Country, Other	Total Cases	New Cases	Total Deaths
World	185,363,559	+430,842	4,008,790
USA	34,622,690	+11,612	621,561
India	30,662,896	+43,957	404,240
Brazil	18,855,015	+62,504	527,016
France	5,790,584	+3,585	111,231
Russia	5,658,672	+23,378	139,316
Turkey	5,454,763	+5,299	49,996
UK	4,958,868	+28,773	128,268
Argentina	4,574,340	+21,590	96,983
Colombia	4,402,582	+26,721	110,019
Italy	4,264,704	+907	127,704
Spain	3,880,612	+14,137	80,952
Germany	3,739,555	+712	91,630
Iran	3,286,923	+16,080	85,095
Poland	2,880,403	+96	75,095
Mexico	2,541,873	+1,805	233,689
Indonesia	2,345,018	+31,189	61,868
Ukraine	2,238,364	+541	52,504
South Africa	2,090,909	+15,500	62,628
Peru	2,069,051	+2,374	193,588
Netherlands	1,692,834	+2,209	17,758
Czechia	1,668,170	+126	30,311
Chile	1,574,465	+1,857	33,288
Philippines	1,445,832	+4,114	25,296
Canada	1,418,080	+441	26,381
Iraq	1,388,323	+8,818	17,376
Belgium	1,088,363	+669	25,190
Romania	1,081,030	+51	34,021
Bangladesh	966,406	+11,525	15,392
Pakistan	964,490	+830	22,452
Portugal	892,741	+2,170	17,118
Israel	843,892	+427	6,429
Hungary	808,294	+32	29,998
Japan	807,951	+1,030	14,862
Malaysia	792,693	+7,654	5,677
Jordan	754,281	+505	9,795
Serbia	717,093	+110	7,061
Austria	650,901	+84	10,718
Nepal	648,085	+1,718	9,263
UAE	642,601	+1,552	1,843
Lebanon	545,965	+294	7,865
Morocco	535,974	+1,177	9,336
Saudi Arabia	495,309	+1,277	7,907
Ecuador	463,951	+1,302	21,708
Tunisia	455,091	+7,930	15,601
Bolivia	446,362	+1,394	16,985
Kazakhstan	439,580	+2,618	4,489
Paraguay	431,367	+1,483	13,553
Greece	429,144	+1,797	12,730
Belarus	422,521	+557	3,204
Bulgaria	422,238	+87	18,127
Panama	410,004	+1,276	6,591
Slovakia	391,735	+15	12,514
Costa Rica	375,812	+1,488	4,740
Uruguay	374,019	+733	5,735
Georgia	371,293	+1,407	5,383
Kuwait	367,642	+1,993	2,049
Croatia	360,342	+96	8,221
Azerbaijan	336,557	+78	4,978
Palestine	314,780	+108	3,576
Guatemala	305,319	+2,785	9,548
Denmark	296,196	+542	2,538
Thailand	294,653	+5,420	2,333
Egypt	282,421	+164	16,306
Venezuela	279,813	+1,148	3,222
Lithuania	278,951	+41	4,395
Oman	278,560	+1,824	3,339
Ethiopia	276,598	+95	4,335
Ireland	275,038	+397	5,000
Honduras	269,000	+1,142	7,129
Sri Lanka	267,433	+934	3,313
Bahrain	266,685	+128	1,366
Slovenia	257,477	+48	4,421
Moldova	257,105	+70	6,200
Armenia	225,661	+55	4,530
Qatar	222,760	+93	594
Cuba	210,913	+3,591	1,387
Libya	196,894	+1,070	3,215
Kenya	186,453	+400	3,697
Myanmar	171,976	+3,602	3,513
Nigeria	168,000	+91	2,122
Zambia	167,132	+1,619	2,559
S. Korea	161,541	+746	2,032
Algeria	142,447	+481	3,775
Latvia	137,699	+46	2,531
Kyrgyzstan	133,303	+1,233	2,054
Albania	132,544	+7	2,456
Norway	132,363	+227	794
Estonia	131,257	+50	1,270
China	91,892	+23	4,636
Cyprus	79,636	+827	380
Suriname	22,581	+116	552
Vietnam	22,064	+1,029	97

