Category Archives: Coronavirus

Covid live: Dutch police open fire at protest; German government not ruling out full lockdown — as it happened

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Two injured as police in Rotterdam fire warning shots; German health minister says nothing can be ruled out

A quick snap from Reuters here that the UK government has announced it will add booster shot status to the Covid-19 pass for outbound international travel, though it said they would not be added to the domestic pass at this time.

The health ministry said that travellers who have had a booster or a third dose would be able to demonstrate their vaccine status through the NHS Covid pass from Friday, adding that a booster was not necessary to travel into England.

This pandemic has exposed a vulnerability to whole-system emergencies – that is, emergencies that are so broad that they engage the entire system. Although the government had plans for an influenza pandemic, it did not have detailed plans for many non-health consequences and some health consequences of a pandemic like Covid-19. There were lessons from previous simulation exercises that were not fully implemented and would have helped prepare for a pandemic like Covid-19. There was limited oversight and assurance of plans in place, and many pre-pandemic plans were not adequate. In addition, there is variation in capacity, capability and maturity of risk management across government departments.

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Political leaders condemn alleged attack on MP’s daughter – as it happened

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PM comments after Animal Justice MP Andy Meddick says daughter attacked; Indian PM repeals controversial agricultural laws; rapid antigen Covid testing for NSW primary schools; Victoria records 1,273 new cases and eight deaths; NSW records 216 new cases and three deaths; rain set to hamper search for remains of William Tyrrell. This blog is now closed

OK, jumping back to South Australia where opposition leader Peter Malinauskas has condemned the premier’s decision not to dismiss his deputy premier and attorney general Vicky Chapman after the parliament passed a vote of no confidence against her.

Malinauskas told ABC News Breakfast that this was “a truly extraordinary state of affairs, if not a constitutional crisis”.

It’s an incredibly unfortunate state of affairs in South Australia where premier Steven Marshall has decided to almost literally tear up the rulebook of convention that’s been established over hundreds of years of the Westminster system of government and ignore the parliament’s will [for him to] ask Vickie Chapman to resign her position at deputy premier.

There’s been a motion of no confidence passed in the deputy premier. This is unprecedented. Everybody seems to be putting their fingers in their ears and pretending nothing has happened, particularly the premier himself.

What I accept and what I’ve always defended and been a very strong supporter of is people’s right to protest. But if it’s not peaceful, it’s not protest and it’s something very different.

We have seen extremists, rabid anti-vaxxer and others making all sorts of threats, threats against me, my wife and my kids. That is not my focus, this is about every family’s safety and that’s why we have to work together and that’s what Victorians have done.

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UK ministers were unprepared for impact of Covid, says watchdog

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Report says detailed plans on shielding, job support schemes and school disruption were lacking

Ministers were not “fully prepared” for the “wide-ranging impacts” that Covid-19 had on society, the economy and essential public services in the UK, and lacked detailed plans on shielding, job support schemes and school disruption, a report has found.

Some lessons from “previous simulation exercises” that would have helped with Covid-19 preparations were “not fully implemented”, according to the National Audit Office (NAO).

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‘No way around it’: Austrians queue for jabs as unvaccinated told to stay home

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In Linz, jab willingness is rising as police check Covid passports – but confusion remains on what is essential travel

On a street of shops in the Austrian city of Linz, a stone’s throw from the winding Danube river, two police officers in navy-blue uniforms and peaked white caps stop random passersby to check their vaccine passports.

Elderly shoppers rummage around in their handbags and comply with a smile, but a fortysomething woman with a nose piercing is less forthcoming: she says she left her immunisation certificate on the kitchen table as she had to dash across town to see a dentist.

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First known Covid case was Wuhan market vendor, says scientist

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Claim will reignite debate about origins of pandemic, a continuing source of tension between US and China

The first known Covid-19 case was a vendor at the live-animal market in Wuhan, according to a scientist who has scrutinised public accounts of the earliest cases in China.

The chronology is at odds with a timeline laid out in an influential World Health Organization (WHO) report, which suggested an accountant with no apparent link to the Hunan market was the first known case.

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Cathay Pacific sacks three pilots for catching Covid on layover

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The ‘unspecified breach’ in Frankfurt led to 150 other employees being quarantined for three weeks under Hong Kong’s strict rules

Cathay Pacific Airways has sacked three cargo pilots for becoming infected with Covid-19 during a layover in Frankfurt, citing an unspecified “serious breach” of crew rules while overseas.

