Category Archives: Infectious Diseases

Coronavirus live news: India’s cases surging as deadly second wave spreads, Iran imposes 10-day lockdown

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India records 145,384 new Covid-19 cases and 794 deaths, the highest number of fatalities in more than five months; lockdown ordered in Iran

The British Retail Consortium estimated that lockdowns in 2020 cost non-essential retail £22bn in lost sales. So with non-essential shops allowed to open again on Monday after nearly four months, retailers have concocted plans to make real-life shopping trips a pastime once again.

Lauren Cochrane looks at how different shops are adapting:

Related: Lockdowns have cost £22bn in lost sales, say British retailers

According to a tally compiled by AFP, at least 2,917,316 people have died from Covid-19 worldwide since the virus first emerged in December 2019.

The US is the worst-affected country with 561,074 deaths, followed by Brazil at 348,718, Mexico with 207,020, India with 168,436 and Britain with 127,040.

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Coronavirus live: Malta offers tourists up to €200; EMA reviewing vaccines – as it happened

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Island to pay visitors after tourism sector hammered by pandemic; EMA looking at reports of rare bleeding condition and four cases of rare blood clots in J&J jab

That’s it from the UK blog team. Thanks for following our coverage..

People who have had the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine are seeking help at A&E in England despite having only mild side-effects such as headaches, in the wake of the controversy over whether the jab causes blood clots.

Related: A&E ‘swamped’ with patients seeking help for mild Covid jab side-effects

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Brazilian Covid variant: what do we know about P1?

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What threat does variant that is causing devastation in Brazil pose, and how is it different?

The P1 variant is causing devastation in Brazil, where an uncontrolled Covid pandemic is raging. P1, behind the terrible scenes of hospital overload in Manaus with patients’ relatives pleading for oxygen cylinders, is now the dominant form of coronavirus in many of Brazil’s cities and partly responsible for the high death toll. Other Latin American countries have closed their borders and restricted travel to and from Brazil but P1 is now in at least 15 countries in the Americas, according to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).

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EU drug agency denies already finding causal link between AstraZeneca vaccine and blood clots

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European Medicines Agency says review ongoing after head of vaccines spoke of ‘clear’ association

Europe’s drug regulator has denied it has already established a causal connection between the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine and a rare blood clotting syndrome, after a senior official from the agency said there was a link.

In a statement to Agence France-Presse, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Tuesday it had “not yet reached a conclusion and the review is currently ongoing”, adding that it expected to announce its findings on Wednesday or Thursday.

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North Korea pulls out of Tokyo Olympics, citing coronavirus fears

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With the Games just months away, the regime’s sports ministry says it wants to protect athletes from the ‘global health crisis’

North Korea’s sports ministry said on Tuesday that it will not participate in the Tokyo Olympics this year to protect its athletes amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The decision was made at a meeting of North Korea’s Olympic committee, including its sports minister Kim Il guk, on 25 March the ministry said on its website, called Joson Sports. “The committee decided not to join the 32nd Olympics Games to protect athletes from the global health crisis caused by the coronavirus,” it said.

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Bat catchers fight the next pandemic – in pictures

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Researchers at the University of the Philippines Los Baños aim to catch thousands of bats to develop a Japanese-funded simulation model over the next three years that they believe could help avert potential pandemics. They hope the bats will help in predicting the dynamics of a coronavirus outbreak by analysing factors such as climate, temperature and ease of spread

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Global rollout of vaccines is no longer a guarantee of victory over Covid-19 | Susan Michie, Chris Bullen, et al

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New variants of concern have changed the game, spreading worldwide and threatening to derail pandemic control efforts

At the end of 2020, there was a strong hope that high levels of vaccination would see humanity finally gain the upper hand over Sars-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. In an ideal scenario, the virus would then be contained at very low levels without further societal disruption or significant numbers of deaths.

But since then, new “variants of concern” have emerged and spread worldwide, putting current pandemic control efforts, including vaccination, at risk of being derailed.

