This photo shows vials of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines after delivery to the Ambroise Pare Clinic in Paris, France, on Jan 6, 2021. (NATHAN LAINE / BLOOMBERG)
GENEVA / LONDON / PARIS / MADRID / CARIO / ROME / MEXICO CITY / SAO PAULO / KYIV / SANTO DOMINGO / HARARE – European Union (EU) governments are divided over a controversial proposal to withhold vaccine exports to the United Kingdom, even as the bloc sits on about 20 million unused doses.
Around 70 million shots have been delivered to countries in the EU, with 50 million of those already administered, according to an EU document seen by Bloomberg. About 15 million of the used shots were second doses.
EU members, including Italy and France, said they were open to exploring the vaccine export ban while others, such as Ireland, Belgium and the Netherlands, urged caution and warned about the possible negative impact on European companies, according to the note
The new figures were shared with EU ambassadors on Wednesday, when they discussed a new proposal by the European Commission that would restrict exports of vaccines to countries – the UK in particular –that don’t reciprocate or that already have high vaccination rates, according to a diplomatic note seen by Bloomberg. The UK is the largest recipient of doses made in the EU, receiving 10 million of the 42 million exported shots.
EU members, including Italy and France, said they were open to exploring the vaccine export ban while others, such as Ireland, Belgium and the Netherlands, urged caution and warned about the possible negative impact on European companies, according to the note.
Any decision on the issue would ultimately be for EU leaders, who are set to meet next week.
ALSO READ: Europe braces for Astra vaccine decision after suspension fiasco
According to the latest figures from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, the EU and the European Economic Area are conducting about 1.3 million vaccinations a day compared to 2.5 million a day in the US, where the population is about 70 percent as large.
The European Commission will send a letter to AstraZeneca as part of its strategy to resolve the dispute with the Anglo-Swedish company over its supplies of COVID-19 vaccines to the bloc, a spokesman for the EU executive said on Thursday.
Asked about whether the letter could be the beginning of a possible legal case against AstraZeneca, the Commission's chief spokesman said: "Today we are taking a specific step. We will see where that leads us."
With the number of COVID-related deaths in the EU topping 550,000 and less than a 10th of the bloc's population inoculated, European Commission head Ursula von der Leyen said the epidemiological situation was worsening.
Von der Leyen said the flow of vaccine products was smooth with the United States but aired frustration over a lack of deliveries from AstraZeneca in Britain.
France
France will implement stricter rules in more regions, including Paris and its surrounding areas, from this weekend to curb COVID-19 resurgence as daily infections hit the new highest level since mid-November 2020.
"The epidemic situation is deteriorating," said government spokesperson Gabriel Attal on Wednesday. "With the virus variants, the situation has changed. It's almost a new epidemic which has started."
Additional measures would be introduced in the most affected territories notably in the greater Paris region, he told a press conference.
In Paris and its surrounding areas, the epidemic situation is reaching a tipping point, with over 1,100 COVID-19 patients filling up the region's intensive care units, forcing transfers of patients to less-strained zones.
The number of people in intensive care units with COVID-19 in France has fallen by 20 to 4,219, health ministry data showed on Wednesday, the first decline in nearly two weeks.
The number of patients in intensive care (ICU) is closely watched by the government as it is the ultimate measure of the country's ability to deal with the viral pandemic.
In the past 24 hours, another 38,501 infections were reported in France, the biggest daily increase since Nov. 17 last year when 45,522 new cases were confirmed in one day in the country.
France now tallies over 4.14 million people with COVID-19, of whom 91,437 have died, up by 246 in one day, according to figures released by the Public Health Agency.
WHO
The World Health Organization's (WHO) vaccine safety panel is now due to issue its findings on the AstraZeneca COVID-19 shot on Friday, a WHO spokesman said.
The benefits of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine far outweigh any risks, and countries across Europe should continue to use it to help save lives in the pandemic, the WHO's European director Hans Kluge said.
Kluge said gaining and maintaining public trust was "crucial". "We need to renew confidence, if it's lost, to restore it – especially for AstraZeneca," he said.
Europe is experiencing a third straight week of rising coronavirus cases and needs a bigger range of vaccines to combat the pandemic, said Kluge.
Meanwhile, the WHO won’t yet endorse the issuance of COVID-19 passports. “We do not encourage at this stage that getting a vaccination is determining if you can travel or not. As with the global shortage of vaccines, it encourages inequities,” said Kluge.
