Category Archives: Coronavirus

Germany faces calls for nationwide approach to Covid restrictions

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Frustration grows over patchwork arrangements across the country as infections rates continue to rise

Calls are growing in Germany for the introduction of nationwide coronavirus restrictions amid confusion and frustration over patchwork arrangements across the country as the infection rate continues to rise.

The majority of Germans are in favour of a more unified approach to tackling the virus, now in its third wave, according to a poll, ahead of an expected tightening of rules after the holiday weekend.

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Nicaraguan ruler Ortega rolls out vaccination campaign amid secrecy and doubt

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Doctors say details on strategy are lacking – a lack of clarity that has characterized the authoritarian leader’s pandemic response

The first person in Nicaragua to receive a coronavirus vaccine was Marco Antonio Aráuz, 62, who was given a dose of the Russian Sputnik V treatment at Managua’s Blue Cross hospital.

Related: Nicaragua leaders face backlash after forming space agency amid human rights crisis

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As a sense of normality returns, we must not forget what this last year has been like for the NHS

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I’m an NHS consultant. We barely had the resources to keep people alive – let alone cope with longer effects of Covid

One year ago, lockdown had just come in. A creeping sense of dread was spreading across the hospital. We were focused on the first wave of admissions, the peak of which for us occurred in early April. We were desperately learning how to keep people from dying due to this new disease. The longer-term consequences were the last thing on our minds.

Now, a year on, there is a superficial sense of normality returning. Our respiratory support unit, for so long hidden behind closed doors with “STOP: CORONAVIRUS” signs and staffed by hooded figures in head-to-toe PPE, has turned back into the bright, airy ward it used to be. Nurses, doctors, porters are back in their usual clothes instead of uniform scrubs; conversation has replaced the incessant hiss of Cpap machines. Our ITU is shrinking back to its normal size. It is easy to forget how things were even a couple of months ago.

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‘I miss school’: 800m children still not fully back in classes

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Rights groups warn that children across the world are being pushed into abusive situations, from early marriage to child labour

Across the world 800 million children are still not fully back in school, Unicef is warning, with many at risk of never returning to the classroom the longer closures go on. There are at least 90 countries where schools are either closed or offering a mix of remote and in-person learning.

The UN agency’s chief of education, Robert Jenkins, told the Guardian that the closures are part of “unimaginable” disruption to children’s education.

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Covid certificates on the cards for use in England since December

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Report shows government was considering plan months before ministers went public

A government-commissioned report in December examined how Covid certificates could be used to decide whether people should be allowed into sports events, pubs and other crowded spaces, months before ministers publicly confirmed the plan.

A document prepared for NHS test and trace and seen by the Guardian shows that the research also looked into whether certificates could be made a condition of entry for family events such as weddings or even small casual gatherings.

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Ontario hastily reverses reopening as new variants usher in a third wave of Covid cases

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Canada’s most populous province has been warning of rapidly spreading coronavirus variants, as cases and ICU admissions surged

Lisa Salamon-Switzman, an emergency room doctor in Toronto, had already worked through two deadly surges of the coronavirus pandemic when a new batch of patients recently began arriving that left her unsettled because of their low oxygen levels – and their age.

“They’re younger than what we saw earlier and they don’t really understand how sick they are,” she said of patients who are in their 40s and 50s. “And now it’s become this huge, huge wave.”

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Police break up Good Friday church service in London – video

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Police broke up a Good Friday service at a Polish church in London after officers said it was violating English coronavirus regulations. People were worshipping at Christ the King church in the south of the capital when police arrived following reports of queues outside the building. The service was being streamed live on social media and footage showed officers addressing those in attendance, telling them the gathering was unlawful. The church defended the service, arguing regulations had been met

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The ‘elite controllers’ who can naturally suppress HIV

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Research into how some HIV-positive people keep the virus at bay promises to yield new treatment possibilities, from vaccines to gene therapies

The year was 1998 when Joel Blankson encountered a patient he would never forget. Blankson was working in the HIV clinic at John Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, when an HIV-positive woman in her mid-40s arrived for some routine tests.

Blankson gave her a PCR test, intending to prescribe a newly developed combination of medicines called antiretroviral therapies to suppress the infection, and prevent her developing Aids.

