Turkey sees record death toll – as it happened

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The UAE announced on Wednesday it had given nearly 10 million vaccine doses, equal to one for every resident, after warning that those who remained unvaccinated would face restrictions on their movement, AFP reports.

The country has mounted an energetic coronavirus vaccination campaign for its citizens as well as the foreigners who make up the majority of the population.

However, daily infection rates remain high after it became one of the first destinations to reopen to tourism last year, making it a magnet for visitors from all over the world, and being hit with a surge in cases afterwards as a result.

The National Crisis and Emergency Management Authority said Wednesday the UAE had administered 111,176 doses of vaccine in the past 24 hours, to reach 9,900,002 in total “and with a rate of 100.10 doses per 100 people”.

That result, with two-dose therapies including Pfizer/BioNTech, AstraZeneca and Sinopharm, makes it second-fastest per capita delivery in the world among major nations, after Israel.

However, the NCEMA warned Tuesday that anyone opting against vaccination was putting their families and communities at risk, and that they would face unspecified penalties.

“Strict measures are being considered to restrict the movement of unvaccinated individuals and to implement preventive measures such as restricting entry to some places and having access to some services,” it tweeted.

“Delaying or refraining from taking the vaccine will pose a threat to the safety of society and put all groups, especially those most vulnerable to infection, as it poses a major challenge to the national efforts to recover.”

The warning, after a vaccination programme that has been widely embraced by citizens and residents alike, caused a stir online and a rare rebuke from two Emirati figures with large social media followings.

“Taking the vaccine is a personal decision, and imposing it deprives people of their rights,” Sheikha Manal al-Maktoum, a member of the Dubai royal family, tweeted.

She was backed by Emirati professor of political science Abdulkhaleq Abdulla who commended her “wisdom”.

“Health authorities, local and federal, should intensify awareness and culture campaigns and offer more incentives instead of taking punitive measures and refusing to provide services, and limiting the movement of those who didn’t take the vaccine,” he tweeted.

The UAE has now recorded some 502,000 cases of coronavirus, the highest number among the Gulf states, and exceeding its much larger neighbour Saudi Arabia.

Strict rules on masks and social distancing are in force, but otherwise life in the UAE’s cities of Dubai and Abu Dhabi is going on much as normal, with restaurants and shops open for business.

Argentina is facing its “worst moment” of the pandemic, the country’s health minister said on Wednesday, as deaths from the virus neared 60,000 amid a sharp second wave that has forced the country to re-impose some lockdown measures.

Reuters reports that Carla Vizzotti warned the country’s healthcare system was at risk, especially in the metropolitan area around the capital Buenos Aires, which had forced the government to restrict movement and suspend indoor activities.

“We are living through the worst moment of the pandemic now,” she told a daily briefing, adding the country was seeing an important rise in the circulation of new variants, with the virus surging in the capital and beyond.

It’s growing exponentially in most of the country.

Argentina, which is rolling out an inoculation program largely around Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, has recorded over 2.7 million Covid-19 cases and has set a series of new daily records for infections in recent weeks. Deaths from the virus are likely to hit 60,000 later on Wednesday.

A local laboratory on Tuesday said it had produced a test batch of Sputnik V ahead of planned large-scale manufacture later this year. Vizzotti said it was “great news” though cautioned it needed to be quality controlled and that the time frame would depend on how that process went.

Carlos Camera, an Argentine infectious disease expert, said there was a possibility of health systems being overwhelmed, which was the cause of new restrictions that had sparked some protests amid a fragile economic rebound.

“What was not foreseen was the size with which this second wave has hit and above all the speed of it compared to the speed we’ve managed with vaccinations,” he said.

South Africa will hold local government elections in October that were delayed by the coronavirus, the presidency said in a statement on Wednesday.

“President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced Wednesday, 27 October 2021, as the date on which local government elections will take place,” the president’s office said.

The polls, scheduled for every five years and last held in 2016, allow South Africans to vote for public representatives at metropolitan, district and the local level.

Some political parties had argued for the polls to be pushed back to 2022 once the worst of Covid-19 has passed.

Reuters reports that Colombia will next month restart domestic flights to and from Leticia, the capital of its Amazonas province, the government said on Wednesday, ending months of isolation for the city.

Flights to and from Leticia were grounded at the end of January over fears about the spread of the Brazilian P1 coronavirus variant, which studies have shown to be roughly 2.5 times more contagious and more resistant to antibodies.

Colombia’s Amazonas province shares a border with the Brazilian state of the same name and the decision to halt flights came after a case of the P1 variant was reported in Tabatinga, a Brazilian city next to Leticia.

