Category Archives: Infectious Diseases

Coronavirus fears grip Middle East as Iran denies cover-up

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Shrine city of Qom believed to be virus hub, as concern grows for region’s refugee population

Fears are growing across the Middle East that coronavirus has infiltrated a main pilgrimage route, which could lead the deadly pathogen to vulnerable refugee populations, causing perhaps unprecedented public health crises across the region.

Concern is centred on the Iranian shrine city of Qom, which is thought to be a hub of the disease and the likely source of its spread elsewhere in the country and in neighbouring states, where infected travellers have been diagnosed in recent days.

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Coronavirus closures reveal vast scale of China’s secretive wildlife farm industry

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Peacocks, porcupines and pangolins among species bred on 20,000 farms closed in wake of virus

Nearly 20,000 wildlife farmsraising species including peacocks, civet cats, porcupines, ostriches, wild geese and boar have been shut down across China in the wake of the coronavirus, in a move that has exposed the hitherto unknown size of the industry.

Until a few weeks ago wildlife farming was still being promoted by government agencies as an easy way for rural Chinese people to get rich.

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Coronavirus: WHO plays down pandemic fears after sixth person dies in Italy – live updates

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Latest updates amid alarm over sudden rise in cases in Italy and Iran

The World Health Organization has played down fears of a coronavirus pandemic sweeping the world, despite sudden serious outbreaks in Italy and Iran, but some experts said they believed it was now inevitable.

“Using the word pandemic now does not fit the facts, but it may certainly cause fear,” said the WHO’s director general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, at a briefing.

Related: Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic 'in all but name', says expert

Austria has said it will stop people suspected of carrying the coronavirus from crossing its border, after parts of northern Italy were put into lockdown over the weekend following a surge in cases.

The Austrian government released a travel warning for affected areas of Lombardy and Veneto, following a meeting of the government’s coronavirus taskforce that included the chancellor, Sebastian Kurz.

Related: Austria to close border for those suspected of carrying coronavirus

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Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic ‘in all but name’, says expert

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While WHO says virus still containable, sudden cases in Iran and Italy causing alarm

The World Health Organization has played down fears of a coronavirus pandemic sweeping the world, despite sudden serious outbreaks in Italy and Iran, but some experts said they believed it was now inevitable.

“Using the word pandemic now does not fit the facts, but it may certainly cause fear,” said the WHO’s director general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, at a briefing.

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Aerial footage shows huge queues for masks in South Korea amid coronavirus panic – video

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A queue of hundreds of people wanting to buy face masks from a supermarket stretched round several streets in Daegu on Monday.

Customers queued outside one of Daegu's E-mart stores, which began to sell face masks at half price in the city, according to local media reports. South Korea has raised its infectious disease alert level to its highest for the first time since 2009 

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How Britain became a nation of stockpilers: ‘It just feels like something is going to give’

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First there were Brexit hoarders, now it’s coronavirus preppers. Sirin Kale talks to some of them – and to the emergency food supplier who is enjoying a boom time

James Blake, the owner of Europe’s largest emergency food supplier, is one of the few people to be doing good business out of coronavirus. Are you planning to hole up indoors while a pandemic, natural disaster or terrorist attack runs its course? Blake’s company – Emergency Food Storage UK – has got you covered, but it’s not cheap: £385 will buy you one month of food, as long as you like freeze-dried macaroni cheese and chicken-fried rice.

The prices aren’t putting Blake’s customers off. Since coronavirus emerged in China in December, he has been swamped with orders. In the last two weeks alone, Emergency Food has done as much business as it normally would in six months. Which is bad news for anyone thinking now might be a good time to stock up on some of its powdered custard apple crunch, because it’s all gone.

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Italy imposes draconian rules to stop spread of coronavirus

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People caught entering or leaving outbreak areas to be fined, after country’s third death

Italian authorities have implemented draconian measures to try to halt the coronavirus outbreak in the north of the country, including imposing fines on anyone caught entering or leaving outbreak areas, as a third person was confirmed to have died on Sunday.

The number of cases of the virus in the country has risen to 152.

