The number of those diagnosed with coronavirus is on the rise with over 250,000 new cases confirmed globally in the past 24 hours. India showed the highest daily increase with over 65,000 infected. Cases are also spiking in the US and Latin America.
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ALMATY (Sputnik) – Health authorities in Kazakhstan have detected 244 new COVID-19 cases over the past day, bringing the overall total to 103,815, the country's interdepartmental commission on the coronavirus said on Thursday.
"We have registered 244 new cases of the coronavirus infection, including 134 people with symptoms and 110 without symptoms", the commission said on its Telegram channel.
The death toll from COVID-19 in Kazakhstan has increased by 15 to 1,461 people, while more than 86,400 people have recovered.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Germany has confirmed 1,707 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, with the total count reaching 228,621, the Robert Koch Institute said on Thursday.
The death toll has grown by 10 to 9,253 people within the same period of time. More than 204,000 people have recovered since the start of the outbreak.
A day earlier, the country confirmed 1,510 new coronavirus cases and seven fatalities.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Turkey is currently developing 13 COVID-19 vaccines, Turkish media reported citing Health Minister Fahrettin Koca.
The minister said that three vaccines had already passed through animal tests, the TRT broadcaster reported on late Wednesday. According to Koca, Turkey is currently holding talks with Russia, Germany, and China on conducting the third phase of clinical trials of the vaccines.
Turkey has confirmed 253,108 COVID-19 cases so far and 6,039 fatalities.
As of Wednesday, New Zealand has reported more than 1,300 confirmed cases and 22 deaths related to the disease. There are 101 active cases in the country.
The country's Green Cross Corporation has received regulatory approval for phase II human clinical trials of its experimental coronavirus plasma treatment drug, according to the National Ministry of Food and Drug Safety.
The trials will test the safety and efficacy of the drug in 60 severe patients with underlying conditions like pneumonia, the Corporation said. Green Cross was allowed to skip the phase I trials.
BEIJING (Sputnik) - China has registered, over the past 24 hours, seven cases of the novel coronavirus disease, and 22 asymptomatic carriers, 60 patients have been discharged from hospitals, the country's state health committee said in a statement.
All seven new cases were imported.
Overall, during the epidemic in the country, 84,895 cases of COVID-19 have been recorded, 79,745 people have recovered, 516 patients with COVID-19 remain in hospitals, and 4,634 have died.
A total of 2,346 cases have been imported, 2,148 people have recovered.
MEXICO CITY (Sputnik) – The number of people, who have died of COVID-19 in Mexico, has risen by 707 to 58,481 within the past 24 hours, Deputy Health Minister Hugo Lopez-Gatell said.
He also said on late Wednesday that the number of confirmed coronavirus cases had increased by 5,792 to 537,031 within the same period of time.
A day earlier, the Latin American nation recorded 5,506 new cases of the coronavirus and 751 fatalities related to the disease.
BUENOS AIRES (Sputnik) – Argentina has confirmed 6,693 new cases of the coronavirus across the country within the past 24 hours, with the total number of people infected with COVID-19 having reached 312,659, the national Ministry of Health said.
The death toll has increased by 283 to 6,630 people within the same period of time.
A day earlier, Argentina confirmed 6,840 new COVID-19 cases and 235 fatalities.
BOGOTA (Sputnik) – Colombia's coronavirus tally has jumped by record 13,056 new cases to 502,178 over the past 24 hours, the country’s Health Ministry said on late Wednesday.
The coronavirus-related death toll has increased by 360 over the given period and reached 15,979. More than 326,000 people have recovered in the Latin American country.
The authorities have conducted more than 2.3 million coronavirus tests.
#ReporteCOVID19 - 19 de agosto:
— MinSaludCol (@MinSaludCol) August 19, 2020
13.975 recuperados
13.056 nuevos casos
360 fallecidos
Muestras:
PCR: 30.920
Antígeno: 7.095
Total:
326.298 recuperados
502.178 casos de COVID-19
15.979 fallecidos
2.337.241 muestras procesadas
158.893 casos activoshttps://t.co/SiKTpTCQ3W pic.twitter.com/tY4yGr4CPW
MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Brazil's number of cases of the novel coronavirus disease has increased by more than 49,000 over the past 24 hours - up from some 47,000 the day before, with over 1,200 deaths, the country's Health Ministry said in a statement.
The case tally rose by 49,298 to 3,456,652, the ministry added. The death toll increased by 1,212 - down from 1,352 the day before - to 111,100.
MEXICO CITY (Sputnik) - Mexico is interested in getting Russia's Sputnik V Coronavirus Vaccine as soon as possible, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said on Wednesday after his meeting with Russian Ambassador Viktor Koronelli.