 

Retrieved from:  https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

 

 

 

The world is worried about the Delta virus variant. Studies show vaccines are effective against it

By Carl Zimmer

 

An Israeli medical worker preparing a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in Tel Aviv on Monday.Credit...Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

As the Delta variant sweeps the world, researchers are tracking how well vaccines protect against it — and getting different answers.

In Britain, researchers reported in May that two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine had an effectiveness of 88 percent protecting against symptomatic disease from Delta. A June study from Scotland concluded that the vaccine was 79 percent effective against the variant. On Saturday, a team of researchers in Canada pegged its effectiveness at 87 percent.

And on Monday, Israel’s Ministry of Health announced that the effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was 64 percent against all coronavirus infections, down from about 95 percent in May, before the Delta variant began its climb to near-total dominance in Israel.

Although the range of these numbers may seem confusing, vaccine experts say it should be expected, because it’s hard for a single study to accurately pinpoint the effectiveness of a vaccine.

“We just have to take everything together as little pieces of a puzzle, and not put too much weight on any one number,” said Natalie Dean, a biostatistician at Emory University.

In clinical trials, it’s (relatively) easy to measure how well vaccines work. Researchers randomly assign thousands of volunteers to get either a vaccine or a placebo. If the vaccinated group has a lower risk of getting sick, scientists can be confident that it’s the vaccine that protected them.

But once vaccines hit the real world, it becomes much harder to measure their effectiveness. Scientists can no longer control who receives a vaccine and who does not. If they compare a group of vaccinated people with a group of unvaccinated people, other differences between the groups could influence their risks of getting sick.

It’s possible, for example, that people who choose not to get vaccinated may be more likely to put themselves in situations where they could get exposed to the virus. On the other hand, older people may be more likely to be vaccinated but also have a harder time fending off an aggressive variant. Or an outbreak may hit part of a country where most people are vaccinated, leaving under-vaccinated regions unharmed.

One way to rule out these alternative explanations is to compare each vaccinated person in a study with a counterpart who did not get the vaccine. Researchers often go to great lengths to find an unvaccinated match, looking for people who are of a similar age and health. They can even match people within the same neighborhood.

“It takes a huge effort,” said Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Health.

For its new study, Israel’s Ministry of Health did not go to such great lengths to rule out other factors. “I am afraid that the current Israeli MoH analysis cannot be used to safely assess it, one way or another,” Uri Shalit, a senior lecturer at the Technion — Israel Institute of Technology, wrote on Twitter.

Israel’s numbers could also be different because of who is getting tested. Much of the country is vaccinated. During local bursts of new infections, the government requires testing for anyone — symptoms or not — who came into contact with a person diagnosed with Covid-19. In other countries, it’s more common for people to get tested because they’re already feeling sick. This could mean that Israel is spotting more asymptomatic cases in vaccinated people than other places are, bringing their reported effectiveness rate down.

Fortunately, all the studies so far agree that most Covid-19 vaccines are very effective at keeping people out of the hospital and have generally protected against the Delta variant. Israel’s Ministry of Health estimated that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is about 93 percent effective in preventing serious illness and hospitalization.

“Their overall implications are consistent: that protection against severe disease remains very high,” said Naor Bar-Zeev, an associate professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Because effectiveness studies are so tricky, it will take more work to determine how big a threat Delta poses to vaccines. Dr. Lipsitch said that studies from more countries would be required.

