COVAX says to provide 1.8b vaccines to poor countries















A bottle containing the Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine is seen at the Al-Abbas Islamic Centre, which has been converted into a temporary vaccination centre in Birmingham, central England on Jan 21, 2021. (DARREN STAPLES / AFP)

QUITO / LISBON / LONDON / MADRID / SANTIAGO / PARIS / BRUSSELS / MEXICO CITY / WASHINGTON / RIO DE JANEIRO / PANAMA CITY / TUNIS / TRIPOLI / RABAT / ALGIERS / ROME / BERLIN / BOGOTA / SOFIA / NAIROBI / HARARE / STOCKHOLM / ZURICH / MOSCOW / JOHANNESBURG / MINSK – The COVAX vaccine sharing platform designed to give equitable access to COVID-19 shots said on Thursday it aimed to deliver 1.8 billion doses to poorer countries in 2021, and hoped to fulfil deals for wealthier nations in the second half of the year.

COVAX, which is co-led by the GAVI vaccine alliance, the World Health Organization and others, said the 1.8 billion doses would be supplied via an advance market commitment to 92 eligible countries and would correspond to approximately 27 percent coverage of populations in those countries.

"Our forecasting indicates that we should fulfil the requests for vaccine placed by self-financing participants in the second half of 2021," GAVI said in an updated forecast statement for COVAX.

Global tally

COVID-19 deaths worldwide topped 17,500 on Jan 20, according to Johns Hopkins data, the highest daily toll to date. 

The previous high was on Jan 8 at 17,454.

According to JHU's tally, the global death toll exceeded 2.07 million while the global tally topped 96.8 million.  

READ MORE: WHO chief: COVAX has secured 2 billion virus vaccine doses

A woman wearing a face shield walks on a quiet shopping street in Kingston upon Thames, London, on Jan 19, 2021 amid a national lockdown in England. (MATT DUNHAM / AP)

UK

The United Kingdom suffered its worst day in the pandemic with 1,820 deaths recorded in 24 hours.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Wednesday's record deaths are "appalling" and the death toll is likely to keep rising in the next few weeks because of the spread of a new, more infectious coronavirus variant.

The record daily toll took the total number of people who have died within 28 days of a positive test in the UK to 93,290. 

There were 38,905 new cases recorded on Wednesday, up from the 33,355 reported a day earlier. Almost 40,000 patients are now receiving treatment in UK hospitals.

Johnson said the nation's medicines regulator will be ready and able to give approval to new versions of COVID-19 vaccines designed to counter new virus variants that may appear.

Researchers warned Thursday that a third pandemic lockdown appears to be having little impact on rates of COVID-19 in England, with prevalence of the disease "very high" and "no evidence of decline" in the first 10 days of renewed restrictions.

Until rates of COVID-19 are reduced substantially, health services "will remain under extreme pressure" and the number of deaths will continue to rise rapidly, researchers leading Imperial College London's REACT-1 prevalence study said.

Lateral flow tests

Rapid lateral flow tests will likely identify the most infectious COVID-19 cases with higher viral loads despite concerns over the overall sensitivity of the tests, Oxford University researchers said on Thursday, as the British government eyes mass testing to ease the current lockdown.

Along with the roll-out of COVID-19 vaccines, the government has cited widespread testing, including lateral flow tests, as a key part of its plans to re-open the economy. Concerns about the tests’ accuracy have led some to question the plan, however.

Some scientists have sounded alarm at Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s plans, dubbed “Operation Moonshot”, saying mass coronavirus testing is likely to be ineffective and expensive.

Lateral flow tests are less sensitive than PCR tests, which are considered the gold standard, but can return results in just half an hour. Lateral flow tests work best among those with higher viral loads – more virus detected in the nose and throat.

Applying previous estimates of the sensitivity of four lateral flow devices to those findings, the researchers found that the tests would detect between 83.7 percent percent and 90.5 percent of cases leading to onward transmission.