“The individuals concerned are no longer employed by Cathay Pacific,” the company said in a statement issued on Thursday.

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Dissent, threats and fury: mood darkens in New Zealand as Covid restrictions bite

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The country has seen a rapid uptick in protests and online disinformation, tinged with far-right undertones

For more than a year, New Zealand’s “team of 5 million” stood largely united in the face of Covid-19. This month, as the country expanded vaccine mandates and a tougher roadmap of restrictions for the unvaccinated, that mood has splintered and darkened. Among a small but vocal sliver of the population, dissent has been turning ugly, with death threats against MPs and journalists, increasing protests, warnings from security services about Covid-prompted terror threats, and what researchers have called a “wave” of disinformation tinged with violent rhetoric, QAnon-style conspiracy theories and far-right undertones.

“We’re talking … your aunt and uncle type-people using language like Nuremberg 2.0, common law trials, like ‘the prime minister is a Nazi’ – these are quite extreme terms and terminologies,” says Kate Hannah, a research fellow at Te Pūnaha Matatini’s disinformation project, a research institute that monitors online extremism and rhetoric. Hannah says the team observed an incredibly rapid shift in both the volume and tone of disinformation circulating in New Zealand’s online communities since the Delta outbreak and level 4 lockdown began.

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Covid live: UK reports 46,807 new cases and 199 deaths; Austria provinces to lockdown fully amid record cases

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UK cases remain high; Austria’s daily infections hit a new record

From Washington, David Smith brings us this report about hard-hitting Covid-19 documentary The First Wave:

It is tempting to suggest that the Covid deniers, the hoaxers, the hucksters, the anti-vaxxers, the flat earthers, the merchants of disinformation and the crackpot conspiracy theorists be strapped into a chair and force fed The First Wave, a harrowing documentary about the early toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

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Anti-vaxxers using bribery and fake certificates to avoid vaccination, Australian government warned

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Pharmacists and aged care providers tell MPs of tactics being employed to escape public health laws including ‘no jab, no job’

The pharmacy and aged care sectors have called for new penalties for vaccination status fraud including bribery, use of fake certificates or stand-in vaccine recipients getting the Covid-19 jab on behalf of an unvaccinated person.

The Pharmacy Guild and Aged and Community Services Australia have warned that anti-vaxxers are using these tactics to escape public health laws including “no jab, no job” provisions in the aged care sector.

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German health chief urges Covid crackdown to avert ‘very bad Christmas’

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Country facing ‘extremely dismal days’ as it set ninth consecutive record for daily case numbers

The head of Germany’s disease control agency has said the country is heading for a “very bad Christmas season” if drastic measures are not taken to dampen the spread of coronavirus.

Lothar Wieler, the head of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), said that even if measures were taken Germany faced a period of “extremely dismal days” during which hundreds of people would die out of those currently infected.

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‘Zero-Covid is not going to happen’: experts predict a steep rise in US cases this winter

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Total US deaths from Covid may reach 1 million by spring as vaccination rates remain lower than 60%

A steep rise in Covid-19 cases in Europe should serve as a warning that the US could also see significant increases in coronavirus cases this winter, particularly in the nation’s colder regions, scientists say.

However, there is more cause for optimism as America enters its second pandemic winter, even in the face of likely rises in cases.

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Age no barrier to activism: how UK’s young and old built bonds in Covid

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The pandemic may have separated us, but it has created alliances too. Five diverse pairings share their stories

Unexpected friendships spanning four – and sometimes five – generations have sprung up between volunteers engaged in “crisis campaigning” during the pandemic.

Experts said the unusual bonding between those in their 60s and older, and those in their early 20s and younger, has been partly galvanised by the enforced separation of the generations during lockdown, leading the age groups to value each other in a way they had not previously.

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US leaders urge Covid boosters for all ahead of expected FDA authorization

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States and cities recommend residents older than 18 seek an additional shot six months after their initial immunization

As Covid-19 cases in the US begin to rise once more and health agencies consider booster shots for all adults, some states and cities are taking matters into their own hands and urging additional shots, advice that goes beyond current federal guidelines.

Leaders in Colorado, California, New Mexico, Arkansas, West Virginia, and New York City recommend that residents older than 18 seek an additional shot six months after their initial immunization.

