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Updated: September 24, 2020 9:52:48 pm
People wait in line at the Women’s College coronavirus disease (COVID-19) testing center in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (Reuters)
Global coronavirus updates: The International Monetary Fund has warned that the coronavirus crisis lasts longer than expected and that some countries will take years to grow again. In other news, Singapore will allow more people to return to offices and try a new business travel pass for senior executives as the city moves to reopen more of its economy amid waning virus cases. China eased restrictions on the entry of some foreigners into the country almost six months after it almost sealed its borders. Hong Kong will include the UK on its “high risk” list from October 1, the South China Morning Post reported, citing unidentified sources.
Globally, infections have exceeded 31.8 million, with deaths exceeding 974,000.
Covid-19 news from around the world
Will people be allowed to die? Vaccination petitions fill UN summit
If the United Nations was created from the ashes of World War II, it will be born out of the global crisis of Covid-19.
Many world leaders at this week’s UN virtual summit hope it will be an available and affordable vaccine for all countries, rich and poor. But with the US, China, and Russia choosing not to participate in a collaborative effort to develop and distribute a vaccine, and some wealthy nations striking deals with pharmaceutical companies to secure millions of potential doses, requests from the UN are plentiful. but probably in vain.
“Will people be allowed to die?” Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, a Covid-19 survivor, said about the uncertain path ahead.
More than 150 countries have joined COVAX, in which the richest countries agree to buy potential vaccines and help fund access for the poorest. But the absence of Washington, Beijing and Moscow means that the response to a health crisis like no other in the UN’s 75 years is far from truly global. Instead, the three powers have made vague promises to share whatever vaccines they develop, probably after helping their own citizens first.
This week’s UN meeting could serve as a wake-up call, said Gayle Smith, president of the ONE Campaign, a nonprofit fighting preventable diseases that is developing scorecards to measure how the world’s most powerful nations world are contributing to vaccine equity.
Trump Says He May Block FDA’s Stronger Guidelines For COVID-19 Vaccine
President Donald Trump said the White House could veto any tightening of the Food and Drug Administration’s rules to authorize the emergency use of a coronavirus vaccine. “That has to be approved by the White House,” Trump said at a news conference Wednesday. “We can approve it or not.” The FDA is expected to issue final rules in the coming days to issue an emergency use authorization for a coronavirus vaccine. Companies like Pfizer Inc., Moderna Inc., and AstraZeneca Plc have vaccine candidates in late-stage trials. Some of the studies could produce data on its effectiveness as of October.
France limits public gatherings
France introduced new steps to combat the rapid resurgence of the coronavirus, including closing bars earlier in the evening and limiting public gatherings in Paris and several other cities. But the government is not considering a new blockade at the national level. The latest steps will force bars in Paris and other cities to close by 10 p.m. at the latest, starting Monday, while gyms will remain closed for at least two weeks. The government also lowered crowd size limits for public events and added new restrictions on private gatherings starting Saturday.
People wearing protective masks as a precaution against cone virus line up to sit in a bistro along the banks of the River Seine in Paris (AP)
Israel’s cabinet strengthens coronavirus lockdown
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet decided on Thursday to tighten Israel’s coronavirus lockdown after he voiced alarm that a surge in infections was pushing the nation to the “brink,” the YNet news site said. Israel returned to the blockade, the second during the pandemic, on September 18. But over the past week, the number of new daily cases has reached nearly 7,000 out of a population of 9 million, severely depleting the resources of some hospitals. Revised edicts that take effect on Friday allow fewer businesses to operate and impose more travel restrictions, YNet said, after cabinet discussions that lasted from Wednesday through the end of early Thursday.
A woman wearing a protective mask plays with her daughter next to a statue of Israeli Prime Minister David Ben Gurion during a three-week national lockdown to slow the spread of the coronavirus on the beach in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Tuesday. September 22, 2020 (AP Photo / Oded Balilty)
Trudeau says Canada is in second wave of pandemic, urges renewed caution
Canada has entered a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Wednesday, warning that the country was on the brink of a surge if people did not follow public health guidelines. In a rare national speech, Trudeau said the country “is at a crossroads” when a second wave emerges in four major provinces, adding that the government would do whatever it takes to help the country recover from the pandemic. “We are on the verge of a fall that could be much worse than spring,” he said. COVID-19 cases in Canada have skyrocketed in recent days, with an average of 1,123 new cases reported daily over the past week, compared to a daily average of 380 cases in mid-August.
A woman wears a mask when she passes graffiti that says ‘No vaccine, no monitoring, no COVID’, in Montreal (Graham Hughes / The Canadian Press via AP)
UK Considering Exposing Healthy People to Vaccine
The UK government is considering conducting the first studies that would deliberately expose healthy people to coronavirus in a bid to speed up the development of a vaccine. These tests also raise ethical questions about people’s exposure to a life-threatening virus and whether some test subjects would receive a placebo for control purposes. A growing number of volunteers have signed up to participate in such studies if the researchers decide to continue, Bloomberg reported.
Johnson & Johnson begins trial
Johnson & Johnson has begun dosing up to 60,000 volunteers in a giant study of its vaccine. If enrollment goes as expected, the tests could yield results as early as the end of the year, allowing the company to seek an emergency authorization in early 2021, if effective, Johnson & Johnson’s chief scientific officer said Tuesday. Johnson, Paul Stoffels. J&J is the fourth vaccine manufacturer to move its candidate to late-stage human studies in the US.
This September 2020 photo provided by Johnson & Johnson shows a single-dose COVID-19 vaccine being developed by the company. (Cheryl Gerber / Courtesy of Johnson & Johnson via AP)
UK May Inject Coronavirus Into Volunteers For Vaccine Trials: Report
Scientists in the UK are moving towards what are known as ‘challenge trials’, which will involve healthy volunteers deliberately infected with the new coronavirus to test whether a vaccine offers any protection, according to a media report.
In the first trial of its kind expected to be formally announced next week, participants will be injected with an unnamed experimental vaccine and about a month later they will be exposed to Sars-Cov-2, the virus that causes COVID- 19, The Financial Times reported. . The government-funded study is expected to begin in January, and the trials are likely to be carried out at or near a large secure facility in Whitechapel in east London.
Around 2,000 potential volunteers have signed up for challenge studies in the UK through the US-based 1Day Sooner group, campaigning for COVID-19 trials, and are expected to be paid a few thousand pounds for signing up for upcoming trials, according to the newspaper. The academic leader of the project is Imperial College London, and it will be led by hVivo, a subsidiary of Queen Mary University of London that was bought earlier this year by Open Orphan, an Irish-based pharmaceutical research organization.
The University of Oxford is also believed to be considering a similar “challenge trial” to test whether people have protective immunity against COVID-19 if they have previously been infected.
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