“If there are five studies with one outcome and one study with another, I think one can conclude that the five are probably more likely to be correct than the one,” Dr. Lipsitch said.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/06/science/Israel-Pfizer-covid-vaccine.html?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

Emergent, the biotech company that botched Covid vaccines, faces an investor revolt

By  Chris Hamby

 

Emergent BioSolutions has had to throw out 75 million Covid vaccine doses because of potential contamination, and production at its Baltimore factory has been halted for more than two months as the company tries to convince regulators that it has fixed serious quality problems.

As the federal government works with the biotech firm in an effort to restart production, some investors are asking for their money back and seeking an overhaul of the company’s corporate governance.

With its stock price cut in half, Emergent faces several shareholder lawsuits accusing it of securities fraud. A pension fund filed a complaint last Tuesday claiming that some executives and board members — including several former federal officials — had engaged in insider trading by unloading more than $20 million worth of stock over the past 15 months.

The executives and board members sold the stock “while in possession of material, nonpublic information that artificially inflated the price” and “profited from their misconduct and were unjustly enriched through their exploitation of material and adverse inside information,” the Illinois-based Lincolnshire Police Pension Fund asserted.

The litigation adds to the troubles of the politically connected company, which is also the target of a widening congressional investigation into its vaccine production problems and the favorable deals it has secured with the government.

An Emergent spokesman said all of the lawsuits were “without merit” but declined to discuss them in detail.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/07/06/world/covid-19-vaccine-coronavirus-updates/emergent-the-biotech-company-that-botched-covid-vaccines-faces-an-investor-revolt?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

With cases spiking again, Greece orders bars and clubs to serve only seated customers

By Niki Kitsantonis

 

Old Port of Naoussa, Paros island in Greece last month.Credit...Maria Mavropoulou for The New York Times

Officials in Greece, a heavily tourism-dependent country that reopened to foreign visitors in May, announced stricter rules for the country’s bars and clubs on Tuesday, prompted by a sudden sharp increase in new Covid-19 infections. The surge in cases is fueling fears of a fourth wave of the pandemic at the height of the tourism season.

The Greek national public health organization, known as Eody, reported 1,797 new cases on Tuesday, more than double the current seven-day average, which has been climbing steadily in recent weeks. Officials attribute the spike to increased activity at bars and nightclubs, which have been operating outdoors since May with capacity limits and other safety measures.

The new rules for those venues, which take effect Thursday, say that bars and clubs can only serve customers who are seated. Businesses that fail to comply can be fined up to 10,000 euros and be ordered to close.

The aim of the new rules is to deter people from crowding tightly together in nightspots, and thus to “curb the transmission of the virus among the younger ages, so we can all have a summer that is safer and more free,” said Nikos Hardalias, the country’s deputy minister for civil protection. Mr. Hardalias noted that the average age of newly infected people has fallen to 27.

“Nothing is over,” he said. “We must vaccinate ourselves and protect our elders.”

Mr. Hardalias said that the more infectious Delta variant of the virus played a role in the spike, but did not indicate what proportion of the new cases were linked to the variant. “As in other countries, it’s only a matter of time until it becomes the predominant strain,” he said.

Greek authorities had been lifting restrictions over the past few weeks, after the waning of a spike in coronavirus cases in April. Death reports have fallen considerably and remain fairly low.

Around 37 percent of Greece’s 10.7 million people have been fully vaccinated so far. Medical experts have warned of further increases in infections unless authorities speed up vaccination efforts, particularly among young adults.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/07/06/world/covid-19-vaccine-coronavirus-updates/with-cases-spiking-again-greece-orders-bars-and-clubs-to-serve-only-seated-customers?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

Israel and South Korea agree to swap hundreds of thousands of vaccine doses

By Livia Albeck-Ripka

 

At a vaccination site in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Monday. Israel will send about 700,000 expiring doses to South Korea.Credit...Abir Sultan/EPA, via Shutterstock

Israel and South Korea have agreed to swap hundreds of thousands of doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in the coming months to meet their countries’ needs, Israel’s prime minister, Naftali Bennett, said in a statement released Tuesday morning.

