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The Overseas Situation Report Friday 6 August 2021

by Mike Evans

“Tough times are normal to come in your journey of life.  If we think about it with a calm head, there is a higher possibility we’ll deal with it better.” 

― Sarvesh Jain

To conclude another week of Overseas reports I will finish my roundup of the situation in the rest of the world with a look at Africa, Asia and Oceania. This will look at comparisons of a week ago to get a feel for what is happening in these areas.

First to Africa, where the cases have been on the increase for the past few months. Well there seems to be some good news in that the cases in the last week have dropped by 7% compared to the previous week. However with the good comes the bad in that the number of deaths in the past week has increased by 2% compared to the previous 7 days.

To look at this continent in detail, South Africa has been the main country where the virus has been the most prolific. However in the past week the country has seen the number of news cases drop by 7% from 81,053 to 75,484. The country also says that the number of deaths in the week fell by 8% although the figure of 2,507 is actually 37.5% of the total deaths in the whole of Africa in the past week.

This comes while Cape Town is struggling to cope with more than 38,000 active cases of COVID-19, making it the epicenter of the pandemic in Africa’s worst-hit country.

The provincial chairman of the Democratic Nursing Organization of South AfrIca, Elenor Roberts, said medical staff members were under immense pressure. “As of now, the situation in our rural areas, it is dire,” because there are so many COVID patients who need attention and “so few staff to look after these patients,” Roberts said. She said there were about 13,000 nurses in Western Cape province, far too few to handle the workload.

To date the country has administered over 8 million doses of vaccine but there is a lot of skepticism in the country about vaccines. About 54% of South Africans say they are unlikely to get a Covid-19 vaccine and almost half say they believe prayer provides more protection than the shots against contracting the disease, a survey showed.

The Afrobarometer survey of 1,600 South Africans highlights a hurdle for the government’s drive to inoculate two-thirds of its 60 million people in a bid to curb infections in the country, which is Africa’s worst hit by the disease, according to official statistics. Hesitancy is highest among those below the age of 35 and among the poor, according to the survey. Just 28% of those surveyed trust the government to ensure vaccines are safe.

Elsewhere in Africa there have been a number of countries showing increases in case in the past week. Morocco saw a 76% increase in cases compared to the previous week and has the second highest number of cases behind South Africa with 55,410 new cases in the week. More worrying is that the death count increased by 110% from 167 to 350 people in the past week. Kenya, Ethiopia Nigeria and Mauritania all showed increases compared to the previous 7 days. As has been highlighted in these reports in the past the big issue for Africa is getting the vaccines out to the people.  The lack of a stable health service in many countries and the sheer size of nations is making the vaccination programme very difficult and there are fears that Africa will be left behind in the world which is a bad thing for all the countries across the world.

In Asia the pandemic continues to hit many countries and this week saw an increase in new case across the 49 states that make up the Region of 13% compared to the previous 7 days. There were 1,822,642 new cases in the week and dceaths rose by 17% to 31,237. The countries with the largest number of cases were Indonesia and India. In Indonesia the  health ministry has recorded 1,747 new deaths of Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, pushing the nation’s total deaths to 100,636.

The south-east Asian country has been struggling to cope with the highly contagious Delta variant since it was first discovered in Indonesia in late June. According to Our World in Data, Indonesia’s total number of infections has now reached 3.53 million.

The country recorded a huge rise in cases at the beginning of July, and more than 30,100 deaths. High fatality numbers have left much of the country frustrated with their government, blaming a slow vaccine rollout, while others point blame at conspiracy theorists and anti-vaxxers. The COVID-19 death rate for people in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta who were not vaccinated was more than three times higher than those who were, according to new health ministry data.

As with Africa the issue is with the speed of the vaccination programme. In Indonesia, 18% of the population have had one dose of a vaccine, while 8% are fully vaccinated, according to health ministry data. Indonesia has had 100,600 deaths.

In India where they have seen a reduction in cases in recent weeks the past week saw an increase of 5%. However, on the good news front deaths reduced in the week by 1%. In terms of vaccinations, in India 27.7% of the population have had one dose of a vaccine and 7.8 % are fully vaccinated, according to government data.

Other countries where there has been a big increase in cases in the past week include Turkey where they have seen a 56% increase, Iran 23%, and Japan where the focus of the world is on the Olympic games, they have seen an increase of 110% in new cases in the week from 35,142 to 73,533. Japan is preparing to expand emergency restrictions to eight more prefectures to fight a surge in COVID-19 cases, as worries grow about strains on the medical system in Tokyo as it hosts the Olympics.

