Currently, among the most affected nations are the US (27.1 million infected, 468,000 deaths), India (10.8 million cases, 155,000 fatalities), and Brazil (9.5 million cases and a death toll of over 233,000).
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has said that although there are still many countries with increasing numbers of cases, the tendency at the global level is encouraging.
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US health officials anticipate the B117 strain of the novel coronavirus that originated in the United Kingdom will become dominant in the United States by March, National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Disease Director Anthony Fauci said on Wednesday.
"Were concerned that over the next month or so it might become dominant," Fauci said during a White House briefing by US health officials.
Centres for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky said the UK variant now accounts for 1 percent to 4 percent of US coronavirus cases.
Fauci said existing vaccines appear more than 95 percent effective against the UK variant of the novel coronavirus in laboratory tests.
The South African 351 strain of the novel coronavirus appears more problematic given that laboratory tests show a five- to six-fold diminution of overall efficacy, Fauci added.
A South African vaccine trial has indicated the vaccine appears effective in protecting against severe and often fatal cases of COVID-19 even if recipients are susceptible to less-severe infections, according to Fauci.
Some European lawmakers on Wednesday slammed the EU authorities for its handling of the coronavirus vaccination campaign, as well as accused them of refusing to purchase Russia's Sputnik V vaccine for ideological reasons.
Earlier in the day, the European Parliament held debates on the bloc's vaccination strategy.
"Hungary has decided do directly order two million doses of the Russian vaccine, which you decided to ignore for ideological reasons," French lawmaker Jordan Bardella from the Identity and Democracy group said, addressing the head of the European Commission and the health commissioner, and accusing the EU "technocracy" of "obvious incompetence."
His colleague from the same group, Nicolas Bay, asked why the European Union has been imposing sanctions on Russia for seven years, to its own detriment, and then has to ask for the Russian vaccine after having questioned its effectiveness.
"[The EU] has to request the Sputnik V vaccine after it has been voicing doubts regarding its effectiveness for some time," Bay said.
The EU signed contracts with six coronavirus vaccine manufacturers. Thanks to these contracts, the EU countries will have access to over 2.3 billion doses of vaccines. The EU expects around 70 percent of European citizens to be vaccinated by the end of summer.
Nevertheless, in recent weeks, the EU faced shipment delays and reductions in the number of doses that were initially agreed upon with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.
Meanwhile, Hungary has become the first EU member state to approve Russia's Sputnik V vaccine.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said on Wednesday that it has not received an application from the developers of Russia's Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine for market authorization in the European Union.
"The European Medicines Agency has to date not received an application for a rolling review or a marketing authorisation for the vaccine developed by the Gamaleya National Centre of Epidemiology and Microbiology in Russia, the Sputnik V vaccine (Gam-COVID-Vac), despite reports stating the opposite," a press release read.
The EMA said that the Gamaleya centre had received scientific advice from the agency and added that discussions were ongoing.
A 71 percent majority of Americans say they are not satisfied with the way the vaccination process is going in the United States amid a parallel increase in the number of adults willing to be vaccinated, a new Gallup poll revealed on Wednesday.
"[Seventy-one percent] of Americans are now willing to be vaccinated, up from 65 percent in late December and the highest recorded since July, when the measure was first included in Gallup's probability-based online tracking survey," Gallup said in a press release explaining the poll.
As with most other COVID-19 measures, partisans' satisfaction levels with the vaccination process diverge. Republicans are about evenly divided, with 49 percent satisfied and 51 percent dissatisfied, while Democrats (79 percent) and independents (63 percent) are largely dissatisfied, the release said.
Gallup noted an "upward trajectory" in Americans’ willingness to be inoculated following a low point of 50 percent in September.
The latest 71 percent of US adults willing to be vaccinated is the highest on record, and the first measurement that includes a reading for those who have already been vaccinated (9 percent), the release said.
The World Health Organization's Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) said on Wednesday that the benefits of the AstraZeneca/Oxford University COVID-19 vaccine outweigh the potential risks.
