Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
The Lancet paper that halted global trials of hydroxychloroquine for Covid-19 because of fears of increased deaths has been retracted after a Guardian investigation found inconsistencies in the data.
The lead author, Prof Mandeep Mehra, from the Brigham and Women’s hospital in Boston, Massachusetts decided to ask the Lancet for the retraction because he could no longer vouch for the data’s accuracy.
The World Health Organization will resume clinical trials of an anti-malaria drug researchers hope may treat Covid-19, after a study of the drug published in May by a major medical journal prompted them to halt trials due to safety concerns.
The paper, published in the Lancet, said hydroxychloroquine was associated with higher mortality rates and higher rates of heart problems in Covid-19 patients in hospitals around the world. The finding prompted the World Health Organization’s director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, to announce the hydroxychloroquine arm of its Solidarity global clinical trial would pause while the study and other findings were reviewed.
Some of the rise expected as counties accelerate plans to reopen and warm weather draws people to beaches and parks, expert says
The number of coronavirus cases in California is on the rise after weeks of optimism that infections had slowed, raising fears that plans to reopen counties, along with mass protests against police brutality, could accelerate transmission of the virus.
According to numbers from Johns Hopkins University, which has been tracking coronavirus cases and deaths, California is one of 20 states that have seen an uptick in cases in the past five days.
Some scientific papers stop the world in its tracks. In the middle of a raging pandemic, a study in the world’s leading global health journal that seemed to prove President Trump wrong to laud the drug hydroxychloroquine for Covid-19 was always going to have a massive impact. It did. When the paper flagged a higher risk of death on the drug, trials were stopped all over the world, including one by the World Health Organization.
The last major football match played in England before all sport was suspended because of the coronavirus crisis was the European Champions League showpiece between Liverpool and Atletico Madrid. It was a thrilling contest that transfixed 54,000 people under the floodlights of Anfield.
But now that match, along with many other mass events that the government allowed to go ahead as the pandemic spread in March, is coming under renewed scrutiny as evidence grows of the lethal danger to which people were exposed. They include rugby matches, horse races, musical concerts and dog shows attended, in total, by hundreds of thousands of Britons.
There was no time to lose when Cyclone Amphan began forming over the Indian Ocean in May.
But shelters are not built with social distancing in mind in Bangladesh and the country faced a challenge: how to move 2.4 million people from the destructive path of the storm without delivering them into an even greater danger – Covid-19.
China reported one new coronavirus case and four new asymptomatic Covid-19 cases in the mainland on 2 June, the country’s health commission said.
The National Health Commission said the one confirmed case was imported involving a traveller from overseas. Mainland China had five confirmed cases, all of which were imported, and 10 asymptomatic cases for 1 June.
China does not count asymptomatic patients, those who are infected with the coronavirus but not exhibiting symptoms, as confirmed cases.
Total number of infections to date in the mainland stands at 83,021. The death toll remained unchanged at 4,634.
Dan Collyns brings you this action-packed update from Bolivia:
“Thanos is beating us” warned a Bolivian government minister in a live televised press conference on Monday as he called for his compatriots to comply with sanitary measures and lockdown restrictions amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Sweden death rate now higher than France; Pakistan records largest single day rise in new infections; global deaths pass 380,000. This blog is now closed
At least three people were reported dead as coronavirus-hit Mumbai appeared to escape the worst of Cyclone Nisarga Wednesday, the first severe storm to threaten India’s financial capital in more than 70 years, AFP reports.
The city and its surrounds are usually sheltered from cyclones - the last deadly storm to hit the city was in 1948. Authorities had evacuated at least 100,000 people, including coronavirus patients, from flood-prone areas in the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat ahead of Nisarga’s arrival.
Public health experts and officials have warned that the idea of “air bridge” links between the UK and overseas holiday destinations may prove impossible this summer, amid continued concern over how they could operate safely.
A number of Conservative MPs are pushing for air bridges – mutual agreements with other countries to allow travellers to fly in and out without coronavirus quarantine restrictions – ahead of the imposition of the UK’s 14-day quarantine system next week.
In England, an official study has found that black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people are up to 50% more likely to die after being infected with Covid-19.
The report, published today by Public Health England (PHE), reveals that people of Bangladeshi ethnicity had around twice the risk of death than people of white British ethnicity.
