Former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo, a strident critic of China, on Tuesday alleged that an international report into Covid’s origins was a cover-up backed by Beijing. The long-awaited report by experts appointed by the World Health Organization and their Chinese counterparts said that the global pandemic likely came to humans from animals and […]
An international expert mission to Wuhan concluded in a report seen Monday that Covid-19 likely first passed to humans from a bat through an intermediary animal, with investigators all but ruling out a laboratory leak. The intermediate host hypothesis was deemed “likely to very likely”, while the theory that the virus escaped from a lab […]
Several coronavirus variants with the potential to be more transmissible have caused global concern over whether existing vaccines will still protect the world from a virus that is constantly mutating. Here’s what we know about them and what this implies for the Covid-19 pandemic. – How many variants? – Viruses continually mutate as tiny errors […]
As rich nations like the United States and pharmaceutical companies face sustained calls to share Covid-19 vaccine knowledge, the head of the World Health Organization on Monday decried the “grotesque” global inequality of vaccine distribution. “In January, I said that the world was on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure unless urgent steps were […]
Deadly small particle pollution in four of five nations exceeded World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations last year despite Covid lockdowns, according to a report released Tuesday. The partial or complete shutdown of transport and industry for months at a time in 2020 reduced average levels of so-called PM2.5 pollution across the world, including in major […]
Joe Biden makes his presidential debut at the G7 on Friday as America’s partners re-focus their collective heft on pandemic recovery and climate change after the psychodramas of the Trump era. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, this year’s chair of the club of wealthy nations, will convene the virtual talks at 1400 GMT, vowing to […]
The World Health Organization expert mission to China ended this week without finding the source of the coronavirus that has killed over 2.3 million worldwide. But the team of foreign experts did agree the novel coronavirus likely jumped from bats to an unknown animal species, before being transmitted to humans. It also concluded that it […]
A WHO expert sent to China to probe the coronavirus hit out at US intelligence on Covid-19 as his team headed home with few answers about the origin of a pandemic that was forcing more clampdowns in some of the hardest-hit parts of the world. German Chancellor Angela Merkel was set to seek an extension […]
The Chinese city of Wuhan marked one year since the start of its traumatic 76-day coronavirus lockdown Saturday while the pandemic continued to rage elsewhere, with US President Joe Biden warning America’s death toll could pass 600,000. Traffic hummed, sidewalks bustled, and citizens packed parks and public transport in Wuhan, underscoring the scale of the […]
Washington’s envoy to the United Nations held a virtual talk with Taiwan’s president on Thursday after her visit to the island was scrapped in a diplomatic volte-face during the chaotic last days of the Trump administration. Ambassador Kelly Craft praised Taiwan’s success in fighting the coronavirus while criticising China for blocking the island from global […]
The European Union started the approval process for its third vaccine on Tuesday after WHO scientists warned that herd immunity from coronavirus was unlikely this year even with mass inoculation schemes. The 27-nation EU — under fire for lengthy approval processes and slow national rollouts of drugs — promised an “accelerated timeline” after confirming drug […]
The United States logged a record new daily virus caseload as Joe Biden slammed the Trump administration’s vaccine roll-out as a “travesty” and millions in Asia woke up to new lockdowns. Almost 1.9 million people have now died from the virus, with new variants sending cases soaring and prompting the re-introduction of curbs on movement […]
The EU cleared a second coronavirus vaccine for use Wednesday, in a relief to struggling European countries as the world reached a grim new record of 15,700 deaths in 24 hours. The Moderna vaccine is now set to join Pfizer-BioNTech’s jab for use in the 27-nation European Union, where governments are grappling with soaring caseloads […]
Kanye West alleged affair with Jeffree Star explodes on social media amid reports Kim Kardashian is filing for a divorce. The news broke yesterday that it looks like power couple Kanye West and Kim Kardashian are headed for divorce. It comes as a sort of a confirmation more than a shock since they’ve been separated […]
The World Health Organization chief said late Sunday that he was self-quarantining after someone he had been in contact with tested positive for Covid-19, but stressed he had no symptoms. “I have been identified as a contact of someone who has tested positive for #COVID19,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a tweet. “I am well […]
