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ZURICH, Switzerland (AFP) — Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Roche said Tuesday it would produce a new antigen test for Covid-19, allowing high-volume and rapid testing for the deadly disease, by the end of the year. The new Elecsys SARS-CoV-2 Antigen test is meant to be administered by healthcare professionals in a lab setting and allows the detection of the virus that causes Covid-19 in as little as 18 minutes, Roche said. It said the “highly accurate” […]
SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — Thousands of North Koreans have packed into Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung square to pledge their support for the government — all of them wearing masks, unlike at a military parade only two days earlier. Authorities held the rally on Monday at the start of an “80-Day Campaign”, a mass mobilization drive to boost the economy ahead of a ruling party congress in January. Such efforts, often dubbed “battles”, feature extra-long […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — More than three million swabs have been taken in a matter of days in Qingdao, the Chinese port city where a minor coronavirus outbreak elicited a sweeping health response. Queues for testing stretched deep into Monday night across the eastern city, which detected six virus cases the day before but swiftly swung into action to head off a wider outbreak. In scenes which contrast with the fumbled efforts of other nations […]
by Chris Lefkow Agence France Presse WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Deprived of his beloved campaign trail for 10 days by Covid-19, President Donald Trump took center stage again Monday in Florida, vowing that he is in “great shape” with 22 days to go until he faces Joe Biden in the election. “I went through it and now they say I’m immune,” Trump told a cheering crowd in Sanford, near Orlando, few of whom […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — More than 10 million Americans have already cast their ballots in the US presidential contest, a tracking group said late Monday, a record pace three weeks before election day November 3. “Voters have cast a total of 10,296,180 ballots in the reporting states,” the US Elections Project of the University of Florida reported on its website. The project said the early-vote count is multiple times higher than it was at […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Johnson & Johnson said Monday it had temporarily halted its Covid-19 vaccine trial because one of its participants had become sick. “We have temporarily paused further dosing in all our Covid-19 vaccine candidate clinical trials, including the Phase 3 ENSEMBLE trial, due to an unexplained illness in a study participant,” the company said in a statement. The pause means the online enrollment system has been closed for the 60,000-patient clinical […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — French authorities could be forced to impose new lockdowns in a bid to contain another surge in coronavirus cases that is putting a strain on hospitals, Prime Minister Jean Castex warned Monday. “If over the next two weeks we see the epidemic indicators worsen, if intensive care beds fill up even more than we expect, we will indeed take additional measures,” Castex said in an interview with France Info radio. Asked […]
ATHENS, Greece (AFP) — Two moderate earthquakes of over 5.0 magnitude struck off the Greek island of Crete early Monday but there were no reports of casualties or damage. The Athens Geodynamic Institute said the first quake, with a 5.1 magnitude, hit at 4:11am local time (0111 GMT) about 47 kilometers (29 miles) northeast of the city of Sitia. A second quake, with a magnitude of 5.2, struck the same point exactly three hours later, […]
LONDON, United Kingdom (AFP) — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to present a new three-tiered alert system for coronavirus cases in England on Monday, with northwestern Liverpool expected to be the only city placed in the top category. Like governments throughout Europe, Johnson’s conservative cabinet is seeking to balance bringing down the rate of new infections against concern about the economy and frustration among voters. The new alert system, which will classify all […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — China aims to test more than nine million residents of the port city of Qingdao within five days following a minor outbreak of the coronavirus, health officials said Monday, the first mass testing in months. The country where the virus first emerged has largely controlled the pandemic, cutting a stark contrast to many parts of the world still afflicted by rolling lockdowns and high case numbers. On Sunday six cases of […]
by Abhaya SRIVASTAVA NEW DELHI, India (AFP) — India’s coronavirus cases surged past seven million on Sunday, taking it ever closer to overtaking the United States as the world’s most infected country. Health ministry data showed a rise of almost 75,000 cases on Sunday, taking the total to 7.05 million, second only to the US which has recorded 7.67 million infections. Experts say that the true number may be much higher, with testing rates in […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — President Donald Trump is no longer contagious, nine days after being stopped in his tracks by Covid-19, his physician said in a statement released late Saturday. “I am happy to report that in addition to the President meeting CDC criteria for the safe discontinuation of isolation, this morning’s COVID PCR sample demonstrates, by currently recognized standards, he is no longer considered a transmission risk to others,” Sean Conley said in […]