"The data reviewed by WHO support the conclusion that the known and potential benefits of AZD1222 outweigh the known and potential risk," SAGE said in a set of interim recommendations.
Citing trial data taken from studies in the United Kingdom, South Africa, and Brazil that saw participants receive two standard doses, SAGE said that the AstraZeneca vaccine showed 63.09 percent efficacy.
SAGE also recommends that the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine be given at an interval of eight to 12 weeks between shots, and the experts also said that the vaccine appears to be safe for individuals aged 65 and above.
"Immune responses induced by the vaccine in older persons are well documented and similar to those in other age groups. This suggests it is likely that the vaccine will be found to be efficacious in older persons. The trial data indicate that the vaccine is safe for this age group," the expert group said.
Additionally, SAGE noted recent studies that have suggested that the AstraZeneca vaccine is less effective against new COVID-19 strains, but still recommended the vaccine for use in countries, such as South Africa, where new strains are spreading.
"In view of this, WHO currently recommends the use of AZD1222 vaccine ... even if variants are present in a country," SAGE said.
Peruvian Health Minister Pilar Mazzetti on Wednesday called on businesses with relevant skills to help the government replenish the shortage of medical oxygen for COVID-19 patients.
Peru is through its second COVID-19 wave at the moment.
"Oxygen consumption has increased by 300 percent. We have expanded the capacity of intensive care units and the number of ventilators, but the oxygen supply remains an obstacle," Mazzetti was quoted as saying by the ministry.
The minister called on companies with the capacity to increase the output of medical oxygen to reach out and "employ their knowledge at the service of those who suffer, even if at the cost of industrial aspects."
"We wait for your contribution, the country waits for you," Mazzetti added.
As reported by Peruvian broadcaster RPP, finding medical oxygen in Lima is near impossible these days. Over 100 people have reportedly gathered in front of one of the companies that produce oxygen in the Peruvian capital, but no product was available for several days now.
The Ecuadorian authorities will payout a COVID-19-relief sum of $500, five times more than previously planned, to people who lost their jobs in 2020 over the pandemic, media reported, citing the Ministry of Labor.
According to El Universo, in February-March, the government will allocate $286 million to compensate about 570,000 families for job losses suffered during the pandemic.
Estimates of the number of qualified recipients of the compensation are currently being conducted.
The Czech Republic will not administer Russia's Sputnik V vaccine until it is approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), but may start building up stocks in advance, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said on Wednesday.
Earlier in February, Czech media reported that experts of the Czech Health Ministry were studying the legal aspects of a possible direct purchase of the Russian vaccine bypassing the EU regulatory authorities. The Ministry's employees were reportedly instructed to find out what legal opportunities exist for the Sputnik V vaccine to be approved in the republic without the corresponding approval of EMA.
Babis' remarks came ahead of his departure to Belgrade, where he intends to get acquainted with the Serbian experience in the procurement and use of vaccines produced outside the EU, primarily Sputnik V. Last week, Babis visited Budapest to study Hungary’s experience in the use of the Russian-made coronavirus vaccine. He, in particular, discussed this issue with his Hungarian counterpart, Viktor Orban, and local doctors.
"We do not plan to start using a vaccine that is not approved by EMA. But if we managed to get a certain amount [of Sputnik V], a certain promise, and if our state institute for drug control would approve the relevant documentation so that we needed only the EMA approval, we could get a certain advantage in time," Babis told reporters.
Babis has previously repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction with the sharp slowdown in shipments of Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which hinders the nation's immunization of priority groups, like frontline medical staff and people aged over 80. At the same time, he highly assessed the Russian vaccine.
The Czech Republic launched a vaccination campaign on December 27 along with the entire bloc. As of Tuesday, 365,000 residents have been vaccinated, including 105,000 residents who received a second shot.
The Russian Direct Investment Fund told Sputnik on Tuesday that it had an official confirmation that EMA accepted all paperwork for registration of Russia's Sputnik V vaccine in the EU market.
Over 40 million COVID-19 vaccine doses have been used across China to inoculate people from risk groups, Mi Feng, a spokesman of the National Health Commission, said on Wednesday.
