A passenger in a railway station in Milan on Friday, as the first Covid-free ‘Frecciarossa’ train prepares to run on the Milan-Rome route where only passengers who have tested negative for Covid are allowed to travel. Photograph: Piero Cruciatti/AFP/Getty Images
A passenger in a railway station in Milan on Friday, as the first Covid-free ‘Frecciarossa’ train prepares to run on the Milan-Rome route where only passengers who have tested negative for Covid are allowed to travel. Photograph: Piero Cruciatti/AFP/Getty Images
Vaccine giant tweets Biden to end US raw materials 'embargo'
The head of the world’s largest vaccine maker directly tweeted the US president Joe Biden on Friday urging him to lift an export ban on raw materials desperately needed to make more coronavirus shots.
The unusual step by Serum Institute (SII) chief Adar Poonawalla underlined the crisis in providing vaccines to developing nations, many of which rely heavily on the firm for supplies, AFP reports.
Respected @POTUS, if we are to truly unite in beating this virus, on behalf of the vaccine industry outside the U.S., I humbly request you to lift the embargo of raw material exports out of the U.S. so that vaccine production can ramp up. Your administration has the details. 🙏🙏
There was no immediate response from the president on Twitter.
The world’s biggest vaccine producer by volume, SII has struggled to meet demand for the AstraZeneca jab, which it manufactures, after India put the brakes on allowing exports of the shots as it battles a ferocious second wave.
Poonawalla said last week that production was “very stressed” and called on the Indian government to provide it with financial assistance.
Johnson & Johnson reached out to rival Covid-19 vaccine makers to join in an effort to study the risks of blood clots, but Pfizer and Moderna declined, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
Only AstraZeneca, which had been buffeted by similar blood-clotting concerns for weeks, agreed, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.
Workers on zero-hours contracts and other insecure jobs are twice as likely to have died of Covid-19 as those in other professions, a report has found.
The research from the Trades Union Congress in England and Wales showed those on the frontline of the pandemic, such as care workers, nurses and delivery drivers, were at a higher risk of death.
It said many of these key workers were in insecure work, such as zero-hours contracts and agency employment, landing them with a “triple whammy” of no sick pay, fewer rights and endemic low pay, while having to shoulder more risk of infection.
On Friday night, the Therapeutic Goods Administration said experts had concluded the New South Wales woman’s death four days after receiving the vaccination was likely linked to the jab.
“In the absence of an alternative cause for the clinical syndrome, VSIG believed that a causative link to vaccination should be assumed at this time,” the TGA said in a statement.
The discovery of 77 UK cases of a coronavirus variant first detected in India could be a cause for concern, an expert has said.
Public Health England (PHE) reported that 73 cases of the B.1.617 variant have been confirmed in England as well as four cases in Scotland.
The figures come from the latest update of PHE’s surveillance of the distribution of variants across the UK, based on data up to 7 April.
Officials have designated it a “variant under investigation” (VUI) rather than a “variant of concern” (VOC), such as the Manaus (Brazil) or South African variants.
In India, Covid-19 rates are soaring, with more than 13.9 million confirmed cases and 172,000 deaths.
The country is not on the government’s “red list” of travel ban nations, which refuses entry to the UK of people who have been in those countries in the previous 10 days.
British or Irish nationals, or people with UK residency rights, are able to return from red list countries but must isolate in a quarantine hotel for 10 days.
Boris Johnson has scaled down a planned trip to India due to its worsening Covid situation.
The prime minister was due to spend four days there at the end of the month but, following talks with Narendra Modi’s administration, the “bulk” of the meetings could be fitted into one day.
Paul Hunter, professor in medicine at the University of East Anglia, told PA it is “not surprising” that the variant has come from India.
If you think about where the main variants have arisen – South Africa, the UK, California, Brazil, and now India – all of these are countries that have really struggled to keep case numbers down.
So it’s not surprising. India has got a huge pandemic, and therefore that’s where you’re going to be getting the variant.
The big, big anxiety with this one is that it seems – and again this is still a little bit speculative because it hasn’t been confirmed – but … there are two mutations here that are causing people to be concerned.
The number of new Covid-19 cases per week has nearly doubled globally over the past two months, approaching the highest rate seen so far during the pandemic, the head of the World Health Organization said this morning.
India’s daily Covid-19 vaccinations have slowed from their record high early this month while new infections have set a record in eight of the past nine days.
The CEO of the Serum Institute of India (SII), the world’s biggest vaccine maker, has urged US president Joe Biden to lift an embargo on exports of raw materials that it says is hurting its production of Covid -19 shots.
Vietnam’s health ministry called for the acceleration of its Covid-19 vaccine rollout on Friday as the expiry date of the south-east Asian country’s first batch of jabs supplied through the Covax scheme approaches.
More than 16,000 expired AstraZeneca Covid-19 doses are to be destroyed in Malawi as concerns over vaccine hesitancy increase. The vaccines are among 102,000 doses donated by the African Union (AU) to the Malawian government last month.
