavirus cases on Sunday, its government said.
Japan expanded a state of emergency in the capital area to seven more prefectures on Wednesday to stem a surge in Covid-19 infections.
Updated
Brazilian health regulator Anvisa said on Saturday it sent back documents submitted by pharmaceutical company Uniao Quimica seeking approval for emergency use of the Russian Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine because they did not meet the minimum criteria required.
In a statement on the Health Ministry website, Anvisa said the firm’s request failed to provide adequate assurances on its Phase III clinical trials and issues related to the manufacture of the vaccine.
Anvisa officials had said previously that the Sputnik V vaccine would have to be submitted to Phase III clinical trials in Brazil before its use can be authorised.
In its statement, Anvisa also said that any applicant requesting emergency use authorisation must show its ongoing clinical trials of the vaccine will deliver long-term safety and effectiveness.
Uniao Quimica sought approval for the use of 10 million doses of Sputnik V in Brazil in the first quarter of this year. Anvisa is expected to decide on authorising emergency use of the vaccines developed by China’s Sinovac and Britain’s AstraZeneca on Sunday. (Reuters)
Cyprus cats out in the cold during pandemic
At a cat sanctuary set in picturesque hills near Paphos, on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, volunteers are grappling with a surge in abandonments they blame on the coronavirus pandemic.
“There has been an increase of about 30% of previously owned, loved (and) looked-after cats that have been left behind” as people depart the island, lamented Dawn Foote, 48, who runs the Tala Cats rescue centre.
Some among Cyprus’s large expatriate and dual resident communities have retreated home as the economic squeeze has tightened, she noted.
“People, at the moment, have just got no money, and it’s expensive to get a cat to another country – you’ve got passports to pay for, you’ve got transport carriers to pay,” Foote said.
“It’s heartbreaking,” she told AFP, saying abandonments were rising island-wide, in part also due to locals no longer being able to afford pet food or vet bills.
The government imposed a nationwide lockdown from January 10, Cyprus’s second since the pandemic began, after Covid-19 infections surged.
The closure of restaurants - choice locations for feline scavengers - has further compounded the misery for many of the island’s feline residents, whose numbers dwarf the human population, according to at least one animal welfare organisation.
Meanwhile, the rehousing of animals, many of whom find their “forever homes” abroad, has become more difficult, a trend confirmed to AFP by a dog sanctuary near the capital Nicosia.
Fewer cargo flights, higher transport costs and the repeated closure of sanctuaries to visitors are making it harder to win would-be owners’ hearts.
As a result, there are now some 800 cats prowling the grounds at Tala Cats, situated on land owned by the nearby Agios Neophytos Monastery.
You can read the full AFP report here.
Updated
Tennis stars face tough South Australia coronavirus rules
Tennis stars and support staff currently quarantining in Adelaide will be subject to South Australia’s strict coronavirus measures should any test positive ahead of an event later this month, premier Steven Marshall says.
A host of the world’s leading players, including Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams, flew into Adelaide last week ahead of a one-day exhibition tournament at Memorial Drive on 29 January.
They are all in hotel quarantine and have special arrangements in place to allow them to train over the next two weeks.
Premier Steven Marshall says there’s no suggestion any of the players or their support crews have tested positive at this stage.
But he says if they do, they will be moved to Adelaide’s dedicated Covid-19 facility along with other active infections.
“There is very tight scrutiny around the people who have come into South Australia,” Marshall said on Sunday.
“We have very strict protocols in place in regard to anybody infected with the coronavirus.
“The reality is, it would be impossible for somebody who has contracted this disease to be out and about in public.
“We would have to have them very securely supervised, there would be no more training for them.”
Updated
Extra charter flights to Australia additional to cap, acting foreign affairs minister says
The Australian federal government expects hundreds of Australians stranded overseas will be brought home on the 20 flights it is chartering in coming months. Seats will be given as a priority where possible to people who are in special need.
There are some 37,000 Australians registered with the Department of Foreign Affairs and trade who want to return home.