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Lockdown made me do it: how we lost our will power

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From vegetarians tucking into battered sausages to ethical shoppers splurging on fast fashion, many of us have abandoned our better lifestyle choices in lockdown. Amelia Tait discovers what sent her moral compass into a spin

It started with a battered sausage – and OK, if I’m being honest, there were chicken nuggets, too. On 14 April 2020, after three years of vegetarianism and three weeks of lockdown, I shamelessly tucked into some processed meat from the chip shop. Two days later, I wrote the following in my diary: “Honestly, I’m still thinking about it. I simply can’t believe how wonderful it was.”

In truth, I was never a great vegetarian – I ate meat on my birthday, during crying jags, and often when abroad. Still, last April marked a shift in my psyche. I knew when tucking into my nuggets that this wasn’t a regular slip-up. This was an active decision to resume eating meat. I remember how I justified it to myself as I splashed on the salt and vinegar: “We’re being denied so much right now. Why should I deny myself something else?”

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How New Zealand’s Covid success made it a laboratory for the world

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Small outbreaks and universal genomic sequencing provides unique insights into how coronavirus spreads

Jenene Crossan doesn’t know where she got it. “I caught it in London, have no idea where or from who, in March 2020,” she says. “I’ve been sick ever since.” Crossan used to worry about it – going back over possible infection scenarios, exchanging theories with a friend who got ill at the same time. These days, though, she’s come to terms with not knowing. “The reality is it doesn’t matter,” she says. “London was awash.”

Like many of the vast majority of people unlucky enough to receive a positive Covid test result, the precise moment of infection remains a mystery. Some might narrow it down to a likely household member, friend or workmate who began showing symptoms too. Others trace it to a gathering – a wedding, funeral, or dinner party, where several attendees subsequently came down sick. But most are left wondering. As a New York Times headline put it last year: “How Are Americans Catching the Virus? Increasingly, They Have No Idea”.

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Coronavirus live news: Number fully vaccinated in UK passes 5m milestone; Argentina’s leader tests positive

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Children in England can visit grandparents for first time from next week; India’s daily coronavirus infections hit six-month high

This from the British health minister Matt Hancock:

I'm delighted that 50% of over-80s have now had their second jab.

Thank you to everyone involved in rolling-out the vaccine across the whole UK pic.twitter.com/VRfVHQeaEM

Turkey reported 44,756 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours to Saturday, health ministry data showed, the highest level since the beginning of the pandemic.

Turkey currently ranks fifth globally for most daily cases based on a seven-day average, according to a Reuters tally.

Turkey re-enforced weekend curfews starting on April 2 in accordance with the risk situation of provinces amid surging coronavirus cases and fatalities.

The weekend curfew started Friday 9 pm nationwide. However, its duration will vary province-wise.

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California scrambles as maskless crowds flood vacation hotspots

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Tens of thousands flood Santa Monica Pier as authorities send mixed messages about coronavirus safety

Authorities across southern California are scrambling to contain large holiday crowds on beaches, boardwalks, and piers this weekend, anxious about a possible new surge in Covid-19 cases.

But they face a restive public eager to party in the sun after more than a year of lockdowns, and appear to have few tools at their disposal to enforce mask-wearing and social distancing.

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Australian Covid vaccine rollout to continue after blood clot case in Melbourne

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The acting chief medical officer says it is ‘likely’ the 44-year-old Victorian man’s condition is related to the vaccine

Australia’s acting chief medical officer says there will be no changes to the national vaccination program for Covid-19 while health authorities continue to investigate whether blood clots developed by a 44-year-old Victorian man are linked to the AstraZeneca jab.

Prof Michael Kidd said the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (Atagi) and the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) had not recommended any change to the rollout of the vaccine following an urgent meeting of health authorities on Saturday.

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A Mexican tragedy: country’s crippling Covid crisis comes into sharp focus

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Adriana Mejía lost half her family in just 83 days – now a huge death toll of 294,000 is being quietly acknowledged

It took just 83 days for Adriana Mejía to lose half her family, as Covid unleashed a Mexican tragedy whose full impact is only now becoming clear.

