Category Archives: Vaccines and immunisation

Covid live: Delta variant becoming globally dominant, WHO says as expert calls Africa’s case trajectory ‘very, very concerning’

Posted on by

WHO expert says Delta variant becoming dominant because of its increased transmissibility as underreporting in Africa means case levels are worrying

The EU has lost its attempt to require AstraZeneca to deliver fewer Covid-19 vaccines to the European Union, Reuters reports.

Reuters reports:

AstraZeneca said that the EU had lost its legal case, but European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the court ruling supported its view that the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical giant had failed to honour its commitments.

The row plunged the EU into crisis earlier this year as states scrambled for shots, highlighting the pressure on them to speed up vaccinations. Brussels has since largely cut ties with AstraZeneca, choosing not to buy any more of its shots for now.

Official data in Britain reported 10,476 new cases of Covid-19 on Friday and 11 deaths within 28 days of a positive test, Reuters reports.

The figures showed 42.5 million people had received their first vaccine dose and 30.9 million had received both shots.

Continue reading...

Netherlands offers free pickled herring as Covid jab incentive

Posted on by

Country becomes the latest to encourage uptake by offering a traditional early-summer delicacy

After Russia offered cars, Washington state spliffs, Indonesia live chickens and Hong Kong the chance of a £1.2m apartment, the latest country to reward people who show up for their Covid shots is the Netherlands – with soused herring.

Early batches of Hollandse nieuwe, or new-season Dutch herring, a traditional delicacy consumed to the tune of 75m a year, are being distributed to vaccination centres around the country as an encouragement for people to get their jabs.

Continue reading...

Previous Covid infection may not offer long-term protection, study finds

Posted on by

Research found marked differences in immune response of medical staff six months after contracting virus

Previous infection with coronavirus does not necessarily protect against Covid in the longer term, especially when caused by new variants of concern, a study on healthcare workers suggests.

Researchers at Oxford University found marked differences in the immune responses of medical staff who contracted Covid, with some appearing far better equipped than others to combat the disease six months later.

Continue reading...

White couple who got vaccines meant for First Nation are fined but not jailed

Posted on by

White River First Nation had sought six months in jail for Canadian millionaires Rodney and Ekaterina Baker

The millionaire Canadian couple who chartered a private plane to a remote community and jumped the coronavirus vaccine queue to receive doses intended for elderly Indigenous people have been fined C$2,300 but were not sentenced to jail after pleading guilty to breaking public health rules.

The size of the fine imposed on the former casino executive Rodney Baker and his wife, the actor Ekaterina Baker, on Wednesday prompted frustration amid members of the White River First Nation, many of whom wanted the couple to face stiffer repercussions.

Continue reading...

France and Spain to ease mask-wearing as Covid vaccine schemes gather pace

Posted on by

French will no longer have to wear masks outside and curfew to end while Spain also planning to lift rule

France and Spain are moving to ease rules around wearing face masks outside, in a development attributed by both countries to their Covid-19 vaccination campaigns.

In France, people will no longer be required to wear masks outdoors from Thursday, though they will still be obligatory on public transport, in sports stadiums and other crowded places. A nightly curfew will end as of Sunday.

Continue reading...

Coronavirus live news: France to bring curfew-lifting date forward; row as India doubles gap between jabs

Posted on by

France to also end mandatory mask wearing outside; Indian government extends gap between doses to 16 weeks

Portugal has said it would allow US visitors into the country, as it scrambles to shore up its tourism sector, but added Nepal to a list of “red” nations amid concerns over Covid variants.

Reuters reports that Portugal is now open to tourists from EU countries and Britain but they must show a negative Covid-19 test result on arrival. Since 15 June, rules applied to UK visitors also apply to those coming from the United States, the government said.

Cristiano Ronaldo’s removal of two Coca-Cola bottles during a press conference at coincided with a $4bn fall in drinks company’s share price. But with obesity being one of the main risk factors for the worst cases of Covid, what have governments done to ensure people have lived as healthily as possible during stringent lockdowns?

Related: Cristiano Ronaldo snub wipes billions off Coca-Cola’s market value

Related: Mexico state bans sale of sugary drinks and junk food to children

Continue reading...

UK excluded again from EU’s Covid-safe travel list, but US added

Posted on by

British tourists face continued restrictions as bloc opens up to other vaccinated travellers

British tourists face continued restrictions on travelling to the EU this summer even as the bloc opens up to others, including residents of the United States.

