Authorities act to counter rumours out-of-date shots are being used as people drag their heels over being vaccinated
More than 16,000 expired AstraZeneca Covid-19 doses are to be destroyed in Malawi as concerns over vaccine hesitancy increase.
The vaccines are among 102,000 doses donated by the African Union (AU) to the Malawian government last month.
Continue reading...German chancellor will be vaccinated on Friday; NI executive to outline reopening dates; Cambodia ‘on brink of death’, says premier
Poland’s top vaccination official said he did not see any obstacle to the country’s inoculation program from the “moral” reservations expressed by the powerful Catholic Church about two vaccines.
Poland’s Episcopate bioethical team on Wednesday said the use of the AstraZeneca and the Johnson & Johnson vaccines raised “serious moral opposition.”
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NSW MPs call for end to police investigating themselves on 30th anniversary of royal commission; Queensland eases Covid restrictions; fashion designer Carla Zampatti farewelled in Sydney. Follow updates live
Scott Morrison is speaking now.
Now that unemployment has hit 5.6%, the treasurer Josh Frydenberg has signalled he will revisit the budget strategy - which is that the Morrison government won’t tighten fiscal policy until unemployment is “comfortably within” 6%.
Frydenberg told reporters in Canberra that 5.6% was not “comfortably within” 6% and that now is “not the time for austerity”.
Continue reading...CDC advisers say they need more evidence to decide if cases of unusual blood clots were linked to the Covid vaccine
Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine will remain in limbo a while longer after US health advisers told the government Wednesday that they need more evidence to decide if a handful of unusual blood clots were linked to the shot – and if so, how big the potential risk really is.
The reports are exceedingly rare – six cases out of more than 7m US inoculations with the one-dose vaccine. But the government recommended a pause in Johnson & Johnson vaccinations this week, not long after European regulators declared that such clots are a rare but possible risk with the AstraZeneca vaccine, a shot made in a similar way but not yet approved for use in the US.
Continue reading...Greece to end quarantine for EU and five other countries including the UK; French PM says P.1 variant is partly to blame for fuelling third wave in France; UK study to examine if vaccines can be safely mixed
The Danish Health Authority confirmed on Wednesday it would halt entirely the use of the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine in its inoculation programme.
“The Danish Health Authority has decided to continue the vaccination against COVID-19 without the vaccine from AstraZeneca,” it said in a statement.
The suspension of Johnson & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine could delay efforts to vaccinate most people in the EU by over two months to December, scientific information and analytics company Airfinity forecast on Wednesday.
“If the EU can’t use the J&J vaccine indefinitely it could push the timeline for vaccinating 75% of the population back into December,” London-based Airfinity said in a forecast update provided to Reuters.
After sitting alone in my flat for most of last year, I jumped at the chance to deliver Covid vaccines. This is what I’ve learned
Pushing a needle through fake skin is not much like the real thing. So I discovered when I vaccinated my first patient at a mass vaccination centre in north London. You feel for a person’s shoulder blade and give the injection two finger-widths below the tip of the shoulder, in the middle of the deltoid muscle. In training, you’re given a salmon-coloured “arm” of silicone sponge to practise on. In reality, arms – like the people they belong to – are unique; it takes a little while to confidently feel your way with each new person you close the NHS regulation blue curtain behind.
When I saw an advert for people willing to train as vaccinators in early January, I applied at once. The idea of being an active part of a historic vaccination rollout was thrilling. I have clinical experience as an assistant psychologist, can put people at ease and was very ready for a meaningful break from spending 10 hours a day looking at a screen alone in my flat. The training was delivered by a group of witty, absolutely zero-bullshit female clinicians wearing Crocs. The conversation was sharp; I adored them immediately. We covered infection control (including a sobering experiment with UV gel; trust me, you need to clean your thumbs), PPE, life support and, of course, learning to inject. I remember a surreal moment, looking around a room full of lawyers, medical students, psychotherapists, cycling instructors and shop managers in full PPE, all bound by the shared purpose of wanting to do something.
