Covax has delivered its first Covid-19 vaccine doses to Ghana as part of a programme to ensure equitable distribution to poorer countries. Anne-Claire Dufay, of Unicef, said it was ‘an historic moment’.
Covax aims to distribute enough vaccines over the next six months to inoculate 3% of the population of 145 countries and tens of millions more by the end of the year
Doses land in Accra as part of scheme seeking to offset ‘vaccine nationalism’
Covax has delivered its first Covid-19 vaccine doses in a milestone for the ambitious programme that seeks to offset “vaccine nationalism” by wealthy countries and ensure poor ones do not wait years to start inoculating people.
An aircraft carrying 600,000 doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine landed in Accra, the capital of Ghana, on Wednesday, where jabs will be administered to frontline health workers on Tuesday. Vaccine doses will arrive on Friday in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, and will be given from Monday.
Continue reading...The government is reviewing the options on proof of vaccination or testing status
The idea of vaccine certificates has gained traction in England, as the government weighs their potential usefulness in reopening sectors of society against concerns about privacy and discrimination.
As ministers prepare to launch a review into whether to introduce the documents, here are the key questions to be answered.
Continue reading...Nicola Davis runs through the science behind the government’s decision to begin lifting lockdown restrictions, a four-stage plan that starts with the reopening of schools and could see the return of nightclubs on 21 June
On Monday Boris Johnson announced a four-stage plan for England, paving the way for schools to welcome pupils, sports fans to fill stadiums once again and nightclubs to reopen their doors. There is a five-week gap between each phase of the plan, intended to allow four weeks for data to emerge about the impact of the changes, plus a week’s notice for the next stage of easing to be introduced.
The Guardian science correspondent Nicola Davis talks to Rachel Humphreys about the science behind the government’s decision to begin easing out of lockdown. Some, including Johnson’s own backbenchers, have criticised the pace of reopening as too slow. But, Nicola says, experts on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), whose analysis was published alongside the plan, have stressed the need for caution. ‘Decisions about changes to restrictions are best made based on epidemiological data rather than based on predetermined dates,’ they advise.
Continue reading...Expected shortfall of 90m doses could hit the EU’s ability to meet its target of vaccinating 70% of adults by summer
AstraZeneca has told the European Union it expects to deliver less than half the Covid-19 vaccines it was contracted to supply in the second quarter, an EU official told Reuters on Tuesday.
Contacted by Reuters, AstraZeneca did not deny what the official said, but a statement late in the day said the company was striving to increase productivity to deliver the promised 180m doses.
Continue reading...Millions who cannot afford to stay home still lack access to inoculation, even as their work puts them in harm’s way
Pharmacy workers helping maskless customers. Uber drivers transporting coughing passengers. Janitors cleaning contaminated workspaces.
Amid California’s slow Covid-19 vaccine rollout, millions of essential workers in high-exposure jobs are still waiting to get the life-saving doses, with many uncertain when or how they will get access.
Continue reading...Study suggests infection rates have been much higher across the country than previously thought
More than one in five people living in the state of Lagos in Nigeria had Covid-19 antibodies at the end of October, according to a study that suggests that infection rates were much higher across the country than previously thought.
Nigeria’s Centre for Disease Control (NDCD) and Institute for Medical Research collected blood samples from over 10,000 individuals living in a representative sample of households in four states in September and October.
Continue reading...Scientists say there is significant risk of resurgence until all age groups are immunised
Vaccinating children and teens could be key to stifling the pandemic, experts have said, as clinical trials begin to test Covid-19 vaccines in young people.
While Covid-19 is associated with a considerably lower burden of morbidity and mortality in young people, and there is evidence that children may be less likely to acquire the infection, the role of children in transmission is unclear, according to the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.
Continue reading...The virus has been used as a pretext in many countries to crush dissent, criminalise freedoms and silence reporting
From the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic almost one year ago, it was clear that our world faced far more than a public health emergency. The biggest international crisis in generations quickly morphed into an economic and social crisis. One year on, another stark fact is tragically evident: our world is facing a pandemic of human rights abuses.
Covid-19 has deepened preexisting divides, vulnerabilities and inequalities, and opened up new fractures, including faultlines in human rights. The pandemic has revealed the interconnectedness of our human family – and of the full spectrum of human rights: civil, cultural, economic, political and social. When any one of these rights is under attack, others are at risk.
Continue reading...Phase 1a of the vaccine program starts today; questions about the government’s response to Brittany Higgins’ rape allegations dominate parliament. Follow all the latest news and updates, live
• Melbourne doctors under review for promoting discredited Covid treatment
• Australia’s first Covid vaccinations rollout out
• Follow the global liveblog
It’s another for the ‘always look at the bright side’ file.
From AAP:
The Morrison government has released the findings of an investigation that the environment minister, Sussan Ley, ordered into her own department over the export of rare and endangered Australian parrots to Germany.
The investigation was prompted by a 2018 investigation by Guardian Australia’s Lisa Cox and Berlin bureau chief Philip Oltermann.
Analysis: many on the Tory backbenches want Covid restrictions over by end of April
When Boris Johnson stands at the dispatch box on Monday to deliver his roadmap for easing Covid restrictions for what he hopes will be the final time, there is likely to be a sigh of relief from his scientific advisers who will have won the most recent battle.
