Olympic Games Bars Foreign Fans, UK passes stage: Updating the virus

The delayed Tokyo Olympics will be held without foreign spectators, the organizing committee said, risking millions of dollars in lost ticket revenue. Britain has vaccinated half of all adults, the country’s health secretary wrote on Twitter.

AstraZeneca Plc has said it will supply 230 million vaccines through Covax in the next few months. Pfizer Inc. informed the European Union that any threat to ban vaccine exports could risk abandoning production if Britain retaliated by withholding key ingredients for its Covid-19 blow.

Meanwhile, Paris has entered a third blockade, Poland has closed shopping malls and Germany is approaching a threshold that could trigger more restrictions. Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan has yielded positive results and is isolating himself, the country’s health minister said.

Key developments:

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AstraZeneca reveals supply plans (7:52 am NY)

The UK drug maker will deliver 230 million doses of its vaccine to 142 countries in the next few months, President Leif Johannson said in Beijing. The announcement came as a result of failures in Europe, after Germany and other nations stopped administering the vaccine amid concerns about blood clots. However, the drama ended, with countries reinstating the doses after the regulator presented its benefits.

United Kingdom Vaccination Drive on Track (7:18 am NY)

More than half of adults in the UK have now received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine, prompting the nation to offer a first dose of vaccine by the end of July. In comparison, less than one in 10 adults in the European Union was inoculated.

However, Britain’s progress is under threat as resilient variants of the virus could undermine the effectiveness of the jab and so-called vaccine nationalism could stifle Britain’s steady supply.

Tokyo Olympics avoids foreign spectators (7:08 am NY)

The biggest international sporting event in the world will take place without spectators from abroad and the tickets bought by them will be refunded. A decision to limit domestic fans will be made in April, said Tokyo 2020 CEO Toshiro Muto.

Before the games were postponed last year, about 600,000 foreign visitors were expected to participate, in addition to more than 11,000 athletes.

Pfizer warns of interruptions (17:52 HK)

The drug maker has spoken to the EU as tensions over vaccine supply rise between the UK and the bloc. The manufacture of lipids – the fatty material used to deliver the genetic material to the Pfizer vaccine center and its German partner BioNTech SE – takes place in a secret location in the UK and is sent to the EU where the photos are completed.

“I have been clear to all stakeholders that the free movement of goods and supply across borders is absolutely essential for Pfizer and the patients we serve,” a Pfizer spokesman said in an email. The Telegraph first reported the talks on Friday.

Pakistani Prime Minister tests positive (17:46 HK)

Imran Khan is the latest head of government to contract the virus after Boris Johnson in Britain, France’s Emmanuel Macron, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro and former US President Donald Trump. Khan is self-isolating at home, Health Minister Faisal Sultan said in a tweet.

European cases accelerate (17:30 HK)

Poland has registered 26,405 new Covid cases in the last 24 hours, the second largest daily increase this year, causing the nation to close shopping malls. In Sweden, even if vaccinations with AstraZeneca are resumed, there is little chance that all adults will be fully vaccinated in two doses by June 30, says vaccine coordinator Richard Bergstrom in an interview with Svenska Dagbladet. There were two medical workers in Denmark admitThere were symptoms of blood clots within two weeks of the AstraZeneca shooting and one died, the Ekstra Bladet newspaper reported. In the Czech Republic, there have been signs of a pandemic easing, with the lowest number of working days in more than a month for new infections.

Senegal lifts emergency (5:25 pm HK)

Senegal has lifted the state of emergency, ending an hour’s night in the Dakar and Thies regions in an attempt to sustain an economy severely affected by traffic restrictions during a first wave of the virus. The decision comes as Senegal has reached the threshold of 1,000 coronavirus-related deaths.

German rate close to the restriction threshold (16:46 HK)

Germany’s seven-day incidence rate rose to 99.9 per 100,000 on Saturday, the highest in nearly two months, according to the country’s RKI health institute, and close to the threshold at which Chancellor Angela Merkel and regional officials agreed to re-impose restrictions.

On Monday, Merkel and state leaders will discuss whether the restrictions should be extended until April or even tightened, rather than eased, as the government suggested earlier this month, as the country faces a resurgence of the virus affecting Europe. Merkel said on Friday that Germany would do it will accelerate its Covid-19 vaccination effort in April, after regulators made everything clear for the AstraZeneca blow.

Daily cases in the Philippines reach registration (16:14 HK)

The Philippines, home to the second worst outbreak in Southeast Asia, reported a record 7,999 cases of coronavirus on Saturday, bringing the total to more than 656,000. The government has asked state offices that are not engaged in critical services reduce operations from March 22 to April 4.

Earlier, it ordered dining restaurants in areas, including Manila, to operate at half capacity until April 4. It also limited religious conferences and gatherings and closed museums and other tourist attractions.

Hungary’s daily cases, registration of deaths (16:12 HK)

Hungary has reported a record 227 daily deaths from Covid-19, while the country is struggling to reduce infections, despite having the second highest vaccination rate in the European Union. The new cases increased by 11,132 unprecedented.

The government announced on Friday the extension of a blockade – which would have expired on Monday and forced most stores to close – by at least another week.

Sri Lanka approves Sinopharm vaccine (3:21 pm HK)

Sri Lanka approved Sinopharm Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use, Xinhua reported, citing a government minister. It is the third vaccine to get approval in the country, after the AstraZeneca and Sputnik V shots.

Australia and New Zealand discuss corridor (8:05 am HK)

Australia and New Zealand could allow the two-way trip between them without requiring quarantine in a few weeks, the Australian Financial Review reported, citing Australian Trade and Tourism Minister Dan Tehan.

Chicago Hospital Reports Offsite Vaccines Off-Site (7:57 am HK)

Loretto Hospital, a safety net in West Austin, Chicago, faces heat it’s said off-site vaccination administration, including at the Trump Tower, according to local news reports.

The hospital’s board, which includes elected officials, says the events “resulted from a sincere desire to vaccinate as many eligible Chicagoans as possible – especially people of color.” But he added that the actions “do not fall within the scope of the main mission of Loretto Hospital”, and two directors were reprimanded, according to a statement on Friday.

The city “will not tolerate providers who blatantly disregard the Chicago Department of Public Health’s distribution guidelines,” Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Thursday.

Paris is closed (7:24 am HK)

A third blockade affecting several French regions, including the Paris area, took effect at midnight on Friday. Only the essential companies and schools will remain open, the restrictions will remain in force for four weeks. Like the rest of the country, the French capital has been under a nightmare since mid-January, with cafes, restaurants, bars and theaters closed. But the rate of infection has risen, and hospitals are under increasing pressure.

Several US states open photos to everyone (6:40 am HK)

At least three other states have said they will open vaccine eligibility to people 16 and older before President Joe Biden’s May 1 deadline. More than a dozen other states have said they will begin vaccination all adults until then.

North Dakota has said it will extend eligibility until March 29. Tomorrow and Vermont have said they will do so by April 19th.

It was reported that the outbreak hit Mar-a-Lago (6:11 am HK)