The WHO on Wednesday reported in its weekly update a surge in new COVID-19 cases as more countries are declaring the presence of the contagious coronavirus variants within their borders.
The WHO said that in the week ending March 14, more than three million new cases were identified, an increase of 10 percent over the week before, reversing a trend that saw cases declining since February 2021.
"After peaking in early January 2021 when there were under 5 million cases, new cases then declined to around 2.5 million in the week commencing Feb. 15," the Geneva-based organization outlined. However, cases "have increased again" in the past three weeks.
According to the WHO, the Americas and Europe continued to account for over 80 percent of new cases and deaths during the period. Brazil, the United States and France were the most affected.
Furthermore, more countries reported cases of coronavirus variants, markedly of the contagious variants that originated from Britain and South Africa. The B117 variant that was first detected in Britain has been found in 118 countries while the one that started in South Africa was spotted in 64 countries.
Global tally
The number of coronavirus cases recorded worldwide surpassed 121 million while the global death toll topped 2.68 million, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Oxford study
AstraZeneca’s and Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccines may help protect patients from the coronavirus variant that emerged in Brazil, scientists said in a study that may alleviate some concerns about their role in slowing the pandemic.
Laboratory experiments indicate that the shots are about as effective against the Brazil variant as another that surfaced in the UK, which has already been shown to be halted by existing vaccines, according to data released Thursday by the University of Oxford. Both inoculations fared a lot less well against another mutant that surfaced in South Africa.
The UK and Brazil variants rendered the vaccines about three times less effective than against earlier strains, the scientists found. Against the South Africa variant, the researchers found a nine-fold reduction in the level of neutralization by the Astra vaccine and a 7.6-fold reduction for the Pfizer shot.
The estimates are based on levels of antibodies, immune proteins that can stop viruses from entering cells, that were found in the blood of people who were vaccinated or recovered from COVID-19. The study was not reviewed by other experts.
Canada
US land borders with Canada will remain closed to non-essential travel until at least April 21, the Canadian government said Thursday.
The new 30-day extension is the second announced under President Joe Biden and comes as US lawmakers in border states have urged lifting the nearly year-old restrictions to address the COVID-19 pandemic.
Canada has shown little interest in lifting the restrictions and last month imposed new COVID-19 testing requirements for some Canadians returning at and crossings.
US
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Wednesday the United States has received requests for COVID-19 vaccines from both Mexico and Canada and is considering them carefully. "I don't have any update for you on whether they will be granted and a timeline for that," Psaki said.
Psaki said on Wednesday that people who are not vaccinated face a great risk from travel as she sought to convince more Americans to take the vaccine.
UK
Britain's medicines regulator said there had been five cases of a rare type of blood clot in cerebral veins among people given AstraZeneca's vaccine but said the shot should still be used as there was no evidence it caused blood clots.
Britain is confident of its supply of COVID-19 vaccines, a spokesman for Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Thursday, after the government warned its rollout would be slower than hoped in the coming weeks.
The country is facing a squeeze on supply of COVID-19 vaccines next month in part due to a delay in a shipment from India's Serum Institute that is making AstraZeneca's shot, Health Minister Matt Hancock said.
Johnson's spokesman told reporters that the Serum Institute in India had said they will supply more vaccines in the future.
Meanwhile, Britain expects to take its first delivery of Moderna COVID-19 vaccines in the coming weeks, Hancock said on Thursday.
Britain is on track to have given a first COVID-19 shot to half of all adults in the next few days and passed 25 million first shots on Wednesday.
AstraZeneca's scheduled deliveries of COVID-19 vaccines to Britain are unaffected and its supply chain in the country is not experiencing disruption, the company said on Wednesday.
On the same day, Hancock rebuked criticism from the European Union that Britain has not been exporting the shots, saying Britain has a legal right to AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine, which it helped to fund and develop.
The United Kingdom has recorded a further 141 deaths of people who tested positive for COVID-19 within 28 days, and 5,758 new cases, official data showed on Wednesday.
The total number of deaths in the last seven days are down 30 percent compared with the seven days before, while the 7-day cases figure is down 1.2 percent.
A man looks at an ambulance of a mobile vaccination unit as he waits to receive a dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine in the mayor's office of the mountain village of Gardevtsi, Bulgaria on Feb 25, 2021. (Nikolay DOYCHINOV / AFP)
Bulgaria
Bulgaria will close schools, restaurants and shopping malls for 10 days from March 22 as it battles a surge in COVID-19 infections that have stretched its hospitals, the health minister said on Thursday.
