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The Covid-19 breeding number in the UK is estimated to be less than 1, suggesting that England’s second national lockdown is curbing infections, government scientists said.
The number of new infections is falling between 0% and 2% every day, the UK Government Office of Science said, after it was estimated that it was growing between 0% and 2% in the figures of the last week.
The breeding number is estimated to be between 0.9 and 1, which means that every 10 infected people will infect between 9 and 10 people, down from last week’s range of 1.0 to 1.1.
The lockdown in England, home to around 85% of the UK’s total population, ends on Wednesday and will be replaced by a regional system of tiered restrictions.
The UK today reported 521 deaths within 28 days of a positive Covid-19 test.
Another 16,022 cases were confirmed, a 25% drop from the previous week.
Wales will introduce stricter restrictions in an attempt to reduce rising infection rates ahead of a relaxation of the rules over Christmas, the delegate government announced.
Wales just emerged from a two-week “firewall” lockdown across the country on 9 November.
But rising rates and concerns about a post-Christmas spike mean more action is required, according to Prime Minister Mark Drakeford.
Cinemas, bowling alleys and other indoor entertainment venues will close starting next Friday, but gyms, hair salons and other nonessential outlets will still be able to operate.
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The latest figures show that the spread of Covid-19 around the world has slowed slightly, but the virus is still increasing rapidly in South America.
Europe remains the center of the pandemic, averaging 236,900 new cases each day, well ahead of the 174,000 daily infections in the United States and Canada, but the rise in infections is slow and steep.
For the second week in a row, the number dropped, falling 10% with many countries locked down.
But Europe is the only continent where new cases are clearly falling, according to the AFP news agency tally.
While infections are stable in the US and Canada, Africa, and the Middle East, they are one-tenth in Latin America and the Caribbean and 13% in Asia.
While there were only 24 new cases per day in Oceania, that was a 64% increase from last week.
In terms of deaths, the United States remains by far the most affected country with 1,571 per day, more than double that of Italy (711), Mexico (591), France (547), India (521) and Poland (497) .
The United States also leads the total death toll with 263,462, followed by Brazil with 171,460; India with 135,715; Mexico with 104,242; and the United Kingdom with 57,031.
Coronavirus infections in Germany exceed one million
Germany has seen its total number of Covid-19 infections exceed one million, said the Robert Koch Institute for Disease Control.
The institute recorded more than 22,000 new cases daily, bringing the country’s total beyond the 1 million mark.
Germany had largely contained the spread of the virus in the spring, but has been hit hard by a second wave of infections.
The number of coronavirus patients in intensive care across the country has soared from just over 360 in early October to over 3,500 last week.
The most populous state in North Rhine-Westphalia has recorded more than a quarter of all cases, ahead of Bavaria’s 198,000 confirmed infections. Berlin has seen 62,000 cases since the start of the pandemic.
South Korea faces hospital bed shortage
South Korea reported more than 500 new infections for the second day in a row, a level never seen in nearly nine months, as a third wave of infections swept across the country, leaving authorities scrambling to provide more hospital beds.
“The situation is extremely serious and acute, as the 17 metropolitan cities and provinces and especially the 25 districts of Seoul are reporting new cases,” said Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun.
The daily tally of 569 came a day after the numbers reached their highest level since March 6.
Of the latest cases, 525 were transmitted domestically and more than 64% of them were from the Seoul metropolitan area, according to the Korea Agency for Disease Prevention and Control.
The authorities said the new wave is more difficult to track and contain than the first outbreaks that were concentrated in a specific region or among a certain religious group.
Indian Doctors Warn About New Delhi Half Marathon
Top Indian doctors have warned that elite runners are at great health risk when competing in Sunday’s New Delhi half marathon amid a major coronavirus outbreak and rising air pollution.
Women’s marathon world record holder Brigid Kosgei from Kenya and two-time male winner from Ethiopia Andamlak Belihu are among the 49 elite athletes running the 21 km race, while thousands of fans participate virtually.
Organizers say “the highest level of safety standards, with biosecurity zones” have been set for the race that starts at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium.
But with New Delhi recording more than 500,000 virus cases and air quality in the world’s most polluted capital oscillating between “unhealthy” and “dangerous,” health experts said athletes should think twice.
South Korea foils North Korea’s attempt to hack into Covid-19 vaccine makers
South Korea’s intelligence agency has thwarted North Korea’s attempts to hack South Korean companies developing coronavirus vaccines, the politicians said.
Ha Tae-keung, a member of the parliamentary intelligence committee, said after being briefed by the National Intelligence Service (NIS) that the agency did not specify how many and which drug manufacturers were targeted, but said there was no damage from the attempts to target. piracy.
The revelation came after Microsoft said earlier this month that hackers working for the governments of Russia and North Korea have attempted to break into the networks of seven pharmaceutical companies and vaccine researchers in Canada, France, India, South Korea and the United States.
Ha and another member, Kim Byung-kee, said that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had taken some “unreasonable” actions due to the “paranoia” of Covid-19.
They said these included a ban on fishing and salt production due to fears that seawater may have been contaminated with the virus and the stranding of some 110,000 tonnes of rice from China in the port of Dalian, in the Northeast China.
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