Category Archives: Science

Coronavirus live news: Beijing back into partial lockdown as new cluster emerges

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Anthony Fauci calls Trump rallies a danger to health; Australia’s chief medical officers warns against BLM rallies

Three activists of Algeria’s Hirak protest movement were ordered to be held in pre-trial detention for offences including “endangering the lives of others during the [coronavirus] confinement period”, a prisoners’ defence group said on Saturday.

The Hirak movement led peaceful protests in 2019 after Abdelaziz Bouteflika announced his candidacy for a fifth presidential term, calling for Bouteflika’s immediate resignation.

Airlines are slowly trying to return to business after the pandemic grounded entire fleets of planes around the globe for months and put their very existence in doubt.

My colleague Gwyn Topham reports.

Related: Lots of distancing, no long-distance: airlines cautiously return to the sky

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Climate worst-case scenarios may not go far enough, cloud data shows

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Modelling suggests climate is considerably more sensitive to carbon emissions than thought

Worst-case global heating scenarios may need to be revised upwards in light of a better understanding of the role of clouds, scientists have said.

Recent modelling data suggests the climate is considerably more sensitive to carbon emissions than previously believed, and experts said the projections had the potential to be “incredibly alarming”, though they stressed further research would be needed to validate the new numbers.

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No ‘patient zero’ as Covid-19 came into UK at least 1,300 times

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Study prompts further criticism that chances to suppress infection early in outbreak were missed

There was no “patient zero” in the UK’s Covid-19 epidemic, according to research showing that the infection was introduced on at least 1,300 occasions.

The findings, from the Covid-19 Genomics UK consortium, have prompted further criticism that opportunities to suppress the spread of infection in February and March were missed.

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Spanish archaeologist sentenced for faking Basque finds

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‘Third-century’ artefacts with hieroglyphics and Basque words referred to non-existent gods and to René Descartes

A Spanish archaeologist whose staggering discoveries included one of the earliest representations of the crucifixion and proof that the written Basque language was centuries older than previously thought has been found guilty of faking the finds.

The saga began in June 2006 when Eliseo Gil presented artefacts excavated from the Roman town of Veleia, near the Basque city of Vitoria.

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Coronavirus live news: pandemic accelerating across Africa; over 2 million cases in US

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Shortage of test kits ‘leading to virus spread in Africa’; Mexico confirms record daily infections; Brazil deaths near 40,000

Another 1.5 million people in the US filed for unemployment benefits last week even as states continued to relax their coronavirus quarantine measures, writes Dominic Rushe and Amanda Holpuch in New York.

In just 12 weeks more than 44 million claims have been made for benefits as people lost their jobs. Rehiring appears to have started. Last week the labor department said the unemployment rate had dipped in May to 13.3% from 14.7% in April – although officials said difficulty collecting data meant the figure was probably 3% higher.

Related: 1.5 million Americans file for unemployment as states relax restrictions

Nearly three-quarters of new cases of coronavirus are coming from 10 countries, mostly concentrated in the Americas and south Asia, the director general of the World Health Organization has said.

Speaking at the UN health agency’s member state briefing on Thursday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the global situation was deteriorating, even as Europe appeared to be over the worst of the outbreak.

More than 7 million cases of Covid-19 have now been reported, and more than 408,000 deaths.

Although the situation in Europe is improving, at the global level, it is getting worse. More than 100,000 new cases have been reported each day for the most part of the past two weeks.

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Is the worst of the pandemic behind us? Here’s what scientists know | Devi Sridhar

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A second wave of coronavirus cases would be disastrous – but there are ways to prevent this happening

Over the weekend, there were no new deaths from coronavirus in London, Scotland or Northern Ireland. Slowly, the number of hospitalisations and deaths is falling across the UK. Rather than celebrating these early signs that the worst of the pandemic could be behind us, however, some scientists are warning of a second wave of infections – an increase in coronavirus cases in the coming weeks or months, which could occur even after a sustained fall in the number of cases. 