"The campaign to vaccinate the population at risk is progressing. As of February 9, 40,052,000 doses of vaccine have been administered across the country," Mi said during a press conference without providing any further details.
During the first stage of the vaccination campaign in China, customs officers and health care workers, as well as employees whose work is related to imported frozen products, sea and air transportation, seafood markets and public transport, will receive vaccine shots.
Earlier in February, the Chinese drug regulator approved Sinovac’s vaccine for mass inoculation. Prior to that, the vaccine was approved only for emergency use.
Bulgaria plans to procure over 3 million additional doses of the coronavirus vaccines by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna to make up for a possible shortage of supplies of the one by AstraZeneca, Bulgarian Health Minister Kostadin Angelov said on Wednesday.
In recent weeks, Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca delayed the supplies of contracted amounts of vaccines to the European Union due to production irregularities.
"According to the data available at the EU level, as well as due to the possible decrease in supplies of the vaccine by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca, we suggest ordering additional doses, which will be proportionally distributed depending on the population of our country, in the amount of 2,897,694 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine and 460,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine," Angelov said, as quoted by the Bulgarian National Television.
The backup procurement is needed to ensure that every Bulgarian citizen has enough variety of vaccines to choose from, according to the minister.
As for other EU member states, Bulgaria launched its COVID-19 vaccination campaign on 27 December. The Bulgarian government used the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine until 13 January and then included the Moderna vaccine afterward.
As of Wednesday, Bulgaria vaccinated over 62,000 people of its roughly 7-million population. The country's COVID-19 toll amounts to over 226,000 cases, including 9,482 deaths and more than 194,500 recoveries.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday called the upcoming introduction of a mandatory COVID-19 hotel quarantine scheme for arrivals from 33 "red list" countries measured and proportionate, one day after Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that individuals could face up to 10 years in prison for violating the new rules.
During an appearance in the House of Commons on Tuesday, Hancock said that citizens and residents of UK and Ireland would have to pre-book a 10-day spell in a government-assigned quarantine hotel at a cost of 1,750 pounds ($2,100) per person if they had been in a "red list" country within 10 days of their arrival. The new initiative is seen as a way of potentially controlling the spread of new COVID-19 strains.
The health secretary said that those who skip tests could be fined and that individuals who lie to avoid spending time in hotel quarantine could face up to 10 years in prison.
"I think that this policy is measured, it is proportionate, it is getting tougher from Monday," Johnson said in parliament.
The prime minister said that it would not be possible to cut the country off entirely, given that the UK is reliant on the importation of food and medicines.
"People should understand that on a normal day … at this time of year, you can expect about 250,000 people to be arriving in this country. We've got it down to about 20,000, 5,000 of whom are involved in bringing vital things into this country such as medicines and food.
According to Hancock, 16 hotels in England have been contracted to take part in the government's quarantine scheme. The cost of the self-isolation stay includes accommodation, transport, and testing.
At present, 33 countries, the bulk of which are in South America and Africa are on the United Kingdom's COVID-19 "red list."
Only about 0.14 percent of all people vaccinated in Spain against COVID-19 have side effects, the Spanish Agency for Medicine and Health Products (AEMPS) said.
"By January 21 of 2021, Spain has administrated 1,131,805 doses of COVID-19 vaccines, having received 1,555 notifications of the side effects," the health authority said in a release.
According to the document, the most common effects are general disorders such as fever and pain in the injection zone, headache and disorders of the digestive system.
At the end of December, Spain as other European countries started the vaccination campaign against COVID-19. To date, the country has received US Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. On Monday, first batch of 196,800 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine was delivered to Spain.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Spain has registered over 3 million positive coronavirus cases. The death toll stood at 63,061 people.
The European Union has underestimated challenges in mass production of coronavirus vaccines, which has yet to match "ground-breaking pace of science," Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday.
For weeks, EU nations have been facing delays in Pfizer/BioNTech и AstraZeneca vaccine supplies as the manufacturers are scrambling to reorganize production to meet global demand.