Continue reading...As the US entered the latest phase of the fight against the pandemic, photographer Filip Wolak felt it was important to capture the unprecedented efforts that the healthcare communities put into place to help mitigate the virus’s lasting effects.
This photo project attempts to capture the largest vaccination sites across the country. Some of the sites pictured were documented in their early stages when the vaccination supply was still limited – Wolak hopes to return to them again.
The photographs were taken from a small airplane, overflying the locations at a high altitude. This point of view allowed Wolak to capture the magnitude of these efforts. In some of the cases, multiple images were combined into one, which allowed a wider reach without degradation of details
Continue reading...The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, has announced plans for a domestic Covid-status certificate. We look to Israel, where a similar scheme has been introduced, and discuss how it might work here
Last week, Boris Johnson set out plans for a domestic vaccine passport system to help the country emerge from lockdown.
To see how it might work, Anushka Asthana talks to the Guardian’s Jerusalem correspondent, Oliver Holmes, about life in Israel, where the government introduced a similar scheme in February.
Continue reading...Doctors speak of a new variant of the virus that appears to be spreading faster than ever before
Dr K Senthil had feared it was coming.
He had feared it as he saw the reckless crush of hundreds of people taking part in large wedding parties over the past months, feared it as he saw the maskless faces of shoppers at the market, feared it as he witnessed thousands come together for political rallies in the ongoing elections in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, where he is the president of the state medical council.
Continue reading...Move to delay vaccine deployment in Europe comes after six blood clot cases detected among Johnson & Johnson jab recipients in US
South Africa has temporarily suspended the rollout of Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine, its health minister said on Tuesday, after US federal health agencies recommended pausing its use because of rare cases of blood clots.
Health minister Zweli Mkhize told reporters:
I had urgent consultations with our scientists, who advised that we cannot take the decision by the FDA lightly. Based on their advice, we have determined to voluntarily suspend our rollout until the causal relationship between the development of clots and the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is sufficiently interrogated.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Tuesday it was reviewing cases of rare blood clots in women who had taken Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine after US federal health authorities recommended pausing the use of the shot.
In a statement to Reuters, the EMA said it was “currently not clear whether there is a causal association between vaccination” and the conditions.
Analysis: rare side-effects mean that confidence in both the Johnson & Johnson and Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccines is now shaken
The call in the US for a pause in the use of the single-shot Johnson & Johnson Covid vaccine is another blow to hopes of vaccinating the whole world as fast as possible.
Health agencies recommended that US states pause use of the jab while investigations take place into six cases of women who have experienced rare blood clotting events combined with low platelets in the days following vaccination.
Continue reading...Prof Marie Scully developed a diagnostic test at University College London hospital after seeing rare side-effect in patient
Marie Scully was alarmed and puzzled. “It didn’t make sense,” she said. The consultant haematologist at University College London hospital (UCLH) had seen patients with blood clots in the brain and low platelets before and, although it was unusual, she always knew why. But there was no reason for the condition of the young woman in her 30s she was treating in early March.
“Now when you have blood clots in the brain like that there’s always a cause, and it was difficult to pinpoint the cause,” said Prof Scully. “It didn’t fit our normal diagnostic boxes, let’s say. She was a young woman with cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, and she had a low platelet count.”
Continue reading...Fear of third wave and new variants as sub-Saharan vaccine distribution is dogged by supply disruption
Millions of healthcare workers in sub-Saharan Africa continue to risk their lives to fight Covid-19 as authorities across the continent struggle to obtain and distribute vaccines to frontline medical staff.
Though hundreds of millions of people in western nations are now protected from the virus, doctors, nurses and others on the frontline of the fight against Covid in Africa will have to wait months, or even years, for a vaccine.
