Here we follow all developments on the spread of SARS-CoV-2 on an international scale.
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9:50 am – Pfizer asks Japan for vaccine approval
The North American pharmaceutical asked the Japanese Government to approve its vaccine produced in partnership with the German BioNTech.
Japan already has an agreement to supply 120 million doses of vaccines.
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9h35 – Thailand starts reopening to tourism
9:29 am – Macau goes to Beijing to present itself as a “healthy and safe” tourist destination
Macau will hold a tourist promotion at the beginning of next year in the Chinese city of Shanghai to captivate Chinese tourists, showing itself as a “healthy and safe destination” for covid-19, without cases for more than five months.
In September, after the resumption of issuing individual and group visas from China to Macau, the gambling capital of the world organized a week of promotional activities in Beijing.
Now, Macau will host the promotional activity of Macau Week in Shanghai between 7 and 10 January 2021, to convey to visitors from Mainland China the message that Macau is a healthy and safe destination to visit, ”said Government in a statement.
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9h10 – UK does not rule out new confinement after Christmas
A new national blockade cannot be ruled out after Christmas, the education minister told Sky News.
Watch live: @skynewsniall is joined by Schools Minister Nick Gibb and SAGE member Professor John Edmunds as more areas across the south of England prepare to move into Tier 3 restrictions https://t.co/uwzjlwUTst
— Sky News (@SkyNews) December 18, 2020
However, Nick Gibb insists that the multilevel system, currently in place, is effective.
Northern Ireland and Wales already have plans in place to return to a new confinement after Christmas.
Parts of England, including London, have entered or will enter Level 3, which requires the closure of all pubs and restaurants, except for take-away.
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8h54 – Xi Jinping wishes Emmanuel Macron a speedy recovery
The President of China, Xi Jinping, today wished the rapid recovery of his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, who contracted the new coronavirus, advanced Chinese state television CCTV.
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8h43 – Supreme Court of Brazil approves mandatory vaccination
The judges understood that the population cannot be forced to get vaccinated, but that each person’s individual decision is not above public health.
The decision represents a defeat for President Jair Bolsonaro who publicly declared himself against mandatory vaccination.
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8:40 am – French scientist sees no return to normality before autumn 2021
The French population should not return to “normality” before the fall of 2021.
“We have a virus circulating strongly at a time when we are leaving the second confinement,” said immunologist Jean-François Delfraissy.
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8:30 am – Russia with more 28,552 infected and 611 deaths
Russia reported an additional 28,552 cases of infection with the new coronavirus, of which 3,937 in Moscow, bringing the national total to 2,791,220.
A further 611 deaths were registered, bringing the number of deaths to 49,762.
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8:29 am – Former President of Burundi, Pierre Buyoya, died of Covid-19
8h25 – Serological study estimates 1.9% of the infected population in the first wave
A national serological study, with the objective of assessing the prevalence of antibodies against the virus that causes covid-19, estimates that 1.9% of the Portuguese population was infected with SARS-CoV-2 in the first wave of the pandemic.
“The results now presented allow an estimate of 1.9% of the global seropositivity of the population to the SARS-CoV-2 virus by September 2020”, which is equivalent to about 195 thousand people, announced today the João Lobo Antunes Institute of Molecular Medicine (iMM) that developed this study, financed at two million euros by the Francisco Manuel dos Santos Society and the Jerónimo Martins group.
The Covid-19 National Serological Panel (PSN), which took place between September 8 and October 14 in 102 municipalities in mainland Portugal and the islands, included a sample of about 13,000 volunteers, distributed across nine strata that crossed population density and the age group almost proportionally to the Portuguese population.
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8h15 – Germany with new record of contagions, plus 33,777 in the last 24 hours
Germany confirms 33,777 more infected and 813 deaths
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Germany has recorded 1,439,938 cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection and 24,938 deaths.
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8h07 – Mexico with 718 dead and more than 11 thousand cases in 24 hours
Mexico has reported 718 deaths from covid-19 and 11,799 cases of the disease in the past 24 hours, health officials said on Thursday.
The country has registered 116,487 deaths and 1,289,298 contagions since the pandemic began last February.
This is the third consecutive day that Mexico has registered more than ten thousand contagions, according to the Mexican Health Department’s daily bulletin.
Only 6% of cases are active, that is, 87,337 people have symptoms in the last two weeks, said Mexican Director of Health Promotion, Ricardo Cortés.
The data show a weekly upward trend, 17% in the estimated cases, or awaiting confirmation by test, and 3% in the number of deaths, he warned.
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8:00 am – China will vaccinate 50 million people by next February 12
China will vaccinate 50 million people, from specific professional groups, by February 12 next year, to prevent further outbreaks during the celebrations of the Lunar New Year, the largest internal migration on the planet.
According to the Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post, health professionals and police members will be the first to benefit from this massive vaccination campaign.
Fifty million people is almost five times the population of Portugal, but it represents only 3.5% of the total population of China, the most populous country in the world.
On Wednesday, staff at disease control and prevention centers across China were summoned to a virtual meeting, aimed at preparing the campaign to distribute 100 million doses of vaccines by Chinese pharmaceutical companies Sinovac and Sinopharm.
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7:34 am – State of play
Christmas will be able to be celebrated as a family. but with extra care. The recommendations were put forward by the prime minister.
On the last night, after the meeting of the Council of Ministers, António Costa warned, however, that “just after Christmas it is necessary to make a great effort of containment”.
António Costa communicated the measures for Christmas and the New Year by videoconference, given that finds in preventive prophylactic isolation. The test you performed yesterday was negative.
The Chief Executive also warned that the evolution of the Covid-19 pandemic will not allow celebrating Christmas with complete tranquility, but he said that the number of new cases and the number of people hospitalized is decreasing.
At the end of the year there will be tighter measures, namely circulation restrictions between December 31 and January 3.
On December 31, the curfew is from 23:00. On January 1, 2 and 3, it starts at 1 pm.