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Germany faces calls for nationwide approach to Covid restrictions

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Frustration grows over patchwork arrangements across the country as infections rates continue to rise

Calls are growing in Germany for the introduction of nationwide coronavirus restrictions amid confusion and frustration over patchwork arrangements across the country as the infection rate continues to rise.

The majority of Germans are in favour of a more unified approach to tackling the virus, now in its third wave, according to a poll, ahead of an expected tightening of rules after the holiday weekend.

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As a sense of normality returns, we must not forget what this last year has been like for the NHS

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I’m an NHS consultant. We barely had the resources to keep people alive – let alone cope with longer effects of Covid

One year ago, lockdown had just come in. A creeping sense of dread was spreading across the hospital. We were focused on the first wave of admissions, the peak of which for us occurred in early April. We were desperately learning how to keep people from dying due to this new disease. The longer-term consequences were the last thing on our minds.

Now, a year on, there is a superficial sense of normality returning. Our respiratory support unit, for so long hidden behind closed doors with “STOP: CORONAVIRUS” signs and staffed by hooded figures in head-to-toe PPE, has turned back into the bright, airy ward it used to be. Nurses, doctors, porters are back in their usual clothes instead of uniform scrubs; conversation has replaced the incessant hiss of Cpap machines. Our ITU is shrinking back to its normal size. It is easy to forget how things were even a couple of months ago.

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The ‘elite controllers’ who can naturally suppress HIV

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Research into how some HIV-positive people keep the virus at bay promises to yield new treatment possibilities, from vaccines to gene therapies

The year was 1998 when Joel Blankson encountered a patient he would never forget. Blankson was working in the HIV clinic at John Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, when an HIV-positive woman in her mid-40s arrived for some routine tests.

Blankson gave her a PCR test, intending to prescribe a newly developed combination of medicines called antiretroviral therapies to suppress the infection, and prevent her developing Aids.

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How New Zealand’s Covid success made it a laboratory for the world

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Small outbreaks and universal genomic sequencing provides unique insights into how coronavirus spreads

Jenene Crossan doesn’t know where she got it. “I caught it in London, have no idea where or from who, in March 2020,” she says. “I’ve been sick ever since.” Crossan used to worry about it – going back over possible infection scenarios, exchanging theories with a friend who got ill at the same time. These days, though, she’s come to terms with not knowing. “The reality is it doesn’t matter,” she says. “London was awash.”

Like many of the vast majority of people unlucky enough to receive a positive Covid test result, the precise moment of infection remains a mystery. Some might narrow it down to a likely household member, friend or workmate who began showing symptoms too. Others trace it to a gathering – a wedding, funeral, or dinner party, where several attendees subsequently came down sick. But most are left wondering. As a New York Times headline put it last year: “How Are Americans Catching the Virus? Increasingly, They Have No Idea”.

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Coronavirus live news: Number fully vaccinated in UK passes 5m milestone; Argentina’s leader tests positive

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Children in England can visit grandparents for first time from next week; India’s daily coronavirus infections hit six-month high

This from the British health minister Matt Hancock:

I'm delighted that 50% of over-80s have now had their second jab.

Thank you to everyone involved in rolling-out the vaccine across the whole UK pic.twitter.com/VRfVHQeaEM

Turkey reported 44,756 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours to Saturday, health ministry data showed, the highest level since the beginning of the pandemic.

Turkey currently ranks fifth globally for most daily cases based on a seven-day average, according to a Reuters tally.

Turkey re-enforced weekend curfews starting on April 2 in accordance with the risk situation of provinces amid surging coronavirus cases and fatalities.

The weekend curfew started Friday 9 pm nationwide. However, its duration will vary province-wise.

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Australian Covid vaccine rollout to continue after blood clot case in Melbourne

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The acting chief medical officer says it is ‘likely’ the 44-year-old Victorian man’s condition is related to the vaccine

Australia’s acting chief medical officer says there will be no changes to the national vaccination program for Covid-19 while health authorities continue to investigate whether blood clots developed by a 44-year-old Victorian man are linked to the AstraZeneca jab.

