More than half of Croatia’s adult population has received vaccines against COVID-19, Health Minister Vili Beros said on Friday.
"We have reached 50% of the vaccinated adult population. Thanks to everyone who became a part of these positive statistics, the Croatian government and those who conduct immunization on the spot and provided the maximum accessibility of vaccine," the minister wrote on Twitter.
About 1.69 million Croatians have received the first shot against the coronavirus, while 1.5 million have undergone the full vaccination.
Croatia has so far registered over 368,000 COVID-19 cases and 8,925 deaths caused by the disease. Vaccines by Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, Johnson&Johnson and AstraZeneca are registered for use.
The Biden administration is providing Kosovo with half a million doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced on Friday.
“Today the United States donated the first tranche of 500,000 Pfizer doses to Kosovo, bringing it 20 percent closer to reaching its vaccination goal,” Blinken said via Twitter.
The vaccine doses were delivered through the so-called COVAX mechanism, the Blinken added.
“[T]his gift represents the shared values and unwavering bonds between our people. Together we can defeat COVID-19,” Blinken said.
COVAX stands for COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access and is a worldwide initiative for equitable access to coronavirus vaccines. COVAX is directed by the Vaccine Alliance Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the World Health Organization.
Israeli Prime Naftali Minister Bennett received on Friday a third shot of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine following the ongoing nationwide booster campaign to slow the spread of the Delta coronavirus strain, according to his office.
Earlier in the day, the country's Health Ministry lowered the minimum third shot age from 50 years to 40, if the second vaccination was at least five months ago.
"Israel is the pioneer of the 3rd dose of the vaccines against the COVID virus. We're seeing profound effectiveness, efficacy of the vaccines. It's working, it's safe and it's the way to defeat this virus," Bennett, aged 49, said before getting the third dose, which was broadcast by his office on social media, adding that Israel will share all the data regarding the booster shots campaign.
Hideaki Omura, the governor of the densely populated Japanese prefecture Aichi, is going to ask the central government to declare a COVID-19 state of emergency, the Kyodo news agency reported on Friday.
Omura said, as cited in the report, that additional emergency measures were needed to help the struggling health care system deal with a rise in coronavirus cases.
Aichi reported more than 1,000 cases for three straight days. It registered 1,347 cases in the past 24 hours, the highest since the start of the outbreak.
Japan extended coronavirus lockdowns in Tokyo and five worst-hit prefectures until September 12 this week and announced a state of emergency in seven other provinces, in an effort to prevent the medical system from collapsing.
Russia registered 20,992 COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, down from 21,058 the day before, taking the overall tally to 6,705,523, the federal response centre said on Friday.
"Over the past day, 20,992 COVID-19 cases were confirmed across 85 Russian regions, including 1,588 cases (7.6%) without clinical symptoms," the centre said, adding that the rate of increase grew to 0.31%.
Moscow has the highest number of new cases with 1,925 daily infections. The Russian capital was followed by St. Petersburg with 1,691 new cases, and the Moscow region with 1,029 new cases.
The response centre reported 785 new deaths linked to the coronavirus, down from 791 the day before, raising the country's death toll to 174,485.
In the same 24 hours, 20,351 COVID-19 patients were discharged from hospitals across the country, bringing the total to 5,983,405.
New South Wales (NSW) Premier Gladys Berejiklian announced on Friday that the lockdown in the NSW capital of Sydney would be prolonged, with new restrictions introduced after daily tally exceeded 600 new infections for the third consecutive day.
On Monday, some 18,000 police officers and 800 soldiers were patrolling the streets of Sydney to guard against infringements of COVID-19 lockdown.
"From Monday at midnight, the Greater Sydney lockdown will be extended until the end of September… For rural and regional communities the lockdown is going to last until at least 28 August… From Monday at midnight, unless you go exercising, masks should be worn outdoors everywhere across New South Wales," Berejiklian stated.
A curfew will be also introduced in Sydney’s west and south-west, the premier added.
On Friday, 642 new cases and 4 deaths of COVID-19 were registered in NSW, despite the 80% vaccination rate.
The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) approved on Friday the use of Ronapreve, the first monoclonal antibody treatment for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 to be used in the UK since the pandemic began.
The health regulator said in a statement that clinical trial of the product developed by the US pharmaceutical Renegeron and the Swiss company Roche showed that the drug cocktail prevented infection, promote resolution of acute symptoms of the disease and reduce hospitalizations.
"This treatment will be a significant addition to our armoury to tackle COVID-19 – in addition to our world-renowned vaccination programme and life-saving therapeutics dexamethasone and tocilizumab," UK Health Minister Sajid Javid was quoted as saying.
Javid said that the government was working "at pace" with the National Health Service and expert clinicians to ensure the monoclonal antibody treatment can be rolled out to patients as soon as possible.
According to the MHRA, Ronapreve acts at the lining of the respiratory system where it binds tightly to the coronavirus and prevents it from gaining access to the cells of the respiratory system.
India has confirmed 36,571 new cases of the coronavirus over the past 24 hours, with the total number of those infected having reached 32,358,829, the country's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said on Friday.
The death toll from the disease has reached 433,589 people, with 540 new fatalities being recorded over the past day.
More than 31.56 million people have recovered in India since the start of the outbreak.
A day earlier, the country confirmed 36,401 new coronavirus cases, with 530 fatalities.
