Rejection of Covid vaccines among wellness community has been blamed on popular social media accounts that spread disinformation
Many know Wanaka, a picturesque tourist town at the foot of New Zealand’s Southern Alps, for its most famous tree.
The willow, which blooms uncannily from the glacial lake as if floating on water, represents different things for different people. For some, the miracles of a divine nature, for others, a marvel easily explained by science.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Guardian survey shows level of intimidation, including death threats, against scientific and medical advisers
The “appalling” scale of abuse, intimidation and threatening behaviour directed at the UK government’s scientific and medical advisers has been laid bare in a Guardian survey of experts working on the pandemic.
Dozens of UK advisers described incidents ranging from coordinated online attacks to death threats and acts of intimidation, such as photos being taken of their homes and shared online and suspicious packages arriving in the post, some containing items with messages scrawled on them.
Continue reading...Covid expert hopeful for ‘relatively normal’ winter 2022 but prevalence limits celebrations across continent
Germany’s leading coronavirus expert has expressed optimism that his country could expect a “relatively normal” winter in 2022 as Europe prepared to ring in the new year in muted fashion, with many countries limiting celebrations.
As the highly transmissible Omicron variant fuels a record-breaking surge in Covid infections across the continent, many governments have curtailed mass public gatherings and either closed or imposed curfews on nightclubs.
Continue reading...Scientific consensus absent as impasse between China and west continues to hamper tracing effort
Robert Garry, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Tulane medical school in Louisiana, got a call from his university management telling him that agents from the FBI and CIA had requested a chat about his research into the origins of Covid-19.
Garry agreed and on 30 July three agents flew down to Louisiana to talk to him in person.
Continue reading...Ireland latest to change guidance for boosted, as surge across continent threatens economic paralysis
Ireland has become the latest EU country to cut the isolation period for many people who contract Covid-19, as record infection numbers spark fears of crippling staff shortages in essential public services, as well as retail and hospitality venues.
Spain, Portugal and Greece reduced isolation times this week while others, such as Germany and France, are considering doing so and Italy cut its quarantine for fully vaccinated people who come into contact with someone who has tested positive.
Continue reading...The WHO’s vaccination goal is achievable – but it will take proper funding, better vaccine distribution and jabs with longer shelf lives
While western countries scramble with their booster rollout to deal with the Omicron wave, only 8.4% of people in low-income countries have had at least one Covid vaccination dose.
The gap in the vaccination rates between high- and low-income countries is wider than ever. We cannot keep turning a blind eye to it.
Continue reading...In December 2019 the WHO was told of a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China. These charts show how Covid-19 has spread across the world since then
Two years ago today, as New Year’s Eve fireworks lit up skies across the world, news reached the World Health Organization (WHO) about an outbreak of “pneumonia” in Wuhan, China, the cause of which was unknown.
There had been several cases in December and possibly as far back as November in the region. But the subsequent WHO announcement was the first time that the world at large was made aware of its existence.
Continue reading...Thousands now free to leave isolation after changes to close contact definition comes into force; New Year’s Eve plans appear to be going ahead in major cities despite surging coronavirus numbers. Follow all today’s news
So, it appears South Australia will resist the changes to the definition of close contact the National Cabinet agreed to yesterday.
In a Facebook post earlier this morning, premier Steven Marshall lays out his government’s definition of close contacts, resisting the changes introduced by the PM yesterday.
It doesn’t matter to us whether they’re free, subsidised or other some other thing.
What we as an industry have been more concerned about is having a clear role for rapid testing in managing infections, in keeping the economy going and in keeping people safe.
So our representation to them [the federal government] has always been that there needs to be a hybrid system, because it may only be $10 or $15 a test and yes, that may be a lot cheaper than a PCR test.
But $10 or $15 per person per household twice in a seven-day period is still not affordable for some low-income earners.
Continue reading...Thursday’s figure is new daily record, with the number of people in hospital and deaths also rising
Confirmed daily Covid cases in the UK hit yet another high on Thursday, with 189,213 reported in the past 24 hours, while the number of people in hospital and deaths have also risen, data reveals.
On Wednesday 183,037 daily cases were reported for the whole of the UK – a record at the time – although this figure included a backlog in some nations from before and during the Christmas period, with five days of case data included for Northern Ireland. Thursday’s newly reported cases for Wales covered a two-day period.
Continue reading...Canadian province’s government says measure will be required if staffing levels become too low during Covid surge
Quebec healthcare workers exposed to Covid-19 may have to go to work sooner than expected if staffing levels in the Canadian province’s facilities reach a critical point.
Quebec’s health minister, Christian Dubé, made the announcement earlier this week, explaining that in a worst-case scenario the province would have no choice but to insist that isolating employees return to work.
