Wed 30 December 2020:
The first cases of COVID-19 were reported in Wuhan, China in December 2019. However, Beijing has denied that China is the origin of the deadly disease, which has affected over 81.9 million people worldwide. More than 1.78 million people have died from the virus while over 46 million have recovered. Here’re the updates for December 30:
Zimbabwe delays new school term due to rising COVID-19 cases, cyclone
Zimbabwe has postponed the re-opening of schools planned for next week, the government said, due to a surge in coronavirus infections and a tropical storm sweeping through the region.
The government had set January 4 as the date to re-open primary and secondary schools, after many students missed class for much of last year as the country tried to curb the spread of COVID-19.
Zimbabwe has recorded more than 13,000 cases of COVID-19 and 359 deaths.
Israel records over 5,500 cases in one day
Israel’s health ministry reported the highest number of new coronavirus infections in over two months.
The ministry recorded 5,585 new cases from the previous day, which is the highest daily rate since the beginning of October, when Israel was in the midst of a national lockdown.
Cases in Wuhan may be 10 times higher than reported: study
The number of cases in the Chinese city where the pathogen was first detected may have been 10 times higher than official figures suggest, according to a study by health authorities in Wuhan.
About 4.4 percent of the city’s 11 million residents had developed antibodies against the novel virus by April, read the report by the Chinese Centre for Disease Control (CDC).
That correlates to around 480,000 infections in Wuhan by April, nearly 10 times the official tally to date of 50,000 cases in the city.
The discrepancy revealed by the CDC’s data may “point to potential underreporting due to the chaos in late January and early February, when a large number of people were not tested or were not tested accurately for Covid-19,” Huang Yanzhong, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, told AFP news agency.
California nurse tests positive over a week after receiving Pfizer vaccine- ABC
A 45-year-old nurse in California tested positive more than a week after receiving Pfizer Inc’s coronavirus vaccine, an ABC News affiliate reported.
Matthew W., a nurse at two different local hospitals, said in a Facebook post on December 18 that he had received the Pfizer vaccine, telling the ABC News affiliate that his arm was sore for a day but that he had suffered no other side-effects.
Six days later on Christmas Eve, he became sick after working a shift in the Covid-19 unit, the report added.
Christian Ramers, an infectious disease specialist with Family Health Centers of San Diego, told the ABC News affiliate that this scenario was not unexpected.
“We know from the vaccine clinical trials that it’s going to take about 10 to 14 days for you to start to develop protection from the vaccine,” Ramers said.
“That first dose we think gives you somewhere around 50 percent, and you need that second dose to get up to 95 percent,” Ramers added.
China urges workers to skip holiday travel
China is encouraging tens of millions of migrant workers not to travel home during February’s Lunar New Year holiday to prevent further spread of the coronavirus.
The measure from the National Health Commission (NHC) is not a direct travel ban but is still extraordinary because Lunar New Year is China’s most important traditional holiday and the only time of the year when many workers have the opportunity to travel home to see their families.
The NHC said it was encouraging provincial governments to persuade workers to follow the suggestion while taking into account their personal wishes. It also said workers who stay behind should be paid overtime and offered other opportunities to take vacation.
India races to find UK arrivals to halt new virus strain
Indian authorities were trying to track down tens of thousands of people who entered the country from Britain in recent weeks as cases of a new and fast-spreading coronavirus strain more than doubled in 24 hours.
They have launched efforts to locate around 33,000 people who flew to India in the last month from the UK after 20 people tested positive for the new, more virulent strain, up by 14 cases since Tuesday.
India also extended the ban on flights to and from Britain by a week to January 7.
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