A medical staff member prepares a dose of the CoronaVac vaccine at a newly-opened vaccine clinic in Central Ladprao shopping mall in Bangkok on May 12, 2021. (LILLIAN SUWANRUMPHA / AFP)
SEOUL / ANKARA / JERUSALEM / BANGKOK – Thailand plans to inoculate the majority of the adult population in Bangkok in the coming months to quell a flareup in virus infections that’s made the capital city the epicenter of the nation’s biggest COVID-19 outbreak.
More than 7 million residents will be able to get their shots at hospitals, malls, gymnasiums and mobile vaccine units, according to Sophon Mekthon, vice minister of public health. With only about 5 percent of Bangkok’s adult population currently vaccinated, the goal is to reach 70 percent as soon as possible, he said.
Thai authorities are adding all Bangkok residents to the priority groups, which include senior citizens, as the city accounts for the bulk of the nation’s new cases and as more vaccines become available. The Southeast Asian nation, which was largely successful in containing the pandemic for much of last year, has been hit by a third wave of infections that started in Bangkok’s night entertainment venues.
Thailand reported a new daily record of 34 COVID-19 fatalities on Wednesday, taking the country's death toll to 486, with 1,983 new infections, according to the Center for COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA).
Of the new cases, 1,974 were domestic infections while nine others were imported cases, CCSA spokeswoman Apisamai Srirangsan told a daily news conference.
India
The more-infectious coronavirus driving a catastrophic COVID-19 epidemic in India was detected in 44 countries, according to the World Health Organization, which urged more studies to understand its severity and propensity to cause reinfections.
The strain, identified in October, spawned three versions — B.1.617.1, B.1.617.2 and B.1.617.3 — amid an unprecedented spike in COVID-19 cases that made the South Asian country the site of world’s worst coronavirus crisis.
Though there may be important differences among the three, the available evidence is too limited to characterize them individually, the WHO said in a report Tuesday. Any impacts on effectiveness of vaccines or therapeutics remain uncertain, it said.
Early analysis suggests B.1.617.1 and B.1.617.2 have a substantially higher growth rate than other circulating variants in India, suggesting potential increased transmissibility. The strains rapidly appeared in multiple countries, the WHO said.
The number of new coronavirus infections in India has peaked, according to a new tracker developed by researchers at Cambridge Judge Business School and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research.
“But there is substantial variation among states and union territories in their trajectories, with cases continuing to increase over the next two weeks in areas such as Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Tripura,” the researchers wrote.
India on Wednesday posted a record rise in deaths from COVID-19 over the last 24 hours, pushing its total fatalities past the 250,000 mark.
Deaths from COVID-19 swelled by 4,205, while daily coronavirus cases rose by 348,421, with India’s overall caseload now surging past 23 million, according to health ministry data.
India's federal government has asked states to check the practice of dumping bodies of COVID-19 victims into the river Ganga, as the country struggles in a devastating second wave of infections.
India's federal minister of Jal Shakti (water resources), Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, said his ministry has taken serious note of the practice and given instructions for its prohibition.
Fiji
Fiji said on Wednesday night that it will tighten up measures to combat COVID-19 after the report of nine new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the Pacific island country over the past 24 hours.
According to Fiji's Health Ministry, of the new cases, three were reported in co-workers of a case confirmed Tuesday at the Extra Supermarket located in downtown Suva, capital of Fiji. The supermarket has been closed for disinfection.
Five of the new cases were all from Nausori, a town about 19 km northeast of Suva. The ninth case was a border quarantine worker.
A woman gets inoculated with the COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center in Mumbai on May 12, 2021. (PHOTO / AFP)
Pakistan
Chairman of Pakistan's National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) Asad Umar said on Wednesday that the registration of COVID-19 vaccination for citizens aged 30 to 39 will be open from May 16.
"As vaccine supply continues to improve and vaccination capacity gets enhanced in all federating units, we continue to expand the categories of those who are eligible to get vaccinated," Umar said on Twitter.