These warnings often refer back to the 1918 flu pandemic. That outbreak killed tens of millions of people when it returned the following winter in a deadlier form after the first outbreak had been controlled. But there’s a confusing lack of consensus from scientists about whether we’ll see a second wave of coronavirus cases. Although the future is uncertain, we can imagine four scenarios for what might come next. 

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Bird figurine is earliest Chinese artwork ever discovered, say experts

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‘Refined’ 2cm carving found in Henan dates to palaeolithic period up to 13,000 years ago

A tiny figurine of a bird, carved from burnt bone and no bigger than a £1 coin, is the earliest Chinese artwork ever discovered, according to an international team of archaeologists. 

The carving, less than 2cm in length, has been dated to the palaeolithic period, between 13,800 and 13,000 years ago, which pushes back the earliest known date of east Asian animal sculpture by more than eight millennia. 

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How would a coronavirus vaccine work and will we even get one? – video explainer

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Science editor Ian Sample explains how vaccines work, runs through some of the main obstacles to creating one for coronavirus and preparing it for public use, and tells us which scenario he thinks is most realistic in the next 18 months 

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‘The older I get, the less I fear’: meet the Italian Larry David

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A decade after his two much-loved comedies about the vicissitudes of ageing, director Gianni Di Gregorio explains why, against his own expectations, he had to make another

In 2000, after a decade of caring for his ailing mother in her large flat in Rome, Gianni Di Gregorio wrote a comedy about a bloke called Gianni who looks after his 93-year-old mother in a large flat in Rome. No one was interested in the story, in which the unemployed bachelor ends up running around after a cohort of old ladies whose spirit and vigour remain undimmed despite various ailments. Everyone thought he was crazy: who would be interested in a funny film about four old women and a middle-aged bloke?

Related: Gianni Di Gregorio: The incidental director

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Coronavirus live news: Argentina records more than 1,000 daily cases for first time

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WHO official walks back asymptomatic transmission comments; world faces worst food crisis in 50 years; UK NHS waiting list could hit 10m

Japan’s lower house of parliament has approved an emergency budget worth nearly over £230bn, doubling the scale of measures to pep up the world’s third-biggest economy after the coronavirus tipped it into recession, AFP reports.

Their raucous clucking deprives residents of sleep. They leave the neighbourhood “wrecked”. And food left out for them attracts “rats the size of cats” to an otherwise peaceful, leafy suburb.

New Zealand’s national lockdown to quell the spread of Covid-19 appears to have vanquished the virus, but it has had one unintended consequence: the re-emergence of a plague – not of frogs or locusts but of feral chickens, a flock of which is once again menacing an area of west Auckland.

Related: 'Like a Stephen King movie': feral chickens return to plague New Zealand village

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Coronavirus live news: Africa passes 200,000 confirmed cases after Burundi president dies of suspected Covid-19

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Asylum applications in Europe fall to lowest level for a decade as borders closed; world faces worst food crisis in 50 years

Louise Taylor and David Conn report:

Premier League clubs should be braced for a collective £500m loss of revenue because of the coronavirus pandemic, Deloitte has warned.

Related: Premier League clubs set for £500m collective loss due to coronavirus

Key developments in the global coronavirus outbreak so far today include:

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Surgisphere: mass audit of papers linked to firm behind hydroxychloroquine Lancet study scandal

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Questions continue for Surgisphere and CEO Sapan Desai as universities deny knowledge of links to firm behind Lancet’s now-disputed blockbuster study

Dozens of scientific papers co-authored by the chief executive of the US tech company behind the Lancet hydroxychloroquine study scandal are now being audited, including one that a scientific integrity expert claims contains images that appear to have been digitally manipulated.

The audit follows a Guardian investigation that found the company, Surgisphere, used suspect data in major scientific studies that were published and then retracted by world-leading medical journals, including the Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine.