Thailand will close close schools, bars and massage parlours, as well as ban alcohol sales in restaurants, for at least two weeks starting from Sunday, after a jump in Covid-19 cases.
Sweden will ease restrictions on citizens who have had at least one vaccination shot against Covid-19.
In Scotland, changes in the rules mean people will be allowed to meet in groups of up to six adults from six households in outdoor settings from today for socialising, recreation and exercise. They will also be permitted to travel across Scotland for the first time since December – provided they do not stay overnight.
Denmark advanced its reopening plan on the back of stable infection rates, allowing indoor serving at restaurants and bars and some football fans to cheer from the stands from 21 April, weeks earlier than originally planned.
French president Emmanuel Macron told local mayors that the epidemic was likely to progress over the next eight to 10 days, with a peak of infections in France between the 25 April and 30 April, and a peak in hospital admissions between now and the end of the month.
Monaco has announced it is easing health restrictions, without resolving fully whether fans would be allowed at its Formula One grand prix next month.
That’s your lot today from me, Martin Belam. My colleague Nicola Slawson will be along to take you through the rest of the day shortly. I’ll see you here again on Monday. Take care and have a great weekend.
With infections again on the rise and Europe’s vaccine rollout delayed over clotting concerns, the Spanish government is under pressure to extend a state of emergency to fight the pandemic.
Activated in October, the measure allows the central and regional governments to adopt measures that curb individual freedoms, such as imposing curfews and closing regional borders to anyone moving without just cause. It is due to expire on 9 May.
Agence France-Presse reports that the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has said his government does not intend to prolong it, arguing the regional authorities had “sufficient tools” to tackle the crisis and that a vaccine was now available.
“The circumstances are different,” he said during a debate in parliament earlier this week. “The alternative to a state of emergency is a vaccination programme, which is intensifying.”
But many regional governments – which are responsible for healthcare – fear that lifting it will throw them into a legal limbo that will hurt efforts to control the spread of Covid-19 and are pushing for an extension.
Iñigo Urkullu, head of the northern Basque Country region, has warned it would remove the “legal guarantees” for imposing measures such as restrictions on mobility.
Regions popular with domestic tourists are especially worried about losing the ability to ban travel in and out of their territory, fearing an influx of visitors from areas with higher infection rates once the emergency ends.
The government has continued to insist it will meet its target of vaccinating 70% of Spain’s population by the end of August.
Thailand to impose additional Covid restrictions for at least two weeks
Just a bit more from Thailand here. As expected, the country will close schools, bars and massage parlours, as well as ban alcohol sales in restaurants, for at least two weeks starting from Sunday, after a jump in Covid-19 cases, Reuters reports.
Activities involving more than 50 people will also be prohibited, Thailand’s coronavirus taskforce spokesman, Taweesin Wisanuyothin, said, adding that 18 provinces including Bangkok had been labelled as red zones with the rest of the country categorised as orange zones.
The French president Emmanuel Macron told local mayors in a video-link up last night that the epidemic was likely to progress in France over the next eight to 10 days, with a peak of infections between the 25 April and 30 April, and a peak in hospital admissions between now and the end of the month.
The government spokesman said this morning that creches, nursery schools and primary schools would definitely reopen as planned on 26 April, with secondary schools following on 3 May. The government has not yet set a date for gradually reopening outdoor dining or museums, which could progressively begin from mid-May, and might be organised by region.
France was placed in a third, partial lockdown at the beginning of April, as new infections were rising and hospitals struggling to find beds for patients. The total number of Covid-19 patients in intensive care in France surged past 5,900 this week. Schools have been closed with a ban on most domestic travel and the shutting of most non-essential shops. An overnight nationwide curfew has been in place since mid-December, and all France’s restaurants, bars, gyms, cinemas and museums have been closed since October.
Monaco has announced it is easing health restrictions, without resolving fully whether fans would be allowed at its Formula One grand prix next month.
“Monaco is taking its decisions in the light of its own situation, in full sovereignty but also in mutual agreement with France,” the principality’s minister of state Pierre Dartout told a press briefing.
He said that from Monday, the curfew would move to 9pm local time and there would be a controlled reopening of restaurants in the evening.
Reuters reports that restaurants, which have been able to open only at lunchtime, may serve customers in the evening until 9.30pm but they are not allowed to play music and customers must return home by 10pm with a certificate from the restaurant owner. The provisions extend to 2 May, three weeks before the Monaco Grand Prix , which is scheduled for May 23.
“It is not a question of complacency, but a certain number of favourable developments have taken place,” Dartout said, saying an infection rate of the virus had fallen to 80 per 100,000 on Wednesday.
For the grand prix, a centrepiece of Monaco’s calendar, there will be a closed practice session on Friday but a crowd, limited to local residents and employees, will be allowed for qualifying on Saturday and for the race on Sunday, the government announced.
Monaco has not yet given any public indication of whether fans would allowed to watch from the stands, terraces and balconies, or whether the traditional influx of visiting fans would be permitted.
