The southern Chinese city of Zhuhai has suspended public bus routes after announcing it had detected at least seven cases of the highly transmissible Omicron coronavirus variant there and warning residents not to leave the city. The coastal city, which borders the gambling hub Macau, said late on Friday that Omicron had been detected in one mildly ill and six asymptomatic patients, after mass testing due to a case in a neighbouring city. China is battling a spate of coronavirus outbreaks, including several from the Omicron variant, as it steps…
Tag: Infectious diseases
Chinese city of 1.2 million people locked down after three Covid cases emerge
Three asymptomatic cases of Covid-19 were enough for Chinese authorities to lock down a city of almost 1.2 million people on Monday, joining 13 million others in locked down Xi’an, where local authorities have asked for restrictions to be tightened even further. Beijing is holding on to its zero-Covid strategy ahead of the forthcoming Winter Olympics next month, and with local officials facing sanctions or sackings over outbreaks, cases have prompted increasingly strict responses. Authorities in Yuzhou, Henan province, announced the lockdown on Monday evening, ordering all residents to stay…
‘Tit for tat’: why hunt for Covid’s origins still wrapped in politics and controversy
Robert Garry, a professor of microbiology and immunology at Tulane medical school in Louisiana, got a call from his university management telling him that agents from the FBI and CIA had requested a chat about his research into the origins of Covid-19. Garry agreed and on 30 July three agents flew down to Louisiana to talk to him in person. The meeting, held at a university conference room, began at 9am and ended at about 5pm. “I presented my evidence to the agents, who were properly trained scientists themselves. They…
Covid live: WHO names new variant ‘Omicron’; US and Canada bring in travel curbs
A selection of countries in north Africa and the Middle East have joined those imposing restrictions on arrivals from southern Africa. Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and Morocco have introduced varying bans on travellers from South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Lesotho and Eswatini according to AFP. Iran said it will ban foreign travellers from six countries, including South Africa. Iranians will be admitted after testing negative twice for Covid, state broadcaster IRIB reported. On Friday it reported 86 deaths. Novavax, the US company that is among those to…
Covid live: Russia’s coronavirus death toll passes 250,000; UK records another 214 deaths and 39,329 cases
The US Food and Drug Administration classified the recall of Ellume’s over-the-counter Covid home test as Class 1, the most serious type of recall, after the Australian diagnostic test maker removed some of its tests from the market last month. Ellume had cited higher-than-acceptable false positive test results for SARS-CoV-2 as the reason for the recall. A ‘false positive’ indicates that a person has the virus when they actually do not. The antigen test, which detects proteins from the SARS-CoV-2 virus from a nasal sample, is available without a prescription…
UK reports 193 deaths – as it happened
Austria said only those vaccinated or recovered from coronavirus would be allowed to frequent restaurants, hotels and cultural venues. The new rule takes effect on Monday with a four-week transition phase to incentivise people to get jabbed, chancellor Alexander Schallenberg said. There have been a further 193 deaths within 28 days of a positive test for coronavirus in the UK, according to the latest official data. The government’s coronavirus dashboard also reported 34,029 more people testing positive for coronavirus on Friday, and 1,072 patients admitted to hospital. The US has…
China locks down city of 4m people after six Covid cases detected
China has placed a city of 4 million under lockdown in an attempt to stamp out a domestic coronavirus outbreak, with residents told not to leave home except in emergencies. Beijing imposed strict border controls in the weeks after Covid-19 was first detected in China in late 2019, slowing the number of cases to a trickle and allowing the economy to bounce back. As the rest of the world opens up and tries to find ways to live with the virus, China has maintained a zero-Covid approach that has included…