Saturday, May 29

Malaysia reports nearly 100 deaths

Malaysia has reported 9,020 new coronavirus cases, the highest daily toll since the start of the pandemic and the fifth straight day of record new infections.

The Health Ministry also reported 98 deaths of people who had tested positive for Covid-19, another daily record. The latest figures took the total number of cases in the country to 558,534 and deaths to 2,650.

Malaysia has seen a surge in coronavirus incidence in recent weeks, partly due to highly transmissible variants.

Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin on Friday announced a two-week nationwide lockdown starting in June, allowing only essential economic and service sectors to stay open. 

Spain lifts ban on cruise ship arrivals from June 7

International cruise ships will be able to dock in Spanish ports from June 7, the Spanish government said, lifting a ban imposed when the Covid-19 pandemic began.

The measure will be lifted due to the easing of the virus in Europe where most cruise passengers come from, as well as rising vaccination numbers, a Transport Ministry statement said.

It was also due to the falling numbers of virus cases in regions where most cruise ships dock.

The ban was first imposed in mid-March 2020 and later took the form of a resolution which was published on June 23 by Spain's Directorate General of Shipping.

Pfizer jab 'less effective' but still protects against Indian strain

The Pfizer vaccine is slightly less effective but appears to still protect against the more transmissible Indian strain of the virus that causes Covid-19, according to a study by France's Pasteur Institute.

"Despite slightly diminished efficacy, the Pfizer vaccine probably protects" against the Indian variant, according to laboratory test results, said Olivier Schwartz, the institute's director and co-author of the study that was published on the BioRxiv website ahead of peer review.

The study sampled 28 healthcare workers in the city of Orleans. Sixteen of them had received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine, while 12 had received one dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

People who had received two doses of Pfizer saw a three-fold reduction in their antibodies against the Indian variant, B.1.617, according to the study, but were still protected.

Germany probes testing centres for fraud

Prosecutors in several German regions have launched probes of companies offering free Covid-19 tests after news reports said that some were padding their numbers to claim more money from the government.

Prosecutors raided a company in the northwestern city of Bochum on Friday, according to the Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, while farther north in Luebeck, prosecutors have opened a fraud probe, the WirtschaftsWoche weekly said.

In Cologne, authorities carried out a surprise control of a testing centre, and the city of Munster has revoked the license of a company that operates around 50 testing centres.

In an effort to boost Covid-19 testing, the German government made testing free several weeks ago, reimbursing companies up to $22 (18 euros) for each test conducted.

But according to a joint investigation by several media companies, the testing centres do not have to furnish any documents to prove how many people they've tested when filing for government compensation and several have been inflating the figures.

Paris venue hosts test indoor rock concert 

French rock band Indochine performed at a concert venue in central Paris before a crowd of 5,000 fans in a welcomed return to pre-pandemic life, with the exception of masks and mandatory tests.

The show at the Bercy arena was part of an experiment launched by the Paris hospital authority aimed at assessing how concerts will be able to resume as France gradually ends restrictions imposed by the coronavirus crisis.

Lebanon holds vaccination marathon

Lebanon’s health authorities have launched a vaccination “marathon" to speed up inoculations around the country, including areas where turnout has so far been low.

The daylong campaign offered AstraZeneca vaccines at 30 different centers around the country without prior appointment to encourage people over age 30 to show up. The capital Beirut was not included in the campaign.

A vaccination program that started in February targeted older age groups, primarily through registration on a government-operated platform and appointments.

By the end of the day Saturday, more than 10,000 people had been vaccinated in the push.

Virus storm hits Mount Everest

Mount Everest guide Buddhi Bahadur Lama has spent days isolated in a tent after testing positive, as an outbreak that climbers say is putting lives at risk sweeps base camp.

He is one of four in his expedition team thought to have contracted the virus at the foot of the world's highest mountain, along with a growing number of others.

Dozens of suspected cases have been flown out of the area and at least two companies have cancelled expeditions after team members tested positive.

However authorities in Nepal have yet to acknowledge a single case at the mountain, with the stakes high for the country's tourism industry after a shutdown last year cost millions in lost revenue.

German and Russian biologists refute US report on virus origins

German and Russian biologists refuted the groundless reports of the United States media outlets on the origin tracing of the virus, saying it's helpless to the scientific research.

US President Joe Biden recently ordered closer review on the origin of the coronavirus, asking the intelligence community to probe into how and where the virus emerged.