ALSO READ: Vaccine disparities raise alarm as COVID-19 variants multiply

Oxford vaccine

Oxford scientists are preparing to rapidly produce new versions of their vaccine to combat emerging more contagious COVID-19 variants discovered in the UK, South Africa and Brazil, The Telegraph reported on Wednesday.

The team behind the vaccine from Oxford and AstraZeneca Plc is undertaking feasibility studies to reconfigure the technology, the newspaper reported, citing a confirmation from Oxford University.

A health worker processes an Innova IVD lateral flow COVID-19 test on a swab taken from a student returning to Hull University, Britain, Jan 4, 2021. (PAUL ELLIS / AFP)

US

The United States under President Joe Biden intends to join the COVAX Facility that aims to deliver vaccines to poor countries, his chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci told the WHO on Thursday.

"President Biden will issue a directive later today which will include the intent of the United States to join COVAX and support the ACT-Accelerator to advance multilateral efforts for COVID-19 vaccine, therapeutic, and diagnostic distribution, equitable access, and research and development," Fauci told the WHO executive board.

Biden’s team is increasingly worried the coronavirus pandemic is spiraling out of control as cases and deaths mount, vaccinations lag and a more-transmissible strain emerges, according to people familiar with the matter.

Biden signed a string of executive orders to jump-start the government's response, including a mask mandate on federal property and for federal employees, aides said

Biden signed a string of executive orders to jump-start the government's response, including a mask mandate on federal property and for federal employees, an order to establish a new White House office coordinating the response to the virus and halting the process of withdrawing from the WHO, aides said.

On Thursday, he will sign another 10 executive orders, including directing that disaster funds be used to help reopen schools and requiring that people wear masks on planes and buses, officials said. He also plans to sign orders to establish a COVID-19 testing board to ramp up testing and address supply shortfalls.

READ MORE: Biden to mend US ties with World Health Organization

The US tally now stands at over 24.4 million with more than 406,000 deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University (JHU).

California has surpassed 3 million confirmed cases, state health department data show. That’s the most of any US state, according to JHU data. More than a million cases are in Los Angeles County, home to about a quarter of the state’s residents.

California's health department said on Wednesday it was safe to continue to use a batch of COVID-19 vaccine from Moderna Inc for inoculation after a pause on Sunday due to possible allergic reactions.

Separately, some shipments of Moderna’s vaccine are being replaced after they became too cold in transit, pharmaceutical distributor McKesson Corp said in a statement Wednesday.

Meanwhile, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city was rescheduling 23,000 vaccine appointments because of a supply shortage.

Spain

Spain is pushing the European Union and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development for the creation of a COVID-19 vaccine certification that would ease travel, Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez said on Thursday.

The issuance of such a document though should be coordinated at the European or even global level, Gonzalez said, adding that a vaccine certificate would allow people to travel, like PCR tests do now.

Spain, which depends heavily on the tourism industry, is one of the countries that suffered the most from the restrictions to travel related to the pandemic.

The country reported 18,500 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, the most since the pandemic began, reflecting the relaxation of restrictions during the holiday period. The country also recorded 464 deaths in the past 24 hours.

Spain's nationwide incidence of the virus as measured over the past 14 days reached a new high of 736 cases per 100,000 people on Wednesday and hit 790 in Madrid. That figure rose to over 1,100 cases per 100,000 people between the ages of 15 and 24.

Meanwhile, the rate of hospitalization also increased to 20 percent.

Health authorities in Madrid began mass testing hundreds of young people for COVID-19 at universities on Wednesday to detect asymptomatic carriers in one of the groups with the highest rates of transmission.

Portugal

The more contagious variant of the coronavirus that was first detected in Britain is spreading rapidly across Portugal, pressuring the health service at a time when authorities are scrambling to tackle the country's worst outbreak since the pandemic's start.

Around 20 percent of new COVID-19 cases being reported are of the more transmissible variant, Health Minister Marta Temido told broadcaster RTP late on Wednesday, warning that number could reach 60 percent as early as next week.