“In Amazonas, particularly in Leticia, the projected seroprevalence is very high, which led the advisory committee to recommend reopening flights in its last session,” Julian Fernandez, Colombia’s director of epidemiology and demographics, said in a statement released by the health ministry.

Seroprevalence is the percentage of individuals in a population who have antibodies to infectious agents such as viruses.

Amazonas’ population numbers just under 80,000 and the majority live in Leticia. So far, more than 50,000 vaccine doses have been administered there, according to the health ministry.

Those looking to travel from Leticia when flights restart on 1 May will have to present Covid-19 vaccination cards showing they have received necessary doses, the health ministry said. Travellers must have received their second dose at least 15 days prior and show a negative antigen result.

People who have chosen not to be vaccinated will face seven-day quarantines in hotels - for which they will have to pay - if flying to or via capital Bogota, the statement added.

Reuters reports that Spain will offer between 5% and 10% of its Covid-19 vaccine shots to Latin American and Caribbean countries this year, the prime minister Pedro Sanchez said on Wednesday.

“Spain will launch this commitment as soon as it reaches the mark of 50% of the Spanish population vaccinated,” Sanchez told the Ibero-American summit in Andorra, adding that he expected Latin American nations to receive 7.5 million doses by the end of the year.

The country aims to have half its population of 47 million fully inoculated by the end of July. So far around 7.6% have received a full course while nearly 21% have received at least one dose.

Spain is entitled to over 93 million vaccine doses this year under an EU-coordinated purchasing scheme, mostly for double-dose inoculation, leaving it with millions of extra shots.

Top UN financial and vaccine officials last week urged rich countries to donate excess Covid-19 vaccine doses to the Covax vaccine-sharing programme supplying lower income countries, which aims to buy up to 1.8 billion doses in 2021.

• Greece will begin administering Johnson & Johnson’s one-dose vaccine on 5 May, health authorities said on Wednesday, a day after Europe’s drug regulator backed its use.
• Turkey has recorded 362 coronavirus deaths the last 24 hours – its largest daily rise since the beginning of the pandemic.
  
• Officials are deploying surge-testing in an area of Birmingham after a case of the coronavirus variant first detected in South Africa was discovered.
  
• Covaxin, India’s domestically developed Covid-19 vaccine, has been found to be 78% effective in a second analysis of clinical trials done around the country, its manufacturer Bharat Biotech said on Wednesday.
• The UK has reported a further 2,396 new Covid-19 cases as well as 22 deaths, according to government data.
• Sweden’s government has warned that coronavirus measures may be strengthened if people ignore existing restrictions as intensive care units in some regions hit capacity.
  
• North-western Syria has received its first batch of Covid-19 vaccines, AFP’s correspondent reports, with the doses arriving in a Idlib on Wednesday.
• Prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has said Greece will reopen for tourism from 15 May as infections begin to level off in the Mediterranean country due to vaccinations.
• France should start using the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine next week, the government spokesman has said following the European drugs regulator’s statement on the jab on Tuesday.
  
• At least 22 patients have died in a hospital in India’s western Maharashtra state after their oxygen supply ran out due to a leaking tank, a government official said on Wednesday.

That’s all from me for today – my colleague Lucy Campbell will be taking you through the evening’s developments shortly. Thanks for reading.

Although still “alarmingly high”, Brazil’s coronavirus cases appear to be falling – but a relaxation of restrictions could see them surge again, the director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) director has warned.

Carissa Etienne said that infection levels in the country, which has recorded more than 14 million cases since the pandemic began, remain “alarmingly high” while cases in Chile were levelling off.

Around 11.8% of Brazilians have had a first dose of a vaccine, while 4.3% have had both shots.

Etienne said Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Uruguay and Argentina are currently worst-affected South American nations, while almost every country in Central America is reporting a rise in infections. Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic are the worst-affected.

Greece will begin administering Johnson & Johnson’s one-dose vaccine on 5 May, health authorities said on Wednesday, a day after Europe’s drug regulator backed its use.

“We expect decisions by the CDC and FDA on Friday and then by our national committee on vaccinations in the following days. Vaccinations will begin on 5 May,” said the head of vaccinations, Marios Themistocleous, .

Greece had been expected to start J&J vaccinations on Monday before concerns emerged over reports of very rare blood clotting disorders associated with the vaccine. It then said it would wait until the European Medicines Agency’s statement before proceeding with the rollout.