Prof Michael Kidd said the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (Atagi) and the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) had not recommended any change to the rollout of the vaccine following an urgent meeting of health authorities on Saturday.

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Brazil records 70,238 new cases; Netherlands halts AstraZeneca jab for under 60s – as it happened

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Country has registered more than 12.9 million cases; 10,000 appointments scrapped, reports Dutch news agency citing Netherlands health ministry

That’s it from the global blog team for now. Thanks for following our coverage, a new blog will be going live in a few hours.

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Amid Brazil’s tragedy, our hope is the prospect of Bolsonaro’s defeat next year | Celso Amorim

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As Covid deaths climb the president seems to be throwing the country into an abyss that will be difficult to escape from

It is no exaggeration to say that Brazil is going through the most serious crisis in its history. With nearly 4,000 deaths a day and moving quickly towards a figure of 500,000 people killed by Covid-19, Brazil is not just the epicentre of the pandemic. It has also become the breeding ground for new variants of the virus: a real threat to its own people and the whole of humankind.

In the midst of a public health war that is being lost, its president, Jair Bolsonaro, is throwing the country more deeply into an abyss, from where it will be hard to emerge. Apart from the suffering caused to hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of relatives and friends of the victims, the economy has been plunged into recession, with 14% of the workforce condemned to the dole. In contrast to what happened during the first wave of the pandemic, when Congress forced the government to distribute relatively significant financial aid to a large portion of the population, now fewer people will benefit with a smaller amount.

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Pandemic 2020 review – a masterly mapping of the Covid outbreak

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The team behind Once Upon a Time in Iraq has compiled a moving and sometimes hopeful three-parter that offers a global perspective on the crisis

Like the virus itself, the programmes about it have moved from localised subjects to a slightly wider field and now have expanded to take in a global view. It hasn’t been a perfectly linear progression, of course, but most of the first documentaries were composed largely of footage recorded by medical professionals themselves, at work and then – exhausted and tearful – at home.

After that came socially distanced films recording the impact on local communities and bereaved families, the experiences of survivors and the long-term consequences for those who do not make a full recovery. Alongside that have come considerations and critiques of the UK response to the crisis and comparisons – not generally favourable – with that of other countries.

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Long Covid: snapshot poll finds more than 1m people with symptoms in UK

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ONS estimates 1.1m people in community had ongoing symptoms in four weeks to 6 March

More than a million people in the UK were experiencing “long Covid” in a recent four-week period, according to new survey figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Statisticians estimate that 1.1 million people in the community had ongoing symptoms in the four weeks up to 6 March after contracting the disease at least three months beforehand.

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Covid vaccine scheme ‘unacceptably slow’ in Europe, says WHO

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Hans Kluge urges ramping up of manufacturing and asks governments to share excess shots

Europe’s vaccination campaign is “unacceptably slow” while rising infection rates in most countries across the region mean its virus situation is “more worrying than we have seen in several months”, the World Health Organization has said.

The WHO regional director for Europe, Hans Kluge, said on Thursday that vaccines “present our best way out of this pandemic. Not only do they work, they are highly effective in preventing infection. However, their rollout is unacceptably slow.”

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UK and US criticise WHO’s Covid report and accuse China of withholding data

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Statement signed by 12 other nations says investigation into virus origins not extensive enough

The US and the UK have sharply criticised a World Health Organization report into the beginnings of the coronavirus pandemic in Wuhan, implicitly accusing China of “withholding access to complete, original data and samples”.

The statement, also signed by 12 other countries including Australia and Canada, came hard on the heels of an admission on Tuesday by the head of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, that the investigation was “not extensive enough” and experts had struggled to access raw information during their four-week visit to Wuhan in January.

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About half of people in UK now have antibodies against coronavirus

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Study by Office for National Statistics based on data from blood test results

Half of people in the UK now have antibodies against coronavirus, either through infection or vaccination, tests conducted by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.

According to the most recent coronavirus infection survey, an estimated 54.7% of the population in England would have tested positive for antibodies to coronavirus from a blood sample in the week ending 14 March 2021.

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