‘Very interesting. Many questions’: WHO wraps up visit to Wuhan virus lab

More than 103.8 million cases of coronavirus have been recorded worldwide with more than 2.25 million deaths, according to the latest data from Johns Hopkins University. The following is a summary of the latest developments on the virus around the world:

WHO Wuhan visit

A team of investigators working on behalf of the World Health Organisation (WHO) wrapped up a visit on Wednesday to a major virus research laboratory in China’s central city of Wuhan, in its search for clues to the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The experts spent about 3-1/2 hours at the heavily-guarded Wuhan Institute of Virology, which has been at the centre of some conspiracy theories that claim a laboratory leak caused the city’s first coronavirus outbreak at the end of 2019.

Most scientists reject the hypothesis, but some speculate that a virus captured from the wild could have figured in lab experiments to test the risks of a human spillover and then escaped via an infected staff member.

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“Very interesting. Many questions,” Thea Fischer, a Danish member of the team, called from her car as it sped away, in response to a question whether the team had found anything.

Some scientists have called for China to release details of all coronavirus samples studied at the lab, to see which most closely resembles SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the respiratory disease.

“I am looking forward to a very productive day, meeting the key people here and asking all the important questions that need to be asked,” team member Peter Daszak, who is the president of the EcoHealth Alliance, said from his car as it arrived earlier.

The WHO, which has sought to manage expectations for the mission, has said its members would be limited to visits organised by their Chinese hosts and have no contact with community members, because of health curbs.

While the novel coronavirus that sparked the pandemic was first identified in Wuhan, Beijing has sought to cast doubt on the notion that it originated in China, pointing to imported frozen food as a conduit.

The team will spend two weeks in field work after having completed two weeks in hotel quarantine after arrival in Wuhan.

China

China reported the fewest number of new Covid-19 cases for a single day in more than a month, official data showed on Wednesday, the latest indication that the current wave of the disease is subsiding ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday break.

Europe

EU lawmakers questioned chief executive Ursula von der Leyen for hours on Tuesday over the slow rollout and shortage of Covid-19 vaccines as she took responsibility for an export control plan that angered Britain and Ireland.

The number of French coronavirus patients were at their highest level since end November. France's National Authority for Health declined to recommend giving AstraZeneca Plc's Covid-19 vaccine to people age 65 and over, a spokesperson said Tuesday by phone, declining to be identified in line with its policy. France is counting on the AstraZeneca shot to speed up its vaccination campaign, after criticism of a slow start there and across the European Union. The inoculation adds to the vaccines by Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE and that of Moderna Inc. already being administered in the country. The French health authority is following the lead of Germany's immunisation authority, which has said the inoculation should be authorised only for people between the ages of 18 and 64 due to a lack of trial data in older groups. The EU's drug regulator on January 29th cleared the vaccine from AstraZeneca for all adults.

Scotland will tighten rules for anyone coming into the country in an effort to further suppress coronavirus infections as the government in Edinburgh set out an initial roadmap out of lockdown. "We intend to introduce a managed quarantine requirement for anyone who arrives directly in Scotland, regardless of which country they've come from," First minister Nicola Sturgeon told the Scottish parliament. The goal is to isolate Scotland – even from the rest of the UK – to keep infections on a downward trajectory. Scotland can't control people entering the country from other parts of Britain and she is urging the government in London to take a similar approach.

The UK variant of the coronavirus has developed a new, concerning mutation in a small number of cases, which scientists said makes it similar to the South African and Brazilian variants and could reduce the efficacy of vaccine.

In the Netherlands, health agency RIVM estimates that about two-thirds of newly infected people last week had the UK variant and therefore lockdown measures can only be relaxed with "the greatest possible caution." The Dutch government is expected to extend lockdown measures until at least March 2nd,   news agency ANP reported, citing people it didn't identify.

Sweden's Public Health Agency, meanwhile, said random checks suggest it's also seeing an increased spread of the British variant. It was found in almost 11 per cent of 2,220 samples analysed.

The Czech Republic recorded a 15 per cent jump in deaths in 2020, with the virus driving the annual increase to its highest level since the end of the second World War. The country recorded 129,100 deaths last year, 16,700 more than in 2019, the statistics office said Tuesday.

Asia-Pacific

New Zealand medicines regulator Medsafe has provisionally approved the use of a Covid-19 vaccine jointly developed by US drugmaker Pfizer Inc and Germany's BioNTech.

Smoke haze covered Australia's fourth largest city of Perth from a fast-moving bushfire that razed dozens of homes, complicating a tight lockdown after Western Australia state's first Covid-19 case in more than 10 months.

South Korea's president Moon Jae-in called for seamless preparations for coronavirus vaccinations, as a refrigerated van drove in convoy with several military and police escort cars in a drill at the capital's airport.

India is expected to grant emergency use authorisation for Russia's Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine this month or next, the Russian Direct Investment Fund said.

Americas

Venezuela will send further shipments of oxygen to help neighbouring Brazil treat Covid-19 patients, president Nicolas Maduro said, after sending a convoy of oxygen-filled trucks to the Amazonian city of Manaus last month.

The Biden administration will launch a new programme shipping coronavirus vaccines directly to retail pharmacies starting next week in an effort to increase Americans' access to shots.

New York City's coronavirus tracking data showed the pandemic's impact on the city on a downward trend, with the seven-day average of new cases at 4,585 as of Sunday, down from its January highs of 6,371, the largest case surge since the pandemic hit last Spring. "The numbers are going in the right direction," Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a briefing Tuesday. "But I'm extremely concerned by the variants. These are big open questions of what's coming at us." Daily hospital admissions totaled at 206 as of January 31st, just six above the city's hospital capacity comfort level of 200, and the previous day, it was below that threshold at 186. Testing for the virus produced a seven-day positivity rate of 8.20 per cent, down from January highs of 9.7 per cent.

Middle East an Africa

South Africa will get 2 million doses of vaccines from the COVAX vaccine distribution scheme co-led by the WHO in by March.

Uganda has ordered 18 million doses of AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccine.

Medical developments

Two Covid-19 vaccines from Chinese companies including Sinopharm triggered immunity against a highly transmissible coronavirus variant first found in South Africa, but their effect appeared weaker, a small-sample lab study showed.

Almost all people previously infected with Covid-19 have high levels of antibodies for at least six months that are likely to protect them from reinfection with the disease, results of a major UK study showed.

Economic impact

Asian shares and US stock futures rose on Wednesday as governments around the world looked poised to boost spending to help economies recover from the pandemic and vaccine roll-out programmes accelerated. Democrats in the U.S. Congress took the first steps toward advancing president Joe Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirus aid plan without Republican support.

Japan’s services sector shrank at the fastest pace in five months in January, as a heavy blow to demand from a resurgence in coronavirus infections and a state of emergency in parts of the country greatly hurt new business orders. – Reuters and PA