Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
The Covid variant first detected in India is set to be the dominant strain in the UK within days, experts have said, with the government and health teams struggling to contain cases, which have risen by more than 75% since Thursday.
With the rapid spread of the more transmissible B.1.617.2 variant threatening to reverse moves to ease lockdown, the government faced intense pressure to more fully explain the delay in adding India to the so-called red list of countries.
Across Poland, bars and restaurants have opened their outdoor terraces for the first time in over six months, with masks not being required outdoors where social distancing can be observed.
On Friday, Poland had 3,288 new coronavirus cases compared with a high of 35,251 on 1 April. Some 35.7% of adult Poles have received at least one dose of vaccine and 13.6% are fully vaccinated, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.
Bars and restaurants can now offer outdoor service, with indoor service due to reopen with limited capacity on May 28. Since October, they have been able to serve only take-away food.
“We’ve been closed for so long, over 200 days, and it was very stressful and exhausting for different reasons, we didn’t know if we could survive at all,” said Zuzia Mockallo, 34, co-owner of Bar Studio, located in the capital’s landmark building, the Palace of Culture and Science.
Thailand has planned to allow restaurants to resume dine-in services in its capital, Bangkok, a senior official has said, but opening hours and the number of diners will be limited as the country faces a third wave of infections.
Since April, Thailand has faced its deadliest coronavirus outbreak. Thailand reported 3,095 new coronavirus cases and 17 deaths today, bringing total cases to 99,145 and 565 deaths. Of the new cases, 1,163 were in Bangkok.
Restaurants in dark red zones like Bangkok will be allowed to reopen for dine-in services but at a limited capacity of 25% and will have to close at 9pm (1400 GMT), said Taweesin Wisanuyothin, a coronavirus taskforce spokesman.
Restaurants in dark red zones, which have the highest risk of infection and the strictest restrictions, could previously only open for delivery.
Shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth has accused Boris Johnson of a “reckless failure to protect our borders” as the Indian variant threatened to derail progress to ending coronavirus restrictions in June.
The Labour MP said: “People across the country will be deeply concerned and tonight’s news brings into sharp focus Boris Johnson’s reckless failure to protect our borders in this crisis.
There is a “realistic possibility” that the Indian coronavirus variant could be as much as “50% more transmissible” than the Kent strain, the Scientific Advisory Group for emergencies (Sage) has said.
The minutes of the meeting between the government’s scientific advisers on Thursday said that it is “highly likely that this variant is more transmissible than B.1.1.7 (high confidence), and it is a realistic possibility that it is as much as 50% more transmissible”, PA reports.
It was all looking so good. After a brutal second wave in the winter, the lockdown combined with the swift rollout of vaccines forced infections, hospitalisations and deaths down to levels not seen since last summer. The vaccines performed better than expected, not only in preventing deaths, but in hampering the spread of the virus. Scientific advisers were confident about England’s cautious roadmap back to a life more normal: the worst, it seemed, was over.
Now, those same advisers are deeply worried that the new variant of concern from India, B.1.617.2, could undermine the hard-won achievement. The government strategy has been to ease restrictions as vaccines reach more people, aiming for a delicate balance that opens up society while preventing another wave that overwhelms the NHS.
The World Health Organization said on Tuesday the Indian Covid-19 variant was a global concern, with some data suggesting the variant has “increased transmissibility” compared with other strains.
Outside India, the UK has recorded the highest number of cases of the Indian variant, at 1,587 cases to date. The US, Singapore and Germany are the only other countries to have sequenced more than 100 cases of the B.1.617+ variant, according to the Gisaid Initiative.
Delaying the second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna vaccines as the UK has done can save lives, according to a US modelling study that suggests other countries struggling to immunise their populations could adopt the strategy.
Second shots of both vaccines and the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab are designed by the manufacturers to be given within three to four weeks of the first dose. The UK, however, opted for a 12-week delay between doses in a bid to ensure that more people received their first vaccination more quickly.
Administering one dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine followed by one of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine (or vice versa) induces a higher frequency of mild to moderate side-effects compared with standard two doses of either vaccine, initial data from a key UK trial suggests.
The Oxford-led Com-Cov study is exploring the safety and efficacy of mixed-dose schedules given that they are being considered in several countries – including the UK – to fortify vaccine rollout programmes that are dependent on unstable vaccine supplies.
Man, known as T5, was able to write 18 words a minute with more than 94% accuracy on individual letters
A man who was paralysed from the neck down in an accident more than a decade ago has written sentences using a computer system that turns imagined handwriting into words.
It is the first time scientists have created sentences from brain activity linked to handwriting and paves the way for more sophisticated devices to help paralysed people communicate faster and more clearly.