Under the deal, Israel will send about 700,000 expiring doses of the vaccine this month to South Korea, where cases of the virus are rising. South Korea will send the same amount to Israel in September and October, the statement said, describing the agreement as the first of its kind for the exchange of vaccines between Israel and another country.

Israel has had among the fastest vaccination programs in the world, fully inoculating 57 percent of its population so far, according to data from The New York Times. The deal with South Korea allows Israel to unload doses it doesn’t need immediately. It also will bolster Israel’s supply of vaccines for later in the year as officials grow increasingly concerned about the global spread of the Delta variant.

Mr. Bennett described it as “a win-win deal” that would “ensure that the State of Israel has a proper stock of vaccines.” He also thanked the chief executive of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, for helping to facilitate the deal.

The announcement came after the collapse of a deal between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in June. The authority had rejected more than one million doses of the vaccine on the grounds that they were too close to their expiration date. At the time, Ibrahim Melhem, a spokesman for the Palestinian Authority, said that the region would instead wait for a direct delivery of four million vaccine doses from Pfizer-BioNTech later in the year.

South Korea, which has fully vaccinated only 10 percent of its people, is trying to speed up its campaign. Average daily infections there have risen 42 percent over the past two weeks, according to New York Times data.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/07/06/world/covid-19-vaccine-coronavirus-updates/israel-and-south-korea-agree-to-swap-hundreds-of-thousands-of-vaccine-doses?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

A fast-growing Covid surge in Fiji is flooding the Pacific nation’s health facilities with patients

By Natasha Frost

 

A health officer directed residents for coronavirus testing in Suva, Fiji, in June. Daily reports of confirmed Covid cases have rocketed upward in recent weeks.Credit...Leon Lord/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Fiji, which got through the first year of the pandemic almost untouched, is now battling one of the fastest growing Covid-19 outbreaks in the world.

The number of new coronavirus cases reported daily in the Pacific island nation of 900,000 people has soared into the hundreds over the past month, after never exceeding single digits before late May. As of Wednesday, the country was averaging 383 new cases a day, or 43 for every 100,000 people, according to a New York Times database; the 636 new cases reported on Wednesday set a record.

The surge is swamping the country’s ability to cope. Fiji’s largest hospital is now exclusively treating Covid-19 patients, and its mortuary is filled to capacity, the health ministry announced on Monday. More than 1,000 Covid people have been sent home from medical facilities to isolate themselves because the facilities had no space for them. The government is working to turn a sports arena outside Suva, the capital, into a makeshift clinic.

The country, which is using the AstraZeneca vaccine, depends on Australia and New Zealand to supply it with doses, but New Zealand’s medical regulatory body has not yet authorized the AstraZeneca vaccine, complicating the roll-out. About 31 percent of Fijians have had at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine, but fewer than 5 percent are fully vaccinated, according to a New York Times database.

Instead, New Zealand has provided the country with 40 million New Zealand dollars, or $28 million, worth of aid and support. “We have provided support in the form of PPE and of course the commitment we’ve made around AstraZeneca vaccines, which is what Fiji are using for their roll-out,” Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said.

James Fong, the country’s health secretary, said that some Fijians were putting off seeking treatment for Covid symptoms, sometimes with deadly results.

“We are also sadly seeing people with severe disease die at home, or on the way to hospital, before our medical teams have a chance to administer what could potentially be lifesaving treatment,” Mr. Fong said.

Thirty-seven of the 39 Covid deaths reported in Fiji throughout the pandemic have occurred since the latest outbreak began.

Officials say the outbreak appeared to be driven by one case of the highly contagious Delta variant which escaped the country’s isolation facilities and spread rapidly in the community.