"I thank the Russian Ambassador Viktor Koronelli for his visit to the Foreign Ministry. We talked about the Sputnik V vaccine. I expressed our interest in conducting the third phase [of clinical trials] in order to get this vaccine in Mexico as soon as possible", Ebrard said on Twitter.
The Russian Health Ministry previously registered the world's first vaccine for the prevention of COVID-19, developed by the Gamaleya Institute in cooperation with the Russian Direct Investment Fund. It was named Sputnik V. Fund's CEO Kirill Dmitriev said that the fund had received applications from more than 20 countries for the purchase of a billion doses of the domestic vaccine against the coronavirus. At the same time, he noted that Russia had agreed on the production of vaccines in five countries, the available capacities allow producing 500 million doses per year.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - The United States has recorded more than 5.5 million confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus disease, Johns Hopkins University data showed on Wednesday.
The US now has 5,505,074 cases and 172,418 COVDID-19 related deaths, according to the data.
The US leads the world in COVID-19 case count, followed by Brazil (3.4 million), India (2.7 million), and Russia (935,000), the Johns Hopkins data revealed.
As of Wednesday, more than 22.2 million people have been infected with the virus worldwide and more than 782,000 have died, according to data compiled by the Johns Hopkins.
"In 23 states with adequate race/ethnicity data, the cumulative incidence of laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 among AI/AN persons was 3.5 times that among non-Hispanic white persons", the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report. "American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) persons appear to be disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic".
However, limited data was available to quantify the disparity in novel coronavirus incidence, severity and outcomes among American Indian and Alaska Native persons compared with those among other racial and ethnic groups, the report said.
"Although non-Hispanic American Indian and Alaska Native persons account for 0.7 percent of the US population, a recent analysis reported that 1.3 percent of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases reported to CDC with known race and ethnicity were among AI/AN persons", the report said.
Historical trauma and persisting racial inequity have contributed to disparities in health and socioeconomic factors between American Indian and Alaska Native and white populations that have adversely affected their communities. These factors likely contribute to the observed elevated incidence of cases among the American Indian and Alaska Native population, the report added.
Public Health England (PHE) on Wednesday announced that it had recruited all 10,000 volunteers needed to begin the study to establish whether people who have survived COVID-19 are able to get reinfected.
All 10,000 volunteers were recruited from the ranks of the National Health Service (NHS) to take part in the SIREN (SARS-CoV-2 Immunity & REinfection EvaluatioN) study, a PHE statement read.
"Every day we learn more and more about the impacts of becoming infected with COVID-19, but we don’t know if you can get it again, if you can pass it on, or if you develop immunity. We urgently need to find out the answers to these questions as rapidly as possible", Professor Susan Hopkins from Public Health England, said in the statement.
Hopkins went on to express her gratitude to the doctors, nurses and orderlies who have signed up for the year-long study.
Minister of Innovation at the Department of Health and Social Care, Lord Bethel, underscored the importance of what he called the largest clinical study in the world to beat the coronavirus.
Preliminary results are expected before winter, the statement said, but the study will take place over the course of 12 months to explore how factors like ethnicity, gender and age affect the chances of reinfection.
The number of COVID-19 cases in the United Kingdom has increased by 812 over the last 24 hours, reaching 321,098, the Department of Health and Social Care reported on Wednesday.
The governmental body also said that another 16 people who had tested positive for the novel coronavirus died within the 28 days of the first positive test, taking the country's death toll to 41,397.
Of all COVID-19-confirmed deaths reported on Wednesday, 15 were recorded in England, and one in Scotland -the first one in more than a month - but there were no new fatalities from the coronavirus in Wales and Northern Ireland.
"By the end of 2021, we’re told by the manufacturers that there will be enough vaccine essentially for everybody in the country. But before then there will be prioritization", Anthony Fauci said during an event hosted by George Washington University.
Fauci said most likely first responders and health care workers will be vaccinated first followed by vulnerable groups such as the elderly and those with underlying medical conditions.
In the past, Fauci has said a vaccine could become "widely available" several months into next year, but stopped short of predicting a time frame for universal access.
The United Kingdom’s largest airport, London’s Heathrow, said on Wednesday it has prepared facilities to rapidly test passengers for COVID-19 on arrival and urged the government to ease the strict two-week quarantine rule for arrivals.
The airport’s CEO, John Holland-Kaye, said that allowing for a more flexible vetting of entrants would facilitate trade with other nations.
"Testing will not only avoid the ‘quarantine roulette’ that so many passengers faced in Spain and France, it will also open up flights to key trading partners such as the US, Canada and Singapore," Holland-Kaye said in a statement published on the airport’s website.
The airport said that up to 13,000 people may be tested daily, but that the facility can be scaled up with demand.
The airport’s proposal eyes shortening the quarantine by conducting a COVID-19 test on arrival and another one after several days in quarantine, thereby ensuring the utmost accuracy of any one person’s negative results.
