World Coronavirus Dispatch: US sets record with 77,000 new cases

Russian spies target vaccine research, Global air passenger slump to last until 2023, UK readies more funds for health sector and other pandemic-related news across the globe

Nearly two-thirds of health-care industry leaders anticipate the pandemic will continue into the second half of 2021 or longer, according to a new survey.

The availability of an effective vaccine is the top concern for 71 per cent of the respondents, according to a Lazard survey of 221 executives and investors across the health-care industry that was published Thursday. The most important factor in bringing about a post-pandemic “new normal” is an effective and widely available vaccine, according to 61 per cent of respondents. Read more here 

Let’s look at the global statistics:

Total Confirmed Cases: 13,818,96. Change Over Yesterday: 253,252

Total Deaths: 590,231

Total Recovered: 7,718,606

Nations hit with most cases: US (3,576,430), Brazil (2,012,151), India (1,003,832), Russia (758,001) and Peru (341,586)

Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

At 77,000 daily rise in cases, US sets new record: The US shattered its daily record for coronavirus infections on Thursday, reporting more than 77,000 new cases as the number of deaths in a 24-hour period rose by nearly 1,000. The loss of 969 lives was the biggest increase since June 10. Read more here 

Russian spies target Covid-19 vaccine research: Russian spies are targeting organisations trying to develop a coronavirus vaccine in the UK, US and Canada, security services have warned. UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) said the hackers "almost certainly" operated as "part of Russian intelligence services". Russia has denied responsibility. Read more here 

Tokyo virus cases hit a record for a second day straight: Tokyo saw a second straight day of record coronavirus cases Friday, with 293 cases reported after 286 were reported on Thursday. Read more here 

China’s Xinjiang tightens controls after finding new coronavirus cases: The city of 3.5 million reported six confirmed infections on Thursday and Friday, along with 11 cases where the people didn’t display any symptoms, breaking a 10-day streak of zero new domestic cases in China. Read more here 
 

Global air passenger slump to last until 2023: Global airline passenger demand won’t recover to pre-coronavirus pandemic levels until the end of 2023 at best, Moody’s forecasts. Demand dropped by more than 90% within weeks of the onset of the pandemic. Read more here

UK readies more funds for health sector: Boris Johnson is set to announce more than $3.8 billion of extra funding to help prepare the UK’s National Health Service for the risk of a second peak in coronavirus cases. The PM is also due on Friday to announce plans to ramp up antigen testing for the virus to 500,000 a day. Read more here

Specials

Australian researchers invent 20-minute coronavirus blood test

The research team was led by BioPRIA and Monash University’s Chemical Engineering Department, including researchers from the ARC Centre of Excellence in Convergent BioNano Science and Technology (CBNS). Their test, using 25 microlitres of plasma from blood samples, looks for agglutination, or a clustering of red blood cells, that the coronavirus causes. While the current swab test is used to identify people who are infected with the coronavirus, the agglutination assay - or analysis to detect the presence and amount of a substance in blood - can also determine if someone had been recently infected, after the infection is resolved. Read more here

How a struggling company won $1.6 billion to make coronavirus vaccine

Novavax received the Trump administration’s largest vaccine contract. In the company’s 33-year history, it has never brought a vaccine to market. Novavax’s good fortune may appear puzzling, given its track record and the air of secrecy surrounding Operation Warp Speed. But for those in the insular biotech world where connections matter, it is far less surprising. In the face of a deadly pandemic that is devastating the economy, the government is placing huge bets on vaccines and treatments that could enable a return to some semblance of normal life. Read more here

Big business in Bangladesh: Selling fake coronavirus certificates

A hospital in Dhaka, Bangladesh, had been selling fake coronavirus certificates — thousands of them, at $59 apiece — indicating that a patient had tested negative, the Bangladeshi authorities said. They said they caught the hospital owner on Wednesday trying to sneak across the border into India disguised as a woman. Police officers said that when they arrested the owner — a man they identified as Mohammad Shahed, with a long criminal record — he was wearing a black burqa that covered him head to toe. Read more here 

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