Because of the rising number of infections and deaths, officials in Brazil’s most-populous city, Sao Paulo, say they are now adding 600 new graves to municipal cemeteries each day.
Iran’s total coronavirus cases top 2 million as it reports record number of new infections
Iran announced a record number of coronavirus cases Thursday, reporting more than 22,000 infections in a 24-hour period as it struggles to tame an explosive new outbreak.
The toll Thursday brought Iran’s total number of coronavirus cases to more than 2 million, cementing its position as the worst-hit country in the Middle East. Iran has now recorded nearly 64,000 covid-19 fatalities.
The recent spike in cases followed celebrations of the Persian New Year, when Iranians meet, travel and feast to welcome the spring. Authorities have fought to impose stricter lockdown measures, but Iran’s ailing economy has meant that many residents flout the rules so they can continue to work.
In the capital, Tehran, and other major cities, nonessential shops were ordered closed.
Health Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari called on Iranians on Thursday to avoid big gatherings, saying it was a “moral and social responsibility,” according to the Associated Press.
“The very dangerous situation of the disease in recent days has led to us losing a number of compatriots,” she said, the AP reported. “Yet many of us still cannot say ‘no’ to invitations to parties, weddings and funerals.”
The government has also overseen a slow vaccine rollout hampered in part by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s edict banning the import of vaccines developed in Britain and the United States.
On Thursday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani blamed U.S. sanctions for the country’s vaccine delays. He said Iran was struggling to pay for doses available through the United Nations-backed Covax program because the United States has blocked Tehran’s access to assets in foreign bank accounts.
“We were one of the first countries to place an order on time,” Rouhani said of the Covax program, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported. “The United States has blocked us and delayed the transfer of our money. ... That’s why our turn [with] Covax is a little behind.”
Prestige college admissions get a little crazier in the pandemic
The chase for the Ivy League and other prestige colleges, a perennial object of global fascination, grew a few degrees more frenzied during the coronavirus pandemic as applications soared and admit rates plummeted to, in some cases, crazy-low single digits.
At 7 p.m. Eastern time Tuesday, the eight private universities identified with the brand of the climbing vine released admission decisions for the entering fall class. New test-optional policies, in effect because the coronavirus clobbered ACT and SAT testing plans, had fueled a surge in applications as students worldwide said, in effect, “Why not me?”
Brazil’s Bolsonaro resists calls for lockdown as pandemic rages
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro resisted calls for a nationwide lockdown to halt the out-of-control spread of coronavirus cases, even as the nation reached several grim milestones, including a record number of deaths.
“We’re not going to accept these policies of ‘stay home, close everything, lock down,’ ” he said on a visit to the southern city of Chapeco, Agence France-Presse reported.
“There’s not going to be a national lockdown,” said Bolsonaro, who fell ill with covid-19 last year. “Our army isn’t going into the streets to force the Brazilian people into their homes.”
The country’s public health institute, Fiocruz, had recommended stricter regulations to prevent the collapse of the health-care system. On Tuesday, Brazilian authorities said that nearly 4,200 people died due to covid-19 in a single day — the highest daily death toll there since the pandemic began.
The recent outbreak has been fueled by the more virulent P.1. variant first identified in the Amazonian city of Manaus. It has since spread across Brazil, driving waves of more severe illness, hospitalization and death, including among younger patients.
Now scientists there say that they have identified Brazil’s first case involving a similar, more transmissible variant discovered in South Africa. That discovery could portend an even worse phase of the pandemic.
Local officials in Brazil’s most-populous city, Sao Paulo, said Wednesday that they are adding 600 new graves to municipal cemeteries each day to grapple with the rising number of dead.
New Zealand bans arrivals from India, including its own citizens
New Zealand plans to temporarily ban travelers from India, including its own citizens, because of the rising number of people who have tested positive for the coronavirus after arriving from the pandemic-hit nation.
New Zealand health officials say that they believe people are contracting the virus on the way to the airport in India, meaning that infections aren’t being picked up by preflight testing.
Starting April 11, anyone who has traveled to India within the past 14 days will be barred from entering New Zealand. The island nation closed its border more than a year ago and requires two-week stays in quarantine hotels for returning nationals.