While the EMA said it had found a possible link between very rare blood clotting cases and the vaccine, it advised its use, saying the benefits outweigh the risk. The agency had examined eight serious cases of clotting disorders the US, which has vaccinated more than 7 million with the shot.

21 Apr 202113.07 EDT

Peter Beaumont

Among the most high-profile cases in India’s devastating second wave of coronavirus infections is the former prime minister Manmohan Singh, who was admitted to hospital this week after testing positive despite being recently vaccinated against Covid-19.

Singh, 88, who developed a fever on Sunday and tested positive a day later, is an economist, academic and member of the Congress party who led the country for a decade between 2004 and 2014 and was the first Sikh to hold the office.

Describing his condition as “stable”, the health minister, Harsh Vardhan, tweeted: “Best possible care is being provided to him. We all pray for his quick recovery.”

Turkey has recorded 362 coronavirus deaths the last 24 hours – its largest daily rise since the beginning of the pandemic.

The cumulative toll stands at 36,975, according to data from the health ministry.

A further 61,967 new cases were recorded in the same period, taking the total number of cases since the onset of the pandemic to 4,446,591.

Turkey currently ranks fourth globally in the number of daily cases based on a seven-day average, according to a Reuters tally.

Officials are deploying surge-testing in an area of Birmingham after a case of the coronavirus variant first detected in South Africa was discovered.

In a statement, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) said the confirmed case had “self-isolated and their contacts have been identified”.

The testing will focus on the Alum Rock, Glebe Farm and Tile Cross areas of the city.

Health officials said that the case is not believed to be connected to a case of the same variant identified in the Birmingham and Sandwell areas last week.

The DHSC said that everybody aged 16 years and over who is contacted from the new areas, announced on Wednesday, would be “strongly encouraged to take a Covid-19 PCR test”, whether or not they are symptomatic.

Residents are advised to continue using twice-weekly rapid testing alongside the PCR test as part of surge-testing.

The US state department has added around 100 countries to its ‘do not travel’ list this week, including the UK, Canada, France, Mexico, Germany after it said it would add about 80% of the world’s countries to the index.

Prior to Tuesday’s additions, the department advised against travel to 34 countries. 131 countries are now marked as Level Four – its highest advisory rating.

The state department said on Monday that the shift is not due to a reassessment of the countries’ coronavirus situations, but rather “reflects an adjustment in the state department’s travel advisory system to rely more on (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s) existing epidemiological assessments”.

Covaxin, India’s domestically developed Covid-19 vaccine, has been found to be 78% effective in a second analysis of clinical trials done around the country, its manufacturer Bharat Biotech said on Wednesday.

“I am very pleased to state that Covaxin ... has shown the efficacy of 78% in the second interim analysis,” said Balram Bhargava, the chief of the state-run Indian Council of Medical Research that has created the vaccine with Bharat Biotech.

The first analysis released in March had shown an efficacy rate of 81%.

The jab had 100% efficacy against severe disease, while its efficacy against asymptomatic infection was 70%.

21 Apr 202111.59 EDT

Alexandra Topping

Five pregnant women wearing “I Am Mary” T-shirts in memory of the nurse Mary Agyapong protested in London’s Parliament Square on Wednesday after figures revealed nearly 1,000 pregnant NHS staff were still working in patient-facing roles.

Despite evidence revealing that pregnant women may be at an increased risk of severe disease and losing their baby if they contract Covid, 984 pregnant staff in 25 trusts across the UK continue to work in frontline roles, a request under freedom of information laws by the campaign group Pregnant Then Screwed has revealed.

Many Indians are turning to social media in a desperate search for medical oxygen and hospital beds amid surging infections that have overwhelmed hospitals across the country.

Some Twitter users are using hashtags like #COVIDSOS to share resources, including phone numbers of volunteers, vendors who have oxygen cylinders or drugs, and details of which hospitals can take availability.

Alongside calls for oxygen cylinders as the country experiences shortages, many are searching for antiviral drug Remdesivir as India records its seventh consecutive day of more than 200,000 new infections.

Prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has said Greece will reopen for tourism from 15 May as infections begin to level off in the Mediterranean country due to vaccinations.

“The vaccines, the self-tests and the better weather make us confident that this unprecedented adventure is ending,” Mitsotakis said in a televised address reported by Reuters.

He warned that case rates remained high and called on people to avoid travel over the Orthodox Eastern weekend, which starts on 30 April.

“I have said that our aim is for a safe Easter, and a free summer,” he said.

The country aims to reopen restaurants at the beginning of May, state minister George Gerapetritis said, according to media reports, with outdoor dining set to return after Easter.