First to depart was her father, Juan, a 90-year-old carpenter who died at the family home in Mexico City last July after summoning his eight children to say goodbye. Two weeks later Mejía’s 55-year-old sister, Cecilia, who began feeling unwell as they buried their father, also lost her life. Two days later, on 3 August, Mejía lost her brother, Juan Carlos, then, 13 days after that, her brother-in-law, Germán.

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Seeing stones: pandemic reveals Palantir’s troubling reach in Europe

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Covid has given Peter Thiel’s secretive US tech company new opportunities to operate in Europe in ways some campaigners find worrying

The 24 March, 2020 will be remembered by some for the news that Prince Charles tested positive for Covid and was isolating in Scotland. In Athens it was memorable as the day the traffic went silent. Twenty-four hours into a hard lockdown, Greeks were acclimatising to a new reality in which they had to send an SMS to the government in order to leave the house. As well as millions of text messages, the Greek government faced extraordinary dilemmas. The European Union’s most vulnerable economy, its oldest population along with Italy, and one of its weakest health systems faced the first wave of a pandemic that overwhelmed richer countries with fewer pensioners and stronger health provision. The carnage in Italy loomed large across the Adriatic.

One Greek who did go into the office that day was Kyriakos Pierrakakis, the minister for digital transformation, whose signature was inked in blue on an agreement with the US technology company, Palantir. The deal, which would not be revealed to the public for another nine months, gave one of the world’s most controversial tech companies access to vast amounts of personal data while offering its software to help Greece weather the Covid storm. The zero-cost agreement was not registered on the public procurement system, neither did the Greek government carry out a data impact assessment – the mandated check to see whether an agreement might violate privacy laws.

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Brazil records 70,238 new cases; Netherlands halts AstraZeneca jab for under 60s – as it happened

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Country has registered more than 12.9 million cases; 10,000 appointments scrapped, reports Dutch news agency citing Netherlands health ministry

That’s it from the global blog team for now. Thanks for following our coverage, a new blog will be going live in a few hours.

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Seven UK recipients of Oxford jab reported dead after clotting

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Experts say numbers of rare blood clots remain low and benefits of Covid vaccine far outweigh risks

Further cases of a rare blood clotting syndrome including seven deaths have been reported among recipients of the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab in the UK, although experts say the numbers remain low and the benefits of the vaccine far outweigh any risks.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), runs a “yellow card” scheme to pick up suspected side-effects or other concerns for medicines and medical devices.

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‘Opportunity is coming’: Joe Biden celebrates latest jobs report – video

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Joe Biden has encouraged Americans to ‘buckle down’ as coronavirus cases rise but he was optimistic on the state of the economy and celebrated the latest jobs report.

The US economy added 916,000 jobs last month according to the report which Biden credited to the resiliency of the American people and his administration’s new economic vision

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Amid Brazil’s tragedy, our hope is the prospect of Bolsonaro’s defeat next year | Celso Amorim

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As Covid deaths climb the president seems to be throwing the country into an abyss that will be difficult to escape from

It is no exaggeration to say that Brazil is going through the most serious crisis in its history. With nearly 4,000 deaths a day and moving quickly towards a figure of 500,000 people killed by Covid-19, Brazil is not just the epicentre of the pandemic. It has also become the breeding ground for new variants of the virus: a real threat to its own people and the whole of humankind.

In the midst of a public health war that is being lost, its president, Jair Bolsonaro, is throwing the country more deeply into an abyss, from where it will be hard to emerge. Apart from the suffering caused to hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of relatives and friends of the victims, the economy has been plunged into recession, with 14% of the workforce condemned to the dole. In contrast to what happened during the first wave of the pandemic, when Congress forced the government to distribute relatively significant financial aid to a large portion of the population, now fewer people will benefit with a smaller amount.

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French lockdown will hit economic growth, finance minister warns

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Bruno Le Maire’s forecast follows imposition of third national lockdown by Emmanuel Macron

A fresh lockdown in France will dent economic growth this year but it is too early to say by how much, the finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, has warned.

Amid concerns that increasing infection rates across much of continental Europe will slow the recovery from the pandemic, Le Maire indicated on Friday that a forecast of 6% GDP growth this year may need to be revised downwards.

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