Portugal's daily COVID-19 cases rose 40 percent on Wednesday from the day before to a record 14,647, with the national health system on the verge of collapse without enough intensive care beds or human resources to treat coronavirus patients.

The country also hit a record of 219 newly reported deaths on Wednesday, up from 218 the day before.

Currently, 681 coronavirus patients are in intensive care units (ICUs), above the 672 maximum allocation of ICU beds out of a total of just over 1,000 available in the SNS.

Temido said ministers discussed the potential closure of schools on Wednesday evening, but said a final decision would only be announced after a government meeting on Thursday.

Meanwhile, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa confirmed that the presidential election will be held on Jan 24 despite the lockdown.

READ MORE: EU leaders to convene amid vaccine delays, virus variant fears

A medical worker holds a vial with Russia's Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination point at the GUM department store in Moscow, Russia, on Jan 18, 2021. (ALEXANDER NEMENOV / AFP)

Hungary

Hungary became the first European Union (EU) nation to approve Russia’s COVID-19 vaccine as Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

Hungary’s drug regulator granted emergency approval for Russia’s Sputnik V, the agency’s director, Matyas Szentivanyi, told state television late Wednesday. The decision followed pressure by Orban to fast-track it and skirt the EU, which has yet to authorize the vaccine.

The country's drug regulator has also given preliminary approval for the use of the vaccine made by AstraZeneca, Prime Minister Viktor Orban's chief of staff said on Thursday.

Like many of its EU peers, Hungary has faced public skepticism of the vaccines and so far has administered them for only a little more than 1 percent of its population amid a trickle of doses from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

The government has warned that without a ramp-up, curbs like an evening curfew and the closure of some businesses could be in effect through the summer.

Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto will be in Moscow on Friday where he may agree to a large purchase of the Russian vaccine. Despite the emergency approval — which is for six months and an option to extend that for another six — Hungary’s health authority is still reviewing the Russian version in tests, and mass inoculations may happen only after its sign-off, state television reported.

Hungary is also ready to purchase more than a million doses from China’s Sinopharm within days of regulatory approval, Orban told state radio on Jan 15.

Chile

The Public Health Institute of Chile (ISP) on Wednesday approved the emergency use of China's Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine.

"We obtained very good results regarding the manufacturing quality and the strains being developed in the manufacture of this vaccine. We are approving a safe and effective vaccine for the population," said ISP Acting Director Heriberto Garcia, .

The vaccine "prevents hospitalizations and the severity of the disease," he added.

The announcement came on a day the Ministry of Health reported 3,583 new cases and 21 more deaths, taking the tally to 680,740 and the death toll to 17,594.

So far, 42,564 people have been vaccinated against COVID-19 with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, according to the ministry, with 8,359 people receiving both their first and second doses.

Brazil

Brazil on Wednesday registered 1,340 deaths from COVID-19 in a day, the second highest daily count since Aug 19, the Health Ministry said.

The latest fatalities brought the death toll to 212,831, the second-highest in the world after the United States.

In the last 24 hours, tests detected 64,385 new cases infection, bringing the tally to 8,638,249, the world's third-largest caseload.

The state of Sao Paulo, the most populated in the country, is the most affected with 1,658,636 cases and 50,652 deaths, followed by Rio de Janeiro with 490,821 cases and 28,215 deaths.

Belarus

Belarus reported 1,804 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday, taking its total to 232,298, according to the country's health ministry.

There were 2,378 new recoveries registered in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 216,744, the ministry added.

So far, 1,619 people have died of the disease in the country, including nine over the past 24 hours, it said.

Russia

After reporting record cases in the weeks before the New Year holiday, Moscow has seen infections and hospitalizations decline, with few reports of the new more contagious strains seen in the UK.

Russia on Thursday reported 21,887 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, including 3,458 in Moscow, pushing the national tally to 3,655,839, according to the country's coronavirus crisis response center. 

The center said 612 people died overnight, taking the official death toll to 67,832.

