In this April 26, 2020 photo, a commuter wearing a face mask to help curb the spread of the coronavirus, sleeps aboard the driverless Metro as it passes the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (PHOTO / AP)
ANKARA / JERUSALEM – Dubai plans to vaccinate all eligible adults by the end of the year, as the Middle East business hub uses a variety of shots and movement restrictions to contain the coronavirus.
“We are planning for 100 percent of eligible adults by the end of the fourth quarter of this year,” Amer Sharif, the head of Dubai’s COVID-19 Command and Control Centre, told Bloomberg TV.
Daily cases in the United Arab Emirates, of which Dubai is a part, have quadrupled since November as the country opened up for travel and eased movement restrictions. The surge forced Dubai to reintroduce curbs on hotels and air travel, and the emirate replaced its top health official last month.
Last week, an official from Dubai’s tourism department criticized the lack of compliance that’s driven cases up but said the city is confident about growth prospects.
While cases have jumped in recent months, the country has also rolled out an aggressive inoculation program. It has administered 4.2 million vaccine doses in a population of about 10 million, one of the highest rates of vaccinations per 100 people globally.
Indonesia
Indonesia approved China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd.’s COVID-19 vaccine for use on the elderly and may start inoculations between March and April, Health Ministry spokeswoman Siti Nadia Tarmizi said.
State-owned PT Bio Farma, which partners with Sinovac to produce the shots locally, received the approval in a letter from the food and drug agency, company spokesman Bambang Heriyanto said in a text message. Reuters reported on the approval earlier.
Indonesia started its mass inoculation drive on Jan 13 with a Sinovac vaccine. More than 777,000 people have received their first shot and about 137,000 have had a second, official data showed. The government plans to vaccinate 181.5 million people by March 2022.
COVID-19 infections and deaths continued to rise by record numbers in the Southeast Asian country in January. Authorities confirmed 191 deaths from the virus in the 24 hours through midday Saturday, bringing the total to 31,393. More than 1.5 million Indonesians have tested positive for Covid-19 and 939,184 have recovered from the disease.
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Afghanistan
Afghanistan received 500,000 doses of AztraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine from India on Sunday, the first to arrive in the country, which is still waiting for emergency approval from the World Health Organisation before it can use them.
Ghulam Dastagir Nazari, head of the immunisation program at the health ministry said the doses would be stored in Kabul until the emergency authorisation was received, which it hoped would happen in a week.
The vaccines were produced by the Serum Institute of India (SII), which is producing the AstraZenecca/Oxford University vaccine for mid- and low-income countries.
Malaysia
Malaysia’s government has kicked off a plan to temporarily house migrant workers in near-empty hotels across the nation to tackle the worsening spread of COVID-19 cases due to workplace clusters.
Malaysia’s Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry said in a statement on Saturday that the program will help curb the virus outbreak and indirectly assist hotel operators hurt by the pandemic.
“The initiative is the best alternative at the moment,” the ministry said. The plan is a collaboration between the ministry and the Department of Manpower of the Ministry of Human Resources, it said.
Overcrowded conditions in employee dormitories have been a key source of infections, spurring record cases and pressuring Malaysia’s health system. The nation has more than 1.5 million documented migrant workers, 91 percent of whom live in accommodation that doesn’t meet minimum housing standards, according to the Ministry of Human Resources.
The government’s plan also provides a lifeline for the tourism industry. More than 100 hotels have closed since the outbreak began almost a year ago, according to a Feb. 5 statement by the Malaysian Association of Hotels.
A recent video of a hotel manager selling the hotel’s food by the roadside in a popular hawker area is an example of many who have resorted to scaling down to cover expenses and employees’ payroll, the association said.
Thailand
The Thai government won’t procure COVID-19 vaccines through the World Health Organization-backed Covax program for now because the conditions are too strict. The move may put the country at risk of getting delayed vaccines at higher prices.
Under the program, Thailand would be charged extra for booking and it would have limitations on the producers and delivery period. Covax also requires a minimum purchase of 10 percent of a country’s population for a fast order with conditions and costs, Nakorn Premsri, director of Thailand’s National Vaccine Institute, said in a statement late Saturday.
“Acquiring the vaccines directly from the producers will be more flexible because we can decide how much we will buy and also negotiate pricing, which may lead to a cheaper price for large orders,” Nakorn said. Still, negotiations are continuing. With acceptable conditions, Thailand might procure the vaccine through the Covax program in the future.
Thailand Sunday confirmed 237 new COVID-19 cases, falling further from Saturday's tally of 490 and 586 on Friday, according to the Center for the COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA).
Of Sunday's new cases, 225 were domestic infections while 12 others referred to imported cases, said CCSA assistant spokeswoman Panprapa Yongtrakul.
Australia
Australians will be able to access their COVID-19 vaccination certificates on their mobile phones, allowing them to access hospitals and high-risk areas, and possibly to cross state borders, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
The plans are being considered by federal Cabinet ministers before Australians start receiving shots later this month, the newspaper reported.
Australia’s most-populous state tightened COVID-19 quarantine testing rules in a bid to stop the virus leaking into the community. Returned overseas travelers in New South Wales must now be tested two days after they complete 14-day hotel quarantines, NSW Health said in a statement.
Turkey
Turkey on Saturday confirmed 7,897 new COVID-19 cases, including 618 symptomatic patients, as the total number of positive cases in the country reached 2,524,786, according to its health ministry.
The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 108 to 26,685, while the total recoveries climbed to 2,412,505 after 8,089 more cases recovered in the last 24 hours.
A total of 137,649 tests were conducted over the past day, with the overall number of tests in Turkey reaching 30,486,691.
The country started mass vaccination of health workers against COVID-19 on Jan. 14 after the authorities approved the emergency use of the Chinese CoronaVac vaccine. More than 2,600,000 people have been vaccinated so far.
Israel
Israel's Ministry of Health reported 4,468 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, raising the tally of confirmed cases in the country to 685,324.
The death toll from the COVID-19 in Israel reached 5,057 after 37 new fatalities were added, while the number of patients in serious condition increased from 1,101 to 1,124, out of 1,717 hospitalized patients.
The total recoveries rose to 608,632, with 17,580 newly recovered cases, while the active cases dropped to 71,635.
The number of people vaccinated against the COVID-19 in Israel has surpassed 3.41 million, or 36.7 percent of the total population, since the vaccination campaign began on Dec. 20, 2020.
Kuwait
Kuwait reported on Saturday 846 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total confirmed cases in the country to 170,036, the Kuwaiti Health Ministry said.
Meanwhile, the ministry announced the recovery of 539 more patients, taking the total recoveries in Kuwait to 161,093, while the death toll remained at 964.
Currently, 7,979 coronavirus patients are receiving treatment in Kuwait, while 70 others are in the intensive care units, the ministry said.
Kuwait will use 15 health centers across the country as COVID-19 vaccination centers for citizens and residents, Abdullah Al-Sanad, the ministry's spokesman, said on Saturday in a press statement.
Lebanon
Lebanon registered on Saturday 2,496 new COVID-19 cases, raising the total infections in the country to 317,836, the Lebanese Health Ministry reported.
The total number of deaths from the virus went up by 67 to 3,562, according to the ministry.
Lebanon will start easing lockdown measures starting on Feb. 8 to enable the economic sector to resume operations amid an unprecedented economic and financial crisis in the country.
Iraq
The Iraqi Health Ministry reported on Saturday 1,660 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total nationwide number of cases to 627,416.
The new cases included 520 in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, 312 in Najaf, 192 in Karbala, 113 in Babil, and 112 in Basra, while the other cases were detected in the other provinces, the ministry said in a statement.
The ministry also reported eight new deaths, raising the death toll from the infectious virus to 13,111.
It said that 1,020 cases recovered during the day, bringing the total recoveries to 599,167.
A total of 5,892,705 tests have been carried out across the country since the outbreak of the disease in February 2020, with 40,481 done during the day, according to the statement.
Singapore
Singapore's Ministry of Health (MOH) reported 26 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, bringing the total confirmed cases in the country to 59,675.
All of the new cases are imported cases.
On Saturday, 32 more cases of COVID-19 infection have been discharged from hospitals or community isolation facilities. In all, 59,405 have fully recovered from the infection and have been discharged from hospitals or community care facilities, the ministry said.
The Philippines
The Department of Health (DOH) of the Philippines reported on Sunday 1,790 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the Southeast Asian country to 537,310.
The death toll climbed to 11,179 after 70 more patients died from the viral disease, the DOH said, adding that 11,388 more patients recovered, raising the total number of recoveries to 499,798.
The Philippines, which has about 110 million population, has tested over 7.58 million people since the disease emerged in January last year.
Bangladesh
Bangladesh has launched countrywide COVID-19 vaccination drive Sunday after a two-day pilot immunization program at the end of the last month.
Bangladeshi Health Minister Zahid Maleque on Sunday morning inaugurated the massive immunization drive by addressing health professionals through video conferencing from the capital Dhaka.
As part of the drive, vaccine shots are being administered in some 1,015 health centers across the country, including dozens in Dhaka.
India
India's COVID-19 tally rose to 10,826,363 on Sunday as 12,059 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours, said the latest data from the federal health ministry.
According to the official data, the death toll mounted to 154,996 as 78 COVID-19 patients died since Saturday morning.
This was the second consecutive day when the number of deaths recorded in a single day was below 100.
There are still 148,766 active cases in the country, while 10,522,601 people have been discharged so far from hospitals after medical treatment.
January 16 was a crucial day in India's fight against the pandemic as the nationwide vaccination drive was kicked off during the day. So far nearly 5.8 million people, mainly health workers, have been vaccinated across the country.
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Mongolia
Mongolia reported 34 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, taking its nationwide tally to 2,023, the country's National Center for Communicable Diseases (NCCD) said Sunday.
"A total of 14,978 tests for COVID-19 were conducted across Mongolia yesterday and 34 of them were positive," Amarjargal Ambaselmaa, head of the NCCD's surveillance department, said at a daily press conference.
New Zealand
New Zealand reported two new cases of COVID-19 at the border, said the Ministry of Health in a statement on Sunday.
There was no new case in the community, said the ministry.
On the community case reported on Saturday, high CT counts and serology results for the case indicated that the case was most likely historical and not infectious. The public health risk of the case was considered to be low, said the ministry.
The total number of active cases in New Zealand was 66 and the total number of confirmed cases in the country reached 1,964, it is said.