"Starting Sunday, the 16th of May, registration will be open to all 30 years and older citizens," the official added.
Pakistan also commenced the process of walk-in vaccination for the citizens aged 40 to 49 on Wednesday. The registered citizens will be able to walk into any COVID-19 vaccination center of their choice and get vaccinated.
Afghanistan
Afghanistan reported 370 new confirmed COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, raising its national tally to 63,088, including 5,793 active cases, the country's Ministry of Public Health confirmed.
"Laboratories conducted 2,082 tests during the past 24 hours, out of the total tests 370 were positive COVID-19 cases in 27 provinces of Afghanistan's 34 provinces," the ministry said in a statement.
Sri Lanka
Sri Lankan authorities on Wednesday declared that strict islandwide travel restrictions will be imposed in efforts to prevent the COVID-19 pandemic from spreading further in the Asian country.
Army Commander and head of the National Operations Center for the Prevention of COVID-19, General Shavendra Silva told Xinhua that the countrywide travel restrictions will come into effect from May 13 to 31.
According to Silva, the restrictions' implementation is divided into two phases, with the first phase starting from 11:00 p.m. on Thursday to 04:00 a.m. on Monday, followed by a daily curfew from 11:00 p.m. to 04:00 a.m. until May 31.
Japan
Technical problems derailed Japan’s coronavirus vaccination booking system on Wednesday, compounding frustration over the government’s handling of new outbreaks of infections and an inoculation drive that critics say has been woefully slow.
The online system to book a vaccine crashed in many places including parts of Tokyo and the western city of Minoh because of a global problem with U.S. cloud computing vendor Salesforce.com Inc, public broadcaster NHK reported.
Salesforce chief technology officer Parker Harris said on Twitter that the company was experiencing a "major disruption", later updating to say services had been mostly restored.
Australia
Authorities in Australia's second most populous state warned on Wednesday the next few days would be critical to preventing a coronavirus outbreak after a man in his 30s tested positive a day earlier for COVID-19.
The unidentified man was the first locally transmitted case in Victoria state in more than two months. Health officials said it was most likely he contracted the virus while serving his 14-day hotel quarantine in neighboring South Australia state.
"So far, we have just had the one positive case but the next day or two would be critical," Victoria state Health Minister Martin Foley told reporters in Melbourne as he confirmed there were no new cases in the state over the past 24 hours.
More than 100 passengers on a Jetstar flight from Adelaide to Melbourne with the man on May 4 have been asked to undergo COVID-19 tests and self-isolate. Around 35 people who were in hotel quarantine with the man, many of whom have since travelled interstate, were also urged to get tested and isolate.
Close contacts of the infected man have tested negative so far. Officials listed several potential virus-exposed sites in Victoria including supermarkets, an Indian restaurant and two train routes in state capital Melbourne.
Neighboring New South Wales state, the country's most populous, reported no local cases for a sixth straight day on Wednesday, further allaying fears of an outbreak there after a couple were diagnosed with the virus last week.
Qantas Airways Ltd pushed back the restart of international flights because of delays to Australia’s vaccination program and indications from the government that it will keep borders mostly closed until mid-2022.
The Sydney-based airline aims to open its overseas network from late December rather than the end of October, it said in a statement Wednesday. It will rely on a domestic travel boom and potential air-travel bubbles to underpin a recovery in the meantime.
Qantas increased services to New Zealand following the opening of a quarantine-free two-way travel bubble with Australia, but other international routes remain suspended as a wider resumption of travel is dogged by domestic vaccination delays. After suppressing COVID-19, the Australian government expected inoculations to be largely complete by October. That’s been pushed to 2022 because of complications tied to the AstraZeneca Plc shot.
Vietnam
Vietnam reported 52 new COVID-19 cases from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. local time Wednesday, including 49 locally transmitted and three imported, raising the total confirmed cases in the country to 3,623, according to its Ministry of Health.
The community cases were all detected in lockdown areas in northern and central localities, including 20 in the central Da Nang city, 11 in northern Bac Giang province, and nine in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi, among others.