Acting foreign affairs minister Simon Birmingham announced the plan on Saturday to get more Australians home on flights running between 31 January and 31 March.
He told Sydney’s 2GB radio on Sunday the actual number of passengers will depend on the quarantine arrangements at the time.
Special arrangements are in place for the Northern Territory, the ACT and Tasmania to activate additional sites for quarantine that can take those people on the 20 flights.
The decision for the chartered flights came after the Emirates airline withdrew services to the east coast, coinciding with Australia’s national cabinet agreeing to reduce the cap on returning overseas travellers due to quarantine restraints in NSW, Queensland and Western Australia.
“But the capacity that Emirates had under that cap will be reallocated to the other airlines, to Qatar, to Singapore, to others who are still flying,” Birmingham said.
“And importantly, these 20 facilitated flights the government will undertake will come in over and above the cap.”
Birmingham, who is also the finance minster, expects travellers on the government flights will be making a contribution for their travel.
“It doesn’t cover the full cost of the flights, but we do expect people to make essentially a contribution into buying an airline ticket,” he said.
“Obviously, there are some circumstances where we may recognise an exceptional case of difficulty or hardship or otherwise. We have already distributed some $15m in hardship payments to vulnerable Australians overseas.”
“So clearly, those parts of the world where there are larger numbers of Australians, where it is difficult in terms of the Covid situation present are the ones that historically we’ve seen a lot of these facilitated flights come from,” he said.
“So the UK, occasionally parts of Europe, India, and I would expect that there would still be a good number of them from similar countries.”
Updated
In a sign of how quickly things change, Singapore – which was opening up to some tourists and signing travel bubble arrangements not so long ago – is hardening its border entry rules for arrivals.
- From 11.59pm 24 January all travellers, including Singapore citizens and permanent residents, will have to take a Covid-19 PCR test when they arrive
- From 11.59pm 18 January all returning citizens and PRs from Britain and South Africa will be subject to an additional seven-day self-isolation at their place of residence, following their 14-day SHN at dedicated facilities
- From 11.59pm 31 January, short-term visitors must have travel insurance that would cover all treatment for Covid-19, and anyone applying to enter Singapore under the air travel pass and reciprocal green lane arrangements must have have a minimum coverage of $30,000 for their Covid-19-related medical treatment and hospitalisation costs.
Updated
One year on from Australia’s first case, there have been almost 30,000 cases in Australia and just over 900 deaths.
Vaccines are being rolled out globally, with vulnerable Australians to receive their first dose in February.
Queensland and New South Wales are managing clusters sparked by hotel quarantine leaks, but Australia’s position is enviable when compared to the almost 2m deaths and more than 90m cases globally, and the overflowing morgues, exhausted healthcare workers and prolonged and repeated lockdowns being navigated by other countries.
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Coronavirus was found on ice cream produced in eastern China, prompting a recall of cartons from the same batch, according to the government.
The Daqiaodao Food Co, in Tianjin, adjacent to Beijing, was sealed and its employees were being tested for the coronavirus, a city government statement said. There was no indication anyone had contracted the virus from the ice cream.
Most of the 29,000 cartons in the batch had yet to be sold, the government said. It said 390 sold in Tianjin were being tracked down and authorities elsewhere were notified of sales to their areas.
The ingredients included New Zealand milk powder and whey powder from Ukraine, the government said.
The Chinese government has suggested the disease, first detected in the central city of Wuhan in late 2019, came from abroad and has highlighted what it says are discoveries of the coronavirus on imported fish and other food, though foreign scientists are sceptical.
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Correction: Australian Open players not fined – yet
A correction: earlier we reported that Victoria’s quarantine commissioner Emma Cassar said two people – including a player – had been given fines for breaching isolation.
Cassar actually said the players had “breached” their quarantine, and that this could result in a fine, or a warning, by Victoria police. That is up to the discretion of Victoria police.
A spokeswoman for Quarantine Victoria told Guardian Australia she does not know yet whether the players will be fined or given a warning.
Cassar said a fine was a possibility and described their breach as “challenging behaviours”.