The Balkan country, which is due to hold a national election on April 4, reported 4,201 new cases on Thursday, with 7,804 people in hospitals, including 609 in intensive care.
There were 136 deaths related to COVID-19 in the past 24 hours.
In total, the country of 7 million people has reported 291,769 coronavirus cases and 11,715 deaths.
Hungary
The third wave of the coronavirus pandemic will reach its peak in Hungary by the end of March the latest, Prime Minister Viktor Orban's chief of staff said on Thursday, adding there was no room to ease lockdown measures yet.
Gergely Gulyas said at a briefing that the government was still planning a phased reopening of the economy, which will start depending on the scale of COVID-19 vaccinations.
On Thursday, Hungary reported its highest daily tally of coronavirus-related deaths at 207, with 10,386 people in hospital – also a record high – which puts major strain on the health system.
"Based on the numbers, it is not the time to ease restrictions," Gulyas said, adding that Orban would announce next week's measures on state radio on Friday morning.
Gulyas said the government was not planning to impose any regional closures or other new regional measures to curb the spread of the virus.
Hungary, which has a population of 10 million, has inoculated 1.442 million people so far, and Gulyas said that by June the government planned to vaccinate everyone who had registered for a shot.
Portugal
Portugal will welcome British tourists from May 17 if they have a vaccination certificate or evidence of a recent negative COVID-19 test, said the country’s tourism minister, adding to hopes for a travel recovery in Europe this summer.
“We do hope to welcome all British holidaymakers from May 17,” Portugal’s tourism minister Rita Marques told BBC Radio on Thursday.
She said that Britons could either present their vaccination certificate or their negative test result in what would be “a very straightforward and simple process”.
Britons should also be able to participate in the EU’s digital green pass plan to allow travel, she said.
Russia
Russia on Thursday reported 9,803 new COVID-19 cases, including 1,934 in Moscow, pushing the national case tally to 4,428,239 since the pandemic began.
The government coronavirus taskforce said that 460 people had died in the last 24 hours, taking its death toll to 93,824.
Sweden
Sweden, which has shunned lockdowns throughout the pandemic, registered 6,467 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, health agency statistics showed.
The country of 10 million inhabitants registered eight additional deaths, taking the total to 13,236. The deaths registered have occurred over several days and sometimes weeks.
Bosnia
Bosnia-Herzegovina’s entity of ethnic Muslims and Croats has signed an agreement to buy 500,000 doses of Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19 from Russia, Klix reported, citing the region’s Prime Minister Fadil Novalic.
The so-called Federation that covers roughly half of Bosnia-Herzegovina’s territory expects the first delivery of 100,000 Sputnik V shots next week, Novalic told lawmakers in the capital of Sarajevo. The Russian shots will cost 14.31 euros apiece, according to the report.
The move comes after authorities temporarily suspended the use of AstraZeneca vaccines on Wednesday, following reports about its possible negative side effects.
War-ravaged Bosnia remains semi-divided into two autonomous entities, the Serb-run Republika Srpska and the so-called Federation for Muslims and Croats. Last month, Serbia shipped 2,000 Russian-made vaccines to the Serb entity.
Ukraine
The number of COVID-19 cases in Ukraine has exceeded 1.5 million with 29,253 deaths, Ukrainian Health Minister Maksym Stepanov said on Thursday.
The Ukrainian capital Kyiv will go into a strict lockdown for three weeks from March 20 to contain the spread of the coronavirus, mayor Vitali Klitschko said.
Theaters and shopping centers will be closed, spectators banned from sporting events, cafes and restaurants can only provide takeaway food, schools will introduce remote learning and all state employees will work from home, he said.
Ukraine has faced a sharp jump in coronavirus cases in recent weeks, which Prime Minister Denys Shmygal called a “third wave” of the pandemic.
On Wednesday, Ukraine registered a record daily high of 289 coronavirus-related deaths and the death toll remained at a high level of 267 on Thursday, Stepanov said on Facebook.
He said the number of hospitalized Ukrainians remained at a high level – 4,376 were admitted to hospitals in the past 24 hours, down from a record 4,887 the day before.
The surge in new infections and deaths has forced the prime minister to urge regional authorities to impose stronger restrictions to contain the disease.
Spain
Spain's health minister warned on Wednesday that a seven-week decline in the national COVID-19 infection rate could have bottomed out after cases ticked higher in a handful of regions.
"We could be facing a possible change in trend," Carolina Darias told a news conference. "So maximum caution should be exercised to avoid a fourth wave."