The capital city is easing some restrictions from tomorrow, citing the trend and the rollout of Russian vaccines. More than 220,000 people have been inoculated in the capital. 

Theaters, cinemas and concert halls can double capacity to fill 50 percent of seats, and museums and libraries are allowed to reopen. Companies will still need to keep at least 30 percent of employees working remotely, and a curfew for cafes and bars remains in place.

Ecuadorian Vice-President Maria Alejandra Munoz (right), Health Minister Juan Carlos Zevallos (left) and a doctor raise their fists as they receive the first 50,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine at Mariscal Sucre airport in Quito, Ecuador, Jan 20, 2021. (DOLORES OCHOA / AP)

Ecuador

Ecuador said the first batch of 18 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines it contracted for with three pharmaceutical companies and the COVAX initiative arrived on Wednesday for a pilot plan with medical staff from public hospitals and nursing homes.

After several months of negotiations, Health Minister Juan Carlos Zevallos said the Andean nation had firm contracts with pharmaceutical companies Covaxx, Pfizer Inc and AstraZeneca for the delivery of 10 million doses, and with the global COVAX initiative for 8 million additional doses.

According to Zevallos, the country will be able to vaccinate 9 million people under those contracts.

Vaccinations will begin in Quito, the capital, on Thursday, as well as in Guayaquil and Cuenca. A more comprehensive process will begin in March and is expected to end in October, the minister added.

Ecuador registered 1,747 new cases and 35 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the tally to 234,315 and the death toll to 9,810, the Ministry of Public Health reported Wednesday. There are also 4,627 probable deaths from the virus, the ministry added.

Africa 

Africa's coronavirus case fatality rate stands at 2.5 percent, higher than the global level of 2.2 percent, a trend that is alarming experts, the head of the continent's disease control body said on Thursday.

Earlier in the pandemic, Africa's death rate had been below the global average, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) head John Nkengasong told reporters.

The number of African nations with a death rate higher than the current global average is growing, he added. There are 21 countries on the continent with a death rate of above 3 percent, including Egypt, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Sudan.

The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases recorded on the African continent reached 3,310,394 as of Wednesday, the Africa CDC said. The death toll stood at 80,970.

The Africa CDC has announced the commencement of COVID-19 vaccines pre-order program for all African Union (AU) members.

The African Export-Import Bank (AfreximBank) will facilitate payments by providing advance procurement commitment guarantees of up to US$2 billion to the manufacturers on behalf of the members.

According to the Africa CDC, the initiative offers an equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines doses for the 55 AU members.

WHO

The World Health Organization (WHO) plans to approve several COVID-19 vaccines from Western and Chinese manufacturers in coming weeks and months, a document published on Wednesday shows, as it aims for rapid rollouts in poorer countries.

In the race to deploy shots, regulatory approvals are key to confirming the effectiveness and safety of vaccines, and to boosting output. But some poorer countries rely mostly on WHO authorizations as they have limited regulatory capacity.

The WHO is therefore "expediting" emergency approvals, according to a COVAX internal document seen by Reuters.

The COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII) could be authorized by the WHO in January or February, according to the document.

The same vaccine produced in South Korea by SK Bioscience could be approved by the WHO in the second half of February, at the earliest, a provisional calendar published by the WHO on Wednesday shows.

The WHO is also considering possible quick approvals for China's Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines, the provisional calendar shows. The WHO could make decisions on both in March at the earliest, according to the calender.

France

French President Emmanuel Macron warned students on Thursday to expect COVID-19 restrictions to remain in place for much of the rest of the 2020/21 academic year.

Macron was meeting a group of students at the Paris Saclay university, to hear their complaints and concerns over issues raised by COVID-19 restrictions, such as feelings of loneliness and hits to the economy that have impacted job prospects.

“We will have a second semester that will have the virus and a lot of constraints,” Macron said. 

The French health ministry reported 26,784 newly confirmed COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, the highest increase since Nov 18, when 28,383 infections were registered during France's second lockdown that month. 