“We take all breaches really seriously,” she said. “For the players that is a fine of up to $20,000, or a warning from the police, but what we have also considered today is for those who are persistently breaching or not willing to remain in their rooms, our other option would be to transfer people to the complex care hotel where there is a member [of] Victoria police outside the door.”
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The WA department of health has today reported one new case of Covid-19 in Western Australia, bringing the state’s total to 887.
The confirmed case is a female in her 30s who returned to Perth from overseas and is in hotel quarantine.
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Interesting question from a journalist who’s noting that the rate of infection among the Australian Open arrivals – who are welcomed in Victoria – is lower than the rate of infection in New South Wales, where a number of Victorian residents are stuck behind border closures.
Cassar deadbats the question, saying it’s a matter for the health department but that there is space in hotel quarantine.
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Cassar said there is “zero tolerance” for people breaching quarantine. She said there hadn’t been an attempted escape, just some “testing procedures and challenging behaviours”.
She gives examples (one of whom was a player and one was not): one man who opened his door to try and speak to a training friend down the hallway instead of calling on the phone. Another man shouted some Uber Eats to someone else on his floor “and was praising himself for his great efforts, and opened his door to do so”.
“It is very low level, but they are dangerous acts that we cannot tolerate. Quarantine is hard and we know it’s a new and difficult arrangement for them. This is to keep them safe and keep the Victorian community safe.”
Fines for breaching quarantine include fines of up to $20,000, and police warnings.
Cassar is asked about claims by players that they were given different information about who would be considered close contacts on the charter flights, but she says the rules around that had never changed. (This is in reference to French player Alize Cornet saying they were told “the plane would be separated by section of 10 people and that if one person of your section was positive, then you had to isolate” not that the whole planeload would be quarantined.)
- This post was edited at 3:08pm to remove a reference to a fine being issued to a player. A clarifying explanation is posted above.
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Fourth Covid diagnosis among Australian Open arrivals
Quarantine Victoria’s Emma Cassar is addressing the media about the Australian Open.
“It’s unfortunate for me to let you know we have our fourth new case ... over two flights,” she’s announced.
One crew, one coach, and – most recently – one member of broadcast team have tested positive out of a flight of 65 from Los Angeles.
One coach on a flight from Abu Dhabi also tested positive.
That’s left the remaining passengers on the two planes considered to be close contacts. That figure was reported as seven players and 143 travellers yesterday.
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NSW premier pressures Daniel Andrews to reopen Victoria border
New South Wales premier Gladys Berejiklian is urging Victoria to reopen its border with the state.
On Sunday Berejiklian said Victoria’s premier Daniel Andrews had not made contact about the state’s hard border and reiterated her misgivings about the controversial move.
“He’s not been in touch with me at all but I also say that should have occurred quite a while back because we don’t have a hot spot in NSW,” Berejiklian said.
“We are, of course, dealing with a result of an outbreak from a month ago, but I think everybody would agree that closing a border of such significance is a really big deal.”
“I stress that we waited until Victoria had in excess of – I think it was 180 cases they had the day after we announced the border closure.”
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Australian Open tennis players who have been forced into stricter quarantine have said they were misled about the rules for the tournament, were promised they would be allowed to train, and are risking injury ahead of the competition.
On Saturday 47 players and 143 travellers were confined to their rooms for 14 days after one flight attendant and two passengers who were not players tested positive for Covid-19 across two charter planes coming into Melbourne.
But we are not asking the Victorian residents to play a professionnal sport afterward. The risks of injury after a two weeks break is huge. Maybe I'm too focused on my side of the story, but that's also why we are here for
— Alize Cornet (@alizecornet) January 16, 2021
French player Alize Cornet said confining players to their rooms for 14 days without training, before a major tournament, would lead to injury.
Kazakhstan’s Yulia Putintseva said “no one told us” whole planeloads of players could be affected, and said she might not have travelled to Melbourne if she had known.
People complaining we are entitled. I have no issues to stay 14 days in the room watching netflix. Believe me this is a dream come true, holiday even. What we cant do is COMPETE after we have stayed 14 days on a couch. This is the issue,not the quarantine rule.