It’s Simon Murphy here covering the global live blog while my colleague, Damien Gayle, takes a break.
All four of the UK’s chief medical officers rejected suggestions from No 10 that the coronavirus threat level could be reduced because it contradicted evidence that showed the virus was still widespread, the Guardian has been told.
A senior source in one devolved government said the chief medical officers of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland discussed and refused Boris Johnson’s proposal.
The World Health Organization struggled to get needed information from China during critical early days of the coronavirus pandemic, according to recordings of internal meetings that contradict the organisation’s public praise of Beijing’s response to the outbreak.
The recordings, obtained by the Associated Press (AP), show officials complaining in meetings during the week of 6 January that Beijing was not sharing data needed to evaluate the risk of the virus to the rest of the world. It was not until 20 January that China confirmed coronavirus was contagious and 30 January that the WHO declared a global emergency.
Officials voice concern as coronavirus halts annual programme in country already struggling against resurgence in cases
In April, almost 40 million children missed their polio drops in Pakistan after the cancellation of the nationwide vaccination campaign.
Alongside Afghanistan, Pakistan is one of only two countries in the world where polio is still endemic. It was very close to becoming polio free, with only 12 cases in 2018, but last year the number of cases rose to 147. In the same year, Pakistan was accused of covering up the resurgence of the P2 strain of the virus, which was thought to have been eradicated in 2014.
The pandemic amplified many of the issues facing remote First Nations communitites. Today, Labor will question officials from the National Indigenous Australians Agency on its pandemic response & plans going forward. Watch at: https://t.co/Ngg6QzZtFn... See more pic.twitter.com/vZorAaEDom
The increased use of antibiotics to combat the Covid-19 pandemic will strengthen bacterial resistance and ultimately lead to more deaths during the crisis and beyond, the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned.
WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Monday that a “worrying number” of bacterial infections were becoming increasingly resistant to the medicines traditionally used to treat them.
When deciding how and when lockdown restrictions will be lifted across the UK, the government has said the R value, denoting how many people on average one infected person will themselves infect, is crucial. But experts say another metric is becoming increasingly important: K.
NSW pubs and museums reopen while Victoria restaurants and cafes can now serve meals for up to 20 people, as NSW says rail project linking Sydney’s second airport will create 14,000 jobs. Follow the latest news
The NSW government’s proposal to give public servants a one-off $1,000 stimulus payment if they agree to a 12-month pay freeze has been slammed by unions as insulting, AAP reports.
Treasurer Dominic Perrottet has been talking with union bosses about the proposal which would see non-executive frontline staff such as nurses, police officers, paramedics and teachers receive a one-off payment in return for accepting a pay pause.
Rugby Australia stood down 47 of its 142 fulltime staff on Monday morning, as it implements a restructure that will save the code $5.5m per year.
The cuts, which will also see 30 contractors and casual workers axed, comes after Rugby Australia reported a $9.4m loss in 2019.
We have delivered the news to staff this morning and told them that Rugby Australia values the contribution of each and every one of them, some of whom have given significant service to Rugby Australia and to the game over many years.
This is a difficult time for a lot of very passionate, hard-working Rugby people and we are committed to helping those people find their next opportunity, whether it be within the game or elsewhere.
Five new drugs are to be trialled in 30 hospitals across the country in the race to find a treatment for Covid-19, it has emerged.
Just days after global trials of hydroxychloroquine, the drug promoted by Donald Trump as a cure, were halted, British scientists are looking to sign up hundreds of patients for trials of medicines they hope will prevent people becoming ill enough to need intensive care or ventilators.
The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the Covid-19 pandemic began, reported no new asymptomatic cases for the first time on Sunday, according to Chinese health officials.
Mainland China reported 16 new cases overall on Sunday, the highest daily number in three weeks. All were reported as imported cases – 11 in Sichuan province, three in Inner Mongolia, and two in Guangdong.
Global coronavirus infections have passed the 6 million mark as Latin America hit the grim milestone of 50,000 deaths with Brazil alone accounting for half of those fatalities.
With at least 369,000 deaths confirmed worldwide since the pandemic began in China in January – and that number believed to be an underestimate – Brazil’s virus death toll of 28,834 has now surpassed that of France with the country reporting 33,274 new infections in the past 24 hours.