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World is approaching coronavirus tipping point, experts say

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78,000 cases confirmed, as Italy and Iran scramble to contain major outbreaks

The world is fast approaching a tipping point in the spread of the coronavirus, according to experts, who warn that the disease is outpacing efforts to contain it, after major outbreaks forced Italy and Iran to introduce stringent internal travel restrictions and South Korea’s president placed the country on red alert.

Some of the countries most affected by the virus are scrambling to halt its progress two days after Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), said the international community needed to act quickly before the narrowing “window of opportunity” closed completely.

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Coronavirus outbreak: four cruise ship passengers test positive in UK – live news

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Turkey and Pakistan close borders with Iran after eight deaths, while in northern Italy towns are on lockdown after jump in cases

Here’s Angela Giuffrida, Patrick Wintour and Sam Jones’s roundup of today’s coronavirus developments across the globe.

Four of the 32 British and Irish Diamond Princess cruise ship passengers taken to Arrowe Park, Merseyside on Saturday have tested positive for coronavirus strain Covid-19, the chief medical officer for England has said.

Prof Chris Whitty said: “Four further patients in England have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total number of cases in the UK to 13.

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Coronavirus: more deaths confirmed as authorities around the world struggle to contain outbreak – latest updates

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The World Health Organization has raised concerns about cases where there has been no contact with someone known to be infected nor travel to China

Thousands of members of a secretive religious sect in South Korea are being screened for the new coronavirus after more than 430 cases were confirmed in the country by officials, the Guardian’s Rebecca Ratcliffe reports with Nemo Kim in Seoul.

Related: South Korea screens thousands of religious sect members for coronavirus

Around 150 people brought to the Kents Hill Park hotel and conference centre in Milton Keynes earlier this month after being evacuated from Wuhan will be discharged tomorrow.

They arrived in the UK on February 9, having been on a second evacuation flight from the virus-hit city, and the Department of Health confirmed that the 14-day quarantine period will come to an end on Sunday but did not say what time the group would be released.

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South Korea screens thousands of religious sect members for coronavirus

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Country confirms more than 430 cases as WHO head voices concern over fifth death in Iran

Thousands of members of a secretive religious sect in South Korea are being screened for the new coronavirus after more than 430 cases were confirmed in the country by officials, one of several fresh clusters of the disease globally.

More than 78,000 people around the world have been infected by the Covid-19 virus, with most cases in mainland China, though clusters that have unclear origins have emerged in Singapore, Iran and South Korea.

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Coronavirus: window of containment ‘narrowing’ after Iran deaths, WHO warns

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Virus is spreading in Middle East, with confirmed cases in Lebanon and Israel

Four Iranians have died after contracting the coronavirus, with health authorities warning it has spread to multiple cities, while Israel and Lebanon declared their first domestic cases as the deadly epidemic spreads across the Middle East.

Asked on Friday if the new cases put the crisis at a tipping point, the World Health Organization director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said the “window of opportunity is narrowing, so we need to act quickly before it closes completely”.

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‘It’s post-apocalyptic’: how coronavirus has altered day-to-day life

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From Wuhan to the north of England, people have been affected by the outbreak in different ways

The coronavirus is a public health emergency, but its threat is not only medical. Millions of lives have been altered by the outbreak, from those in self-isolation in China to Chinese nationals experiencing racism abroad. We talk to those affected in different ways, from Wuhan to the north of England.

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Coronavirus: China prison reports 200 cases, as virus spreads in South Korea – live updates

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Justice chief sacked in Shandong province with prison guard reported to be source of outbreak, as South Korea adds 52 new cases. Follow latest news

China’s Global Television Network is reporting that 200 prisoners in a facility in the eastern province of Shandong are infected with Covid-19. The sources of the infection is reported to be an affected prison guard.

These prison cases may partly explain the spike in new cases today to 889, up from 394 reported on Thursday.

East China's Shandong Province reported 200 #COVID19 cases from the Rencheng Prison on Thu., bringing the total to 207 in the facility

- Virus brought in by affected prison guard
- Treatments underway
- Provincial justice chief among eight officials removed from office pic.twitter.com/yyMWa21a86

Car sales plummeted in China in February, state media is reporting.