— Sorana Cirstea (@sorana_cirstea) January 16, 2021
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Some shortages of vaccines persist in US
In the United States scattered shortages of Covid-19 vaccines persisted on Saturday under pressure from growing demand, as previously inoculated Americans returned for their required second shots and millions of newly eligible people scrambled to get their first.
The supply gaps, coming as the vaccination effort enters its second month, prompted some healthcare systems to suspend appointments for first-time vaccine seekers, and one New York healthcare system to cancel existing ones.
“As eligibility increases, you just increase demand, but we’re not able to increase supply,” Northwell Health spokesman Joe Kemp said.
Northwell, New York’s largest healthcare provider, offers appointments only as it gets more vaccine, and only after allocating doses to people scheduled for their second shots, Kemp said.
Although the supply flow has been sporadic, Northwell expects to offer appointments in the coming week.
Both approved vaccines, one from Pfizer Inc and BioNTech and the other from Moderna Inc, require a booster three to four weeks after the first shot to maximise their effectiveness against the coronavirus.
While healthcare workers and nursing home residents and staff got first priority, eligibility for the vaccines has since widened. Some states opened it to healthy people aged 65 and up and people of any age with pre-existing conditions.
Besides New York, signs of vaccine supply strains appeared in Vermont, Michigan, South Carolina, New Jersey and Oregon.
In Oregon, governor Kate Brown said vaccinations for seniors and educators would be delayed, and Vermont governor Phil Scott said the state would focus exclusively on its over-75 population because of “unpredictable* federal supplies. (Reuters)
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China reports 109 new cases
Mainland China has reported 109 new cases for the 24 hours to midnight, including 96 local transmissions. The numbers, while still high, are a drop on this week’s consecutive increases – mostly out of the worrying outbreaks in Hebei and Heilongjiang provinces.
The National Health Commission also reported 119 asymptomatic cases, detected through testing but not counted among the confirmed Covid caseload until symptoms present. Of the 119, 32 were converted to the Covid count on the same day.
China is aiming to have 50 million people vaccinated by mid next month, before the start of the Chinese new year holiday.
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“We have to be careful … not to hug much, but sometimes it’s difficult.”
Premier League managers have responded to the idea of physically distanced goal celebrations after the chairman of a government committee said footballers were “brainless” for continuing to hug on the field.
“Football has and always will be a game of instinct, and if we want to take instinct out of the game, it’s not that simple,” said Chelsea manager Frank Lampard.
Watch the full video here:
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Australia is investigating reports Norwegian authorities are concerned about the safety of the Pfizer vaccine after a number of elderly people died after being inoculated.
The Norwegian Medicines Agency has reported 29 people had suffered side effects from having the vaccine – 13 died.
“We have immediately sought and I have been in contact with the Australian medical regulator ... this morning, and requested that they seek additional information, both from the company, but also from the Norwegian medical regulator,” health minister Greg Hunt said on Sunday.
Foreign affairs minister Marise Payne has also tasked her department to seek advice directly from the Norwegian government.
“So as further information is available, we’ll share that with the Australian public,” Hunt said.
The Pfizer vaccine forms only part of Australia’s response to Covid, as there will be a greater use of the AstraZeneca, and home produced, vaccine once it has been approved.
Vaccinations are due to start next month. (AAP)
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India kicked off one of the world’s largest coronavirus vaccination drives Saturday, aiming to inoculate 300 million people by July with Covishield - developed by AstraZeneca and made by India’s Serum Institute - or the homegrown Covaxin.
India, home to 1.3 billion people, has the world’s second-largest number of recorded cases behind the United States.
Covaxin is still in clinical trials and recipients had to sign a consent form that stated that the “clinical efficacy... is yet to be established”.
But Prime Minister Narendra Modi, launching the immunisation campaign, urged people to reject “propaganda and rumours” about the indigenous vaccine.
The government says it has about 150,000 specially trained staff involved in the rollout and has ramped up security to avoid doses ending up on the black market.