The infection rate as measured over the preceding 14 days has fallen from a peak of nearly 900 cases per 100,000 people at the end of January to below 130 cases as authorities brought a post-Christmas third wave under control.
But the pace of decline has slowed recently, and infections inched higher on Wednesday to 127.9 cases per 100,000 from 127.8 cases a day earlier.
A health worker administers the Moderna vaccine to a visitor at a vaccination center in Rome, Italy, March 17, 2021. (PHOTO / BLOOMBERG)
Italy
Flags flew at half mast and thousands of towns held a minute's silence on Thursday as Italy mourned the victims of a coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 100,000 in 13 months.
Prime Minister Mario Draghi led tributes in Bergamo, an epicenter of the disease's first destructive wave a year ago and where city mayor Giorgio Gori said it had left no one unscathed.
"There is not a single person in Bergamo who did not have to say goodbye to a loved one," he said.
Thursday marked the first anniversary of the day a convoy of army trucks rolled into the city to remove dozens of coffins accumulated in churches and chapels – a stark snapshot of the virus' untamed power.
In all, 103,432 deaths linked to coronavirus have been reported in Italy, the seventh highest toll in the world, including 670 in Bergamo and around 6,000 in the surrounding province.
Italy reported 431 coronavirus-related deaths on Wednesday against 502 the day before, the health ministry said, while the daily tally of new infections rose to 23,059 from 20,396 the day before.
The country has reported 3.28 million cases to date.
Netherlands
A Dutch watchdog has received reports of two people who developed blood clots and low platelet counts after receiving the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, news agency ANP reported on Thursday.
The Dutch government paused its rollout of AstraZeneca's vaccine on Sunday after being advised to do so by the country's medicines regulator.
Norway
An investigation at Rikshospitalet in Oslo has found that a immune response caused the blood clots in three health workers after they received the AstraZeneca vaccine, Pal Andre Holme, the hematologist leading the probe, said on Thursday.
Romania
Romania registered 6,186 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, the second consecutive day in the current year to report over 6,000 new cases, according to the latest data released Wednesday by relevant health authorities.
On Tuesday the country recorded 6,118 new cases, as the pandemic began to pick up in March in the country, from an daily average of 2,616 in February.
Emilian Imbri, the newly retired manager of the Victor Babes Clinical Hospital of Infectious and Tropical Diseases in Bucharest, the country's most important infectious disease hospital, warned on Tuesday in a TV interview that "it will be a tsunami of infections."
He called for "much stricter and unpopular measures." "There is no time for hesitation" and "the situation is no longer under control."
Poland
Poland has reported 27,278 new daily coronavirus cases on Thursday, according to health ministry data, the highest number so far this year.
In total, the country of 38 million has reported 1,984,248 cases and 48,388 deaths.
The Polish government said on Wednesday that it will reintroduce a full nationwide lockdown on Saturday after the number of reported COVID-19 cases topped 25,000 on Wednesday.
"We are losing control over how the pandemic is developing," President Andrzej Duda said in parliament hours before the lockdown was officially announced. "The situation is bad, and containing it is now of fundamental importance."
According to reports, the coronavirus variant which was first detected in the United Kingdom is now the dominant strain in Poland, accounting for 52 percent of the newly reported cases. According to researchers, this mutation is more infectious than the original strain, and also more deadly.
Austria
Austria reported 3,357 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, the highest daily count this year, pushing the cumulative tally to 504,581.
The death toll rose by 26 to 8,982, according to the interior ministry.
There were 1,814 people receiving treatment in hospitals, including 386 in intensive care, according to the ministry.
North Macedonia
North Macedonia reported 1,293 new COVID-19 cases and 24 deaths in the past 24 hours, the country's Health Ministry said Wednesday.
According to the ministry, the country has to date recorded a total of 115,222 cases, with 99,015 recoveries and 3,388 fatalities.
On Wednesday, the country's Commission for Infectious Diseases decided to keep in place the nationwide curfew as North Macedonia is experiencing the third wave of COVID-19.
Speaking at a press conference, Health Minister Venko Filipce said that the latest data on the percentages of positive cases over the past days showed that there is a significant increase in the number of positive cases in several cities, as well as an increase in the number of hospitalized patients.
Germany
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany jumped by 17,504 to 2,612,268, the biggest daily rise since Jan. 22, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Thursday.
The reported death toll rose by 227 to 74,132, while the number of new cases per 100,000 people over seven days rose to 90, compared to 86 a day earlier.
