Coronavirus live news: Pfizer vaccine works on Brazil variant; US airlines ask Biden to back Covid travel guidelines | World news

Greece on Monday mourned a 37-day-old baby, the youngest among the country’s nearly 6,800 Covid-19 victims, AFP reports.

“Sadly today we had the pandemic’s youngest victim in our country, an infant that spent 17 of its 37 days fighting the coronavirus,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis tweeted.

“Today, grief is unbearable,” he said.

The health ministry said the baby boy was brought to an Athens children’s hospital in mid-February with a nasal inflammation and fever, and placed in intensive care a day later. He died on Sunday.

Nearly 6,800 people have died of the virus in Greece, while nearly 480 people are in intensive care.

The health ministry last week said it was calling for additional private hospital resources as it admitted that the public health system in Athens was under “unbearable pressure”.

Tunisia said Monday the first coronavirus vaccines were set to arrive to start mass inoculation in the North African nation using Russia’s Sputnik V jabs, AGP reports.

An initial 30,000 doses are due to arrive Tuesday from Russia, followed by 500,000 doses “in coming weeks”, a presidency statement read, citing “constant diplomatic efforts” to procure them.

Tunisia, which has some 11.7 million inhabitants and has recorded 237,704 Covid-19 cases including 8,201 deaths since the pandemic began, will be one of the last North African nations to start vaccinations.

The government had previously announced it was expecting an initial 94,000 doses of Pfizer/BioNTech and AstraZeneca/Oxford jabs from mid-February, but delivery under the UN-led Covax scheme was delayed. Beijing last month also pledged to gift 100,000 doses.

A vaccination campaign is expected to begin in coming days.

Lockdown measures remain in place, although rules have been eased slightly, with an overnight curfew now starting at 10:00 pm instead of 8:00 pm.

For travellers, mandatory quarantine at a hotel has been replaced by self-isolation at home for 48 hours.

Preliminary data from a study in Brazil indicates that the Covid-19 vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd is effective against the P1 variant of the virus first discovered in Brazil, a source familiar with the study told Reuters on Monday.

The source, who did not provide data details, said the study had tested the blood of vaccinated people against the Brazilian variant of the virus.

Coronavac, as the Sinovac shot is known, is the main vaccine currently being used to inoculate people in Brazil.

Major US aviation, travel and aerospace groups on Monday joined airline unions in urging the Biden administration to help establish temporary Covid health credentials to boost travel, which has been hard-hit by the coronavirus pandemic, Reuters reports.

In a letter to the White House Covid recovery coordinator Jeff Zients, trade group Airlines for America, the US Chamber of Commerce and the US Travel Association urged the administration to work with industry to “quickly develop uniform, targeted federal guidance for temporary Covid health credentials (CHC) covering both tests and vaccinations.”

The groups also said “Covid vaccines should not be a requirement for domestic or international travel.”

The White House did not immediately comment.

The Covid vaccine from Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE was able to neutralise a new variant of the coronavirus spreading rapidly in Brazil, according to a laboratory study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Monday.

Reuters: Blood taken from people who had been given the vaccine neutralised an engineered version of the virus that contained the same mutations carried on the spike portion of the highly contagious P.1 variant first identified in Brazil, the study conducted by scientists from the companies and the University of Texas Medical Branch found.

The scientists said the neutralising ability was roughly equivalent the vaccine’s effect on a previous less contagious version of the virus from last year.

The spike, used by the virus to enter human cells, is the primary target of many Covid vaccines.

In previously published studies, Pfizer had found that its vaccine neutralised other more contagious variants first identified in the United Kingdom and South Africa, although the South African variant may reduce protective antibodies elicited by the vaccine.

Pfizer has said it believes its current vaccine is highly likely to still protect against the South African variant. However, the drugmaker is planning to test a third booster dose of their vaccine as well as a version retooled specifically to combat the variant in order to better understand the immune response.

Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic with me, Helen Sullivan.

I’ll be bringing you the latest developments as they happen for the next few hours. I will also be posting some fun stories (headless slugs; are daddy long legs poisonous) to give everyone a much-needed break.

So rest assured you will be informed and entertained.

You can find me on Twitter @helenrsullivan if you feel I am not meeting my obligations as outlined.

Onto the news of the day.

The Covid vaccine from Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE was able to neutralise a new variant of the coronavirus spreading rapidly in Brazil, according to a laboratory study published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Monday.

And major US aviation, travel and aerospace groups on Monday joined airline unions in urging the Biden administration to help establish temporary Covid health credentials to boost travel, which has been hard-hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

Other key recent developments include:

• The reopening of schools in England will have an impact on infection rates that could affect the roadmap for lifting restrictions, prime minister Boris Johnson has warned, despite the number of new cases recorded in the UK having fallen to its lowest total since late September.
• Fully-vaccinated Americans can gather with other vaccinated people indoors without wearing a mask or social distancing.
• The pandemic has had an “extremely unfair” impact on the income and economic opportunities of women, US treasury secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday.
• Most Dutch coronavirus restrictions must remain in place for now, prime minister Mark Rutte said on Monday, with the evening curfew being extended until 31 March and foreign travel advised against until mid April.
• Italy’s coronavirus death toll eclipsed 100,000 on Monday, as prime minister Mario Draghi reiterated his pledge to speed up the vaccination programme.
• Italy approved the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine for people aged over 65 on Monday, after the Italian government had initially blocked the use for over-65s over doubts regarding the vaccine’s efficacy in that age groups and a lack of data.
• Preliminary data from a study in Brazil indicates that the Covid-19 vaccine developed by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd is effective against the P1 variant of the virus first discovered in Brazil.
• The EU’s executive criticised Belgium on Monday for extending its blanket ban on non-essential travel to and from the country despite the European commission asking it to ease restrictions on movement.
• The US federal government should be able to launch the delivery of $1,400 checks to around 160m American households almost immediately once Congress finalises the new coronavirus aid bill and president Joe Biden signs it.
• High schools in New York City will welcome students back to the classroom for in-person instruction on 22 March, mayor Bill de Blasio said on Monday.