Mexico reported 20,523 new confirmed coronavirus cases and 1,219 more fatalities on Saturday, according to the health ministry, bringing its total to 1,630,258 infections and 140,241 deaths.
The real number of infected people and deaths is likely to be significantly higher than the official count, the ministry has said, because of a lack of widespread testing.
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Greg Hunt, the Australian health minister, is nudging state governments to ease internal border restrictions as he declared the removal of the last Covid-19 hotspot in Australia.
Hunt said in Melbourne on Sunday the federal government’s priority remained on helping Australians stranded overseas to return home, but also “ensuring that Australians who are within our own borders are able to reunite with their families as soon as possible”.
He said the chief medical officer Prof Paul Kelly, had removed the last remaining hotspot definition in Australia on Sunday – the hotspot for greater Brisbane area.
That step came after Kelly reviewed data from the past 14 days and the handling of the case involving the UK variant in hotel quarantine.
“We are very, very thankful to everybody involved in Queensland,” Hunt said.
Kelly’s decision is based on the federal government’s definition of a hotspot, but states and territories indicated on Sunday they wanted to maintain their right to make their own border decisions, a stance Scott Morrison ultimately accepted.
Hunt said removing the hotspot declaration showed Australia was “containing” the virus. That didn’t mean there would be no cases in the time ahead, “but we have very very clear evidence that the Australian system has been tested and tested again and continues to pass”.
“It’s important to understand that our real challenge, our real threat, is international, not domestic,” Hunt said, noting that 39 of the 40 cases in Australia over the past three days had been in hotel quarantine.
“We are very keen to ensure that our priority is bringing Australians home [from overseas] and also as a result of the removal of the last of the hotspot definitions, ensuring that Australians who are within our own borders are able to reunite with their families as soon as possible.
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Indonesian authorities began the biggest vaccination drive in Jakarta on Thursday, aiming to reach 7.9 million people – more than 75% of the population.
The first stage aims to vaccinate 60,000 of the city’s 131,000 health workers and a small number of public officials.
Indonesia has procured or ordered a number of different vaccines, including China’s CoronaVac, becoming the first country outside of China to approve it for general use. The Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) has also issued a fatwa that declares the Chinese vaccine as halal and acceptable for Muslims to use, the Jakarta Post reported.
Jakarta has reported record high daily totals of new cases recently, and is preparing for a worsening disaster – health facilities are overwhelmed, burial plots are running out – and the country has been hit by a run of disasters including a plane crash and earthquakes.
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Australian state of NSW records six new cases
In Australia, New South Wales has recorded six new cases of community transmission in the 24 hours until 8pm on Saturday.
All six are close contacts of a person from western Sydney who tested positive yesterday.
A staff member who worked at Concord Repatriation General hospital is one of today’s new cases. They are now in isolation. They worked three shifts in the cardiology and radiology wards while potentially infectious on 12, 13 and 14 January. The person’s role involves minimal contact with patients, and they wore a face mask during each shift.
It also issued new public health alerts – details available here.
There were also three cases of Covid-19 recorded in returned travellers in hotel quarantine.
NSW’s chief health officer, Dr Kerry Chant, wants more residents to be tested after six new cases of community transmission were recorded in the state. The state conducted 12,700 tests over the past 24 hours.
“That is a decline among testing levels,” Chant said. “It is critical that we get those testing rates up very high.”
She especially called on more testing in Bankstown, Lidcombe, Auburn, Berala and Wentworthville.
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Biden to sign Covid executive orders on first day
In the United States Joe Biden’s team has flagged a raft of executive orders to be issued by the new president immediately he’s in office, including several relating to the US Covid-19 epidemic.
In a memo to senior staff, incoming chief of staff Ron Klain said Biden would sign orders related to the outbreak aimed at reopening schools and businesses and expanding virus testing. He would mandate mask-wearing on federal property and during interstate travel, and the following day, Friday, will act to provide economic relief to those suffering the economic costs of the pandemic.
