Lack of discipline has led to a recent spike in virus cases, WHO spokeswoman says
- More than 18.8 million people have contracted the virus worldwide, resulting in nearly 708,000 deaths
All updates in Universal Coordinated Time (UTC/GMT)
23:00 Here’s a roundup of all developments from Asia at the end of Wednesday:
China: The country is struggling to contain an outbreak in the northwestern region of Xinjiang with 101 new cases reported on Wednesday. This is the highest daily increase for China in weeks.
India is set to open gyms and lift a nighttime curfew that has been in place for months, even as the total number of confirmed infections cross 1.5 million. Schools, colleges, cinemas and bars will remain closed.
North Korean authorities are reminding foreigners residing in Pyongyang to abide by preventive measures like wearing masks and avoiding large gatherings, as North Korea investigates its first possible infection.
Some areas in Japan are running out of isolation facilities as the country attempts to deal with an uptick in confirmed infections. Chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said the national government is ready to help regions that are struggling to house and monitor those infected.
22:35 Here’s the latest news from North and South America:
The death toll from COVID-19 in the United States has exceeded 158,000, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. More than half of the country’s 50 states have recorded 1,000 deaths. The US has also recorded more than 4.8 million cases since the pandemic began.
Brazil set a daily record of 69,074 new cases and 1,595 deaths, according to the country’s health ministry. Brazil has now recorded more than 2.5 million cases and 90,134 deaths since the pandemic began, both of which are the second highest in the world behind the US.
Ecuador’s capital Quito has seen a surge in coronavirus cases since the South American country eased lockdown measures last month. The city has recorded 12,474 cases and 605 deaths since the pandemic began, but half of the cases and 141 deaths have been recorded since June 30. Ecuador has a whole has registered 83,193 cases and 5,623 deaths.
Hospital officials in Guatemala say they have had to bury dozens of unidentified COVID-19 death victims. A hospital has been creating an archive with the hopes of eventually identifying the deceased when the pandemic passes. Guatemala has recorded 47,605 cases and 1,800 deaths since the pandemic began.
Argentina has approved clinical trials of a COVID-19 treatment involving hyperimmune serum from horses. The serum is obtained by injecting a horse with a SARS-CoV-2 protein and extracting plasma with the neutralizing antibodies the horse creates. The clinical trial, which is being conducted by biotech firm Inmunova, will be carried out on 242 people diagnosed with the disease.
19:00 The government of the Netherlands said on Wednesday that it would not formally advise or require people to wear masks in public, saying their effectiveness was yet to be proven. Over the past week, the Netherlands has identified 1,329 new cases, an increase of roughly one third on the previous week.
16:15 Germany has said it will provide 1.4 million COVID-19 tests to the African Union, as an estimated 20,000 new infections on the African continent are currently being reported every day — twice as many as last month.
In South Africa, the hardest-hit African country with 450,000 COVID-19 cases, only around 46 tests have been carried out per 1,000 people, according to Oxford University. In Kenya, the number is around 4.8 and in Nigeria it is 1 per 1,000. By comparison the German figure is around 88 per 1,000 and the US is at 155 per 1,000.
15:10 Israel’s Ministry of Health has reported a record 2,093 new COVID-19 cases in 24 hours, as infections continue to rise after Israeli authorities appeared to have the virus under control in May. Since lockdowns were lifted at the end of May, cases have steadily risen, and the government has faced widespread protests and public discontent over its handling of the pandemic and other more longstanding grievances.
Israel has logged a total of 66,805 COVID-19 cases and 490 deaths, with over 33,000 cases currently active.
11:50 One in five patients hospitalized in Germany over the coronavirus died from the disease, with the fatality rate rising to 53% for those who received ventilation, a study has shown.
Data of 10,000 patients admitted to 930 German hospitals. The study found that male patients who were hospitalized had a higher mortality rate than women, with 25% compared to 19%, and those aged above 80 years old were significantly more at risk of death from the virus.
11:25 Some member states in the EU had broken a pact to reinstate freedom of movement inside the bloc after coronavirus lockdowns were lifted, said Portugal’s foreign minister.
