An independent panel said on Monday that Chinese officials could have applied public health measures more forcefully in January to curb the initial COVID-19 outbreak, and criticised the World Health Organization (WHO) for not declaring an international emergency until Jan. 30.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo asked Pfizer Inc Chief Executive Albert Bourla on Monday if the state could buy COVID-19 vaccine doses directly from the U.S. drugmaker.
Infectious diseases and livelihood crises led the rankings of risks expected to pose a critical threat to the world in the next two years, according to a survey of more than 650 World Economic Forum (WEF) members from business, government and academia.
Human trials of a coronavirus vaccine combining Russia's Sputnik V shot with that developed by Britain's AstraZeneca and Oxford University are expected to start in early February, the chairman of Russian drugmaker R-Pharm told Reuters.
Two British hospitals are using blockchain technology to keep tabs on the storage and supply of temperature-sensitive COVID-19 vaccines, the companies behind the initiative said on Tuesday, in one of the first such initiatives in the world.
An estimated 1 in 8 people in England had antibodies against the coronavirus during December, suggesting they have had COVID-19 previously, an official estimate based on samples of the population showed on Tuesday.
China is using localised tactics to battle a wave of COVID-19 outbreaks, an approach that avoids the sort of widespread shutdowns that devastated the economy last year but is also sowing uncertainty ahead of the Lunar New Year travel season.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, received a COVID-19 vaccine and urged people across the world to accept the jab, saying that getting vaccinated was part of the Christian commandment to love our neighbour as ourselves.
The Philippines will buy 20 million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine, presidential spokesman Harry Roque said on Tuesday, adding to deals for a total of 72 million doses from AstraZeneca, Novavax and Sinovac.
Denmark's reproduction rate, indicating how many people one person infected with COVID-19 on average transmits the virus to, has fallen to 0.6 from about 1.0 a month ago, Health Minister Magnus Heunicke said in a tweet on Tuesday.