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Australia's health minister defends Australian Open proceeding
The Australian health minister, Greg Hunt, has backed the decision to proceed with the Australian Open in Melbourne, saying the Victorian state government has “taken appropriate steps” to ensure the safety of tennis tournament.
His comments follow the news that 47 players and 143 travellers have been confined to their rooms after a coach and a flight attendant on the charter flight from Los Angeles and one person on a flight from Abu Dhabi tested positive for Covid-19.
Speaking in Melbourne on Sunday Hunt said the Victorian government was “monitoring and setting the terms and conditions for those that are arriving”.
“They have a pre-screening process. They have a subsequent quarantine process. And this is what we’re doing as a country with all of our international arrivals – so we respect that process. We respect the steps they’re taking and also the way that they’ve responded. We think that that’s appropriate.”
When pressed on whether it was the right thing to host the Australian Open at the current time, Hunt said:
“With regards to the Australian Open, we respect not only the right, but also the processes of particular states to screen, to monitor and to conduct events – whether it’s the Melbourne Test, the Sydney Test, the Brisbane Test and the Adelaide Test, whether it is the current event, which the Victorian government has been planning. And we think that they have taken appropriate steps.”
But Hunt argued the federal government’s priority had been to bring stranded Australians home. Despite the recent reduction in flight arrival caps, and the decision by Emirates to suspend flights to Australia, he pointed to the government’s announcement on Saturday of 20 additional facilitated flights for returning Australians.
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Hello, this is our continuing coverage of the coronavirus pandemic. You can catch up on the previous blog here.
I’m over in Twitter @heldavidson, please feel free to send me thoughts and news tips.
Top story: Brazil recorded 61,567 new coronavirus cases on Saturday and 1,050 further deaths, marking the fifth consecutive day with more than 1,000 fatalities, the health ministry said on Saturday.
The South American country has now registered 8,455,059 cases since the pandemic began, and the official death toll has risen to 209,296, according to ministry data. It is the world’s third worst outbreak outside the US and India.
Other key developments at a glance:
- It took just six weeks for the world to report the most recent 500,000 deaths from Covid-19, after death rates began to rise sharply in November 2020 in both Europe and North America, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
- Brazil marked the fifth consecutive day with more than 1,000 fatalities, as it recorded 61,567 new coronavirus cases on Saturday and 1,050 further deaths.
- The Australian state of Victoria recorded another day of zero cases on Saturday. Victoria has recorded its 11th consecutive day of zero locally acquired cases of Covid-19, out of just over 11,000 tests.
- New South Wales recorded six new cases of community transmission in the 24 hours until 8pm on Saturday.
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The UK government posted the third-highest daily death toll from coronavirus on Saturday, but the number of new infections dropped to its lowest level this year.
- Denmark has registered its first case of infection with a more transmissible coronavirus variant, first found in South Africa, known as B.1.351/501Y.
- France on Saturday implemented a 6pm curfew intended to help stem the spread of infections, after the country’s death toll rose to over 70,000, the seventh highest death toll in the world.
- Slovakia is planning another large-scale testing and quarantine push to combat a serious rise in coronavirus infections, health minister Marek Krajci said on Saturday.
- Italy forecasts its debt to soar to a new post-war record level of 158.5% of gross domestic output (GDP) this year, surpassing the 155.6% goal it set in September.
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Another coronavirus variant is likely to be in the UK already despite the imposition of a travel ban from affected countries. Prof John Edmunds, a member of the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said he would find it unusual if the second of two new variants from Brazil was not already present, although it has not yet been detected.
- India has begun one of the world’s biggest Covid-19 vaccination programmes, the first major developing country to roll out the vaccine and marking the beginning of an effort to immunise more than 1.3 billion people. The first dose was administered to a health worker at All India Institute of Medical Sciences in the capital, New Delhi.
- Suicides rose in Japan in the second wave of the country’s Covid pandemic, particularly among women and children, despite having fallen in the first wave, a survey has found. The July to October suicide rate was up 16% on the same period a year earlier, according to a study by researchers at Hong Kong University and Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Gerontology.
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