Boris Johnson has said delays in vaccine supplies will not affect the government’s roadmap out of lockdown. ‘We’ve always said that in a vaccination programme of this pace and scale, some interruptions in supply are inevitable,’ he said. ‘The progress along the road to freedom remains unchecked.’
Most side-effects are mild and short-lived, and some groups are more likely to get them than others
According to Public Health England, most side-effects from the Covid vaccines – Pfizer/BioNTech and Oxford/AstraZeneca – are mild and short-lived. These include soreness where the jab was given, feeling tired or achy and headaches. Uncommon side-effects include having swollen lymph nodes.
Continue reading...The Oxford/AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine is 'safe and effective' and its benefits outweigh the risks, Europe’s medicines regulator has said. The director of the European Medicines Agency, Emer Cooke, said the agency’s safety committee had reached 'a clear scientific conclusion' and had not found that the vaccine was associated with an increase in the overall risk of blood clots
Continue reading...Health secretary says stocks will be affected by need to retest 1.7m doses and delay from India
Matt Hancock has said there will be a significant dip in vaccine supply in April, confirming supplies have been hit by a need to retest 1.7m doses and a delay in arrival of imports from India.
Speaking in the House of Commons, Hancock stressed the overall target timetable for vaccinations would not change but said he wanted to give more information, following the “speculation we’ve seen overnight”, after he was criticised for a press conference on Wednesday where the drop in supply went unexplained.
Continue reading...Biden administration has come under pressure to share vaccine, which has been authorized in other countries but not yet in US
The United States plans to send roughly 4m doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine that it is not using to Mexico and Canada in loan deals with the two countries.
Mexico will receive 2.5m doses of the vaccine and Canada will receive 1.5m doses, the official said.
Continue reading...Life-saving techniques fall out of favour on maternity wards in developing countries over Covid fears
Small and sick babies are at increased risk of dying due to disruptions in care caused by coronavirus, a survey of health workers across 62 mainly developing countries has found.
Every year, 2.5 million babies die within 28 days of birth, and more than 80% of them have low birth weight. A technique for premature and small babies known as kangaroo mother care (KMC), involving early prolonged skin-to-skin contact with their mothers and breastfeeding, can help reduce mortality.
Continue reading...Health authority in Lombardy withdraws questionnaire for patients after sexism complaints
A health authority in Italy’s Lombardy region has come under fire after distributing a questionnaire to recovering Covid-19 patients that included questions about cooking and housekeeping aimed solely at women.
The questionnaire, issued by the ASST Rhodense health authority in Milan and intended to capture the lingering symptoms of coronavirus, was being given to patients invited back to hospitals for check-ups.
Continue reading...With medical resources diverted to the pandemic, years of progress in children’s healthcare are under threat
Nurse Magdalene Fornah was on duty at Freetown’s Connaught hospital when she heard that Sierra Leone had its first confirmed coronavirus case. It was five years after Ebola had killed about 4,000 people in the small country, ravaging the fragile health system. Soon after that initial case was announced last March, the UN estimated that 3.3 million people across Africa could die of Covid-19.
Like the rest of her medical colleagues, Fornah had no idea this nightmare scenario would not come to pass. “When I saw the first patients, I was scared,” she says.
Continue reading...Month-long restrictions to come into force as officials warn virus could rip through PNG’s fragile health system ‘like a tornado’
Papua New Guinea will go into a month-long nationwide isolation in an effort to arrest a spiralling Covid-19 outbreak that threatens to rip through the country’s fragile health system “like a tornado”, health officials say, shutting hospitals and leaving wards without sufficient staff.
Hospitals across the country have already been forced to shut wards and departments, overwhelmed by a combination of staff becoming infected with the coronavirus, surging patient demand, and swingeing budget cuts.
Continue reading...Delaying England’s winter lockdown ‘caused up to 27,000 extra Covid deaths’; John Magafuli, one of Africa’s most prominent Covid-19 sceptics, dies of ‘heart condition’; Brazil sees record daily case rise
India reported 35,871 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, the highest in more than three months, with the worst-affected state of Maharashtra alone accounting for 65% of that.
Total infections have now risen to 11.47 million, the highest after the United States and Brazil. Deaths rose by 172 to 159,216, data from the health ministry showed.