On Wednesday, Tokyo reported a record 4,166 new cases, while nationwide new cases topped 14,000. “New infections are rising at an unprecedented fast pace,” Economic Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura told a panel of experts reviewing the proposal for expanded restrictions. “Not just in the national capital region, but starting with the Kansai region and northern Kanto region, the number of new infections has surged across the whole country at levels we have never seen before.”

“The situation on the ground is extremely severe,” he said, adding: “We are seeing clusters where we’d seldom seen them before, such as at department stores, hairdressers and cram schools.”

The latest steps, to take effect from Sunday, mean more than 70 percent of Japan’s population will be under some restrictions. Already, six prefectures including Tokyo are under full states of emergency, which will remain in place until August 31, while a further five are under less strict “quasi-emergency” directives.

Finally to Oceania, and in the past week the region has seen a surge in new cases in Fiji, Australia and French Polynesia. In the region which since the start of the pandemic has fared better than most other areas in the world. In Australia there has been a 34% increase in new cases in the past week. Sydney reported its worst day of the Covid-19 pandemic on Thursday with five deaths and a record rise in locally acquired infections as a weeks-long hard lockdown is struggling to contain the highly contagious Delta strain of the coronavirus.

Four of the five people that died were unvaccinated while one had one dose, New South Wales state health authorities said, as they implored residents to get inoculated as early as possible.

Authorities also announced a one-week lockdown from Thursday in the region surrounding the state’s second-largest city of Newcastle, 140 kilometers (87 miles) north of Sydney, after six cases were reported there.

That will place an additional 615,000 people under lockdown, raising the total in New South Wales under strict stay-home restrictions to 6 million people out of 8 million in the state, or about a quarter of Australia’s population.

In the state of Queensland, whose capital Brisbane is under lockdown, another 16 Covid-19 cases were reported on Thursday, the same as the previous two days.

The state of Victoria, meanwhile, entered a weeklong lockdown as of 8 p.m. Thursday. People in Victoria must stay home unless they are doing essential work, buying food, getting exercise, receiving or providing healthcare or getting a Covid-19 vaccine.

With the new restrictions in place, some 13 million people across Australia’s three largest cities of Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane will be under lockdown from Thursday night.

Meanwhile in French Polynesia, the increase in the week has been just under 2000 new cases or a 34% rise. Restrictions are being reintroduced in French Polynesia in a bid to counter a rapidly worsening Covid-19 pandemic.

Within two weeks, the incidence of the virus has increased more than 40-fold, with case numbers since the start of the pandemic topping 20,000, including 149 fatalities.

While there was no Covid-19 patient in the hospitals in mid-July, the wards are again filling fast, with 40 patients in care and eight of them in ICUs. More than 90 percent of those admitted have not been vaccinated.

The French High Commission and the French Polynesian government have set a stop to all public events, limited public gatherings to no more than 20 people and funerals to 15.

A reintroduction of a curfew has been mooted, should the latest measures fail to curb the spread of the virus. Despite an abundance of vaccines, only about a third of the population has been inoculated, with officials warning almost 80,000 doses risk expiry by October. As with many people in Africa the local Polynesians are suspicious of vaccines and the government has had a hard time trying to convince people otherwise.

So in the past three reports we have been around the world and one thing we can see from these reports is that this virus is still amongst us and is not going to go away anytime soon.

So until the next time Stay Safe.

Total Cases Worldwide – 201,212,343

Total Deaths Worldwide – 4,274,299

Total Recovered Worldwide – 181,175,212

Total Active Cases Worldwide – 15,762,832 (7.8% of the total cases)

Total Closed Cases Worldwide – 185,449,511

Information and resources:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/weekly-trends/#countries

https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/448256/tahiti-gripped-by-new-covid-19-wave

The Overseas Report 4 August 2021

by Mike Evans

“Always remember, people have survived all sorts of challenges & struggles in every era. Let’s take the inspiration knowing ‘this too shall pass.’ Life is much more than it is right now.’’ 

– Rajesh Goya

The last Overseas report focused on the two Americas and the neighbouring countries and how the past week has seen an increase in Infections. For this report we will focus on Europe over the past week and see what has happened with regards to new cases and deaths.In the past week the whole of Europe has seen a drop of 8% in new reported cases but a rise of 8% in new reported deaths.

Four countries in Europe have the bulk of the new cases. These are the UK, Russia, Spain and France. Between them they represent 78% of the 872,444 cases reported across the region. As with many countries the Delta variant is the cause of these new surges in infections. In the UK it is estimated that 96% of new infections are from the Delta variant. On the plus side for the UK new cases dropped in the week by 27% compared to the previous 7 days. With regards to deaths in the UK these were also down compared to the previous week by 20%.