Continue reading...Holgate says she was ‘humiliated’ by prime minister Scott Morrison; man dies of coronavirus in Queensland. Follow all the latest news and updates, live
• Australia won’t purchase Johnson & Johnson jab
• AstraZeneca blood clotting: what is this rare syndrome?
• Andrew Laming blocked from recontesting next election
• More than half of Australians think vaccine rollout is too slow
Wow, it’s been a busy few hours! With that, I’m going to hand you over to Michael McGowan to take you through the rest of the afternoon.
Christine Holgate gave some evidence about executive bonuses. It is a little confusing and we’ll come back to it, because even the senators seem a little confused about what is being said. And it’s important we get it right, so I’ll head back over the transcript to see what she was saying there.
Liberal senator Sarah Henderson has the question call now. She says she has been very moved by Holgate, and what she went through. She asks whether she thinks the questioning on the 22 October estimates hearing was fair.
Holgate:
In all honesty, I didn’t consider whether it was fair or not fair. I absolutely respect and Senator Carr, forgive me but you’ve asked me many tough questions over my time with you (“that’s my job,” Carr says)...and I was about to say ‘that’s your job’.
Continue reading...Achievement hailed by PM as ‘hugely significant milestone’ means people in late 40s should be next to be immunised
All over-50s and high-risk groups in the UK have been offered a coronavirus vaccine a few days before the mid-April deadline set by the government – meaning the second phase of the rollout to younger cohorts can now begin.
Despite fears of a supply slowdown and possible knock in confidence after a change in advice on who could get the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab, Boris Johnson hailed the passing of “another hugely significant milestone”.
Continue reading...Israel became the first country in the world to test vaccine passports when it announced the 'green pass' scheme in February. The passes allow people who have had two doses of a Covid-19 vaccine to return to restaurants, theatres and sport events. With many countries planning to reopen after their vaccination campaigns, the Guardian's Jerusalem correspondent, Oliver Holmes, examines the lessons that could be learned from Israel's rollout
Continue reading...Former prime minister says group should commit to global vaccine drive and slams UK’s foreign aid cut
Preventing poor countries suffering from vaccine “apartheid” will require the G7 group of rich nations to commit $30bn (£22bn) a year to a global immunisation drive, Gordon Brown has said.
The former Labour prime minister said the UK should use June’s G7 summit in Cornwall to rekindle the moral purpose of the Make Poverty History campaign of 2005, paying for its share of the new fund by reversing the government’s “misguided” cut to the foreign aid budget.
Continue reading...Contrasting lessons from the two countries, both with high rates of inoculation against the virus, show the danger is not past
A trio of countries stand out for the effectiveness of their Covid-19 vaccination programmes: Israel, Chile and the UK. All have managed to inoculate an impressively high percentage of their people but each has fared very differently in controlling the disease.
Israel has done so well it is resuming university lectures, concerts and other mass gatherings and has opened up its restaurants and bars. By contrast, Chile is experiencing soaring levels of Covid cases and faces new lockdown restrictions.
Continue reading...Lack of transparency over deals with private consultants, logistics companies and healthcare contractors adding to ‘layers of confusion’ over rollout
The Australian government is funnelling millions of dollars to private contractors for its beleaguered Covid vaccine rollout using opaque deals – some of which are hidden from the public and ignore transparency standards.
The government is relying heavily on contractors to aid its vaccine rollout, including multinational consultants PwC and Accenture, logistics companies DHL and Linfox, and healthcare contractors Healthcare Australia, International SOS, Sonic Clinical Services and Aspen.
Continue reading...As daily inoculations hit record figures, warning comes of new delays
Vaccine rollouts in France and Germany have finally begun to pick up speed, after a slow start and problems with supplies and bureaucracy.
France continues to struggle to contain a third Covid-19 wave, but announced it had hit its 10 million inoculations target a week earlier than expected, while Germany doubled the number of vaccinations, administering a record 720,000 doses on Thursday after the rollout was extended to family doctors.
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