On Thursday, Australia reported its biggest pandemic caseload amid a runaway Omicron outbreak. The outbreak is driving up the need for hospitalization due to a surge and putting strain on supply chains, forcing authorities to ease quarantine rules for more workers. The number of confirmed cases in Australia has nearly doubled since the beginning of the pandemic as people remain unrestricted as they get used to living with the coronavirus. There have been more than 147,000 new cases confirmed, including about 92,000 in New South Wales (NSW), although that includes a backlog of positive at-h
The European Union regulators warn frequent COVID-booster shots could adversely affect the immune system and may not be feasible. According to the European Medicine Agency repeating the booster shots every four-month can weaken the immune response and might tire out people. In its report, the agency advised countries to leave more time between boosters and synchronize them with cold-season onsets in each hemisphere, following the blueprint set out by influenza vaccination strategies. Earlier this month, Israel become the first country to administer a second booster shot over people abov
Maya Angelou, a poet, and activist become the first Black woman to appear on the US quarter coin. The new version of the coin was unveiled on Monday by the US. The American Women Quarters Program, which was signed into law in January 2021, will also be the first figure commemorating. Angelou, author of "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" Amnesty International hopes to honor Angelou in the future. According to the press release from the agency, the US mint has started shipping the first few coins with Angelou’s likeness on the American quarter, a 25-cent piece. Mint Deputy Director Ve
In a new lockdown to curb the spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant of coronavirus, millions of residents in central China are home confined. A mass testing drive has been launched by the government to control the situation. 14 million residents are ordered to undergo testing. According to the reports, all the non-essential businesses are also shut down. Beijing is looking forward to hosting the Winter Olympics next month with its “zero-Covid” strategy. The city is under high alert due to the new outbreak with targeted lockdowns, lengthy quarantines, border restrictions.
On Sunday, according to the African Union’s health watchdog by AFP, Africa has recorded more than 10 million coronavirus cases. The African Centres for Disease Control (CDC) released the data showcasing the 55 member states of the African Union with more than 10,028,508 cases since the outbreak of the pandemic. The CDC confirms recording the death toll of 231,157. Several countries on the continent have enforced new restrictions following the discovery of the highly contagious Omicron variant in South Africa in late November. However, due to poor access to jabs and some vaccine hesitancy
According to the professor of biological science at the University of Cyprus and head of the Laboratory of Biotechnology and Molecular Virology, Leondios Kostrikis said that a new strain of COVID-19 was found. This new strain is the combination of the Delta and Omicron variants. On Friday in a televised interview he said, “there are currently omicron and delta co-infectious and we found this strain that is a combination of these two”. The new variant is named “deltacron” as the study suggests omicron-like genetic signatures are found within the delta genomes. Professor and his t
Due to the increasing number of Covid-19 cases caused by the highly infectious Omicron variant, Hong Kong is on alert and has decided on taking some stringent measures to curb the spread of the disease in the state. On Wednesday, the Hong Kong government barred flights from India and seven other nations for at least two weeks which is one of the most important steps to prevent the spread of the disease. Hong Kong has currently reported 114 cases of Omicron and all of them have been imported. However, the Special Administration Region (SAR) is currently witnessing the local spread of the di
The major countries like U.S, U.K and Australia are at the worst position in terms of the effects of the new Omicron variant. According to news agency Reuters, the U.S broke the record with reporting over million Covid-19 cases. The rapid increase in the Covid cases have also led to a sharp rise in hospitalization in the U.S with over 50% increase over the past week. More than 100,000 people have been hospitalised which has been the highest record of the year. The U.S is the worst hit due to the Omicron variant and has reported almost 978,856 new cases on Monday. However, the death rate ha
The United States on Monday again shook the world by reporting almost 1 million cases in one day as the true data of Covid-19 cases over the holiday season came into the limelight. As the highly mutated Omicron variant of Covid-19 is spreading fast like wildfire across the nation, the disease had spread rapidly during the holiday season but the government delayed the reporting of these cases which worsened the situation. The data collected on Monday was double the number reported just four days ago of 590,000 cases. The John Hopkins University collected the data which relies on the local gove
As the entire world is battling the spread of the highly infectious Covid-19 variant Omicron, there is another variant diagnosed in France ‘IHU’ which is said to be even more mutated than Omicron and is more infectious than the former. There are 12 persons who have already been infected with this new variant and if not controlled in time, it will likely spread like wildfire and would be another huge global issue to tackle. The researchers at the Institute IHU Mederranee Infection discovered this new variant of Covid-19, therefore, it is named ‘IHU’. According to the reports, the IH