Australia’s federal government will wind down emergency funding for people who lost work during shutdowns as nationwide vaccination rates rise, while neighbouring New Zealand’s daily cases jumped to their highest in weeks.
Deaths and Infections
EUROPE
* Sweden will offer additional groups, including people aged 80 and above, to top up their COVID-19 vaccinations with a third dose, the Nordic country’s health minister said.
* Italy’s health ministry said on Tuesday it had given the go-ahead for travel to six non-European tourist spots without the need for quarantine as a COVID-19 precaution either on arrival or return.
AMERICAS
* The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is leaning toward authorizing half-dose booster shots of Moderna’s vaccine, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday.
* At least 400,000 people in the United States have received booster doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine after U.S. health regulators cleared the third round of shots for millions of people, and a million more are seeking them, the White House said on Tuesday.
* Premier Jason Kenney promised Albertans the “best summer ever” when he lifted most COVID-19 public health restrictions on July 1, but a surge in infections has overwhelmed the Canadian province’s hospitals.
ASIA-PACIFIC
* China administered about 3.0 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines on Sept. 27, bringing total doses to 2.203 billion, data from the National Health Commission showed.
* India’s drug regulator has allowed vaccine maker Serum Institute to enrol kids aged 7-11 years for its trial of U.S. drugmaker Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine.
MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA
* Egypt is now providing immediate vaccinations at youth centres across the country without prior online registration, a step aimed at encouraging vaccinations and relieving pressure on hospitals and health units.
* Algeria will start production of Sinovac’s vaccine in partnership with China on Wednesday with the aim of meeting domestic demand and exporting the surplus.
Medical Developments
* Japan’s Shionogi & Co said on Wednesday it plans to make at least 1 million doses of a new antiviral treatment for COVID-19 for domestic use by March 2022.
* Pfizer and BioNTech have submitted initial trial data for their vaccine in 5-11 year olds and said they would make a formal request with U.S. regulators for emergency use in the coming weeks.
* The pandemic badly hit enrolment into clinical trials for drugs to treat cancer, heart disease and other conditions, an industry body said.
Economic Impact
* Asian shares lost ground on Wednesday, and were set for their worst quarter since the pandemic hit, as worries about economic growth in China combined with fears of a global slowdown and a strong dollar to push equities markets lower.
* Central banks that launched massive emergency support last year are now planning a global turn in the other direction, with gaps already emerging in their perceived risk of inflation, the need to respond to it, and the pace of the likely return to normal monetary policy.
* U.S. Senate Republicans for a second day in a row blocked a bid by President Joe Biden’s Democrats to head off a potentially crippling U.S. credit default, as partisan tensions rattled an economy recovering from the pandemic.
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Source: Reuters