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) fired the first shot. In a recent article, it hinted a far-fetched connection between "sick staff" of a Wuhan lab and the outbreak and repeatedly called for a reinvestigation of China. Yet the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which had not been exposed to the virus before Dec. 30, 2019, has not registered any infection among its staff and graduate students.

According to a report on the global tracing released by the World Health Organization (WHO) in March, introduction through an intermediate host is "likely to very likely," introduction through cold/food chain products is "possible," and introduction through a laboratory incident is "extremely unlikely."

Matthias Glaubrecht, a biologist from the Center of Natural History in the University of Hamburg, said in an interview that the WHO assessment is the most convincing given the data available so far because viruses have also spread from animals to humans through intermediate hosts previously.

Alexander Semenov, head of the Yekaterinburg Research Institute of Viral Infections, visited China three times during the outbreak as a member of the Russian medical expert team.

In an interview with Sputnik on Monday, Semenov said that the United States claim of the coronavirus originating from a Chinese laboratory has no foundation and evidence and the hypothesis of coronavirus obtained by artificial means is pure fantasy.

Vietnam detects hybrid of Indian and UK variant

Vietnam has detected a new variant.

The country's health minister Nguyen Thanh Long said the new variant is a mix of the Indian and UK variants and spreads quickly by air, online newspaper VnExpress reported.

Virus sweeps through Thailand's overcrowded prisons

A surge sweeping through Thailand's prisons has thrown the spotlight on the kingdom's overcrowded penal system, where some inmates have less space to sleep than the inside of a coffin.

More than 22,000 people have tested positive inside jails, where inmates living cheek by jowl have been encouraged to keep wearing their masks even while they sleep.

Authorities have floated plans to give early releases to prisoners with underlying medical conditions and have announced funding for more testing and medical care in recent days.

But those behind bars say they have been kept in the dark about the seriousness of the outbreak.

Afghanistan closes schools in Kabul, provinces

Afghanistan's Health Ministry has announced the shutdown of all public and private universities and schools in the country's 16 provinces, including Kabul, for at least two weeks.

The decision follows a surge in cases. On Friday, 977 people tested positive for the virus and 18 died, most of them in Kabul. Only 3,800 were tested.

Over 600,000 people have received a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, the ministry said, without counting the armed forces. The vaccination drive has been put on hold due to shortages and the remaining stocks are reserved for those who got the first shot.

Philippines stops workers from Saudi Arabia

The Philippines has suspended the deployment of workers to Saudi Arabia due to a dispute over PCR tests and quarantine costs.

Thousands of workers were affected by the temporary ban, including more than 400 passengers bound for Saudi Arabia on Friday who were not allowed to board their Philippine Airlines flights.

The Philippines is a leading source of global labor.

The government said it has learned that the workers were being asked to shoulder the costs of the tests and quarantine accommodation in the oil-rich kingdom.

Brazil sees 49,768 new cases, 2,371 deaths

Brazil has registered 49,768 new cases and 2,371 new deaths in the last 24 hours, the Health Ministry said.

Mainland China reports 16 new cases vs seven a day earlier

Mainland China has reported 16 new cases for May 28, up from seven cases a day earlier, the country's national health authority said on Saturday.

The National Health Commission said in a statement 14 of the new cases were imported. The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, fell to 14 from 26 cases a day earlier.

Confirmed cases in Mainland China stand at 91,061, while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,636.

Mexico reports 3,006 new cases, 411 more deaths

Mexico's health ministry has reported 3,006 new confirmed cases in the country and 411 more fatalities, bringing its total to 2,408,778 infections and 223,072 deaths.

The government has said the real number of cases is likely significantly higher, and separate data published recently suggested the actual death toll is at least 60 percent above the confirmed figure. 

Denmark incinerates 4M mink culled to curb virus mutations

Denmark this week began incinerating 4 million mink that had been culled to curb virus mutations but began to resurface from mass burial sites, prompting renewed health concerns.

The Danish government last year decided to cull all of the country's 17 million mink to curb a mutation and because the mammal was considered likely to host future mutations.

Some were buried in pits in a military area in western Denmark under two metres of soil only for some to resurface in less than a month.

Contaminants were later found under the graves in an examination carried out on behalf of the Danish Environmental Protection Agency, prompting the government to order the incineration of the the animals.

The contaminants were not coronavirus-related but were a result of the decomposition process.

Mink easily become infected by the virus and infection is exacerbated because they are bred in large numbers and kept in cramped living conditions, the World Health Organization has said.

All of the 4 million mink are expected to be incinerated by mid-July.