Eight countries are to be added to a list of countries from where the EU says non-essential travel is safe, but the UK has not been included.

Continue reading...

The Covid Delta variant: how effective are the vaccines?

Posted on by

Analysis: what protection do they offer against infection, hospital admission and death?

As lockdown easing in England is delayed from 21 June to a possible date of 19 July amid concerns of a substantial wave of hospitalisations due to the Delta variant of coronavirus, we take a look at the latest data on the protection offered by vaccines.

Continue reading...

Why is Israel lifting Covid restrictions as England extends them?

Posted on by

Analysis: both are viewed as running successful vaccine campaigns, but case numbers are very different

Israel and the UK were viewed as world leaders in their coronavirus vaccine campaigns but whereas the former is lifting almost all pandemic limitations, the latter is now glumly extending its restrictions in England amid a sharp rise in infections.

Despite starting its mass inoculation programme after the UK in December, Israel has sped ahead and it reached a key milestone on Tuesday, scrapping a requirement to wear face masks indoors, one of the final Covid limitations.

Continue reading...

China set to administer 1bn Covid vaccine doses by end of this week

Posted on by

Cash incentives and gifts offered to fulfil target of vaccinating 40% of population by end of month

China is on track to administer 1bn vaccine doses by the end of this week, after bolstering production and distribution networks in an ambitious drive to vaccinate 40% of the population by this month.

Chinese authorities have been encouraging people to take the free and voluntary doses with cash incentives, gifts and colour-coded signage to laud or shame businesses depending on vaccination rates, as well as the promise of protection against Covid-19.

Continue reading...

Eradicating polio is finally within reach. Why is the UK taking its foot off the pedal? | Anne Wafula Strike

Posted on by

Instead of cutting the aid budget – including 95% from the plan to stamp out the disease – Britain should take a global lead

Despite the Covid pandemic, there have been just two recorded cases of wild polio in 2021 – in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the two remaining hiding places for the disease. But eradication is not guaranteed. Polio is virulent and spreads quickly. Even one case poses a threat to unvaccinated children everywhere, which is why a new strategy launched last week by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) outlines a plan to utilise this small window of opportunity for the world to end polio for good.

A 99.9% fall in polio cases globally in recent decades is thanks in large part to the GPEI and its supporters. The British government’s recent announcement that it will slash its contributions to the GPEI by more than 95% has been a body blow. The funding cut amounts to almost a quarter of the annual World Health Organization polio eradication budget.

Continue reading...

Brazil records 2,468 new Covid deaths – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is closed. Follow the latest updates on the pandemic from around the world:

This blog is closed. Follow the latest updates on the pandemic from around the world:

Bars at full capacity. No masks for vaccinated Disneyland goers. Fans sitting side-by-side at Giants and Dodgers games.

California rolled back its major public health restrictions on Tuesday, 15 months after it became the first state in the US to shut down to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

Related: Goodbye masks, hello full bars: California lifts Covid rules in ‘grand reopening’

Continue reading...

Vaccines and oxygen run out as third wave of Covid hits Uganda

Posted on by

Vaccine thefts reported and hospitals unable to admit patients as cases leap 2,800% in a month

Uganda has all but run out of Covid-19 vaccines and oxygen as the country grapples with another wave of the pandemic.

Both private and public medical facilities in the capital, Kampala and in towns across the country – including regional hubs in Entebbe, Jinja, Soroti, Gulu and Masaka – have reported running out or having acute shortages of AstraZeneca vaccines and oxygen. Hospitals report they are no longer able to admit patients to intensive care.

Continue reading...

Coronavirus live news: Indonesia fears peak in July with hospitals filling; Thailand vaccine supplies disrupted

Posted on by

Hospitals in Indonesia’s capital Jakarta already at 75% capacity; Bangkok cancels vaccine appointments; India reports lowest cases since March

Africa will get priority treatment for the Group of Seven’s pledged 870 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine, a senior World Health Organization adviser said on Monday.

“You will see that Africa is one of the most vulnerable, under-served (areas), so the priority would be for doses to go... to the African continent writ large. Those numbers will be sorted out the coming weeks,” Bruce Aylward, a senior WHO adviser and coordinator of the ACT (Access to Covid-19 Tools) Accelerator, told an online news briefing from Geneva.

Italy reported 36 coronavirus-related deaths on Monday against 26 the day before, the health ministry said, while the daily tally of new infections fell to 907 from 1,390.