The latest surge of infections reached a peak on July 21 when the 7 day average was at 47,101 cases. Since then the country has seen a steady decline in new cases to 26,117 on  2 August.

The UK has now fully vaccinated 57% of its population and just recently relaxed rules for arriving travellers from a number of countries who previously had to quarantine for 10 days. Most of the country’s restrictions have been lifted as well so while cases are still being seem the rise is not as big as previous spikes and the percentage of people vaccinated will help the hospitals cope with any surges they might have.

In Russia where since the early days of the pandemic the figures that were quoted were always felt to be highly inaccurate, have also seen the weekly number of cases fall by 3%. However, the number of deaths has risen by 1%. It is worth noting that the total deaths announced in the week across the whole of Europe was 6,992. Russia had a death toll of 5,463, which equates to around 80% of the total deaths in Europe.

Overall Russia has confirmed 6,334,195 cases of coronavirus and 160,925 deaths, since the start of the pandemic,according to the national coronavirus information centre. Although the number of deaths attributed to Covid 19 is relatively low for such a large country it is interesting to see that Russia’s total excess fatality count since the start of the coronavirus pandemic is around 483,000.

The Kremlin’s ambitions to win soft-power dividends around the world from Russia’s COVID-19 vaccine are being hampered by delays in delivering Sputnik V to foreign buyers clamoring for supplies.

This week, Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei said his country would seek to replace 8 million planned doses with supplies from other producers by the end of year after delays receiving its initial order.

Countries that embraced Sputnik amid a global rush to secure vaccines are increasingly reporting supply problems with the second component in the two-shot inoculation. In Argentina, a presidential adviser said the shortages put the government at risk as people were unable to receive the second dose within the recommended period of three months after the first.

President Vladimir Putin has touted Sputnik to leaders around the world as part of an ambitious Kremlin drive to put Russia on the map as a major player in the international vaccine business. But difficulties producing the promised shots could relegate it to a secondary-role as rivals from the U.S., Europe and China fill the gap.

Meanwhile in Spain, over the week they have seen infections drop by 11% but regretfully deaths have risen by 152%. Spain recorded 160,929 new infections in the past week compared to 180,204 in the previous 7 days. However, deaths in the previous week were 149 and the past 7 days has seen that figure rise to 375.

Although there has been a slight drop in cases the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has decided to place Spain and the Balearic Islands in the dark red category.

Such a decision comes after the country registered an upsurge in Coronavirus cases, identifying more than 500 infections per 100,000 inhabitants during the last 14 days. Consequently, since Spain has been registering high infection rates, ECDC has advised against all unnecessary travel to the country and to the three islands, Ibiza, Palma, and Minorca.

Spain is one of the EU countries that has been severely affected by the Coronavirus pandemic. However, since the country’s economy significantly relies on the travel and tourism industry, the country decided to open its borders for several arrivals from the European Member States without requiring them to undergo testing and quarantine requirements.

The other country in the top four of the highest new cases of infection is France. In the past week France, unlike the other three countries, has seen the rate of infections rise by 20% and the number of deaths during the week has risen by 54%.

With France facing a fourth COVID wave, the government is making it harder for unvaccinated people to access certain public places. Over the weekend, protesters once again came out in force to show their opposition. The demonstrators feel their personal freedom is in danger, with some talking about a segregated society. Among other things — like relaxing the vaccination requirement for health care workers — they have been demanding that the health pass be withdrawn. But although the number of protesters has been going up every week, they don’t seem to represent the majority of the French. Only between 35% and 40% of the population supports their demands, according to a recent survey by polling institute Ifop.

A “health pass” will soon be required on trains, domestic flights and in long-distance buses, as well as in restaurants and cafes.

The pass consists of a QR code on a smartphone or on a piece of paper, and shows that people have been fully vaccinated, hold a recent negative PCR test result or have recently recovered from a COVID-19 infection. The QR code is already mandatory at cultural venues and its use will be extended on August 9, provided France’s highest court of appeal gives its go-ahead. The law will also make a COVID-19 vaccination compulsory for health care workers and those working with vulnerable people. In case of noncompliance, staff are to be suspended without pay.

French authorities are implementing the health pass in an attempt to boost vaccination rates and stem a fourth wave of COVID-19, fueled by the highly contagious delta variant. Daily infection rates have exploded in recent weeks, increasing from roughly 3,000 in early July to now over 20,000.

The government is aiming to reach collective immunity, which virologists believe can be reached with an immunization rate of 80% to 90% of the entire population.