Retail of domestic passenger #vehicles in China plummeted 92% y-o-y in the first half of Feb, a record decline, due to #COVID19: industrial report pic.twitter.com/SkLUjtOdqA

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Coronavirus: South Korean city faces ‘unprecedented crisis’ after spike in cases – latest news

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Mayor of Daegu orders shutdown of all kindergartens and public libraries in while two Japanese passengers from stricken Diamond Princess ship die

Two more Russians aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined in Japan have been diagnosed with a new virus, the Russian Embassy in Japan said Thursday.

The two will be transferred to a hospital in Japan for treatment, according to the embassy statement published on Facebook.

An evacuation flight for Britons stuck on a cruise ship docked off the coast of Japan over coronavirus fears will leave Tokyo on Friday, the UK’s foreign secretary has said.

Dominic Raab said information had been provided to those registered for the flight, but he urged other British nationals still seeking to leave to contact the Foreign Office. He added: “We will continue to support British nationals who wish to stay in Japan.”

I can confirm the evacuation flight out of Tokyo on Friday for British nationals from the Diamond Princess cruise ship: https://t.co/vBYNRkvBbK

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‘Bali’s been through a lot’: holiday island’s tourism industry hit by coronavirus fears

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Hotel bookings plummet by 40,000 in recent weeks as ban on incoming flights from China bites local businesses

The idyllic holiday island of Bali has been hit by the ripple effect of the coronavirus crisis, with tourism plummeting and suggestions it “does not have the capacity” to treat patients if they become sick.

Indonesia, the largest country in south-east Asia, claims to have no cases of coronavirus, but according to the Bali’s tourism board, there have been around 40,000 cancellations of hotel bookings in recent weeks nonetheless. In the first half of February about 740,000 people visited the island – 16.25% fewer than the same period last year – Bali’s airport spokesman told state news agency Antara this week.

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Foreign Office tells Britons not to leave cruise ship struck by coronavirus

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Passengers who disembark Diamond Princess may not be allowed to board evacuation flight later in week, FCO warns

British passengers stuck on the cruise ship in Japan where more than 600 people have been infected with the coronavirus have have been told to stay onboard by the Foreign Office, while those who are evacuated face a 14-day quarantine in the UK.

Japanese authorities said those who had tested negative for the virus were allowed to leave on Wednesday, but the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) warned that passengers who disembark may not be allowed to board a British evacuation flight scheduled for later this week.

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Coronavirus: Diamond Princess exodus begins amid criticism over quarantine

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More than 3,000 people to disembark over three days after ship proved a fertile breeding ground for Covid-19

Hundreds of passengers have begun leaving the stricken Diamond Princess in Japan after testing negative for the coronavirus, ending two weeks of quarantine that experts say failed to prevent the virus spreading onboard.

Japanese TV showed passengers – who spent quarantine largely confined to their cabins – leaving the ship on Wednesday morning to board waiting buses, while others left the pier in Yokohama, near Tokyo, by taxi.

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Dissent becomes the next victim of coronavirus as China cracks down

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Analysts say epidemic poses gravest threat to authorities since Tiananmen Square – and Beijing’s tight control could backfire

The coronavirus crisis in China has posed unprecedented political challenges to the authorities and prompted them to further crack down on speech freedom and tighten control over people in a desperate move to bolster the regime, say analysts and activists.

After President Xi Jinping ordered “resolute efforts” to curb the spread of coronavirus in his first public remarks on the disease on 20 January, Wuhan was swiftly placed under lockdown. Millions of communities across China also began to implement draconian epidemic control measures.

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China’s handling of coronavirus is a diplomatic challenge for WHO

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Beijing’s draconian measures to contain outbreak have delayed global transmission

The World Health Organization is having to perform a diplomatic balancing act over the new coronavirus outbreak, caught between China – whose draconian measures to contain the disease have delayed transmission to the rest of the world –and China’s critics, who say its behaviour is typical of its disregard for human rights.

At every press briefing, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has defended China’s handling of the epidemic in the face of critical questions, very often from US journalists. At the end of January, when Tedros declared a public health emergency of international concern – having put it off a week earlier under what was assumed to be pressure from Beijing – he praised China for protecting the rest of the world.

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