Repeated breaches of local health restrictions have further increased the spread. More than 1000 people have been arrested because of breaching a national curfew, while 48 people were arrested in a 24 hour period earlier this week for breaching mask requirements, according to the police. The government has so far refused to impose a lockdown to contain the outbreak.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/07/05/world/covid-19-vaccine-coronavirus-updates/a-fast-growing-covid-surge-in-fiji-is-flooding-the-pacific-nations-health-facilities-with-patients?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

To try to spur shots, Biden again outlines strategies to reach those who remain unvaccinated

By Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Michael D. Shear

 

President Biden delivered remarks on the Covid-19 response and vaccinations in Washington on Tuesday.Credit...Sarahbeth Maney/The New York Times

WASHINGTON — With the pace of U.S. coronavirus vaccinations relatively flat, President Biden called on Tuesday for employers to set up clinics at work and to offer paid time off for workers as part of a renewed push to reach tens of millions of Americans who remain unvaccinated.

“Please get vaccinated now — it works, it’s free, it’s never been easier,” Mr. Biden said in brief remarks. “It’s never been more important. Do it now for yourself and the people you care about — for your neighborhood, for your country. It sounds corny, but it’s a patriotic thing to do.”

Just two days after he hosted a big White House Fourth of July celebration and declared “America is coming back together,” Mr. Biden is turning his attention to a public health conundrum: Despite his administration’s aggressive push, he has not met his self-imposed goal of having 70 percent of adults at least partially vaccinated by now, and officials have already tried many techniques.

In his remarks, Mr. Biden noted a different metric: By the end of the week, nearly 160 million Americans, not quite half the population, will be fully vaccinated. The worrisome Delta variant spreading quickly around the country remains a concern in areas with lower vaccination rates. Although there is not yet good data on how all of the vaccines hold up against Delta, several widely used shots, including those made by Pfizer-BioNTech, are still effective against the Delta variant after two doses, research suggests.

But providers were administering about 0.87 million doses per day on average, as of Tuesday, about a 74 percent decrease from the peak of 3.38 million reported on April 13.

And beyond the issues with the vaccination campaign, declines in the virus itself appear to have stalled nationally. After a sharp drop in virus cases, the average number of new daily cases across the country seems to have leveled off and remain close to the lowest point since testing became widely available. Mr. Biden underscored that overall progress in his remarks on Tuesday, but pockets of outbreaks remain. In some parts of Texas, Arkansas and Missouri, for instance, there has been a sharp rise in cases.

Mr. Biden used his remarks to outline five areas of concentration for his administration, all avenues it has already pursued: targeted, community by community, door to door outreach to get the remaining Americans vaccinated; a fresh push to get vaccines to primary care doctors; a boost in efforts to get vaccines to pediatricians and other providers who serve younger people so that adolescents ages 12 to 18 can get their shots; expanded mobile clinic efforts and the workplace changes.

“The bottom line is, my administration is doing everything we can to lead a whole-of-government response at the federal, state and local levels to defeat the pandemic,” he said. “We need everyone to do their part.”

 

Retrieved from: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/07/06/world/covid-19-vaccine-coronavirus-updates/vaccines-biden?smid=url-share-live

 

 

 

Sydney locked down for another week as Delta COVID-19 variant spreads

by Renju JoseByron Kaye

 

A lone woman wearing a protective face mask pulls a suitcase through the city centre during a lockdown to curb the spread of a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Sydney, Australia, July 6, 2021. REUTERS/Loren Elliott

 

The leader of Australia's New South Wales (NSW) state on Wednesday ordered a week-long extension of Sydney's COVID-19 lockdown, warning new cases are bound to rise as the country's biggest city grapples with the highly infectious Delta variant.

Sydney, home to a fifth of Australia's 25 million people, was plunged into lockdown on June 26 as a Delta variant outbreak persuaded officials to tighten restrictions in a country that has been slow to vaccinate. Strict stay-at-home orders were due to end on Friday, but now remain in place until July 16.

"This Delta strain is a game-changer, it is extremely transmissible and more contagious than any other form of the virus that we've seen," NSW state Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters in Sydney.

