Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine has yet to win EU regulatory approval and is likely to play little part in the bloc’s rollout, but it has already achieved what some observers say is one of its objectives – sowing division among, and within, member states.
“Sputnik V has become a tool of soft power for Russia,” said Michal Baranowski, a fellow with a US thinktank, the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “It’s planted its flag on the vaccine and the political goal of its strategy is to divide the west.”
AstraZeneca’s chief executive, Pascal Soriot, has mounted a robust defence of the drugmaker’s Covid-19 vaccine efforts, and said the business should be proud of what it has done for the world and is doing its “very best” to produce more, as the company faces legal action from the EU over delivery shortfalls, and shipments to poorer countries have also been delayed.
The company generated $275m (£197m) in revenues from the Covid vaccine it developed with Oxford University in the first three months of the year and shipped 48m doses to 120 countries through the global vaccine-sharing initiative Covax, 80% of which went to low and middle-income countries. In total, it has supplied more than 300m vaccine doses to more than 165 countries so far this year.
Clive Palmer has been ordered to pay Universal Music $1.5m in damages over the “unauthorised” use of a version of the hit 1980s song We’re Not Gonna Take It by glam metal band Twisted Sister in a political ad during the 2019 election campaign.
Palmer used a cover version of the song during his multimillion-dollar advertising blitz during last year’s federal election campaign. The Palmer version of the song changed the lyrics to:
Australia ain’t gonna cop it, no Australia’s not gonna cop it, Aussies not gonna cop it any more.
Victoria says 500-bed $15m facility to be built in Mickleham; Australia’s medicine regulator expected to determine whether death of two men in NSW linked to coronavirus jab. Follow the day’s news live
Thousands of corellas have been filmed flocking to the suburban streets of Nowra on the NSW south coast and it is terrifying.
China’s top envoy to Australia has blasted as “ridiculous” the claim that Beijing’s economic coercion has been the cause of tensions between the two countries.
China’s ambassador, Cheng Jingye, has also cautioned Australia against “teaming up in [a] small group against China” - in apparent reference to initiatives like the Quad with the US, Japan and India. Cheng said Australia should not play the “victim game”.
Dr Anthony Fauci, the White House’s chief medical adviser, has said countries have failed to unite to provide an adequate global response to prevent the “tragic” coronavirus outbreak from overwhelming India.
He singled out wealthier nations for failing to provide equitable access to healthcare around the world.
"We’re all in this together. It’s an interconnected world. And there are responsibilities that countries have to each other, particularly if you’re a wealthy country and you’re dealing with countries that don’t have the resources or capabilities that you have,” he said
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.
For Democrats it has been a hundred days of sweeping legislation, barrier-breaking appointments and daring to dream big. For Republicans, a hundred days in the political wilderness.
The party that just four years ago controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress now finds itself shut out of power and struggling to find its feet. As Joe Biden forges ahead with ambitions to shift the political paradigm, Republicans still have a Donald Trump problem.
Senate Democrats are pushing Biden to admit more refugees into the US.
Biden’s announcement earlier this month that he would not increase refugee admissions from the record low cap of 15,000 that Donald Trump set before leaving office. After intense pushback from advocates and Democratic lawmakers, Biden said he’d increase the cap by 15 May.
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 reportedly running out of Covid-19 vaccines just as a virulent second wave continues to devastate the country, threatening the government’s plans to ramp up the vaccination programme by the weekend in an effort to curb the spread of the virus.
From Saturday, everyone in India over the age of 18 will be eligible for a vaccine, a decision made by the government as the virus has brought India’s healthcare system to its knees, with more than new 352,000 cases on Monday and over 2,800 more deaths.
AstraZeneca said it would “strongly defend itself in court” and highlighted its supply of 50m Covid vaccine doses to European countries as Brussels launched legal action against the pharmaceutical company over delivery shortfalls.
The Anglo-Swedish firm said it regretted the decision by the European commission to start a legal case over alleged breaches of an advance purchase agreement.
Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser said on Sunday the recent pause on the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine should raise confidence in health agencies’ focus on vaccine safety, as the administration tries to curb deadly outbreaks across the US.
Western Australia’s international arrivals cap for the next month will be halved, officials said on today, as the state is battling a coronavirus outbreak that forced more than two million people into a three-day lockdown from Saturday, Reuters reports.
The lockdown was ordered after a traveller likely became infected while in quarantine in a hotel and unknowingly passed it on to two other people in the community.
Australia closed its borders more than a year ago and allows mostly only its citizens and permanent residents to return. All, except from New Zealand, must undergo two weeks of mandatory hotel quarantine at their own expense.
A Spanish man with Covid symptoms who coughed on work colleagues and told them “I’m going to give you all the coronavirus” has been charged with intentionally causing injury after allegedly infecting 22 people, AP reports:
Spanish police said their investigation began after a coronavirus outbreak at the company where the 40-year-old man worked on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca.
Days before the outbreak, the man showed Covid symptoms but refused his colleagues’ suggestions to go home and self-isolate, police said in a statement.
The government has hit both its self-imposed targets so far. How will it go the rest of the way?
More than half of the UK population has now received at least a first dose of vaccine against Covid-19. By Friday evening 33,388,637 people had received one of the Pfizer, AstraZeneca or Moderna vaccines. Here’s how it was done, and what is still left to do.
Before the pandemic, Neha knew exactly what she was looking for in a date: an athletic, liberal-minded guy who liked healthy living but wasn’t too outdoorsy. Ideally, he would be Indian like her. Party types were a no-no, pets were a turn-off. Now, multiple dating apps, three lockdowns and a handful of real-life dates later and Neha’s adding a new, elusive quality to that list: Covid vaccination status.
Indiana, New York, Virginia, Missouri and Michigan among states ordering or recommending resumption after US officials lift pause
Seeking in the words of one governor to put “the long Covid nightmare behind us”, several US states on Saturday resumed use of the one-shot Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine.
France has reported 32,633 new coronavirus cases, Reuters reports.
The country has recorded over 5.44 million cases in total.
Angela Merkel has urged Germans to accept nationwide pandemic restrictions that took effect at midnight, resulting in a 10 p.m.-to-5 a.m. curfew and further limits on personal contacts and access to nonessential stores in regions with high infections.
Merkel acknowledged the new rules are “tough” but insisted they are needed to curb the spread of the virus in the country, Associated Press reports.
The vaccine was temporarily halted while scientists investigated rare but dangerous blood clots
US health officials have lifted an 11-day pause on Johnson & Johnson vaccinations following a recommendation by an expert panel. Advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday the benefits of the single-dose Covid-19 shot outweigh a rare risk of blood clots.
Panel members said it is critical that younger women be told about that risk so they can decide if they’d rather choose another vaccine. The CDC and Food and Drug Administration agreed. European regulators earlier this week made a similar decision, deciding the clot risk was small enough to allow the rollout of Johnson & Johnson’s shot.
Vaccine developed by scientists at Jenner Institute, Oxford, shows up to 77% efficacy in trial over 12 months
A vaccine against malaria has been shown to be highly effective in trials in Africa, holding out the real possibility of slashing the death toll of a disease that kills 400,000 mostly small children every year.
The vaccine, developed by scientists at the Jenner Institute of Oxford University, showed up to 77% efficacy in a trial of 450 children in Burkina Faso over 12 months.