COVID-19 WRAP | SA records 55 new Covid-19 deaths

March 23 2021 - 22:18

Just more than 500 new Covid-19 cases confirmed in SA in the past 24 hours

SA recorded just 510 new Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize said on Tuesday night.

This means that there have now been 1,538,961 total cases recorded to date.

According to Mkhize, the new infections come from 16,445 tests, at a positivity rate of 3.1%.

March 23 2021 - 18:25

More than 28 million Britons have received first Covid-19 vaccine dose

A total of 28,327,873 Britons have received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to official data released on Tuesday which also showed a further 112 deaths within 28 days of a positive test and 5,379 new cases.

-REUTERS

March 23 2021 - 14:25

US's Fauci says Astrazeneca's Covid-19 vaccine likely good, but company statement caused concern

AstraZeneca Plc's Covid-19 vaccine is likely very good, but an independent review board was concerned about how the drugmaker presented data in a press release this week, top US health official Dr. Anthony Fauci said on Tuesday.

"This likely a very good vaccine," Fauci, US President Joe Biden's Covid-19 medical adviser and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director, told ABC News' "Good Morning America" program.

But the data and safety monitoring board "got concerned" that the data in AstraZeneca's public statement "were somewhat outdated and might in fact be misleading a bit," he added.

Reuters

March 23 2021 - 13:58

France eyes 1.7-1.8m  Covid-19 vaccine injections this week-official

French authorities are aiming to administer 1.7-1.8 million Covid-19 vaccine injections this week, compared with 1.2 million last week following a four-day suspension of AstraZeneca's shot, an official with the health ministry said.

France resumed giving the AstraZeneca vaccine last Friday. 

Reuters 

March 23 2021 - 12:41

One year on from first lockdown, Britain grieves for Covid-19 dead

A year to the day after they were first ordered to stay at home to contain the spread of Covid-19, Britons will remember the more than 126,000 people who have lost their lives to the virus, a toll few could have imagined in March 2020.

March 23 2021 - 12:36

Wits grad designs app for medications after hours, as Cape duo's bicycle deliveries gain traction

When Johannesburg-based Raees Carim’s immune-compromised relative struggled to access essential medication after normal pharmacy operating hours, he realised they were not the only one in that predicament.

March 23 2021 - 12:17

March 23 2021 - 10:55

UK health minister says mistakes were made, one year on from first Covid lockdown

Mistakes were made in the original response to the coronavirus pandemic, health minister Matt Hancock said on Tuesday one year on from the first Covid-19 lockdown in England, adding there would be a time for an inquiry into the government's response."

We've actively admitted that things weren't right. One of the examples I think of is how at first we thought that this virus didn't pass on if you didn't have symptoms.

There were policy consequences from that assumption, and we've changed that," Hancock told BBC radio, adding that the government had already been learning from things that hadn't gone well.

"There will be a time for everybody to reflect and there'll be an inquiry to look back over all of this in the whole. But the honest truth of that is, we've been doing that all along."

Reuters

March 23 2021 - 10:50

COVAX to set aside 5% of vaccine doses for 'buffer'

The COVAX vaccine-sharing scheme will set aside 5% of the vaccine doses it procures for a "buffer" to be used in humanitarian settings or released in the case of severe outbreaks, the GAVI vaccine alliance said on Tuesday.

That amounts to up to 100 million vaccine doses by the end of 2021, it said.

Reuters

March 23 2021 - 10:25

Congo Republic presidential candidate dies of Covid as election results roll in

The main opposition candidate in Congo Republic's presidential election, Guy Brice Parfait Kolelas, has died while being evacuated for medical treatment, aides said on Monday, as early results from Sunday's vote showed the incumbent in the lead.

March 23 2021 - 08:20

Roche antibody cocktail shown effective in Covid-19 patients

New late-stage clinical trial data show an antibody cocktail of casirivimab and imdevimab reduced hospitalisation or death by 70% versus a placebo in non-hospitalised patients with Covid-19, Swiss drugmaker Roche Holding said on Tuesday.

Casirivimab and imdevimab also met all key secondary endpoints in the phase III trial with 4,567 participants, including the ability to reduce symptom duration to 10 days from 14, Roche said in a statement. 

Reuters

March 23 2021 - 07:52

Israelis vote on Netanyahu again, after vaccination success

Israelis began voting on Tuesday on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's political survival in a fourth election in two years, with the veteran leader hoping his role in a rapid Covid-19 vaccine campaign will win him another term.

March 23 2021 - 07:18

AstraZeneca may have provided incomplete efficacy data from latest Covid-19 trial -NIAID

British drugmaker AstraZeneca Plc may have provided an incomplete view of efficacy data on its Covid-19 vaccine from a large scale US trial, the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) said on Tuesday, in a fresh setback to the shot.

AstraZeneca said a day earlier that its Covid-19 vaccine developed with Oxford University was 79% effective in preventing symptomatic illness in a large trial in the United States, Chile and Peru.

"The DSMB expressed concern that AstraZeneca may have included outdated information from that trial, which may have provided an incomplete view of the efficacy data," the US agency said, referring to the independent Data Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB).

"We urge the company to work with the DSMB to review the efficacy data and ensure the most accurate, up-to-date efficacy data be made public as quickly as possible.

Reuters

March 23 2021 - 06:00

Zimbabwe's entire tourist town of Victoria Falls to get Covid-19 vaccination

Zimbabwe’s entire tourist town of Victoria Falls will be vaccinated against Covid-19 as a way to reduce the spread of the virus in one of its most-visited areas.

March 23 2021 - 06:00

ONE YEAR ON | Biggest Covid-19 headaches revealed as tracing teams talk about their challenges

Covid-19 track and tracing teams' biggest headaches over the past year included patients giving the wrong contact details and team members falling ill themselves, provincial officials told TimesLIVE.

March 23 2021 - 06:00

Private sector wants in on SA’s vaccine rollout

A growing frustration by business was clear when Shoprite CEO Pieter Engelbrecht said SA’s private sector should be allowed to secure vaccines in a bid to speed up the rollout.

He told BizTech that Shoprite “would certainly purchase for our employees to get those frontline people vaccinated as quickly as possible.”