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‘I thought I’d never hear applause again’: Brazilian sambistas rejoice at the return of music

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Renowned singer Zeca Pagodinho is back performing after Covid-stricken nation carries out one of world’s largest vaccination drives

“If I want to smoke, I’ll smoke. If I want to drink, I’ll drink,” the legendary Brazilian singer Zeca Pagodinho proclaims in one of his best-known sambas.

Coronavirus robbed Zeca of an even greater pleasure: performing the songs that have made him one of Brazil’s most successful and universally adored stars.

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What the UK can learn from South Korea’s Covid response | Devi Sridhar

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At the start of the pandemic, Seoul pursued a zero-Covid policy. How will this affect the west’s response to the next pandemic?’

With winter approaching, it’s time to talk about the optimal Covid-19 strategy again – and for that, we need to look once more at what’s happening in South Korea.

It has vaccinated 79.2% of its population with two doses, and, if it continues administering 220,000 doses a day, will have covered almost 90% of its population by the end of the year. Compare this to the UK, where 68.6% of the population has received two doses, and the US, where this figure is at 58%. If we compare deaths, the numbers are even more shocking. South Korea has suffered only 3,137 from a population of 51.8 million. For the UK, the corresponding figures are 142,945 deaths from a population of 67.2 million, while in the US there have been 783,575 deaths from a population of 329.5 million. In addition, in the first quarter of 2021, South Korea became one of the first high-income countries to see its economy recover to pre-pandemic levels, after it managed to only experience a 1% contraction in GDP in 2020 (the second-best performance behind China).

Prof Devi Sridhar is chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh

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Covid live news: fourth wave hitting Germany with ‘full force’, Merkel warns; Belgium mandates working from home

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Angela Merkel calls for an extra push on vaccinations; Belgium tightens restrictions as cases rise in fourth wave

Agence France-Presse is reporting that delivery and logistics firm FedEx have announced it is closing its operations base in Hong Kong over the city’s quarantine requirements.

“As the global business environment continues to evolve and with the pandemic requirements in Hong Kong, FedEx has made the decision to close its Hong Kong crew base and relocate its pilots,” FedEx said in a statement to Hong Kong’s public broadcaster RTHK.

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A moment that changed me: ‘After 102 days in intensive care, I finally came home’

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A year after I left hospital, I’m still getting over the Covid that almost killed me. But I’m not going to waste another minute of my life

I was in a wheelchair when they brought me home at the end of September 2020. I had been in intensive care for 102 days. For the first two months my wife, Plum, had not been allowed to visit, instead receiving daily reports on my condition – recurrent delirium, two heart attacks, stents, kidney dialysis, pneumonia, memory loss and tracheotomy – all brought on by Covid.

Three times she was told I wouldn’t be resuscitated if I suffered any further deterioration and she had come to dread the ringing of the phone. But only when I got home did I fully realise how much she and the families of other Covid patients had suffered.

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Fauci: US can get Covid under control by next year with more jabs

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Top infectious disease official said if more Americans get vaccines and booster shots, the disease could be downgraded to endemic status

Anthony Fauci, the top infectious diseases public official in the US, said on Tuesday that if America further ramps up vaccination rates and those already immunized take booster shots that it is feasible Covid-19 could be reduced from a pandemic emergency to endemic status next year.

More than 70% of adults in the US are fully vaccinated. Fauci said if a lot more Americans take the vaccines, and if the US makes boosters available for everyone, the country could get control of the virus by spring of 2022.

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Five Tory MPs and peers who referred firms to controversial VIP lane

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A number of Conservatives made referrals for firms that won Covid contracts, leaked document shows

A list of the 47 companies referred to the government’s VIP fast-track lane for contracts to supply PPE has been revealed. These are five of the significant political figures whose referrals ended up with the companies winning contracts.

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Coronavirus live: Ireland brings in midnight curfew; Cyprus offers boosters to all adults

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Irish restrictions include advice to work from home to fight rising hospitalisations; Cyprus health officials react to rising cases

Our economics editor Larry Elliott has written his analysis this morning on how the UK economy is beginning to emerge from Covid, but old problems remain. He concludes:

The economy as a whole is now starting to go post-Covid. The inflation figures due out on Wednesday will still show the impact of the virus on global energy prices and on supply chains but in other respects it is as if the past 18 months never happened.

There are two sides to that. The good news is that the labour market has emerged relatively unscathed. The bad news is that the problems of February 2020 – low investment, low productivity, weak underlying growth – are problems that remain to be tackled in November 2021.

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