Germany is in a third wave of the pandemic, driven by an easing of restrictions in recent weeks just as a more transmissible variant has spread, the RKI has said, predicting a big jump in cases in coming weeks.
That has not been helped by a sluggish rollout of vaccinations, further dented by a decision this week to suspend the use of AstraZeneca doses due to safety worries.
Greece
The Greek government on Wednesday appealed to private doctors to immediately offer their services to the public healthcare system in the battle against COVID-19 as the number of daily confirmed infections and intubations broke new records.
Greece registered 3,465 new coronavirus infections in the past 24 hours, the National Public Health Organization (EODY) said on Wednesday. The previous record was reported on Nov. 12 last year. Meanwhile, 630 patients were currently on ventilators. The previous high was 622 on Dec. 3, 2020.
To date, Greece has confirmed a total of 227,247 infections since the start of the pandemic. The country's death toll rose by 56 in a day to 7,252.
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic received two batches of Chinese vaccines on Wednesday, allowing the Caribbean nation to advance its immunization plan against the coronavirus, authorities said.
The cargo was received at the airport in the capital, where the country's Vice President Raquel Pena, Minister of Public Health Daniel Rivera and Chinese Ambassador to the Dominican Republic Zhang Run attended a handover ceremony.
The shipment contained doses of Sinopharm vaccines with syringes donated by the Chinese government, as well as doses of Sinovac vaccines purchased by the government of the Dominican Republic.
Mexico
Authorities in Mexico have seized a batch of fake doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19, the Russian Direct Investment Fund, responsible for exports of the drug, said on Thursday.
"Analysis of the photographs of the seized batch, including the design of containers and labels, suggests that it is a fake substance which has nothing to do with the original vaccine," the fund said in a statement.
The fake batch of 5,775 doses was seized at Campeche International Airport in Mexico, according to a government statement. It had been en route by private plane to Honduras.
Mexico has registered 6,455 new confirmed cases of coronavirus infection and 789 additional fatalities, bringing the total in the country to 2,175,462 cases and 195,908 deaths, health ministry data showed on Wednesday.
The government says the real number of infected people is likely significantly higher than the confirmed cases.
Brazil
Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro on Wednesday said he was happy that supporters have been staging anti-social distancing protests, on the same day as the country registered more than 90,000 new COVID-19 cases for the first time.
Brazil registered a record 90,303 new COVID-19 cases in 24 hours, pushing the nationwide tally to 11,693,838, the Ministry of Health said on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, 2,648 more people died from the disease, increasing the national death toll to 284,775, said the ministry.
The South American country has the world's second-highest COVID-19 death toll and number of cases, only next to the United States.
Brazil is one of the hardest hit countries by the pandemic, experiencing another wave of infections which has overwhelmed the health system in most regional capitals.
Peru
The Peruvian government is preparing for a possible third wave of infections of COVID-19, President Francisco Sagasti said on Wednesday.
Officials want to anticipate a third wave of COVID-19 cases because "there is a third wave throughout the world," Sagasti said in an interview with local radio station Radio Uno Tacna.
"We are in the middle … between the second and a possible third wave, in the sense that we are not seeing uniformly across the country a significant increase in test positivity," he said.
In fact, several regions of the country have been seeing a slight slowdown in COVID-19 infections in recent weeks, according to health authorities.
Chile
Chilean Interior Minister Rodrigo Delgado was hospitalized on Wednesday with COVID-19, after testing positive on Friday, the Ministry of Interior and Public Security said.
In a statement, the ministry said Delgado went to the Clinical Hospital of the Chilean Air Force as a "preventive measure," undergoing various tests, and was declared in "normal condition, pending any changes" by the attending doctor.
On March 12, the ministry confirmed that Delgado had been infected with the virus, after returning from a work trip in the northern city of Arica, where he presented COVID-19 symptoms.
Chile's Health Ministry reported on Wednesday 4,395 new COVID-19 cases and another 27 deaths related to the virus in one day, amid a spike in cases in the South American country.
According to official figures, Chile has accumulated a total of 905,212 cases and 21,816 deaths.
Africa
The African Union (AU) said on Thursday that it considers that the benefits of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine outweigh the risks and recommended that vaccinations continue across the continent.
The announcement came a day after the WHO backed the vaccine and as more than a dozen European countries have suspended the use of it amid concerns over the risk of blood clots.
John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), said at a news conference that adverse reactions would be monitored and reported for future assessments on the vaccine.
"I encourage countries…to continue with their vaccination campaigns and not to pause, as we are in a race against time," the WHO's Africa director Matshidiso Moeti said at a separate briefing.
In Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo has delayed the rollout of AstraZeneca's shot, citing the suspensions in Europe.
But other countries are forging ahead. Angolan Health Minister Silvia Lutucuta said on Thursday her country had not recorded any serious side-effects from AstraZeneca's vaccine so far. She said doses shipped to Angola were from a different batch to ones distributed in Europe.
Muluken Yohannes, a senior adviser to Ethiopia's health ministry, said the government there would continue using the AstraZeneca shot.
As of Thursday, a total of 4,062,388 confirmed cases, 108,659 deaths and 3,649,317 recoveries had been reported in Africa, according to the Africa CDC.
Botswana
Botswana on Wednesday launched a communications campaign aimed at addressing fears, misinformation, doubts and frustration regarding the COVID-19 vaccine.
Speaking during the launch cerenomy in Gaborone, Minister of Health and Wellness Edwin Dikoloti said Botswana is on the eve of rolling out the COVID-19 vaccination and "to achieve this, communication becomes critical to ensuring that the leadership, community and stakeholders are informed, engaged and mobilized to elicit intended responses and outcomes."
Tunisia
Tunisia received Wednesday 93,600 doses of Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine, announced Tunisian Ministry of Health in a statement.
"This new batch is part of the COVAX initiative led by the World Health Organization," the ministry said.
Additional batches of vaccines would follow in the coming weeks, said the Minister of Health, Faouzi Mehdi, indicating that 70,000 doses are expected each week from April, 2021.
The ministry aimed to speed up the vaccination process to cover 50 percent of Tunisians before the end of the current year, at a time when vaccination operations are experiencing low participation in the regional centers set up by the authorities.
Tunisian Health Ministry on Wednesday reported 766 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total number of infections in the country to 243,439.
The death toll from the virus rose by 34 to 8,463, the ministry said in a statement.
Algeria
Algeria on Wednesday reported 148 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total number of confirmed cases in the North African country to 124,688.
The death toll from the virus rose to 3,048 after three new fatalities were added, said the Algerian Ministry of Health in a statement.
Meanwhile, 116 more patients recovered from the disease, bringing the total number of recoveries in the country to 80,279, the statement added.
Morocco
Morocco announced on Wednesday 466 new COVID-19 cases, taking the tally in the North African country to 490,088.
The total number of recoveries from COVID-19 in Morocco increased to 477,305 after 578 more were added.
The death toll rose to 8,745 with eight new fatalities during the last 24 hours, while 408 people are in intensive care units.
The COVID-19 fatality rate in Morocco stands at 1.8 percent while the recovery rate is 97.4 percent.
Meanwhile, 4,244,651 people have received so far the first vaccine shot against COVID-19 in the country, and 2,116,081 people have received the second dose.
Ethiopia
Ethiopia registered 1,704 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, taking the nationwide tally to 179,812 as of Wednesday evening, said the country's Federal Ministry of Health.
Meanwhile, 19 new related fatalities were reported across the country, bringing the national death toll to 2,592.
With 531 more patients recovering from the virus, the country's total number of recoveries reached 145,019, the ministry said.
Ethiopia, Africa's second most populous nation, has the fifth largest number of COVID-19 cases in Africa, after South Africa, Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt, and has so far reported the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the East Africa region.
Uganda
Uganda on Wednesday launched a rapid COVID-19 antibody test partly funded by France that developers hope to market in sub-Saharan Africa, where the laboratory infrastructure needed for extensive novel coronavirus testing is thin.
The test, which requires a finger prick to draw blood, was developed by a team at Makerere, Uganda's oldest public university, with partial funding from the French embassy.
The east African country has long experience of infectious diseases like HIV and Ebola which it has drawn on to develop diagnostics expertise.
"This is a point-of-care test that can be used within equatorial Africa village settings, remote areas where there's no laboratory, there's no electricity, there's no expert," said Misaki Wayengera, a researcher at Makerere's Department of Pathology.
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwean Vice-President Constantino Chiwenga on Thursday received his second Sinopharm dose at Wilkins Hospital in Harare.
The VP was the first Zimbabwean to receive the jab on Feb 18 as the country began its rollout of the COVID-19 vaccination program.
Zimbabwe has so far received two batches of the Sinopharm vaccine donated by China, and an additional batch of Sinovac doses which were purchased from the Asian country.
At least 37,000 people have been vaccinated in Zimbabwe, against a targeted population of 10 million, since the inoculation program started a month ago.
