Filenews 11 January 2021
The World Health Organization announced today that it has been informed by Japan of a new variant of the new coronavirus detected in that country. Japan's Health Ministry said Sunday it detected a variant of the virus in four travellers from Brazil's Amazon State.
This variant carries 12 mutations, including one that exists in the highly infectious variants of SARS-CoV-2 found in England and South Africa.
With regard to vaccines, the WHO hopes to be able to start vaccinations in poor countries in February through the COVAX programme (multilateral initiative on the market and universal access to vaccines), said Bruce Eilward, a senior adviser to the Agency.
"More than 40 countries have now started vaccinations for Covid-19. However, all or almost all of these vaccinations have taken place in high- or middle-income countries so far. We need to see vaccines pass into the hands of both low- and low-middle-income countries," he stressed. The COVAX programme could start vaccinations in February. But efforts are being made to speed up the process and start from this month, he added.
The picture of vaccinations internationally
The Indian pharmaceutical company Dr. Reddy's Laboratories presented the results of the second phase of clinical trials of the Russian Sputnik-V vaccine to the competent regulatory authority of the country (Data and Safety Monitoring Board), it said in a statement.
The same communication states that the regulatory authority, after studying the results of the clinical trials, decided that the Russian vaccine meets India's safety standards and recommended that clinical trials continue without further changes. Following this development, clinical trial data were sent to the Auditor General of Medicinal Products of India to approve the third phase of clinical trials. "The results of the second phase of clinical trials in India showed a high degree of safety (of the vaccine).
This further reinforces our belief in the safety of the Russian Sputnik-V vaccine," the company's statement said, adding that "these clinical trials will be the bridge to the large-scale third phase involving 31,000 volunteers." M.M.ED
About ten countries will approve the Russian Sputnik-V vaccine by the end of January, the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Said today, clarifying that two countries have approved it in recent days.
According to the National Research Centre for Epidemiology and Microbiology N. Gamalay, which developed the Russian vaccine, applications for the acquisition of 1.2 billion doses of the Sputnik-V vaccine have been submitted by more than 50 countries.
In the last 24 hours in Italy, 12,532 new cases of coronavirus have been recorded and 448 people have died. A total of 91,656 diagnostic tests were carried out, 13.6% of which were positive. Yesterday the incidents were 18,627, with 361 deaths.
Compared to yesterday, patients with coronavirus in the country's ICU are 27 more and in hospital wards they have increased by 176. Since the beginning of the epidemic in Italy, 2,289,021 people have been infected, while the death toll has reached 79,203. With regard to the regions of the country with the most cases, today the region of Emilia Romagna (1,942) with Bologna as its capital is in first place. They are followed by Veneto (1,715), Sicily (1,587) and Lombardy (1,488). Finally, as far as Italian prisons are concerned, the number of prisoners who are positive in Covid is decreasing.
Source: eyenews/KYPE
