Coronavirus spread exacerbated by Beirut blast

Lebanon has announced a record daily number of over 300 Covid-19 infections and seven deaths from the virus as the country grapples with the aftermath of the Beirut port explosion that rocked the capital and overwhelmed hospitals.

The country’s tally now stands at 7,121 cases and 87 deaths since February, according to health ministry data. Even before the blast there had been a recent surge in infections.

The 4 August explosion killed at least 171 people, injured some 6,000 and damaged swathes of the capital, leaving some 300,000 without habitable housing. Hospitals, many of which were damaged and their staff injured, were flooded with wounded.

World Health Organization spokesman Tarik Jarasevic told a United Nations briefing in Geneva on Tuesday that the displacement of so many people risks accelerating the spread of Covid-19.

Florida breaks daily coronavirus death record with over half a million cases total

Florida has recorded its highest single-day number of coronavirus-related deaths, with 276 reported by local health officials, and a total of 542,792 cases throughout the state.

The record number brings the state’s total death toll to 8,685 since the pandemic began. The previous record of daily Covid-19 deaths in Florida was 257 on 31 July.

Data from the Florida Department of Health released on Tuesday morning reflected the number of deaths confirmed on Monday, though they may have died previously days or weeks earlier.

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BA agrees trade union deal with Heathrow workforce

British Airways has agreed a deal with trade unions representing parts of its workforce in Heathrow over planned job cuts, with the airline’s chief executive saying significant progress had been made in a message to staff.

On Friday, the airline said it was planning to cut 12,000 of its staff, with thousands of workers due to receive letters saying whether they had lost their jobs.

“I am pleased to report we have made significant progress in these areas with both unions which will help us to save jobs and mitigate the impact of redundancies,” BA Chief Executive Alex Cruz said in an internal message seen by Reuters.

“Representatives from both GMB and Unite have now signed a formal ‘agreement in principle’ that would cover those colleagues working above the wing in Heathrow and in Engineering. This is a significant step forwards.”

Trump’s ex-FDA chief says he ‘wouldn’t take’ Russia’s reported Covid-19 vaccine

The former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned a Russian vaccination for COVID-19 may not prove to be effective, while suggesting its reported approval could be a further attempt by the Kremlin to “stoke doubts” about US vaccine trials.

Scott Gottlieb, who led the FDA under Donald Trump from 2017 until last year, told CNBC’s Squawk Box about the vaccination that Russia has claimed was the first to combat the novel coronavirus: “I wouldn’t take it, certainly not outside a clinical trial right now.”

He added: “It appears that it’s only been tested in several hundred patients at most.”

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Dutch government to order mandatory quarantine for those exposed to virus – report

The Dutch government plans to order mandatory quarantine for people who are known to have been exposed to the coronavirus, national broadcaster NOS reported citing a letter to parliament.

The decision follows a 55 per cent jump in the number of positive cases in the country to 4,036 in the past week from 2,588 cases the week before.

‘If we don’t act collectively, we expose ourselves to the heightened risk that the rebound in the epidemic becomes hard to control’

The renewed spread of coronavirus in France could become harder to control without a collective effort to stop a rise in the infection rate, its prime minister said.

The public was becoming careless, Jean Castex warned, speaking shortly before health authorities said new daily infections were up by 1,397 over 24 hours, almost twice as much as Monday, to reach 204,172.

“If we don’t act collectively, we expose ourselves to the heightened risk that the rebound in the epidemic becomes hard to control,” Mr Castex said during a visit to a hospital intensive care ward in southern France.

A health ministry statement also reported 15 new deaths in hospital due the disease, compared to an increase of 16 over a three-day period between Monday and Saturday, with the total death toll standing at 30,354.

Russia approves world’s first coronavirus vaccine – but what do the experts think?

Experts have expressed serious concerns after Vladimir Putin said Russia had approved the world’s first coronavirus vaccine following less than two months of human testing.

Mr Putin claimed on Tuesday that one of his adult daughters had already been inoculated with the vaccine, which he insisted had passed necessary tests and been proved to be effective.

However, scientists from outside Russia have warned there is so far no published scientific evidence to support the claims.

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French cases double that of previous 24 hours

French health authorities have reported 1,397 new COVID-19 infections over 24 hours, almost twice Monday’s tally.

The Health Ministry website said there were 15 new deaths in hospital due the disease, compared to an increase of 16 over a three-day period between Monday and Saturday, with the total death toll standing at 30,354.

The number of people hospitalised for the disease went down again after creeping up Monday for the first time in two and a half months.

It took 6 months to reach 10m coronavirus cases, but just 6 more weeks to reach 20m

Global coronavirus cases have passed 20 million, just six weeks after the 10m milestone was reached.

The latest landmark comes as several of the worst-affected countries continue to see new daily cases surge, with new cases consistently topping 250,000 globally every 24 hours since late July.

