Brazil's daily death toll reaches 3,650; Spain records increase in infection rate - as it happened

Norway has said it will delay the decision on whether to resume use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, Reuters reports.

Authorities suspended the rollout of the vaccine two weeks ago after several younger inoculated people were hospitalised, some of whom later died.

Hungary has no room to loosen lockdown measures due to a rise in coronavirus infections, the prime minister has said.

Reuters reports:

The prime minister, Viktor Orbán, said the government planned to limit the number of shoppers allowed in shops from the weekend, while possibly keeping shops open longer in the evening. The decisions will be published on Saturday.

Orbán said it was hard to predict when the third wave of the pandemic – which swept the region fuelled by the spread of the more contagious variant of the virus first discovered in Britain – would peak. He said the main question was how fast infections would start dropping once the peak was passed.

“The next 1-2 weeks will be hard,” he told state radio.
He added, though, that there was a “realistic chance” of schools reopening from 19 April, once teachers and staff have been vaccinated.

Orbán said by now, 71% of those aged above 65 years who have registered for a shot have been vaccinated, and a total of 1.8 million people got at least a first dose of a vaccine in the country of 10 million.

The UK has said it has sufficient coronavirus vaccine supplies to meet its targets of vaccinating all over 50s and vulnerable people by mid-April.

Robert Jenrick, the housing secretary, told Sky News that “we do have enough supply in sight to continue to meet our obligations”.

This is despite a row between the UK and the EU, with the prime minister telling the EU that the bloc would be the loser if it imposed a vaccine blockade on Britain.

Romania has extended its night-time curfew to slow the spread of coronavirus infections, according to Reuters.

Officials say the movement of people will be restricted from 8pm onwards, and shops will be shut from 6pm Friday until Sunday in towns with more than 4 cases per 1,000 people. Movement will be restricted from 8pm in towns with more than 7.5 cases per 1,000 people.

The country reported 6,651 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, the highest daily tally this year.

Good morning, Tobi Thomas here from London. I’m taking over from my colleague Alison Rourke. As always, if you would like to get in touch you can reach me via email or twitter: @tobithomas_

Thanks in advance!

• EU leaders have given a lukewarm response to plans by the European commission to potentially block vaccine exports to highly vaccinated countries. In a statement issued after the EU virtual summit late on Thursday, the leaders failed to offer their support for the commission approach, instead saying they backed “global value chains” and reaffirmed that “companies must ensure predictability of their vaccine production and respect contractual delivery deadlines”.
• The EU commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, advocated support for the plan to block vaccine exports if necessary: “While remaining open, the EU needs to ensure Europeans get a fair share of vaccines,” she tweeted.
• Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, said while the EU had to “provide [for] our own population” the bloc would not damage the supply chains necessary for the production and distribution of vaccines.
• France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, used a press conference after the meeting to criticise the British media: “Every day, when I read the press across the Channel, they make a case against us saying that it is the EU that is being selfish. This is false!” he said.
• Germany is expected to declare France a high-risk zone for coronavirus on Friday. It comes as the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 21,573 to 2,734,753, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Friday.
• In England, more than 40,600 people have been likely infected with coronavirus while being treated in hospital for another reason, raising concerns about the NHS’s inability to protect them.
• Joe Biden announced he had doubled his administration’s vaccination goal to 200m shots during his first 100 days as president (up until 29 April).
• Australia on Friday reported its first locally acquired coronavirus case in more than a week, prompting authorities in Queensland to place restrictions on hospitals, retirement homes and disability centres.
• Moderna has delayed the shipment of 590,400 doses of its vaccine that were due to arrive in Canada this weekend, the federal procurement minister said on Thursday.
• Colombia has approved emergency use of Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot Covid-19 vaccine, the director of food and drug regulator Invima said as part of a government address on Thursday.
  

Reports say Germany will classify France as a high-risk zone for Covid-19, the chancellor, Angela Merkel, said, in a move that could see Berlin tighten border controls and require mandatory quarantine to enter the country.

Agence France-Presse says the decision will come into force on Friday and be announced by the national health institute, the Robert Koch Institute, according to the newspaper FAZ.

Covid-19 incidence rates, which measure the number of infections in every 100,000 people over the previous seven days, have crossed the threshold of 200 in numerous French departments.

In Île-de-France, the region which encompasses the capital of Paris, it has passed 600.

“While we see such a high incidence it is simply a necessity ... a practically automatic process,” Merkel told a press conference in Berlin on Thursday as part of an EU summit focused on the fight against Covid-19.

“It is not related here to a political decision but when we see the evolution of the incidence rate – as is the case here – exceed the threshold of 200 for a long time, that requires a classification as a zone of high risk,” she added.

Up until now, only France’s border area of Moselle had been classified by Germany as a high-risk zone.

The classification imposes several travel restrictions, including a requirement to obtain a negative test result before entering German territory, 10-days quarantine, as well as the imposition of strict border controls.

Berlin has also placed Austria’s Tyrol state and the Czech Republic in the same category.

But Merkel hinted on Thursday that France could enjoy special treatment and avoid strict border controls, despite being classified as a high-risk area.

“There is a whole specific test procedure ... that is in discussion with France,” she said.

The French secretary of state for European affairs, Clément Beaune, “is negotiating the easing of terms ... to avoid the border being closed”, AFP has learned from his entourage in Paris.

India will widen its coronavirus vaccination campaign in the “near future” to include more people, instead of restricting it to those above age 45, the health minister, Harsh Vardhan, said on Friday.

The federal government has already announced everyone older than 45 will be eligible for vaccination from 1 April. States have demanded that all adults be included as Covid-19 cases surge in the country.

26 Mar 202102.43 EDT

Warren Murray

More on the UK papers and The Mail’s Friday take on jars and jabs is “Fury over Covid ‘pub passport’ on phones” – hospitality bosses reckon it won’t work (but did anyone ask “parched punters” what they think, if only for an excuse to add to the alliteration).

The i has “Revealed: UK vaccine plan for booster jab” – using both “vaccine” and “jab” in the one headline is regrettable, for mine.

The Express continues to wear the laboured EU/you homophone threadbare with “EU can’t stop us! We WILL all get jab by July”.

“Tell us why they died” demands the Mirror as it lends front-page support to calls for a Covid inquiry.

The Times and the Telegraph cover the row surrounding a West Yorkshire school where a teacher has been suspended for displaying Charlie Hebdo cartoons.

26 Mar 202102.37 EDT

Warren Murray

Our Guardian print front page in the UK today is “Pub check strategy to make young people seek vaccine”. Government insiders are understood to believe that making Covid certificates compulsory to get into a pub could act as a “nudge” to get vaccinated for young people, who are thought to be a “particularly hesitant group”. We also report on concern about police officer deployments in schools – while police forces say the officers play an important role in keeping children safe, campaigners and charities warn their presence risks criminalising young people, exacerbating inequalities, and creating a climate of hostility.