Continue reading...Government says border officials will show tolerance toward those who had gone back to UK for Christmas
The French government has suspended a new rule that prevented British nationals legally resident in other EU countries from travelling through France to reach their homes, a move that caused confusion for thousands of travellers.
Border officials would “show tolerance” in order to “allow these nationals to transit through France to reach their residence in a country of the European Union after the Christmas and New Year period”, the interior ministry said in a statement. It came as Germany also relaxed rules for British visitors.
Continue reading...Arrival of Omicron variant coupled with loosening of restrictions has seen ‘fortress Australia’ policy abandoned
Since the Covid-19 pandemic began to emerge across the globe almost two years ago, Australia has often appeared to be living in a parallel reality.
In November last year, when more than 50,000 people had already died in the UK and daily case numbers were hovering at about 33,000 during a suffocating lockdown, the Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, was boasting of packed crowds at rugby games.
Continue reading...There were winners and losers as work patterns continued changing, with repercussions for city centres and society as a whole
Of all the predictions on your 2021 bingo card, who had employees being fined for going into the office? Workers in Wales now face that threat since the tightening of Covid regulations amid the spread of the Omicron variant, with a possible £60 penalty for failing to work from home.
That is just one of many examples of how the pandemic has transformed the world of work this year – and perhaps for ever – for city centre employers, their staff and the service industry that depends on them for trade.
Continue reading...Biodiversity talks in Kunming are likely to be delayed again, but the world urgently needs a Paris-style agreement for nature
It was supposed to be a “super year for nature”: 2020 was going to be “a major opportunity to bring nature back from the brink”. But then the coronavirus pandemic set in and long-held plans to tackle the environmental crisis, kickstarted at Davos in January, where the financial elite underscored the risks of global heating and biodiversity loss to human civilisation, never happened. The biggest biodiversity summit in a decade, Cop15 in Kunming, China, where world leaders were expected to strike a deal to halt and reverse the destruction of ecosystems by reaching a Paris-style agreement for nature was postponed until 2021. The Cop26 climate summit was also postponed for a year.
As we enter 2022, there has still not been a super year for nature. Substantive negotiations for the biodiversity Cop15 meeting in China, the little sister to the climate convention, are likely to be delayed a fourth time as a result of the Omicron variant. Preparatory talks planned for January 2022 in Geneva have been pushed back – again – until March in a process that is feeling increasingly cursed, despite the best efforts of organisers.
Continue reading...Victoria’s case numbers have also come in and 5,137 new Covid-19 infections have been detected. That’s quite a jump from 3,767 yesterday.
Sadly, 13 lives have been lost overnight.
Continue reading...French officials report over 206,000 cases; number of people to die from Covid in eastern Europe has reached 1 million people
Here’s a reminder of the news overnight that NHS England is looking to set up new “pop-up” Covid facilities. My colleagues Rowena Mason and Aubrey Allegretti report:
NHS England confirmed that it was creating new small-scale “Nightingale” facilities with up to 100 beds each at eight hospitals across the country. The health service said it had asked trusts to identify empty spaces to accommodate beds in places such as gyms or teaching areas. NHS managers are aiming to create up to 4,000 beds as surge capacity if needed, with work on the first tranche, in temporary structures, starting this week.
Continue reading...Sheer scale of cases means the impact on an already fatigued health system ‘could be enormous’, report says
Australia’s independent expert group OzSage has savaged the “let it rip” Covid-19 strategy in New South Wales and elsewhere, saying it will condemn some people to death, particularly the more vulnerable.
In a report released on Thursday, OzSage said the trajectory of Covid data suggested hospital admission and intensive care unit occupancy numbers were “on a steeply rising trend and anticipated to exceed earlier peaks quite soon. In other words, optimistic assumptions about the impact of the Omicron variant on hospital admissions are unrealistic.”
Continue reading...Eurotunnel operator issues warning to UK nationals after update to Covid travel rules by French government
Eurotunnel is warning British citizens who live in the EU that they cannot travel through France by car from the UK due to new coronavirus restrictions imposed by the French government.
Getlink, the operator of the Channel rail link, issued an urgent warning on its website and Twitter page on Wednesday evening that appeared to confirm that the French government had changed its travel rules.
Continue reading...Case figures include delayed data from Northern Ireland; Spain cuts quarantine despite record rise in cases
India has recorded another 9,195 confirmed coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, according to recently released data from its health ministry.
A further 302 deaths were also recorded, bring the total death toll to 480,592.
Continue reading...Reports cost of RAT kits soaring as federal government considers calling in consumer watchdog
Any official crackdown on price-gouging of rapid antigen tests in Australia is unlikely, despite government suggestions it will get the consumer watchdog involved amid reports the kits have doubled in price as stock disappears from shelves.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has previously noted “price gouging is generally not illegal”, meaning its ability to respond is likely to be limited unless specific circumstances are involved.
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