Covid Updates From Around the World

Europe: Starting today, people in England will be able to see what the inside of a pub looks like for the first time in months thanks to an easing of restrictions. And countries including Greece and Portugal are gradually opening their borders for the all-important summer tourist season. But at least in England, officials are worried about the growing prevalence of the highly transmissible B16172 variant first found in India.

Southeast Asia: Despite early successes at taming the coronavirus, Singapore and Taiwan are clamping down aggressively to combat new outbreaks. Singapore is sending most kids back to Zoom school this week, and Taiwan is limiting indoor social gatherings to five people.

North America: The one-week average of new cases in the US hit its lowest level since June. Meanwhile, the Canadian government has started to discuss reopening the border with the US, which has been closed since March 2020.

Read more at: Covid Updates From Around the World

USA: Coronavirus vaccines: The U.S. is awash in vaccine supply. Its new concern: Will demand keep up?

On the road to mass-vaccination, the U.S. is so far ahead that it's detecting new obstacles that remain, for much of the world, an afterthought on a distant horizon.

The proportion of the population who've received at least one dose is almost twice as high as in Canada, and it's 10 times higher for the fully vaccinated.

The vaccine supply in most states has ballooned to more than one dose per adult — that's allowed half of adults and nearly 40 per cent of the total U.S. population to have received a shot

Note EU-Digest: The US should do some coronavirus diplomacy and give some of their excess vaccines to countries which don't have the means to buy the vaccines.

Note EU-Digest: Read more at: The U.S. is awash in vaccine supply. Its new concern: Will demand keep up? | CBC News

Coronavirus vaccine: EU poised to secure Sanofi deal for coronavirus vaccine

French drugmaker Sanofi (SASY.PA) aimed at securing its COVID-19 vaccine for the 27 country EU bloc, the latest deal with vaccine producers.

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EU poised to secure Sanofi deal for coronavirus vaccine - Reuters

China: Chinese firm says coronavirus vaccine candidate shows promise in human test

China National Biotec Group (CNBG) said on Sunday that early human test results for a coronavirus vaccine candidate suggested it could be safe and effective, the second vaccine candidate from the firm to show encouraging results in a clinical trial.

The experimental shot, developed by a Beijing-based unit of CNBG, has induced high-level antibodies in all the inoculated participants in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial involving 1,120 healthy people, according to preliminary data of the trial, CNBG said in a posting on the social media platform WeChat, without disclosing specific readings.

Chinese companies and researchers have been allowed to test eight vaccine candidates in humans at home and abroad, making China a major front-runner in the race to develop a shot against the virus that has killed nearly 500,000 people globally.

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Chinese firm says coronavirus vaccine candidate shows promise in human test