Across the rest of Europe there is a mixed picture with regards to new infections. Around half of the countries listed have shown an increase in new cases, notably Germany, Italy and Denmark, while other significant decreases have been seen in The Netherlands, Sweden and Belgium.

In Italy whilst the number of infections is dropping the number of deaths in the week has increased by 22% compared to the previous seven days. This comes on top of an attack by Cyber hackers on one of the country’s largest health areas, Lazio. Hackers have attacked and blocked an Italian Covid-19 vaccination booking system, a source from Italy’s cybercrime police told CNN on Monday, marking the worst cyberattack the country’s health service has ever seen.

An investigation has been opened into the “very serious” attack on the IT system of the health department of Lazio, one of the most populated regions of Italy and home to capital Rome, according to a source from the Postal and Communications Police, which investigates cybercrime.

The attack by unknown perpetrators began early Sunday, a statement from the regional health department said. The attack, according to investigators, is likely still ongoing.Lazio regional health councillor Alessio D’Amato assured more than 500,000 citizens that had already booked their Covid-19 vaccines through August 13 would still be able to get their shot.

Speaking at a press conference on Monday, D’Amato called the attack “the most serious cyber-attack ever carried out on an Italian public administration.” “The technicians are working to safely reactivate the new bookings and no data has been stolen,” D’Amato said in a post on the region’s official Facebook page.

We all hope that this does not hamper the plans to vaccinate their citizens.

Until the next time Stay Safe

Total Cases Worldwide – 199,859,035 

Total Deaths Worldwide – 4,253,835 

Total Recovered Worldwide – 180,283,542 

Total Active Cases Worldwide – 15,321,658  (7.7% of the total cases) 

Total Closed Cases Worldwide – 184,537,377

Information and resources:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/news/ecdc-places-spain-balearic-islands-in-dark-red-category-warns-against-travel-to-the-country/

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/weekly-trends/#countries

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations?country=~GBR

https://www.dw.com/en/covid-19-france-makes-life-difficult-for-unvaccinated/a-58731429

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/08/02/business/italy-hackers-covid-vaccine-intl/index.html

The Overseas Situation Report Monday 2 August 2021  

by Mike Evans 

“The world we are experiencing today is a result of our collective consciousness, and if we want a new world, each of us must start taking responsibility for helping create it.”

– Rosemary Fillmore

If anyone thought we were seeing the beginning of the end of the pandemic, the past week has shown that we cannot take this virus for granted. All across the world many countries that thought they were over the worst have seen new cases emerging by the day. The worrying trend in some parts of the world is that deaths are also on the rise after many had seen the numbers reduce in the past few months.

In this report we take a look at the trend over the past week in both Northern and Southern Americas and the countries that lie inbetween and see where the virus is more prevalent than ever and where there does seem to be a slow down of both infections and deaths.

Let’s start by showing what has happened across the whole world in the past 7 days. We have seen an 11% increase in cases compared to the previous week and a 12% increase in deaths due to covid 19.

According to Worldometer.info there were 4,077,798 new cases reported in the past week. To put these figures into context we will look at the individual areas of the world that worldometer uses to show its statistics.

First to North America. This includes the countries of North America, the Central Americas and the Caribbean. In this area there has been a 41% increase in new cases during the past seven days compared to the previous week. This equates to an increased figure of 756,360 compared to 536,921 the week previous.

The USA, Mexico and Cuba account for almost 700,000 of these cases with the rest of the area contributing a relatively small number of cases. In terms of deaths the area recorded an increase of 22% with numbers rising from 4,900 in the previous 7 days to 5,988 in the past week. As with the increased cases, the same three countries accounted for almost 5000 of the deaths.

In the USA, weekly reported cases have risen by 51%, from 354,993 to 534,699. The increase in cases has also seen an  increase of 20%  in deaths in the past week from 1862 in the previous 7 days to 2228. The spread of the highly contagious Delta variant is largely responsible for the uptick in cases. This week we saw the President set out a new plan to combat this surge in new cases. President Joe Biden announced that all federal employees must attest to being vaccinated against Covid-19 or face strict protocols including regular testing, masking and other mitigation measures. These requirements will apply to military and civilian Defense Department personnel, and the department is also considering adding Covid-19 vaccines to the list of required vaccines for military personnel, the Pentagon said.

“With freedom comes responsibility,” Biden said. “So, please, exercise responsible judgment. Get vaccinated — for yourself, for the people you love, for your country.” Biden called on states and local governments to give each newly fully-vaccinated person $100 as an incentive to get more people inoculated.

“If incentives help us beat this virus, I believe we should use them,” the President said. “We all benefit if we can get more people vaccinated.”