Johnson is now gearing up for the next tussle, which will be with his MPs. There is a truce with the cabinet.
Continue reading...From immunity to blocking transmission of the virus, labs across the UK are hunting for second-generation jabs
Scientists are developing a range of second-generation Covid vaccines aimed at expanding protection against the disease.
Continue reading...PM Scott Morrison one of the first to be vaccinated; Ireland’s pubs to stay closed until summer; all UK adults to be offered vaccine by ‘end July’. Follow latest updates
Reuters: Israel reopened swathes of its economy on Sunday in what it called the start of a return to routine enabled by a Covid-19 vaccination drive that has reached almost half the population.
While shops were open to all, access to leisure sites like gyms and theatres was limited to vaccines or those who have recovered from the disease with presumed immunity, a so-called “Green Pass” status displayed on a special health ministry app.
In Australia the state of Victoria has recorded no new locally-acquired cases as the government commits $143m of support for businesses unable to operate on Valentine’s Day due to the state’s five-day lockdown.
Vaccinations will start for eligible high-risk recipients on Monday in Victoria, where there were no local or overseas-acquired coronavirus diagnoses in the latest 24-hour period, with more than 10,300 tests conducted.
Call comes as prime minister aims for all adults to be vaccinated by July
Data on the number of Covid-19 cases is now so encouraging that outdoor sports for children and small numbers of adults should be allowed immediately as part of an accelerated easing of the lockdown, a leading scientist and adviser to government has told the Observer.
With the prime minister expected to take a cautious approach to lifting restrictions in a statement to the House of Commons on Monday, Prof Mark Woolhouse of Edinburgh University, whose work feeds into the Sage committee’s sub-group Spi-M, said the data showed there was no need for the government to be “ultra-cautious”.
Continue reading...Russia mediated deal in which Israeli woman was exchanged for two Syrian shepherds
Israel secured coronavirus vaccines for the Syrian regime as part of a Russian-mediated prisoner swap agreed this week, according to an Israeli source and local media reports.
The source, who requested anonymity, did not state the number of vaccines, or whether they were from Israel’s own supply. Barak Ravid, an Israeli reporter, wrote on Twitter that the country had paid Russia $1.2m (£850,000) for its Sputnik V vaccine as part of the deal, citing “foreign sources”.
The prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, announced on Friday that a young Israeli woman who crossed the border into Syria was heading back to the country. In return, the Israeli government had returned two Syrian shepherds it had been holding, he said. It is not clear why the Israeli woman entered Syria.
The press in Israel had initially referred to another unspecified but apparently significant clause in the deal, adding that the country’s military censor had blocked publication. Under Israeli law, the agency can prevent reporting on topics it deems related to security issues.
The Times of Israel website said a “central aspect of the agreement” had been barred by the censor “despite the fact that the matter would be seen as deeply controversial to the Israeli public”.
Continue reading...Pressure mounts for patent waivers to allow poorer countries to develop their own manufacturing capacity to boost availability
The domination of global medicine by major pharmaceutical companies needs to be confronted to provide fairer access to vaccines, a leading South African official has said.
The scramble over Covid vaccines should alert rich countries to the power of profit-driven companies that control production of crucial medicines, said Mustaqeem De Gama, South Africa’s delegate at the World Trade Organization (WTO) on intellectual property rights.
Continue reading...While the UK and US strive for herd immunity, Russia and China are leveraging their Covid jabs
“Today it is easier to get a nuclear weapon than to get a vaccine,” the Serbian president, Aleksandar Vučić, declared in January. He was bragging. The Balkans country had just received its first shipment of almost 1m Covid-19 vaccine doses from Sinopharm, a state-owned Chinese pharmaceutical company.
Since then, Serbia has augmented its stockpile with tens of thousands of shots of Russia’s Sputnik V, signed an agreement to build a bottling plant for the Russian vaccine and now boasts the fastest vaccination rate in continental Europe.
Continue reading...French proposal comes after accusations wealthier nations have ordered more than they need
As Britain prepares to host the G7 club of wealthy nations on Friday under the chairmanship of Boris Johnson, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, has proposed that 5% of its vaccines are sent to poorer countries, especially in Africa.
Johnson is expected to advance a parallel plan to cut the amount of time it takes to create vaccines, and may be unimpressed it has been upstaged by Macron.
Continue reading...Liam Thorp, whose real height is 6ft 2in, was recorded as having a BMI of 28,000
A 32-year-old man with no underlying health conditions was offered a Covid vaccine early because of a blunder at his GP surgery which recorded him as being 6.2cm tall, giving him an astonishing body mass index (BMI) of 28,000.
The Liverpool Echo’s political editor, Liam Thorp, said he was left “really confused” after he was offered the jab this week seemingly ahead of the government’s rollout plan, and shared the “frankly surreal” experience in a Twitter thread which quickly went viral.
Continue reading...Police are looking into allegations of so-called ‘wind vaccinations’ amid speculation about possible motives
Police in Brazil are investigating allegations that healthcare workers are giving fake Covid-19 inoculations, amid reports of nurses injecting people with empty syringes.
Cases of what local media are calling “wind vaccination” have been reported in four states, adding to the woes of the country’s halting and uncoordinated immunisation programme.
Continue reading...