Worldwide COVID news at a glance

1 US booster rollout will start on 20 September

US officials have expressed optimism that Covid-19 booster shot delivery can start for all adults on 20 September, the goal set by President Joe Biden, as cases continue to rage across the country fueled by the highly transmissible Delta variant.

The officials insist, however, that boosters will not be rolled out without US health agencies’ authorization, leaving open the possibility of delays.

Dr Anthony Fauci, ​​head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and chief medical adviser to Biden, was asked Sunday on CBS’s Face The Nation whether the 20 September goal remained the planned rollout date. He responded that in some respects, it is. They were hoping that they would get both the candidates, both products, Moderna and Pfizer, rolled out by the week of the 20th. It is conceivable that they will only have one of them out, but the other one will follow soon thereafter.

2 Israel population warned to get ready

coronavirus commissioner has weighed in on the grim reality of the ever-evolving global pandemic, warning citizens to be prepared for ongoing vaccine booster shots as new variants and outbreaks emerge.

Once the poster boy for vaccination rates, the middle-eastern nation now has a rolling average of 9300 daily cases. Israel has now broken a grim new record – the country with the highest seven day average of new cases per million.

Infectious diseases experts have said Israel may prove that the effectiveness of vaccines do indeed wane over time.

3 Brazil halts use of 12 million vaccine shots

Anvisa, the federal health regulator of Brazil, on Saturday (4 September) halted the use of over 12 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine that were produced in an unauthorised plant, reports Reuters.

Notably, Butanan Institute is a biomedical center that has partnered with Sinovac to locally fill and finish the vaccines. It further added that the ban was “a precautionary measure to avoid exposing the population to possible imminent risk.”

A 90-day-ban has been imposed on the unauthorised plant, and during this period Anvisa will seek to inspect the plant and find out more about the security of the manufacturing process.

4 Privacy alarm in Indonesia’s vaccine certificate

A leak online of the president’s COVID-19 vaccine certificate has heightened concern in Indonesia about information security, coming in the same week as a data breach affecting 1.3 million users of a government contact-tracing application.

President Joko Widodo’s vaccine records were accessed using the app, PeduliLindungi (care protect), and shared widely on social media, raising questions among experts about the government’s commitment to data security.

5 India covid conspiracy theories

A conspiracy theory going around at the moment is that India began treating people en masse with hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin and that was responsible for the fall in cases and deaths.

AAP fact checked the claim and found it was baseless.

“There is no evidence that new guidance on the use of ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine led to a reduction in COVID-19 cases in India,” they found. “In fact, hydroxychloroquine was reported to be in widespread use well prior to the country’s second-wave outbreak.”

Experts — including the ivermectin’s manufacturers — have repeatedly said there was no evidence the drugs were effective in treating COVID-19.

6 Bahrain Approves Third Booster Shot of Sputnik V

Bahraini authorities have authorised the use of a booster dose of the Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine, the first time the Russian shot has been approved for a third dose, the state-run Bahrain News Agency said on Saturday.

The booster shot was approved for use among all over-18s at least six months after receiving their second dose of the Sputnik V vaccine, the news agency reported. Bahrain and fellow Gulf state the United Arab Emirates have already approved third booster shots using the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.