Meanwhile its Northern neighbour Canada also saw a large increase of 56% in the week although in terms of actual numbers the rise was not as significant as the US. Canada’s top health officials are warning that Canada could be seeing the beginning of a fourth COVID-19 wave driven by the more infectious delta variant. The seriousness of the pandemic’s resurgence will depend largely on vaccination coverage — especially as provinces move forward with reopening plans — Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam said today. “I think we are in a slightly precarious period at the moment, in between these people trying to get the vaccines in and reopening,” Tam said. “As soon as that balance is tipped, and it wouldn’t take very much with a highly transmissible virus, you’re going to see an uptick in cases.”

The Public Health Agency of Canada released data on Friday that show fully vaccinated Canadians have accounted for less than one per cent of new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations since December. Of the entire population eligible to receive a vaccine, 81 per cent have received one dose and 66 per cent are fully vaccinated.

Further south in the Caribbean cases have risen dramatically in the past week although again with the populations of these countries the actual number of new cases is relatively small compared to the US.

The French owned territory of Guadalupe has followed France in seeing a big rise in cases from just 406 in the previous week to 1,724 in the past 7 days. Of the 29 Caribbean Islands that provide figures only Barbados, Dominican Republic, Cayman Islands, Costa Rica and Dominica have seen a drop in new cases in the past week. Other notable increases have come from Cuba, Martinique and Trinidad & Tobago. Apart from Haiti and Cuba the region does not seem to be experiencing the issue of deaths in the same way as the Northern American countries are in the past week.

Further south in the continent and we see that the countries that make up South America are faring slightly better than their northern neighbours in the past week. The past week saw a drop of 11% in reported cases compared to the previous 7 days. Brazil accounts for more than 50% of all the new cases with 2457,830. This is a drop of 11% on the previous week. The trend continues in deaths across the region with a drop of 10% week on week.

Only Guyana showed a rise in new cases with an increase of 22% which equates from 499 the previous week to 608 in the past seven days. Regretfully they have also seen a 55% increase in deaths from 11 in the previous week to 17 in the past seven days.

Colombia, which had seen new cases and deaths rise significantly over the past month, saw a dramatic drop of 32% in cases and 21% in deaths in the past week.

The drop in new infections across the region comes despite only Uruguay and Chile having vaccinated almost 65% of its population. The rest of the continent has been slow to vaccinate and currently only Colombia with 23% fully vaccinated is next highest followed by Brazil with 19% of its population fully vaccinated. It is a disturbing feature that both Paraguay and Venezuela have fully vaccinated just 4%  of their populations.

Unlike the rest of the world where the Delta variant is the major threat in South America the Lambda variant has been wreaking havoc with many of the South American countries.

In Peru, which has the highest deaths per capita across the whole world, this variant is responsible for almost all the cases in Peru. The WHO classified this variant as C.37 as a “variant of interest” after it appeared in a number of countries simultaneously. The virologist Pablo Tsukayama and his team at Lima’s Cayetano Heredia University have traced the evolution of the lambda variant in Peru for months after identifying it through genome testing. Lambda spread more quickly than variants deemed far more dangerous by the WHO out of the way, even prevailing over the gamma variant, which had run rampant in neighboring Brazil.

“We had 200 lambda infections in December,” said Tsukayama. “By the end of March, it made up half of all samples taken in Lima. [In June, it was] more than 80% of all infections nationwide. Lambda has become the dominant variant in Peru in a very short period of time.”

Tsukayama said lambda was more transmissible, which had helped it spread so quickly in Peru. “With  the highest mortality rates in the world, we are the country that has struggled most when it comes to the coronavirus,” he said. “Therefore, it is probably no wonder that the new variant has gotten its start here.” By the end of July, COVID-19 deaths in Peru had surpassed 195,000.

The drop in recorded cases in the past week is good news for Peru, as is the 22% decrease in deaths but until many more of their citizens get fully vaccinated these figures will remain very high.

We can all hope that those wealthy nations with surplus vaccines continue to send them to the poorer nations so the pandemic can be stopped across the world and not just in certain areas of the world.

Until the next time, Stay Safe. 

Total Cases Worldwide – 198,879,142 

Total Deaths Worldwide – 4,238,503 

Total Recovered Worldwide – 179,521,450 

Total Active Cases Worldwide – 15,119,189 (7.6% of the total cases) 

Total Closed Cases Worldwide – 183,759,953

Information and resources:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/07/29/health/us-coronavirus-thursday/index.html

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/weekly-trends/#countries

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-could-be-start-of-4th-wave-1.6123894

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations