The EU promise
The European Union plans to export 700 million doses of anti-Covid vaccines by mid-2022. This was announced by the president of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, in a video message broadcast on social media. “The EU is the largest vaccine donor for Covid-19. We surpassed our sharing target in 2021, with 380 million doses shared. And we will do more. Team Europe has promised to share 700 million doses by mid 2022. We are on the right track “, underlines the president.
Brazil, due to Covid, Rio de Janeiro cancels Carnival again
by Daniele Mastrogiacomo
Third wave in India
India has officially entered the third wave of Covid 19: in the last 24 hours, the country has registered an exponential growth of new positives, almost 91 thousand new cases, with 325 deaths. This was announced by the daily bulletin of the Federal Ministry of Health, which also speaks of 2,630 cases of the Omicron variant. Compared to not even a week ago, the growth is almost 4 times: on January 1st there were 22,775 new cases in the country, last December 15th there were just 6,984.
On 3 January Delhi started vaccinating children aged 15 to 17: for this age group the government imposed the use of Covaxin, the inactivated viral vaccine made in India, developed by Bharat Biotech in collaboration with the Indian Council for medical research, authorized in the country a year ago, and approved by the WHO last November. To date, 90% of the Indian population has received the first dose and 62% also the second; from January 10, the government will begin offering a third “precautionary” dose to healthcare workers, front-line workers and over 60s, 39 weeks after the first injection.
Covid, first data from Israel on the fourth dose: it increases antibodies by 5 times
at Rossella Tercatin
Israel, 16 thousand cases
New absolute record of Covid infections yesterday in Israel. According to the Ministry of Health, 16,115 positive cases were detected on over 200,000 swabs, with a percentage of 7.89 percent. The contagion rate is now 1.99. Yesterday there were 12,000 positive cases. The number of seriously ill patients has meanwhile risen to 134, nearly 50 percent more than a week ago.
Meanwhile, the Israeli health insurance funds continue to administer a fourth dose of Pfizer vaccine to people over 60 who received the third over four months ago, to certain categories of chronically ill patients and to medical personnel. In a few days, according to the Ynet website, 132,000 people have already been immunized with the fourth dose.