Hanoi banned gatherings of more than 10 people in public places and requested the suspension of non-essential meetings and events.
The city, which is asking residents to leave home for essential reasons only, closed parks after a new outbreak centered in North Vietnam began April 27. The municipality also requested beer establishments, wet markets and most restaurants to close.
Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City have shut most schools. The country reported 3,571 infections and 35 deaths as of the morning of May 12, according to the health ministry’s newspaper Suc Khoe Doi Song.
Malaysia
Malaysia will follow a standardized protocol nationwide to make it easier for people to comply with social-distancing procedures as the nation bolsters efforts to stem a new wave of COVID-19 infections.
The decision comes after Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin extended the restrictions on movements nationwide to rein in the fresh wave that has left some hospitals low on ICU beds. There’s been confusion among the public over the different protocols that have been imposed from time to time to tackle the pandemic.
Malaysia recorded its highest single-day death toll from COVID-19 on Wednesday after the virus claimed 39 more lives, bringing the total deaths to 1,761, according to the Health Ministry.
Malaysia has suffered a resurgence of COVID-19 cases which has forced the government to impose a nationwide movement control order till June to curb the spread. The previous record for single day fatalities was reported on Sunday with 26 deaths.
The Maldives
The Maldives, which has one of the world’s fastest growing COVID-19 outbreaks, has tightened its restrictions.
Residents of Male, the capital, are now required to stay indoors from 4 pm, until 4 am and visas for tourists from India and other nations in South Asia will be halted from May 13, the Indian Ocean archipelago’s Health Protection Agency said in Twitter postings.
The curfew, which had previously started at 9 pm, will be imposed for a week. Other restrictions include a ban on group prayers at mosques, halting physical classes at universities and limiting restaurants to takeaways, the agency said.
Indonesia
Sinovac Biotech Ltd’s vaccine is wiping out COVID-19 among health workers in Indonesia, an encouraging sign for the dozens of developing countries reliant on the Chinese shot.
Indonesia tracked 25,374 health workers in capital city Jakarta for 28 days after they received their second dose and found that the vaccine protected 100 percent of them from death and 96 percent from hospitalization as soon as seven days after, said Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin in an interview on Tuesday. The workers were tracked until late February.
“We see a very, very drastic drop,” in hospitalizations and deaths among medical workers, Sadikin said. It’s not known what strain of the coronavirus Sinovac’s shot worked against in Indonesia, but the country hasn’t flagged any major outbreaks driven by variants of concern.
The COVID-19 cases in Indonesia rose by 4,608 within one day to 1,728,204, with the death toll adding by 152 to 47,617, the Health Ministry said on Wednesday.
According to the ministry, 4,671 more people were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of recovered patients to 1,584,878.
South Korea
South Korea reported 635 more cases of COVID-19 as of midnight Tuesday compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 128,918.
The daily caseload was up from 511 in the previous day, marking the highest in four days.
The daily number of infections hovered in triple figures since Nov. 8 last year due to small cluster infections in Seoul and its surrounding Gyeonggi province as well as imported cases.
Of the new cases, 220 were Seoul residents and 184 were people residing in Gyeonggi province.
Twenty-two cases were imported from overseas, lifting the combined figure to 8,630.
Five more deaths were confirmed, leaving the death toll at 1,884. The total fatality rate stood at 1.46 percent.
A total of 656 more patients were discharged from quarantine after making full recovery, pulling up the combined number to 119,373. The total recovery rate was 92.60 percent.
ALSO READ: Iran starts to mass-produce domestic COVID-19 vaccine
Iraq
An Iraqi official said on Tuesday that a 10-day full curfew to curb the spread of coronavirus would start at midnight, while the Ministry of Health said that the total COVID-19 infections in the country reached 1,122,914.
Tahseen al-Khafaji, spokesman of the Iraqi Joint Operations Command, told the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) that the restrictive measures, previously decided by the Iraqi authorities, including a full curfew from May 12 to 22, will start at midnight.
