Failure to share Covid vaccines ‘coming back to haunt us’, says Gordon Brown

Ex-PM says world was ‘forewarned’ of dangers of failing to vaccinate poorer countries amid rise of new variant

The failure of the world to get vaccines to the developing world is “coming back to haunt us”, Gordon Brown has warned, as experts said the emergence of variants such as B.1.1.529 could have been avoided if jabs had been more fairly distributed.

Writing in the Guardian, the Labour former prime minister said the world had been “forewarned” that a lack of vaccines in poorer countries could have serious consequences for the pandemic.

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WHO to assess new highly mutated Covid-19 variant as countries ramp up health checks

Meeting will determine if B.1.1.529 variant warrants a designation as one of ‘interest’ or of ‘concern’

The World Health Organization will meet on Friday to assess a new variant detected in South Africa that is feared to be the worst Covid-19 variant yet identified.

The meeting will determine if the B.1.1.529 variant should be designated a variant of “interest” or of “concern”. The variant, which was identified on Tuesday, initially attracted attention because it carries an “extremely high number” of mutations.

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Amnesty UK accused of ‘spreading false information’ about Northern Territory Covid outbreak

NT Aboriginal health organisation and Amnesty’s Australian arm ‘extremely disappointed’ by UK office’s statement

Amnesty UK has been accused of “spreading false information” about the Northern Territory’s Covid outbreak in an extraordinary joint statement from the territory’s peak Aboriginal health organisation and Amnesty’s own Australian operation.

Disinformation about the Covid outbreak in Aboriginal communities near Katherine, spread by third parties online, was on Thursday described by the NT chief minister as “conspiracy theories” pushed by “tinfoil hat wearing tossers”.

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Covid live: France announces boosters for all adults and stricter mask rules; EU approves Pfizer jab for children aged five to 11

French health minister holds press conference to announce new measures; EU regulator approves vaccine for younger children

Alberto Nardelli (formerly of this parish) and John Follain have a story leading the Bloomberg site at the moment, claiming that the EU is to propose a nine-month limit on Covid vaccine validity for travel. They write:

The European Union will recommend a nine-month time limit for the validity of Covid-19 vaccinations for travel into the bloc and also propose prioritising vaccinated travellers.

The European Commission will propose that member states should continue welcoming all travelers inoculated with shots approved by the bloc, according to a document seen by Bloomberg. It also calls for countries to reopen as of 10 January to all those who have used vaccines approved by the World Health Organization.

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Novavax expected to be approved as fourth Covid vaccine in UK

Trials show the protein-based jab causes fewer side-effects – and hundreds of British jobs depend on it

Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Moderna. Britons have become so accustomed to the three Covid vaccines available in the UK that most have forgotten about another jab, Novavax – even though the government has ordered 60m doses and hundreds of British jobs depend on it.

Late last month the US company, with a factory on Teesside primed to manufacture doses, submitted final data to UK regulators and a positive decision is anticipated within days or weeks. It will bring to an end what feels like a long wait compared with the speedy development and approval of the other jabs, including for those who took part in trials.

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Covid live: Italy bans unvaccinated from numerous venues and extends compulsory vaccination

Italy unveils new Covid measures, to come into force on 6 December, that will ban unvaccinated people from entering venues

The health service in the UK is considering “radical ideas” to help tackle the backlog of care that has built-up over the last few years and been exacerbated by the Covid pandemic. That includes the idea of sending patients to different regions for treatment, the chief executive of NHS Providers has said.

But Chris Hopson told Times Radio it is more likely that people will be asked to go to neighbouring hospitals rather than different parts of the country. PA Media quote him saying:

Everybody across the NHS recognises that having patients wait for their care is not an acceptable situation. There is a moral obligation on trusts and their leaders to make sure that they do everything they can, no stone unturned, to get through those care backlogs as quickly as possible.

What we’re working on at the moment is a really comprehensive plan to get through those backlogs as fast as possible. And some of it will be all the traditional things that we do, which is: we will expand temporary capacity; we will ensure that we use overtime as much as possible; we will ensure that we use the capacity that sits in the independent sector.

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New Zealand to reopen borders to vaccinated visitors from new year

Border will first open to New Zealand citizens coming from Australia, then from the rest of the world, and finally to all other vaccinated visitors from April

New Zealand has announced it will reopen its borders to vaccinated visitors in the opening months of 2022, for the first time since prime minister Jacinda Ardern announced their snap closure in the first month of the Covid-19 pandemic. The country’s borders have been closed for more than a year and a half.

The border will initially open to New Zealand citizens and visa holders coming from Australia, then from the rest of the world, and finally to all other vaccinated visitors from the end of April. They will still have to self-isolate at home for a week, but will no longer have to pass through the country’s expensive and highly-space limited managed isolation facilities.