Europe’s medicines regulator is under mounting pressure to clear up safety concerns over the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid vaccine as experts warned that arguably political decisions to pause it in many countries risked seriously delaying the continent’s already sluggish vaccination drive.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is due on Thursday to announce the findings of its investigation into cases of bleeding, blood clots and low platelet counts in 30 of the vaccine’s recipients that have led many European countries to suspend it:
Related: EU medicines regulator to report on AstraZeneca Covid vaccine safety
Continue reading...Pared-back bill now relates only to casual employment; government faces scrutiny over its botched vaccine booking website. Follow all the latest updates
Four Corners has announced its episode for Monday. Here is the release:
On Monday Four Corners investigates how and why Brittany Higgins’ story was kept quiet for almost two years.
It does not bode well for the Centre Alliance “alliance” if its two remaining MPs can’t come to an agreement of whether or not there was an agreement.
Continue reading...Study finds under-65s have about 80% protection from virus for at least six months but over-65s only 47%
Older people who have recovered from Covid cannot assume they are immune from a second attack, according to a new study that shows the under-65s are much less susceptible to reinfection.
The study carried out in Denmark found that the under-65s had about 80% protection for at least six months from catching Covid a second time. But the over-65s had only 47% protection.
Continue reading...Leader’s death follows two-week absence from public life that prompted rumours he had virus
Tanzania’s president, John Magufuli , one of Africa’s most prominent Covid-19 deniers, has died after a two-week absence from public life which prompted speculation that he had contracted the disease.
Related: Tanzania’s missing president is in Kenya with Covid, says opposition leader
Continue reading...The UK's foreign secretary said the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, needed to explain herself after she threatened to ban exports of Covid-19 vaccines to the UK. Raab said such a move would cut across previous assurances. 'Frankly, I'm surprised we're having this conversation,' Raab said. 'It's normally the UK and the EU [who] team up to object when other countries with less democratic regimes than our own engage in that kind of brinkmanship'
Continue reading...The health secretary is not concerned about an NHS warning that a 'significant reduction' of vaccine supplies could leave people under the age of 50 waiting an extra month for their first shot.
Playing down the importance of what he described as a 'normal operational letter', Matt Hancock said the government's plan to offer every adult a vaccine by the end of July had not changed. 'Vaccine supply is always lumpy,' he said. 'These supply schedules have moved up and down throughout this whole rollout –it's absolutely par for the course.'
Decision to pause use of AstraZeneca jab could lead to more deaths as new variant cases increase rapidly
Large parts of Europe are at the start of a third coronavirus wave, experts have said, with warnings that the decision to pause the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine over health concerns is likely lead to a rise in cases and a high number of deaths as more contagious new variants account for the majority of cases.
Christian Drosten, a leading virologist at Berlin’s Charité hospital said Germany’s epidemiological situation was “not good right now”, and was compounded both by the exponential rise in the spread of the B117 mutation which first originated in Britain that now makes up about three-quarters of new cases in Germany, and the decision to temporarily stop using Oxford/AstraZeneca. “We need this vaccine,” he insisted.
Continue reading...The EU commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has hinted that the bloc could withhold vaccine exports to the UK, reopening a dispute with the British government over supply delays affecting the European inoculation campaign. 'We want reciprocity,' she said. 'This is an invitation to show us that there are also doses coming to us from the UK'
Plan will also allow states most reliant on tourism to make bilateral arrangements with non-EU members – including UK
The European commission has unveiled a “digital green certificate” that could allow EU citizens who have been vaccinated, tested negative or recovered from Covid-19 to travel more freely within the bloc this summer.
The plan would also allow southern states such as Spain, Greece and Portugal, whose economies are most reliant on tourism, to make bilateral arrangements with non-EU members – including Britain – providing the deals are approved by the commission.
Continue reading...With France under nationwide curfew from 6pm to 6am, the usually crowded Champs-Élysées in the centre of Paris is all but empty these days. But that has not stopped businesses along the avenue continuing to keep their signs and advertisements turned on. Now a group of parkour climate activists have begun climbing buildings to turn off the signs as part of the Lights Off movement, which seeks to take a stand against light pollution. Since going viral on TikTok, similar actions have started taking place in other French cities
Continue reading...Goats of Great Orme venturing even further into town, sparking fears for their safety as lockdown eased
The goats of the Great Orme headland in Wales were a worldwide sensation during the first Covid lockdown last year after they were pictured roaming brazenly around the deserted streets of nearby Llandudno.
This year there has been a population explosion of the kashmiri goats in their north Wales headland home after the Covid crisis forced countryside wardens to cancel a planned contraception campaign.
Continue reading...