With Sydney fighting its worst outbreak of the year so far, total infections have topped 350 since the first case was detected three weeks ago in a limousine driver who transported overseas airline crew.

A total of 27 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19 were reported on Wednesday in NSW, up from 18 a day earlier. Of the new cases, 20 were either in isolation throughout or for part of their infectious period, while seven cases spent time in the community while they were infectious.

Lockdowns, swift contact tracing and a high community compliance with social distancing rules have helped Australia suppress past outbreaks and keep its COVID-19 numbers relatively low, with just over 30,800 cases and 910 deaths. The current lockdown is Sydney's second since the pandemic began.

Health officials warned Sydney residents they expect cases to rise in the next 24 hours and urged residents in three western suburbs - Fairfield, Canterbury-Bankstown and Liverpool - to stay home.

Liverpool Deputy Mayor Mazhar Hadid said there was "no choice" but to lock down the neighbourhood.

"I know it's affecting small businesses in Liverpool, it's like they've lost their city, but we need to do the right thing," he told Reuters.

Schools in Sydney will move to remote learning next week when they return from the winter break.

FRUSTRATED RESIDENTS

With less than 10% of Australians fully vaccinated and rolling restrictions ordered in Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth as well as Sydney, lockdowns are starting to wear on residents watching other parts of the world open up.

As crowds gather at Wimbledon to watch the tennis championships, sporting events including the Australian F1 Grand Prix have been cancelled.

"Let's lock down the people that are vulnerable, you don't lock down healthy people because a few are sick. It's just not making sense and your numbers don't justify it," Sydney resident Paul Coleman told Reuters at Bondi, near the epicentre of the latest outbreak.

Australia's vaccination drive has fallen well behind initial schedules after age restrictions were placed on AstraZeneca's (AZN.L) COVID-19 vaccine, the backbone of the country's programme, due to the small risk of blood clots.

Canberra has since scrambled to secure additional supplies of Pfizer's (PFE.N) vaccine, although large quantities are not due to arrive until late in the year.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg told reporters that "challenges have been forced upon us" in the inoculation programme but the pace was picking up.

Reporting by Renju Jose and Byron Kaye; Additional reporting by Jill Gralow, Jonathan Barrett and Colin Packham; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell and Stephen Coates

 

 

 

Summary

 

Here are the key developments from the last few hours:

· Two million people could contract Covid in the UK this summer, potentially meaning up to 10 million must isolate in just six weeks, Guardian analysis shows.

· Zimbabwe has gone back to a strict lockdown to tackle a resurgence of Covid-19 amid vaccine shortages, the country’s information minister has announced.

· Tunisia has broken its record for positive Covid tests, with 7,930 confirmed on Tuesday, Reuters reports. The increase is in addition to 119 deaths, according to the north African country’s health ministry.

· The human rights commission in Mexico has accused authorities of keeping nearly 90 people in overcrowded facilities, without face masks to prevent Covid-19 or medicine.

· It comes as Mexico has reported another 8,000 confirmed cases, and another 269 deaths. 233,958 have now died from the virus.

· The situation is still bleak in Brazil, as it recorded another 1,780 deaths and 62,504 new cases, its health ministry said on Tuesday.

· In Latvia, employers will be allowed to sack employees who have not had their vaccines by 15 September, according to the country’s main news agency.

· Dozens of staff at a seafood plant in Northern Ireland have tested positive for Covid-19. A total of 42 workers at Kilkeel Seafoods, in County Down, have had confirmed infections, out of 250 staff at the site.

· Heathrow, the Gaucho restaurant chain and the City Pub Group in England are set to continue with mask-wearing rules despite government plans to sweep away most safety measures from 19 July.

 

Retrieved from: https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/jul/07/coronavirus-live-news-china-reports-highest-cases-since-january-russia-reports-record-deaths?page=with:block-60e522908f08d660ba38c4b9#block-60e522908f08d660ba38c4b9