The number of Covid-19 patients in French intensive care units fell below 5,000 for the first time since late March on Sunday, Reuters is reporting that health ministry data showed.
The number was down for a sixth day in a row at 4,971, against 5,005 the previous day, the ministry said.
The United States is closer to getting the coronavirus pandemic under control and health officials are focused on the next challenge: getting more Americans vaccinated, the White House Covid-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients said on Sunday, Reuters reports.
“I would say we are turning the corner,” Zients said in an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Gene-screening, as is used to detect some breast cancer risks, could save thousands of lives
Scientists have begun work to create a prostate cancer screening service for the UK. In a few years, middle-aged men could be tested to reveal their genetic susceptibility to the condition, with those deemed to be under significant threat of developing it being offered treatment or surgery.
The service would tackle a disease that has become the nation’s most commonly diagnosed cancer and would parallel Britain’s breast cancer screening programme. Every year, more than 47,500 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer: 129 a day on average. More than 11,500 deaths from the disease occur each year, with one in eight men being diagnosed with prostate cancer at some time in their lives.
Three Covid medicines with the potential to “change the course” of the pandemic will be authorised for mass production and use in the EU by October under a European Commission plan.
Stella Kyriakides, the commissioner for health, said such a move would reduce hospitalisation and tackle the long-term impact of Covid, with one in 10 people reporting symptoms 12 weeks after infection.
Staff at an Indonesian pharmaceutical company have been accused of washing and repackaging used Covid nasal swabs, which were then sold to thousands of unsuspecting travellers.
Five employees from the state-owned Kimia Farma have been arrested, while the company may also face a civil lawsuit over the claims.
The handling of the coronavirus crisis in the UK has provided few moments to celebrate, but the day we reach zero deaths from the disease will clearly be one to toast. That day may not be far off. On Tuesday, the UK reported four Covid deaths within 28 days of a positive test. On Monday it was only one. Months of painful lockdown, in the face of more transmissible variants, and the rapid rollout of effective vaccines, have proven their worth. We have good reason to feel optimistic for the months ahead.
No one will have forgotten the brutal winter. In January alone, the UK reported nearly 32,000 Covid deaths, an appalling tally directly linked to locking down too late. In April, the death toll fell to 753. This month, scientists advising the government expect deaths to fall further. It is worth remembering that it’s been more than nine months since the UK last reported zero Covid deaths. We may see more in May, though people will continue to die of Covid, and the numbers might well rise again when restrictions are lifted on indoor mixing.
Even short, temporary increases in airborne particles can damage brain health, research suggests
Temporary rises in air pollution may impair memory and thinking in older men, according to research that indicates even short-term spikes in airborne particles can be harmful to brain health.
Scientists found that the men’s cognitive performance fell following rises in air pollution during the month before testing, even when peak levels remained below safety thresholds for toxic air set by the World Health Organization and national regulators.
Our South Asia correspondent reflects on a catastrophe that is now affecting the lives of almost everyone in the country
You recently lost a close colleague, Kakoli Bhattacharya, to Covid-19. Can you tell us about her and the important work that she did?
Kakoli was the Guardian’s news assistant over here and had worked for us since 2009. She could find any number or contact I needed and smoothed over any and all of the bureaucratic challenges that working in India can present. She made reporting here a huge joy, when it could be a huge challenge, and she was hugely well thought of by journalists for other organisations too. More than that, though, she was the person who welcomed me to Delhi. She knew the region inside out. She was incredibly warm and was someone I could always call on. The Guardian’s India coverage won’t be the same without her.
Vital coronavirus research, including a project tracking variants in India, has had its funding reduced by up to 70% under swingeing cuts to the UK overseas aid budget.
One of Britain’s leading infectious disease experts said the UK government cuts were certain to damage attempts to tackle the virus and track new variants.
A single dose of a Covid-19 vaccine can slash transmission of the virus by up to half, according to a Public Health England study.
The PHE finding offers further hope that the pandemic can be brought under control as it indicates that vaccinated people are far less likely to pass the virus on to others.
A coronavirus “vaccination persuasion” initiative targeting elderly people who have declined invitations to get vaccinated is gearing up to be rolled out across Turkey after proving a resounding success in a district in the country’s south-east.
Since February, doctors and healthcare workers in the mainly Kurdish city of Adıyaman, or Semsûr, have been calling people in age groups already eligible for the vaccine to ask why they have not come to clinics for appointments.
India is now identifying more than 1 million coronavirus cases every three days, with many times more thought to be going unregistered in a vast country where public health surveillance is often poor. Daily deaths exceeded 2,800 on Sunday, but these too are thought to be many times higher.
Epidemiologists and other experts are speculating that several factors have coalesced over the past months to bring India to the point of the world’s worst Covid-19 outbreak.