Holland-Kaye went on to argue that over 30 nations worldwide have adopted some form of the test-on-arrival approach, which is helping the airline industry bounce back from the pandemic.
A number of UK-based airlines have expressed their grievances over the government’s rigid quarantine rules for arrivals from nations with high-infection rates, arguing that unconditional two-week isolation scares off potential travellers to and from the UK.
The shaky reopening of borders has not helped either, as the list of countries requiring a quarantine has been updated several times in accordance with the epidemiological situations abroad, causing inconveniences for travellers and holidaymakers. The government has so far refused to give in to the complaints from the travel industry.
Milorad Dodik, the Serb member of Bosnia and Herzegovina's three-person presidency, on Wednesday announced going to Russia in the fall and purchasing the Russian-made COVID-19 vaccine for his country.
According to Dodik, if the Russian authorities are ready to use the vaccine to protect its own citizens, other countries should not doubt it.
"We have good relations, and I am sure that I will visit Russia again in September or October, where we will come up with something like this [vaccine purchase]," Dodik told the Serbian RTRS broadcaster.
The average age of Italian citizens infected with the novel coronavirus has decreased to 35, according to the Italian National Institute of Health (ISS), which constitutes a significant drop.
During the direst months of the pandemic, the number was surpassing 60 by far. Now, however, 56 percent of all cases are within the range of 19-50 years old. Only 19 percent of Italian patients are in the 51-70 age bracket, despite it being the most affected group at the beginning of the outbreak.
Experts explain this shift by referring to the social behavior of young people who tend to disregard the safety rules against the infection amid the vacation season. Also, the youth experience milder symptoms with two in three carriers under 30 showing no symptoms at all.
Italy has confirmed a total of 254,636 cases, with a death toll of 35,405.
MOSCOW, August 19 (Sputnik) - The High Court of New Zealand on Wednesday found that the first nine days of the lockdown introduced by the authorities amid the COVID-19 pandemic were unlawful.
"While there is no question that the requirement was a necessary, reasonable, and proportionate response to the COVID-19 crisis at the time, the requirement was not prescribed by law and was therefore contrary to s 5 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act", the ruling read.
Last month, Andrew Borrowdale, a lawyer from Wellington, challenged the legality of steps taken in the early stages of the five-week lockdown, including calls by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and other officials between 26 March and 3 April urging residents to stay at home. According to the court, an order imposing such restrictions was not passed until 3 April, so New Zealanders’ rights and freedoms were illegally restricted for those nine days.
LONDON (Sputnik) – UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced on Wednesday that the survey conducted by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to look at the prevalence of symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19 infection in the community would test 150,000 people per day by October.
"The ONS COVID-19 Infection Survey tracking the virus in the general population will expand from regularly testing 28,000 people per fortnight in England to 150,000 by October", Hancock said, as quoted in a press release from the Department of Health and Social Care.
According to the release, the ONS has also partnered with Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland to extend the survey across the country.
"The expanded study will play a crucial role in providing extensive, weekly data on the spread of infection, supporting rapid testing and diagnosis of COVID-19 both nationally and in areas of concern", the text added.
Participants in the survey are asked to provide samples taken from self-administered nose and throat swabs to show whether or not they have the virus, and answer a few questions during a home visit by a trained health worker.
Further tests will be taken every week for the first 15 weeks, and then every month for 12 months, while 20 percent of the participants aged 16 and over will provide a blood sample to determine what proportion of the population has developed antibodies to COVID-19, the Department of Health and Social Care explained.
"The government continues providing assistance to people affected by the spreading of the coronavirus, including those who have lost their jobs. This is a very tough situation; these people need support from the government badly. It is important to increase their chances to find a great new job. The government will disburse almost 3 billion rubles for their retraining. A relevant decree has already been signed", Mishustin told the Russian cabinet.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The Philippines will likely receive an approved COVID-19 vaccine for mass use in the second quarter of 2021, Rowena Guevarra, the undersecretary for research and development of the Philippine Department of Science and Technology, said on Wednesday.
"If we are talking about availability en masse, we believe this is going to be happening in the 2nd quarter of next year", Guevarra said, as quoted by the broadcaster ABS-CBN News.
Guevara told the network that she was referring to several vaccines, including the ones from Russia, China's Sinovac, and those expected to be included in the World Health Organisation’s Solidarity Trial for vaccines.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Russia has registered 4,828 COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours (4,748 yesterday), bringing the cumulative total to 937,321, the country's coronavirus response centre said on Wednesday.
"Over the past 24 hours, Russia has confirmed 4,828 COVID-19 cases in 85 regions, of which 1,230 (25.5 percent) have been detected with people showing no clinical symptoms", the response centre said in a statement.
This takes the total case count to 937,321, with the daily increase standing at 0.5 percent.