France also reported 310 more deaths in hospitals in the past 24 hours, from 229 last Wednesday. 

Germany

Germany’s coronavirus fatalities passed 50,000 on Thursday, underscoring the urgency facing Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government to slow the spread of the disease and guard against new mutations.

In Europe’s largest economy, 1,013 people have died since Wednesday morning, increasing the total number of deaths related to COVID-19 to 50,010, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Pandemic-related fatalities have doubled in the past month.

According to data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases on Thursday, the reported death toll rose by 1,013 to 49,783 while the number of infections increased by 20,398 to 2,088,400.

Germans should take a new variant of the coronavirus believed to spread much faster very seriously or else risk a third wave of infections, Merkel said during a news conference.

"The mutation of the virus is a threat," said Merkel.

Earlier in the day, Merkel's chief of staff, Helge Braun, warned that Germany may need to close borders to neighboring countries if they do not act to curb virus infections.

Mexico

Mexico confirmed 20,548 new coronavirus cases and 1,539 fatalities on Wednesday, according to health ministry data, bringing its totals to 1,688,944 infections and 144,371 deaths.

Nigeria

Nigeria expects to take delivery of its first coronavirus vaccine doses in February, with health workers, top government officials and vulnerable people to be given priority.

The vaccines, which could be as many as 100,000 vials, will be procured through the Covax initiative backed by Gavi the Vaccine Alliance, the World Health Organisation and Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, Faisal Shuaibu, head of the West African country’s National Primary Health Care Development Agency, said in an interview.

“We are waiting for final confirmation from Covax on when the first doses will arrive,” Shuaibu said, adding that the “most recent indication is they’re expected in February.” The shots were first expected to arrive in January.

Africa’s most populous country of more than 200 million people plans to vaccinate about 70 percent of its population in the long run and is working on other options, besides Covax, for supplies.

Panama

Violeta Gaona, a 59-year-old nurse, on Wednesday became the first person to be vaccinated in Panama against COVID-19, following the arrival of the first batch of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines.

President Laurentino Cortizo was on hand for Gaona's vaccination at the publically-run Santo Tomas Hospital in Panama's capital, which was broadcast live on television.

The second phase of the immunization drive will target more than 550,000 people over 60, with vaccination centers set up at schools and college campuses, said the president.

According to the Ministry of Health's latest pandemic report on Monday, a total of 301,534 people had tested positive for COVID-19 and 4,864 had died from the disease. 

South Africa

South African pharmaceutical company Biovac Institute has been contracted by the government to import, store and distribute coronavirus vaccines for frontline healthcare workers, a letter from the National Treasury shows.

Cape Town-based Biovac, part owned by the government, has been appointed for three months to provide storage and distribution services for vaccines to immunise frontline healthcare workers, according to the letter.

Meanwhile, South Africa will pay US$5.25 per dose for COVID-19 vaccines from the Serum Institute of India (SII), a senior health ministry official said on Thursday, more than some wealthier countries are paying.

The price is higher than the US$3 a dose that South Africa and other countries on the continent are due to pay for the same vaccines under an African Union (AU) arrangement, and the price European Union countries have agreed to pay.

Health department Deputy Director-General Anban Pillay said SII's price for South Africa was based on the country's status as an upper-middle-income level country, confirming a report in the Business Day newspaper.

This photo shows a view of Badrutt's Palace Hotel, center, in St. Moritz, Switzerland, Jan 18, 2021. (GIANCARLO CATTANEO / KEYSTONE VIA AP)

Switzerland

Mass COVID-19 testing of thousands of people in the Swiss resort of St Moritz, where luxury hotels were placed under quarantine, found 53 coronavirus infections, including 31 cases of a fast-spreading variant, local officials said on Thursday.

Authorities said about 3,200 people were tested this week, and that the 31 infections caused by viral variants were discovered among hotel employees, not guests at the two hotels placed under quarantine, Badrutt's Palace Hotel and the Grand Hotel des Bains Kempinski.