More than half of all Covid-19 cases come from just three countries – Brazil, India and the United States – though a levelling off over the last week has given hope that the pandemic’s spread is beginning to slow.

Here is all the latest data:

Spanish figures below peaks of previous week

Spain’s health ministry has reported 1,418 new coronavirus cases, below last week’s peaks.

Cumulative cases, which also include results from antibody tests on people who may have recovered, increased further to reach a total of 326,612.

The disease claimed 64 lives over the past seven days, the statistics showed. In total, more than 28,500 people have died from the disease in Spain, one of Europe’s hardest-hit countries by COVID-19.

Since lifting a nationwide lockdown, Spain has struggled to contain a rise in new infections, with heavy concentrations in the populous regions of Madrid and Catalonia.

New infections recorded on Monday and Tuesday were however below last week’s peak of 1,895, reported on Friday.

Vaping ‘makes young people up to seven times more likely to contract coronavirus’

Young people who use e-cigarettes are five to seven times more likely than non-smokers to be infected with coronavirus, a study suggests.

Vaping also appears to diminish the protections afforded by youth against the symptoms of the virus, warned scientists who analysed data from across the US.

“Teens and young adults need to know that if you use e-cigarettes, you are likely at immediate risk of Covid-19 because you are damaging your lungs,” said the study’s senior author Bonnie Halpern-Felsher, professor of paediatrics at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

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WHO yet to see proof Russian vaccine is safe

The World Health Organization has not received enough information on the Russian Covid-19 vaccine to evaluate it, the assistant director of its regional branch, the Pan American Health Organization, Jarbas Barbosa, has said.

Asked about plans to produce the potential vaccine in Brazil, Mr Barbosa said that should not be done until Phase 2 and 3 trials are completed to guarantee its safety and effectiveness.

“Any vaccine producer has to follow this procedure that guarantees it is safe and has the WHO’s recommendation,” he said in a virtual briefing from Washington.

Malaria discovery could be used to develop coronavirus treatment

Scientists hope a breakthrough in our understanding of malaria could offer potentially effective treatment for coronavirus and other infectious diseases.

A new study has found that the parasites causing the mosquito-borne infectious disease are heavily dependent on particular enzymes inside a human host’s red blood cells.

Led by experts at Australia’s RMIT University, the research revealed that drugs which deactivate these human enzymes are highly effective in killing the malaria parasite – and represent an alternative to drugs targeting the parasite itself.

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Americas reporting more than 100,000 cases a day

More than 100,000 cases of the virus are being reported every day in the Americas – half of them in the United States – and there are worrisome spikes in countries that had controlled their epidemics like Argentina and Colombia, the World Health Organization regional director Carissa Etienne has said.

“Our region remains under Covid’s grip,” she said in a virtual briefing from Washington with other Pan American Health Organization directors.

Ms Etienne said the disruption of healthcare services threatened an increase in illnesses that were under control such as TB, HIV and hepatitis.

Students in Scotland will now receive their original grades estimated by teachers, as more than 120,000 results downgraded in moderation will be scrapped.

After children found out their grades last week, it emerged tens of thousands had been lowered by the exam board.

The Scottish educations secretary said on Tuesday these results would go back to the original teacher estimate.

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MP accuses government of being ‘too quick to hand out contracts’ over test and trace outsourcing

Labour has raised fresh questions over outsourcing giant Serco’s role in the Government’s test-and-trace programme to track coronavirus cases.
 

Shadow health minister Justin Madders accused the Government of being “too quick to hand out juicy contracts to the private sector” as he shared a letter on Twitter, which he claimed revealed communication with the company back in January months ahead of the coronavirus lockdown.

Speaking to the PA news agency, Mr Madders said: “I think it’s for the Government to explain the process they underwent and what conversations were taking place in January about test and trace…It just seems really, really shambolically handled all the way along.”

Police have made almost 270 arrests using emergency coronavirus legislation in Scotland.

Mike Russell, Scottish constitutional secretary, told Holyrood that officers had used the powers for 3,310 fines, to make 349 forceful dispersals and to make 268 arrests between 27 March and 21 July.

He said 94 per cent of the 61,593 interventions had been peaceful dispersals.

Six more people who have died in hospital in England after testing positive for coronavirus, bringing the total number of confirmed reported deaths in hospitals to 29,425, NHS England has announced.

The patients were aged between 46 and 96 and all had known underlying health conditions.

The region with the highest number of deaths was the northwest with four, while the remaining two deaths were recorded in the Midlands and the southeast respectively.

In Wales, a further two people who tested positive for Covid-19 have died, bringing the total number of deaths since the beginning of the pandemic to 1,581.

Public Health Wales said the total number of cases in the country increased by 13, bringing the revised total of confirmed cases to 17,476.

No new deaths with Covid-19 have been reported in Northern Ireland, the Department of Health said. Another 48 people tested positive, bringing the overall tally to 6,188.