Australia suffered its worst day since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, with cases surpassing the record posted more than a year ago as an outbreak of the Delta variant spreads.
New South Wales recorded 681 new cases, Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters on Thursday in Sydney, where stay-at-home orders have been enforced for almost two months.
Victoria state recorded 57 new infections—more than double from the previous day, and its highest tally since September—as Melbourne endures its sixth lockdown since the pandemic began.
Regional New South Wales will remain in lockdown until at least Aug. 28, in line with Sydney, Berejiklian said.
Meanwhile, vaccines against Covid-19 are less effective against the Delta variant, a large UK study showed in results that may fuel a push for booster shots for fully vaccinated people.
Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE’s messenger RNA vaccine lost effectiveness in the first 90 days after full vaccination, though that shot and the one made by AstraZeneca Plc still staved off a majority of Covid infections.
When vaccinated people did get infected with Delta, they had similar levels of virus in their bodies as those who hadn’t had their shots, backing up a recent assessment by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
One of Israel’s top health-care providers said initial results of a study found that a third Pfizer dose given to Israelis over 60 was 86 percent effective.
Key developments:
New Zealand finds outbreak source
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said officials are confident they have discovered how the Delta strain of the virus entered the country.
Current positive cases are a close match to a recent returnee from Sydney who arrived on Aug. 7, Ardern told a press briefing Thursday in Wellington. This was a “significant development,” she said.
Ardern put the country into a three-day lockdown this week after just one positive case was found in the community. Auckland and the nearby Coromandel region that the positive case visited were placed into lockdown for seven days. Case numbers have now grown to 21, will 11 new infections reported Thursday.
Thailand plan to protect manufacturing
The country started a pilot program to test, vaccinate and isolate factory workers to limit Covid-related disruptions to its export-driven manufacturing industry, one of the few bright spots in an economy crushed by the virus.
The “Factory Sandbox” initiative aims to protect 3 million jobs and support manufacturers who contribute about 700 billion baht ($21 billion) to gross domestic product, according to a government statement this week.
Meanwhile, new cases stayed below 21,000 for the third straight day, while fatalities topped 300 for a second day, government data showed. Cumulative infections rose to 989,859 and total deaths reached 8,586.
China developing promising antibody
Scientists from the Institute of Microbiology under Chinese Academy of Sciences and other institutions are developing a new antibody that may be effective against coronavirus and variant strains.
It stopped the virus from replicating and sickening laboratory animals, the study in the journal Nature showed. The antibody effectively prevented and treated infections from coronavirus and its variants, the institute says in a statement in its WeChat account.
Mexico sees record case increase
Mexico reported a record daily rise in cases with 28,953, bringing the total to 3,152,205, the Health Ministry said in its daily report Wednesday.
The ministry reported 940 new Covid-19 deaths, for a total of 250,469.
Mexico had vaccinated 61 percent of adults as of Aug. 16 with at least one dose, a little more than half having received complete vaccination, Deputy Health Minister Hugo Lopez-Gatell said on Twitter on Tuesday.
Delta accounts for 95 percent of new N.Y. cases
Nearly all positive coronavirus cases in New York state are linked to the high transmissible Delta variant, Governor Andrew Cuomo said.
The state is seeing a dramatic increase in cases, with 4,737 new positives reported on Wednesday, up from 823 cases one month ago, according to state data. There were 20 coronavirus-related deaths and 1,888 hospitalizations.
Samples collected between August 1 and August 14 showed 95 percent of the recent positives in the state are linked to the variant, Cuomo said in a news release. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 65.5 percent of New Yorkers have at least one vaccine dose.
Singapore to deport mask refuser
Singapore will deport a UK national who repeatedly refused to wear a mask in defiance of the Asian city-state’s strict social distancing rules, CNA reported.
Photos of Benjamin Glynn not wearing a mask on a train in Singapore’s central business district went viral, and he was charged for that violation as well as subsequently showing up for a court appearance without a mask.
Cases rise in three South African provinces
The South African provinces of the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal can expect to see their Covid-19 case rates rise in the third wave of infections in the country, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases said.
Gauteng, where a quarter of South Africans live, and North West, Limpopo and Mpumalanga are over the worst of the wave while the Northern Cape and Free State are continuing to see “a steady number of new cases.”
South Africa is the worst hit nation in Africa by the coronavirus, having reported over 78,000 deaths and 2.6 million infections. Bloomberg News