St Moritz said it was lifting emergency measures that had been put in place to protect the community. The town of 5,200 people had closed local schools, shuttered ski schools and required masks be worn in all public areas, for fear mutant virus was spreading quickly.

"The mutated virus was found particularly in hotel employees and was not transmitted to hotel guests," officials with the canton of Grisons said in a statement.

Across Switzerland, the number of infections has surpassed 500,000 out of a population of 8.6 million, causing nearly 8,200 deaths.

Switzerland's biggest crematorium is bracing itself for a renewed spike in virus deaths as new variants of the virus drive up infection rates around the country.

Italy

Italy reported 524 coronavirus-related deaths on Wednesday, against 603 the day before, the health ministry said, while the daily tally of new infections rose to 13,571 from 10,497.

In total, Italy has registered 83,681 COVID-19 deaths and 2.41 million cases to date.

Patients in hospital with COVID-19 – not including those in intensive care – stood at 22,469 on Wednesday, down 230 from a day earlier.

There were 152 new admissions to intensive care units, against 176 the day before. The total number of intensive care patients fell by 26 to 2,461.

Italy is considering legal action against Pfizer after the US drugmaker announced a further cut in coronavirus vaccine deliveries, the country's COVID-19 special commissioner Domenico Arcuri said.

Tunisia

The Tunisian Health Ministry on Wednesday night reported 3,890 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total number of infections to 188,373.

The death toll rose by 77 to 5,921, the ministry said in a statement.

The number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients reached 2,038 while the total number of recoveries stood at 135,543, it said.

Earlier in the day, Health Minister Faouzi Mehdi announced that Tunisia is expected to receive its first batch of COVID-19 vaccine in early February.

Mehdi said 30 percent of Tunisians will be vaccinated from April, with 120,000 injections to be administered on a daily basis.

According to the minister, 6 million doses of Pfizer's vaccine will be received from April through the COVAX initiative, while 4 million more will arrive by other direct purchases or as part of the Africa CDC initiative.

Libya

Libya's Ministry of Education on Wednesday decided to close all schools in the country for two weeks to minimize the spread of COVID-19.

Only final examinations for preparatory students will be allowed to take place during the two weeks, the ministry said.

Schools reopened on Jan 2 after months of closure due to the pandemic.

According to the National Center for Disease Control of Libya, the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Libya stood at 111,124, including 88,930 recoveries and 1,715 fatalities.

Algeria

Algeria on Wednesday reported 265 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of infections in the country to 104,606.

The death toll rose to 2,849 after six more fatalities were recorded, the Ministry of Health said in a statement.

Ryad Mahyaoui, a member of the Algerian Scientific Committee monitoring the spread of COVID-19, told local media on Wednesday that Algeria will receive the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine in February.

He added that Algeria will also be receiving vaccines from Russia and China.

Meanwhile, President Abdelmadjid Tebboune had a successful surgery on his right foot, the Presidency said in a statement. The presidency had earlier announced before Tebboune left for Germany on Jan 10 that he would undergo an orthopedic operation due to complications from COVID-19.

Bulgaria

Bulgaria's Finance Minister Kiril Ananiev has tested positive for COVID-19, the minister's press office said on Wednesday.

The 65-year-old minister, who has been serving on the post since July last year, is in good condition and without symptoms, according to the press office.

Bulgaria has so far reported 212,927 COVID-19 cases and 8,614 deaths.

Ethiopia

The Ethiopian Ministry of Health on Wednesday confirmed 307 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, bringing the tally to 132,034.

Seven more deaths were logged, taking the death toll to 2,044, according to the ministry.  

Morocco

Morocco's COVID-19 tally rose to 462,542 on Wednesday as 1,152 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours.

According to a statement by the Ministry of Health, the death toll mounted to 8,043 as 32 more patients have died in the last 24 hours.

Passengers in full personal protective gear get off a plane at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, Kenya, on Jan 19, 2021. (YASUYOSHI CHIBA / AFP)

Kenya

Kenya has identified two cases of the new coronavirus variant first seen in South Africa in two men who have since left the country, a senior health ministry official said on Wednesday.