But this is the first time it has prevented its citizens from entering the country.
“While arrivals with covid-19 from India has prompted this measure, we are looking at how we manage high-risk points of departure generally,” New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told reporters.
She said the suspension is temporary, to give officials time to see if there are ways to reduce the risk travelers face on their journeys.
Of the 23 cases detected in New Zealand quarantine facilities on Thursday, 17 were recent arrivals from India.
India’s Modi gets second vaccine shot as covid-19 case numbers hit record
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi received his second dose of a coronavirus vaccine Thursday, posting a photo on Twitter from the vaccination site in New Delhi as daily case numbers hit a record high.
Authorities on Thursday reported more than 126,000 new infections in India over the last 24 hours, the country’s highest-ever spike in new daily cases. Some 55,000 of those cases were reported in the hard-hit state of Maharashtra.
India’s total confirmed caseload has now reached nearly 13 million and the populous South Asian nation has emerged as a global pandemic hot spot in recent months, trailing only the United States and Brazil.
The surge there has been driven by more relaxed social distancing measures and the spread of new coronavirus variants, experts say. Last month, India’s Health Ministry announced it had detected a new “double mutant” variant in Maharashtra, home to the country’s financial capital, Mumbai. But authorities have downplayed the variant’s role in surging new infections.
This week, local health officials also raised the alarm over potential vaccine shortages, including in Maharashtra where the state health minister said authorities would run out of doses in just three days.
India is a major global vaccine producer but was forced to halt exports due to rising infections. The Health Ministry says that it has administered about 90 million doses so far, out of a population of more than 1.3 billion.
Australia weighs options after betting big on AstraZeneca vaccine
SYDNEY — Australia has asked the country’s vaccine and medical regulators to urgently consider findings out of Europe about a “plausible” link between the Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine and rare blood-clotting issues.
Australia is particularly exposed because it is counting on increasing production of the vaccine locally, through Melbourne-based manufacturer CSL, to get its vaccine program on track. Fewer than 5 percent of Australian adults have had their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine.
Regulators so far have said the benefits of the vaccine, produced by British-Swedish pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca with Oxford University, outweigh the risks. But some health experts say they should be factoring in the low risk of contracting the virus in Australia.
“When some overseas regulators say the benefits may still outweigh the risk, they are referring to a situation where potentially the vaccine could still save more lives from covid-19-related deaths than are lost due to this syndrome,” said Nikolai Petrovsky, a medical professor at Flinders University in South Australia. “In the context of Australia, where we currently have no covid-19 deaths, the risk-benefit relationship of the AstraZeneca vaccine is very different, particularly when other vaccines are potentially available that do not appear to share this risk.”
Australian Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said Wednesday that regulators would consider the move by British officials to offer people under 30 a different vaccine.
However, supply limitations and logistical challenges with Australia’s current alternative, the vaccine jointly produced by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and German biotech firm BioNTech, “may make the strategy of offering an alternative vaccine in this country challenging,” said Paul Griffin, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Queensland.
Predatory debt collectors would be barred from government’s pandemic relief loans under new bill
Predatory debt collectors would be barred from collecting any more money from the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program under recently proposed U.S. legislation.
Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Ore.) and Rep. Marie Newman (D-Ill.) introduced the measure last week, arguing that during the pandemic, abusive collectors had harassed consumers and that such firms should not be eligible for the federal relief. Their proposal would block firms that have violated federal debt collection laws from receiving the forgivable loans.
Analysis: AstraZeneca safety concerns come amid high demand in lower-income nations
There is no coronavirus vaccine on Earth more closely scrutinized than AstraZeneca’s right now. The vaccine, developed by the Anglo-Swedish drug giant with Oxford University researchers, was widely hyped in the early days of the pandemic for its speedy development and innovative technology.
But the rollout has been plagued by issues, including questions over misleading data and missed deliveries that clouded public perceptions of AstraZeneca as other vaccines raced ahead.
This week, renewed concerns about rare but serious blood clots among those who have received the vaccine were bolstered by Europe’s top drug agency.
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