Italy has registered 127,038 deaths linked to Covid-19 since its outbreak emerged in February last year, the second-highest toll in Europe after Britain and the eight-highest in the world. The country has reported 4.25 million cases to date.

Patients in hospital with Covid – not including those in intensive care – stood at 3,465 on Monday, down from 3,542 a day earlier.

There were 11 new admissions to intensive care units, down from 20 on Sunday. The total number of intensive care patients fell to 536 from a previous 565.

Some 79,524 tests for Covid-19 were carried out in the past day, compared with a previous 134,136, the health ministry said.

Continue reading...

Novavax Covid vaccine has efficacy of 90%, say manufacturers

Posted on by

UK has ordered 60m doses of vaccine that is also critical part of effort to vaccinate developing world

A Covid vaccine that is a critical part of the effort to vaccinate the developing world, as well as the UK, has an efficacy of 90% overall, its manufacturers have said after trials in the US and Mexico.

The UK has ordered 60m doses of Novavax, which has manufacturing agreements in Britain. Novavax has signed an agreement to provide 1.1bn doses to Covax, the UN-led initiative to get vaccines to poorer countries. The Serum Institute of India is contracted to make 100m doses, but has been making vaccines only for India in recent months in response to the Covid crisis there.

Continue reading...

Delaying England’s Covid reopening ‘could keep thousands out of hospital’

Posted on by

Research backs four-week delay on lifting restrictions to allow more people to get jabs

Ministers have been told that a four-week delay to easing all Covid restrictions would probably prevent thousands of hospitalisations, as Boris Johnson prepares to tell the English public they will have to wait up to another month for “freedom day”.

The government roadmap out of lockdown earmarks 21 June for the last remaining coronavirus restrictions to be lifted in England, but the prime minister is expected to announce on Monday that the timetable will be pushed back by two to four weeks amid a rapid rise in cases of the Delta variant first detected in India.

Continue reading...

Boris Johnson doesn’t quite get his big moment in the Cornish sunshine

Posted on by

Analysis: an unseemly spat over Brexit derailed the UK prime minister’s chance to impress on the global stage

Delivering his closing press conference in the Carbis Bay hotel on Sunday, pale golden sand and azure sea visible behind him, Boris Johnson sought to play down the unseemly diplomatic spat that had marred his moment on the world stage.

“Actually, what happened at this summit was that there was a colossal amount of work on subjects that had absolutely nothing to do with Brexit,” he insisted.

Continue reading...

Johnson defends G7 deal amid criticism of final communique

Posted on by

Green campaigners and anti-poverty groups say Cornwall summit failed to address challenges facing the world

Boris Johnson has sought to defend the deal struck by G7 leaders at the Cornwall summit, as green groups and anti-poverty campaigners said the rich nations’ club had failed to match the scale of the challenges facing the world.

The final communique contained no early timetable to eradicate coal-fired emissions, offered only 1bn extra coronavirus vaccines for the world’s poor over the next 12 months and made no new binding commitments to challenge China’s human rights abuses.

Continue reading...

Factory workers making goods for the west bear brunt of virus surge in south-east Asia

Posted on by

Migrant labourers tell of being forced to isolate in brutal conditions as Covid wave grips region

It was around mid-May when workers at the Cal-Comp factory in Phetchaburi, central Thailand, heard a small group of their colleagues had tested positive for Covid-19. It soon became clear the virus had ripped through the production lines. A cluster associated with the electronics factory has since been linked to thousands of infections.

Hwan Htet Paing*, a worker from the factory, said he was not told the results of his Covid test, carried out on 19 May. Despite this, he was instructed to quarantine inside a vast hall at his workplace. The floor was covered with tarpaulin sheets and lined with rows of mosquito nets for each worker. Everyone was given a bucket and a cup, and bedsheets to lay across the floor. Fans were handed out to help ease the heat – until the vast numbers of people testing positive meant there were none left.

Continue reading...

Drop Covid vaccine patent rules to save lives in poorest countries, Britain and Germany told

Posted on by

G7 summit hears move would slash the cost of jabs and accelerate rollout of programmes across the developing world

Britain and Germany were under intense pressure on Saturday to drop their resistance to proposals that would slash the cost of Covid-19 vaccines, following accusations that an agreement at the G7 summit to fund a billon doses will give the world’s poorest countries “crumbs from the table”.

Aid agencies said rules that protect drug patents from being illegally copied must be waived during the pandemic to accelerate the rollout of vaccines and save lives across the developing world.

Continue reading...