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Covid deaths in Europe to top 2 million by March, says WHO

Dr Hans Kluge describes situation as ‘very serious’ with increasing strain on health services

Total deaths across Europe from Covid-19 are likely to exceed 2 million by March next year, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said, adding that the pandemic had become the number one cause of death in the region.

Reported deaths have risen to nearly 4,200 a day, double the number being recorded in September, the agency said, while cumulative reported deaths in the region, which includes the UK, have already surpassed 1.5 million.

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UK employers step up demand for workers vaccinated against Covid

Analysis shows job adverts requiring candidates to be jabbed rose by 189% between August and October

Employers in the UK are following the lead of their counterparts in the US by stepping up demands for staff to be vaccinated against Covid-19, analysis of recruitment adverts reveals.

According to figures from the jobs website Adzuna, the number of ads explicitly requiring candidates to be vaccinated rose by 189% between August and October as more firms ask for workers to be jabbed before they start on the job.

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Covid live: UK records 44,917 new cases; strict restrictions for unvaccinated come into effect in Greece

UK also reports 45 further Covid-related deaths; from today Greeks barred from all enclosed public spaces if they are unvaccinated

Here’s some more detail from Agence France-Presse in Vienna on Austria’s move into its fourth Covid lockdown:

People in Austria are not allowed to leave home except to go to work, shop for essentials and exercise, as the country returned to a Covid-19 lockdown on Monday morning.

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Covid live: UK reports 40,004 new cases and 61 new deaths; Brussels protest turns violent

Latest updates: tens of thousands of people march in Belgian capital against Covid measure; UK health secretary says vaccination must be voluntary

From Monday, people aged 40-49 in England will be able to book a Covid jab, the Department of Health and Social Care has confirmed. Sixteen and 17-year-olds will also be able to book in for their second jab.

Taking up the offer of a second or third dose will help protect the progress of the vaccine rollout in the face of waning immunity, and mean people can “enjoy Christmas safely”, the Department of Health and Social Care said.

We simply don’t know how many people who didn’t come forward during Covid-19, during the pandemic, will actually come forward, and therefore we are in a bit of a guessing game about exactly how many.

But the bit I can assure you is that NHS staff and NHS leaders are working incredibly hard at the moment to create that plan to ensure that we can get through that backlog as quickly as possible.

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Hong Kong authorises Sinovac Covid vaccine for children aged 3 to 17

Benefits of approving age extension outweigh the risks, says secretary for food and health

Hong Kong has approved lowering the age limit for the Covid-19 vaccine from China’s Sinovac Biotech to three, down from 18 years of age.

Hong Kong’s secretary for food and health, Sophia Chan, said in a statement published on Saturday: “Adolescents aged 12 to 17 will be accorded priority to receive the CoronaVac vaccine, with a view to extending to children of a younger age group at a later stage.”.

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Victoria protests escalate as child under 10 among new deaths – as it happened

NSW reports 182 cases and ACT 14; anti-fascist activists vow to counter ‘freedom rallies’ they claim have been infiltrated by far-right groups. This blog is now closed

Asked about whether we can expect to see the introduction of a legislation for a federal anti-corruption commission in parliament in the next couple of weeks, Tim Wilson says it’s important that they “get the legislation right”:

Because what we’ve had too often is proposals which are designed to establish, kind of, kangaroo courts, and actually would do more to breed distrust in the political conversation. We’ve seen that particularly in the consequence of what’s happening in Icac in New South Wales.

We want a process that’s based around integrity, that’s been consulted with the Australian community, and is actually going to do the job we need it to do, which is actually to breed trust and strength in the political system, not simply to create show trials, as I’ve seen it many times.

I think this is pretty simple. You’ve got a group of people marching down the street with a life-sized execution device. You’ve got people threatening to kill the premier of Victoria. If you’re any sort of leader, you just condemn that, full stop. You don’t go on and then say, ‘But I understand why people are frustrated.’

I think it is legitimate to point out that Scott Morrison has pulled the sheet out of the Trump handbook here. Lie, deny, blame other people, never take responsibility for anything, try and divide the community, pander to the extreme right – this is Trump without the toupee. And, seriously, I think the Australian people deserve better than that.

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UK ministers were unprepared for impact of Covid, says watchdog

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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First known Covid case was Wuhan market vendor, says scientist

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

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

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

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

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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Covid booster jabs extended to people aged 40 to 49, says JCVI

Extension approved by government’s vaccine watchdog as well as second doses for 16- and 17-year-olds

Covid booster vaccines can be extended to those aged between 40 and 49 in the UK after being approved by the government’s vaccines watchdog, which also gave approval for teenagers aged 16 and 17 to receive second jabs.

While such decisions are devolved, all devolved nations tend to accept JCVI guidance. Ministers in England, Scotland and Wales have already said they would extend boosters.

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