Coronavirus live news: WHO says there may never be a 'silver bullet' vaccine for Covid-19 - The Guardian

The Times says poetry is a casualty of the coronavirus pandemic as school exams are pared back.

In case you missed it, Donald Trump rejected calls for a national lockdown at his coronavirus press briefing and insisted the US “doing very well” in its fight against Covid-19.

On a day that the US had surpassed 4.7m confirmed cases of infection – more than a quarter of the global total – Trump tried to deflect criticism of his administration’s handling of the pandemic on to other countries.

In fact, while Australia and Japan are experiencing renewed surges, their total incidence of disease remains a fraction of the catastrophe now sweeping across the US.

In Germany, the total number of confirmed cases stands at 212,000, with fewer than 1,000 new cases per day.

On Monday, Trump signed a new executive order aimed at providing a lifeline to struggling hospitals and health centers in rural areas, while also extending telehealth services across the country, after virtual visits soared during the coronavirus pandemic.

Trump, who is counting on votes from backers in rural areas in the 2020 presidential election, said the new order would ensure that telehealth services expanded during the pandemic remained in place even after the public health emergency ended.

“Our healthcare workers should not bear the burden of deciding who lives and who dies,” they said in an open letter at the weekend, warning the health system was at risk of being overwhelmed.

The Philippines has so far recorded 106,330 cases, a number that is rapidly rising.

On Monday, the country reported a record number of infections for a fourth successive day.

UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, warned on Tuesday that the world faces a “generational catastrophe” because of school closures amid the coronavirus pandemic and said that getting students safely back to the classroom must be “a top priority.”.

This came on top of more than 250 million children already being out of school before the pandemic and only a quarter of secondary school students in developing countries leaving with basic skills, he said in a video statement.

“Once local transmission of COVID-19 is under control, getting students back into schools and learning institutions as safely as possible must be a top priority,” he said

“Consultation with parents, carers, teachers and young people is fundamental,” he said

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 879 to 211,281, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed on Tuesday

I mentioned a few posts ago that Hong Kong recorded fewer than 100 cases of Covid-19 for 3 August

For the first time in two weeks Hong Kong has reported fewer than 100 new cases of Covid-19 in a day

On Monday evening health authorities said 80 people had been diagnosed with the virus, with the infection source unknown for 24 of them

Driven largely by community transmission, 2,342 of Hong Kong’s 3,590 total cases have been recorded in the past month

The centre for health protection said they would observe the trend over the coming days before making any determination about whether the infection rate was declining

Citing anonymous sources, the South China Morning Post said mainland Chinese experts deployed to Hong Kong last week are assisting the construction of two temporary Covid-19 hospitals, and increased testing

The high number of infections has threatened to overwhelm Hong Kong’s public hospital system

Unlike other countries, which allow, encourage, or even require Covid-19 patients to recuperate at home if they have mild systems, Hong Kong sends everyone to a hospital isolation bed

New Zealand has recorded no new cases of Covid-19

But the country’s health director general, Ashley Bloomfield said a single case outside of the quarantine facilities could turn into a wider outbreak if people were not vigilant

“We have worked too hard to let that happen here,” he said at a news conference

He appears to have contracted the virus after visiting a restaurant in Seoul where a COVID-19 patient stayed, command officials said, adding that contact tracing is under way

The Beijing-baked Global Times has reported that Hong Kong has confirmed 78 new cases of coronavirus, citing to China’s National Health Commission

#HongKong reported 78 new confirmed #COVID19 cases on August 3, bringing the total number of infections in the city to 3,589: NHC pic.twitter.com/SoQq6RQCik