The World Health Organization has urged countries grappling with coronavirus to step up control measures, saying it is still possible to rein it in, as some nations clamp fresh restrictions on citizens. With case numbers worldwide more than doubling in the past six weeks, Uzbekistan on Friday returned to lockdown and Hong Kong said schools […]
“This won’t protect American lives or interests—it leaves Americans sick and America alone.” Epidemiologists and public interest groups were among the critics condemning the White House’s announcement on Tuesday that the U.S. is formally withdrawing from the World Health Organization, five weeks after threatening to do so. The move was announced to WHO on Monday and […]
World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom said on Wednesday he expected the number of novel coronavirus cases around the world, now at about 9.3 million, to reach 10 million next week. Tedros also told a news briefing he backed Saudi Arabia’s decision to ban pilgrims from abroad from attending the annual Haj pilgrimage to […]
Global coronavirus infections topped nine million on Monday shortly after the World Health Organization warned that the pandemic was accelerating, even as France took its biggest step yet back to normality by allowing millions of children to return to school. Despite Europe further easing lockdowns, case numbers around the world are still rising, especially in […]
The World Health Organization warned Friday of a “new and dangerous phase” of the coronavirus pandemic, as infections continued to surge in the Americas, with Brazil registering more than one million cases. Colombia and Mexico also passed bleak milestones, as their death tolls topped 2,000 and 20,000, respectively, showing how the virus continues ravaging the […]
“More than 150,000 new cases of Covid-19 were reported to WHO yesterday—the most in a single day so far.” The head of the World Health Organization warned Friday that humanity is facing “a new and dangerous phase” of the coronavirus crisis. “The pandemic is accelerating,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. The remarks from came at a […]
President Jair Bolsonaro threatened on Friday to pull Brazil out of the World Health Organization after the U.N. agency warned Latin American governments about the risk of lifting lockdowns before slowing the spread of the novel coronavirus throughout the region. A new Brazilian record for daily COVID-19 fatalities pushed the county’s death toll past that of Italy late on […]
The World Health Organization announced Wednesday that clinical trials of the drug hydroxychloroquine will resume as it searches for potential coronavirus treatments. On May 25, the WHO announced it had temporarily suspended the trials to conduct a safety review, which has now concluded there is “no reason” to change the way the trials are conducted. The UN […]
Healthcare systems across Latin America risk being overwhelmed by the coronavirus, the World Health Organization has said, as the death toll from the disease in hard-hit Brazil nears 30,000. The warning from the global health body came as a sister UN agency issued new guidelines for pandemic-hit airlines that reveal what flying might look like when passenger planes take to […]
Increased antibiotics use in combating the COVID-19 pandemic will strengthen bacterial resistance and ultimately lead to more deaths during the crisis and beyond, the World Health Organization said Monday. WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said a “worrying number” of bacterial infections were becoming increasingly resistant to the medicines traditionally used to treat them. The UN […]
President Donald Trump has just announced he is pulling the United States out of the World Health Organization in the middle of a global pandemic. To support his move Trump claimed China controls the WHO. Trump says China “broke their word to the world on ensuring the autonomy of Hong Kong.” Says “the Chinese government […]
India’s top biomedical research body on Tuesday backed the use of the anti-malarial hydroxychloroquine as a preventive against coronavirus, after the WHO suspended clinical trials of the drug over safety concerns. The endorsement from the Indian Council of Medical Research came a week after US President Donald Trump said he was taking the drug as […]
The World Health Organization said Monday it had temporarily suspended clinical trials of hydroxychloriquine as a potential treatment for COVID-19 being carried out across a range of countries as a precautionary measure. The decision came after publication last week of a study in The Lancet which indicated that using the drug on COVID-19 patients could increase their chances of […]
The World Health Organization has reported the largest single-day increase in coronavirus cases, as US President Donald Trump proposed hosting world leaders for the annual G7 summit as a sign of “normalization.” The WHO said Wednesday that more than 106,000 virus cases had been reported — the most in a single day since the outbreak […]
The World Health Organization expressed concern on Wednesday about the rising number of new coronavirus cases in poor countries, even as many rich nations have begun emerging from lockdown. The global health body said 106,000 new cases of infections of the novel coronavirus had been recorded in the past 24 hours, the most in a single day […]