The restrictive measures also include closing malls, restaurants, cafes, and other public facilities, as well as preventing social gatherings, al-Khafaji said.
However, he said that the authorities' restrictions exempt the movement of trucks transporting goods and fuel on the roads and border crossings, according to INA.
Turkey
Turkey on Tuesday confirmed 14,497 new COVID-19 cases, including 1,582 symptomatic patients, pushing the total number of positive cases in the country to 5,059,433, according to its health ministry.
The number of daily cases are declining in Turkey since the full lockdown took effect on April 29.
The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 278 to 43,589, while the total recoveries climbed to 4,766,124 after 22,253 more cases recovered in the last 24 hours.
A total of 226,452 tests were conducted over the past day, with the overall number of tests in Turkey reaching 49,830,456.
Israel
Israel's Ministry of Health reported 47 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, raising the total number of cases in the country to 839,000.
The death toll from the virus remained unchanged at 6,378, while the number of patients in serious condition increased from 78 to 80, out of 137 hospitalized patients.
Qatar
The Qatari Health Ministry on Wednesday announced 392 new COVID-19 infections, raising the total number of confirmed cases in the Gulf state to 212,124, the official Qatar News Agency (QNA) reported.
Meanwhile, 862 more recovered from the virus, bringing the overall recoveries to 204,408, while the fatalities increased by three to 519, according to a ministry statement quoted by QNA.
The Qatari health ministry on Tuesday announced 343 new COVID-19 infections.
Lebanon
Lebanon registered on Tuesday 544 new COVID-19 infections, raising the total number of infections to 533,685, the Health Ministry reported.
Meanwhile, the number of deaths from the virus increased by 20 to 7,527.
Firas Abiad, director of Rafic Hariri University Hospital (RHUH), urged on Tuesday the Lebanese authorities to impose tough border restrictions while calling for more public adherence to safety measures as the COVID-19 variant first detected in India has already been identified in nearby countries.
READ MORE: India cases close to record highs as calls widen for lockdown
Singapore
Singapore's Changi Airport Group (CAG) announced on Wednesday that it will close all passenger terminal buildings to the public starting from May 13 to 26.
In addition, Jewel Changi Airport, the entertainment and retail complex inside Changi Airport, will also be closed for 14 days.
CAG said that Changi Airport remains open for air travel during this period. Passengers may also continue to be dropped off and picked up from the airport. Access to the passenger terminal buildings will be restricted to only passengers with air tickets and essential airport workers. Some essential services and the food and beverage outlets will remain open.
Singapore's Ministry of Health (MOH) reported 25 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday, bringing the total tally to 61,403.
Of the new cases, 12 are imported cases and 13 are community cases.
On Tuesday, 22 more COVID-19 patients were discharged from hospitals or community isolation facilities, bringing the total number of recoveries from the coronavirus epidemic to 60,975, the ministry said.
There are currently 144 active cases being treated in hospitals. Of them, three patients are in critical condition and held in the intensive care unit.
Iran
Iran on Tuesday reported 18,133 new COVID-19 cases, taking the country's total infections to 2,691,352.
The pandemic has so far claimed 75,568 lives in Iran, up by 307 in the past 24 hours, Sima Sadat Lari, spokeswoman of the Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education, said during her daily briefing on the state of the pandemic in the country.
A total of 2,144,197 people have recovered from the disease or been discharged from hospitals across the country, while 5,522 remain in intensive care units, said Lari.
The ministry said 17,343,568 tests have so far been carried out across the country.
Nepal
Nepal on Tuesday reported over 200 deaths from COVID-19 for the first time, and the dire situation has led to the extension of the lockdown in the Kathmandu Valley and the suspension of international flight till later this month.
According to the latest data released by the Ministry of Health and Population, a total of 225 fatalities were reported in the last 24 hours, a significant jump from 139 on Monday.
Meanwhile, the country with a population of some 30 million had 9,317 new confirmed coronavirus cases, breaking the previous day's record of 9,127. In fact, it has been witnessing over 8,000 cases per day for the last seven consecutive days.