"Quite rightly, all of us were very much focused on the development of the vaccine, but broadly speaking, we underestimated the difficulty related to mass production. Normally, it takes five to 10 years to produce a new vaccine – we did in 10 months. That is a huge scientific success and we should be rightly proud," von der Leyen told the European Parliament.
Science thus has "outstripped" industry, according to the top EU official.
She explained that vaccine production is a complex procedure, and it is impossible to establish a production site overnight. Moreover, vaccines contain up to 400 ingredients, and their production involves as many as 100 enterprises, she continued.
Still, von der Leyen is convinced that EU-level vaccine distribution was "the right thing to do." Otherwise, "only a handful of big member states" could secure vaccines, leaving the others "empty-handed," she argued.
Chinese police have uncovered a number of cases involving production and distribution of fake COVID-19 vaccines with doses up to 58,000, the country's prosecutor general's office said on Wednesday.
According to a statement from the Supreme People's Procuratorate, a group of suspects led by a ring leader, identified only by his surname as Kong, were detained by the police last November for producing about 58,000 doses of fake COVID-19 vaccines made of simple saline resolution.
Kong's group generated 12 million yuan (about $1.86 million) in profits through the sales of the fake vaccines, the statement said.
In a related case, a number of suspects bought the fake COVID-19 vaccines produced by Kong and tried to smuggle them overseas. A batch of 600 doses of the fake vaccines were transported to Hong Kong on 11 November last year and sent to an unknown destination overseas the next day.
A second batch of 1,200 doses of fake COVID-19 vaccines arrived in Hong Kong on 12 November. But the group was forced to destroy the unsold fake vaccines two weeks later, after a number of their accomplices were detained by Chinese police.
As of Wednesday, about 70 suspects have been arrested in 21 cases related to fake COVID-19 vaccines, the statement said.
South Africa will proceed with the planned coronavirus immunization campaign using the Johnson & Johnson vaccine instead of the one by Oxford/AstraZeneca, which was deemed ineffective against the South African COVID-19 variant, the country's health minister, Zwelini Mkhize, said on Wednesday.
On Monday, South Africa stopped the AstraZeneca vaccine's rollout after a study published by the Wits Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Analytics Research Unit showed that the vaccine offered minimal protection against mild-to-moderate forms of COVID-19 caused by the mutated coronavirus strain known as B.1.351, which was originally identified in South Africa in November.
"It is as a result of this work, in which the government has directly invested, that it was established that the Astra Zeneca vaccine does not prevent mild to moderate disease of the 501Y.V2 variant. ... Given the outcomes of the efficacy studies, the Department of Health will continue with the planned phase 1 vaccination using the Johnson & Johnson vaccine instead of the AstraZeneca vaccine," Mkhize said in a statement.
According to the country's health authorities, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine has been proven effective against the 501Y.V2 variant.
The US-made vaccine will be used to launch phase one of the mass vaccination campaign, in which South Africa's 1.25 million health workers will be inoculated first.
Travelers arriving in China from overseas would still be required to submit to existing quarantine rules, even if they have taken COVID-19 vaccine shots, China's National Health Commission said on Wednesday.
"After vaccination, most people can produce antibodies that can help prevent infections. But there are still a small number of vaccinated individuals who fail to produce enough antibodies and could still be infected, and could become a source to trigger more infections. That's why we recommend that even after vaccination, they still need to comply with existing COVID-19 containment measures," Mi Feng, spokesperson of the National Health Commission, said during a press conference.
Mi made the comments in response to a question on whether vaccinated travelers arriving from overseas would still be required to quarantine upon arrival.
The official stressed that the quarantine requirement applies to both Chinese nationals and foreigners who came from overseas.
Travelers arriving in China from overseas are required to complete two-three weeks of quarantine in designated hotels, depending on their point of entry to the country.
Even though Brasilian and South African coronavirus strains are present in France, their spread is significantly slower than the circulation of the UK-linked coronavirus variant, Bruno Lina, French virologist and a member of the national Scientific Council, told the France Inter broadcaster on Wednesday.