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Remains of earliest purpose-built playhouse found in east London

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Location of the Red Lion, which predated the Globe, has been subject of debate for years

Archaeologists believe they have found remains of one of the most elusive of all known Elizabethan structures – the earliest purpose-built playhouse in Britain and a prototype for a theatre that staged plays by a young William Shakespeare.

The Red Lion is thought to have been built around 1567 and probably played host to travelling groups of players. Its precise location has been the subject of conjecture and debate for a number of years, but archaeologists are as certain as they can be that they have found its remains at a site in the East End of London where a self-storage facility once stood.

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CrossFit CEO Greg Glassman resigns after offensive George Floyd and coronavirus tweets

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Fitness program lost key partnerships, endorsements and the business of hundreds of affiliated gyms around the world after Glassman tweets

The founder of the US fitness brand CrossFit will step down from his position as CEO following a disastrous few days that have seen the fitness program lose key partnerships, endorsements and the business of hundreds of affiliated gyms around the world.

The move comes after a pair of offensive tweets by Greg Glassman. On Saturday, in response to a tweet from the research centre Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, which stated “Racism is a public health issue”, Glassman tweeted “It’s FLOYD-19”, in reference to the police killing of George Floyd, whose death has sparked a global protest movement.

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Coronavirus live news: New Zealand ‘Covid-19 free’ as UK travel quarantine rules begin

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New Zealand has zero active cases; Global cases pass 7 million, deaths pass 400,000; Chile deaths jump after new fatalities added. Follow the latest updates

The Ryanair boss, Michael O’Leary, has delivered his withering verdict on Britain’s quarantine rules, which came into force today: “British people are ignoring this quarantine. They know it’s rubbish.”

More here:

Related: Ryanair boss: Britons know quarantine rules are rubbish

The Philippines has reported 579 new confirmed cases of Covid-19 today, and eight deaths. Malaysia has reported seven new confirmed cases, and no deaths.

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Brazil stops releasing Covid-19 death toll and wipes data from official site

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Government accused of totalitarianism and censorship after Bolsonaro orders end to publication of numbers

The Brazilian government has been accused of totalitarianism and censorship after it stopped releasing its total numbers of Covid-19 cases and deaths and wiped an official site clean of swaths of data.

Health ministry insiders told local media the move was ordered by far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, himself – and was met with widespread outrage in Brazil, one of the world’s worst-hit Covid-19 hotspots, with more deaths than Italy and more cases than Russia and the UK.

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What is the coronavirus R number and is it rising in the UK?

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Research suggests the average number of people one person infects may be increasing – but opinions differ as to why

With models suggesting that R could have risen above 1 in some parts of the UK, we look at what that means and how concerned we should be:

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Global report: China hails coronavirus response as world death toll tops 400,000

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Beijing denies cover-up or delay, while countries easing lockdowns face spike in cases

The number of confirmed deaths from coronavirus globally has topped 400,000, as the Chinese government released a report lauding its own response to the pandemic that emerged in the city of Wuhan six months ago.

As more countries prepared to continue easing their lockdowns from Monday, Singapore’s prime minister warned the city-state’s citizens that they were entering a tougher world of slowing demand and travel restrictions for the foreseeable future.

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Breakthrough close on coronavirus antibody therapy: reports

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Scientists say injection of cloned antibodies could help treat people already infected, while vaccine development continues

Scientists working on coronavirus treatments may be close to a breakthrough on an antibody treatment that could save the lives of people who become infected, it has been reported.

An injection of cloned antibodies that counteract Covid-19 could prove significant for those in the early stages of infection, according to the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

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‘It’s psychologically easier’: how anti-vaxxers capitalised on coronavirus fears to spread misinformation

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While many believe a Covid-19 vaccine will be a ‘ticket out’, experts are concerned getting people to take it is the real challenge

When Susan had a baby daughter, she was not planning on having her vaccinated. It didn’t seem abnormal to her – most of her mothers’ group didn’t vaccinate either.

“I had friends who believed in natural healing, healthy food, being vegan, eating raw food. I just didn’t think that vaccines were necessary.” 

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