Covid news live: Latest updates as NHS leaders warn of the third wave

German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced that orders will be issued to close most stores starting Wednesday, along with schools and day care centers.

The new restrictions are expected to remain in effect until at least January 10 as the country grapples with a second wave of the epidemic.

However, German states are still expected to ease Covid-19 restrictions during the holiday period from Dec.24-26 in order to allow family members to gather.

Here’s more details on this warning that NHS leaders gave Boris Johnson about reviewing category restrictions on Wednesday.

NHS Providers, which represent NHS Trusts across England, are raising concerns that “the spread of the virus will increase rapidly once restrictions are eased, leading to a third wave of hospitalized Covid-19 patients completely as the NHS enters its traditional activities. Period.”

They also indicate a slower decrease in the number of patients compared to the first wave, with an increase in some areas.

“So trust leaders are so concerned about the task they face between late December and February as they try to balance large numbers of Covid-19 patients, the impact of mounting emergency stresses in the winter season, planned care that cannot be delayed any longer, and new demands for the vaccination program,” the sponsors add. NHS.

The He sent a letter to the Prime Minister He also urged the public to “think carefully” before organizing additional social contacts, especially with vulnerable people, during Christmas.

The Oxford / AstraZeneca syringe will likely be available by the end of the year, according to lead researcher Professor Sarah Gilbert.

When asked how many people would need to be vaccinated for life to return to normal, she told BBC correspondent Andrew Marsh Shaw: “If we are trying to protect the most vulnerable, then in this country we are planning to vaccinate about 20 million people based on age and also health care workers. In the front lines.

“This will have a major impact on the hospitals’ ability to return to normal. This will not prevent transmission completely, but it should prevent hospitalization and severe cases.

“And then to reduce it in the community even further, we will need more people to be vaccinated, and it will be something that we get with the data when we start to see the launch of the vaccine.”

About the chance for people to get the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine before the end of the year, she said: “I think the chances are very high. But we need multiple vaccines, all countries need multiple vaccines, and the world needs multiple vaccines and we need vaccines made using different technologies, if It is possible. “

She said that this is due to the possibility that companies will face problems in supplying raw materials when producing the doses, which may slow down the launch of the vaccine in the absence of other vaccines.

“So having multiple shots on target, multiple irons in the fire, is what we really need,” she added.

The lead researcher at Oxford Vaccine said the higher rates of Christmas infection mean the UK will take longer to “return to normal”.

Professor Sarah Gilbert has set the example in the United States, where the Thanksgiving holiday is believed to have contributed to the current record levels of deaths, of more than 3,000 deaths per day.

“If this kind of thing happened over the Christmas holidays, it would take longer to get things back to normal,” she said on the BBC’s Andrew Marr program.

“It is not possible to run vaccination clinics when staff are sick and there is a high transmission rate that affects people’s ability to come to vaccination clinics.

What we do over the next few weeks will have a huge impact on how long it will take to return to normal. We hope to be able to go back to normal in one way or another by summer, but that won’t be possible if we start from a very bad situation in January. “

The Minister of Health confirmed that residents of Scottish care homes will start receiving the Pfizer vaccine for the Corona virus from Monday.

NHS employees began receiving the vaccine on December 8 and so far more than 5,000 immunization workers and other key personnel have received their first dose.

The focus is now on residents and staff in care homes, who are in a high priority group identified by a UK-wide committee.

The Scottish government said a logistical solution had been found to “package” the vaccine from its initial batches to smaller package sizes that could then be brought into nursing homes.

Pfizer vaccine must be stored at minus 70 ° C before thawing, however it can be transported in an unfrozen state for up to 12 hours.

The government announced the first wave of areas in England to be subject to community testing.

As of Monday, December 14, a total of 67 local authorities can launch community testing programs to help limit the spread of the coronavirus.

So what exactly is the community test, where can you get it and is it mandatory? Here is everything you need to know.

The National Health Regulatory Authority in Bahrain announced that it had approved the registration of a coronavirus vaccine developed by the Chinese National Medicines Group (Sinopharma).

The statement cited data from the third phase of clinical trials that showed an efficiency rate of 86 per cent and said that Bahrain participated in those trials.

Bahrain, which earlier this month granted permission for the emergency use of the Pfizer / BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, said Thursday that it will provide free vaccines to all citizens and residents.

The government’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, has warned that the coronavirus will “backfire” unless people follow the rules until the vaccination program takes effect.

“We are entering a new phase of the epidemic, a phase that will be completely different because of the promise that vaccines hold. And although every person who is vaccinated is one small step back toward normal life, it is imperative that we remain clear and realize,” he wrote in the Guardian newspaper. We are not out of the woods yet. Vaccines will need to be given to millions of people to protect the vulnerable from severe disease, and we hope to limit transmission of the virus, but we don’t know this for sure yet. It will take time to find out everything we need to know, and it will take time for vaccination to reach levels Then we can begin to lower our caution.

“Let’s celebrate the scientific achievement, let us be happy that new vaccine technologies will change expectations for future infectious diseases, let us realize the international nature of cooperation in science and medicine, but let us not ignore the gains we have made by allowing the virus to spread while we wait for the vaccination to take effect.” It will be to continue to follow the rules. Avoiding the spread of the virus is essential, otherwise this virus will simply rebound. “

South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Sunday warned that Covid-19 restrictions may be lifted to the highest level after the second day of record increases in cases.

While presiding over an emergency meeting at the Central headquarters for disaster response and safety measures for the first time since February, the president urged caution and called for all-out efforts to contain the virus.

“If the outbreak cannot be contained now, it has reached the critical point of looking at escalating social distancing measures to the third level,” he said.

Seoul, home to about half of South Korea’s 52 million people, is currently subject to Level 2.5 restrictions. Gatherings of more than 50 people are banned, and restaurants are also prohibited from serving customers after 9 pm.

Level 3 restrictions essentially mean a lockdown for the first time in Asia’s fourth largest economy. Schools will switch to distance learning, companies can only allow essential office workers and gatherings of more than 10 people will be prohibited.

“We appeared on the wall,” said Moon. “This is a crucial moment to dedicate all our anti-virus capabilities and our administrative powers to stop the spread of the coronavirus.”

Italy now has the highest number of Covid deaths in Europe after overtaking the UK on Saturday night – at least by one metric.

The country reported 649 more deaths, bringing the official total to 64,036. The official UK total is currently 64,024, after adding 519 more deaths yesterday.

However, both numbers are thought to significantly reduce the number of true losses, due to missed infections, limited testing and different counting criteria. The total number of deaths in the UK is based on the number of deaths within 28 days of positive testing, and separate data based on the number of deaths recorded with Covid as the cause of more than 73,000 deaths as of 27 November.

The United States has the highest death toll in the world at 300,000, followed by Brazil, India and Mexico.