Patrick Amoth, acting director general of health at the Ministry of Health, did not say where the infected men were tested or if they had been notified.

The announcement came as the country has been witnessing a significant drop in positivity rate since late December 2020, signalling that the country might have escaped the worst of the pandemic and was ready for a return to normalcy.

Mutahi Kagwe, Kenya's cabinet secretary for health, said earlier this month that the country was on course to flattening COVID-19 curve but warned citizens against letting their guard down.

Kagwe said that an extension of night curfews and a ban on public gatherings, such as political rallies, till mid-March is expected to ward off a spike in infections that could overwhelm public health facilities.

"Containment measures will remain in place until the situation stabilizes, and we are hoping the arrival of COVID-19 vaccines in early February will provide much awaited relief to the country," said Kagwe.

Nigeria

Nigeria wants its children back in school despite a resurgence of coronavirus cases that threatens to overwhelm the healthcare system.

Infections have jumped more than sixfold since December, forcing the government to reopen isolation centers that closed last year as the disease appeared to ebb. But federal and state authorities insist that students return to school to avoid further dropouts.

Only 59 percent of school-age children went to school in October, compared to 74 percent in January 2019, according to Nigeria’s statistical agency. More than half of those who stayed at home said it was because schools were closed due to virus restrictions. Overall, since the lockdown was imposed in March, 45 percent of children haven’t received any learning activities at all, the agency said.

Reopening schools was a “difficult decision” but “the best decision for our children’s safety and long-term development, especially our most vulnerable children,” Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu said this week. In Lagos, a city of more than 22 million people, at least 24,000 children haven’t resumed their education since the lockdown, he said.

The coronavirus pandemic has put many of Nigeria’s children at risk, Sanwo-Olu said.

Colombia

Colombia registered 17,908 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, taking the nation's tally to 1,956,979, said the Ministry of Health and Social Protection on Wednesday.

The country also recorded 390 more deaths, raising the death toll to 49,792, the ministry said. 

Zimbabwe

The Zimbabwean government said Wednesday that it was reducing the number of staff members at workplaces to 10 percent to slow the spread of COVID-19.

Acting Secretary of the Public Service Commission Moses Mhike to heads of government ministries said that given the continued surge in infections, ministries, government departments and agencies should reduce on-site staff during Jan 21-Feb 3 from 30 percent to 10 percent, except for the Ministry of Health and Child Care and designated critical services.

Zimbabwe has so far recorded 29,408 infections with 879 deaths.

Sweden

Sweden extended distance learning for high school students and told public employees to continue to work from home, renewing measures to limit the spread of the coronavirus pandemic despite signs that infections are beginning to slow.

"We can see a cautious downturn in the spread of infection in some regions, but the situation remains serious," Prime Minister Stefan Lofven told reporters at a news conference.

The government, however, adjusted recommendations for high schools to allow a mixture of distance learning and normal lessons in school and extended a ban on sales of alcohol after 2000 by two weeks.

On Wednesday, Sweden registered 4,702 new cases, well down on a daily peak in late December. In total, there have been 10,797 COVID-related deaths in Sweden, a rate per capita many times higher than that of Norway, Finland and Denmark, but lower than some European countries that opted for lockdowns.

Roche

Roche Holding AG’s arthritis drug Actemra doesn’t help all COVID-19 patients, and in fact might harm some, Brazilian researchers said in the latest seemingly contradictory study results to emerge on the medicine.

Adding Actemra to standard treatment not only didn’t improve outcomes in a trial in Brazil last summer, it may have led to more deaths, according to results published late Wednesday in the British Medical Journal. The study was stopped early after a monitoring committee raised concerns about the deaths.

The trial, with 129 participants, is too small to be definitive, but it highlights the unanswered questions surrounding the use of the Roche arthritis medicine for COVID-19 after a handful of trials returned different results. Positive findings from another recent study led the U.K. earlier this month to say it would start using Actemra widely.

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