10:27 The European Union has signed a €63 million ($73.99 million) contract with Gilead for its COVID-19 anti-viral medicine remdesivir. Under the deal, the EU will get treatment courses for 30,000 patients.
10:21 A lawmaker in the government of one of Bosnia’s two highly independent regions has died at the age of 53, a week after testing positive for COVID-19. So far, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the central Balkan country of 3.5 million people, has tallied over 10,700 virus cases, with 297 deaths. Nearly 80% of all cases were registered since mid-May, when a strict, nearly 2-month-long, coronavirus lockdown was lifted.
08:35 German Research Minister Anja Karliczek says it’s unlikely a coronavirus vaccine will be made available to the wider public before the middle of 2021. Karliczek urged people to continue to observe rules designed to stop the virus from spreading. Germany has so far recorded more than 205,000 infections and over 9,000 deaths, but a recent spike in cases has prompted warnings from the country’s health agency.
08:00 The head of Europe’s busiest airport, Heathrow, has called on the UK to introduce a passenger testing scheme “fast,” warning that “European competitors are racing ahead” with testing programs. Passenger numbers in the UK tumbled 96% in the second quarter, following measures put in place to stem the flow of the coronavirus outbreak.
07:12 French Health Minister Olivier Veran urged people to comply with social distancing rules or risk facing another lockdown.
“We are not facing a second wave, the epidemic is continuing … some people do not respect the rules. We must not let down our guard,” Veran told France’s national LCI television. Meanwhile, French Junior European Affairs Minister Clement Beaune urged borders between European countries to remain much as possible. Closing them was “to be avoided.” he told public radio France Inter. He acknowledged that political responses to the COVID-19 crisis were always prone to change.
06:28 Central Asian country Kazakhstan will extend its coronavirus lockdown for two more weeks until mid-August, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has announced.
The latest figures for the country show a total of 86,192 infections and a death toll of 793.
06:12 Every province and city in Vietnam is at high risk of coronavirus infections, state broadcaster VTV reported, citing the country’s leader. The warning comes days after its first local transmission in more than three months.
06:00 China has reported its highest daily case increase in weeks with authorities confirming 101 new cases. The majority of these are in the northwestern province of Xinjiang, where the Turkic-speaking minority Uighurs live.
05:41 Hong Kong has begun implementing its toughest measures for residents yet, while its leader warned that the territory is on the verge of a “large scale” coronavirus outbreak. The outbreak “may lead to a collapse of our hospital system and cost lives, especially of the elderly,” Chief Executive Carrie Lam warned in a statement released to coincide with the new measures. The strict measures come as confirmed cases in the territory spike. More than 1,000 infections have been confirmed since early July — more than 40% of the total since the virus first hit the city in late January.
03:53 Australia’s most populous city Sydney has been declared a virus hotspot by neighboring state Queensland on Wednesday after 19 new cases of the coronavirus were reported in Sydney overnight.
03:10 Germany has recorded 684 new infections, bringing the national total to 206,926 since the pandemic began, according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI). It’s the fourth time in the last week that Germany’s daily tally was above 600 new cases. Germany also confirmed six new deaths, increasing its death toll from the virus to 9,128.
02:09 Colombia’s nationwide lockdown has been extended until August 30, by which time the country will have been under a quarantine for over five months. The announcement came as Colombia recorded over 10,000 confirmed infections in a single day for the first time.
01:23 The United States has registered 1,592 new deaths due to the coronavirus, the highest single-day death toll in two and a half months, according to Johns Hopkins University.
The nation’s 149,209 fatalities accounts for more than 20% of the global death toll from the coronavirus.
The US has also recorded more than 60,000 new coronavirus cases over the past 24 hours, the university’s data showed.
00:57 New measures in Hong Kong came into effect on Wednesday, the toughest since the pandemic began, as the city grapples with a recent surge in coronavirus cases. The new regulations include bans on gatherings of more than two people and on close dining in restaurants, and masks are now also mandatory in public places, even outdoors.