London discovered the UK-linked coronavirus mutation in December 2020. The Brazilian strain was identified in Rio de Janeiro in the same month but the South African variant was detected two months earlier in October 2020.
"They [Brazilian, South African coronavirus variants] have been detected for around a fortnight [in France] but their penetration levels are much lower than that of the UK variant," Lina said.
He noted, in particular, that the South African strain represents about 1 percent of the total daily numbers of coronavirus infections, which is the equivalent of some 200 people per day testing positive for the disease.
As for the Brazilian mutation of the virus, it shows "a few cases" per day, Lina specified.
The scientist also said he expected that the UK variant would prevail over the other strains in France in the first half of March and account for the majority of coronavirus infections, adding that its transmission capacity has increased up to 40 percent compared to the "classic" COVID-19 variant since it appeared in the country.
To date, France has confirmed 3,419,210 coronavirus cases and 80, 295 related fatalities.
Peru's President Francisco Sagasti has received the first dose of the Chinese Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine as the vaccination campaign kicks off in the Latin American nation.
"Today I get vaccinated with confidence and hope together with all of you, those who will be vaccinated today [Tuesday] and we are absolutely sure that all the Peruvians will stand behind Peru when it comes to receiving the vaccine," the president said during the live broadcast on TV Peru.
On Tuesday, Peru started the vaccination campaign after receiving the first batch of 300,000 doses of the vaccine developed by the Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinopharm on February 7. Health workers are first in line to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Peru has confirmed almost 1.2 million COVID-19 positive cases, including more than 1.1 million recoveries and 42,626 fatalities.
Russia's single-day increase in COVID-19 cases fell below 15,000 for the first time since 17 October, as 14,494 new cases were confirmed in the past 24 hours (down from 15,019 the day before), the response centre said on Wednesday.
"Over the past day, 14,494 coronavirus cases were confirmed across 85 regions, including 1,458 cases (10.1 percent) that were detected actively, with people showing no clinical symptoms," the centre said, adding that the cumulative case count has now reached 4,012,710, with the rate of increase at 0.36 percent.
Moscow confirmed 1,441 new coronavirus cases over the given period, down from 1,584 the day before. The Russian capital was followed by St. Petersburg with 1,169 new cases, up from 1,078 the day before, and the Moscow Region with 650 new cases, down from 903 on Tuesday.
The response centre reported 536 coronavirus fatalities, up from 530 the day before, raising the country's death toll to 78,134.
Total recoveries count 3,516,461 after 22,575 people were discharged from hospitals over the past day, up from 21,795 the day before.
New Zealand has formally approved the use of the COVID-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer/BioNTech after the government deemed it safe for nearly everyone except people under 16, COVID-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins said on Tuesday.
The approval came a week after the country's regulator Medsafe authorized the vaccine's emergency use with a view to receiving the first shipment by April. Frontline medical workers, border staff and risk groups will be the first in line to receive the shots.
"Yesterday Cabinet confirmed formal government approval to use the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. ...This is another critical step in the process of ensuring that our vaccine is safe and effective, and it follows the provisional approval that was granted by Medsafe last week. Cabinet considered and has endorsed the COVID-19 vaccine technical advisory group's decision to use recommendations on the Pfizer vaccine," Hipkins told reporters.
People under 16 have been excluded as they have not yet passed the clinical trials, the minister noted adding that pregnant women were advised to discuss vaccination with their general practitioners.
According to national media, the country will first receive 450,000 out of 1.5 million Pfizer vaccine doses. The island nation also has contracts with other vaccine manufacturers — Janssen, AstraZeneca and Novovax.
Chile has already vaccinated over 1 million people against the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the country's Health Ministry said.
“Today, we have reached 1,025,580 people vaccinated against COVID-19 in the country. We thank the health officials who are enthusiastic and optimistic making this great task achievable,” the ministry said.
It also thanked the older people, with whom the mass vaccination began, for becoming an example of responsibility for everyone.
Chile was supplied with vaccines by US company Pfizer and China's Sinovac. Mass vaccination began on 3 February.
