(Reuters) – Here’s what you need to know about the coronavirus right now:
WHO Wuhan team heads to Hubei centre for disease control
A World Health Organization-led team investigating the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic was due on Monday to visit the Center for Disease Control and Prevention of Hubei province, the central Chinese region where the outbreak emerged in late 2019. The group of independent experts is conducting two weeks of field work, which has included visits to hospitals, markets, and an exhibition commemorating Wuhan’s battle with the outbreak.
The WHO, which has sought to manage expectations for the mission, has said that team members would be limited to visits organised by their Chinese hosts and would not have any contact with community members, because of health restrictions.
Two million Australians in lockdown over one case
About 2 million Australians begun their first full day of a strict coronavirus lockdown on Monday following the discovery of one case in the community in Perth, capital of Western Australia state, but no new cases have since been found. Authorities ordered a five-day lockdown after a security guard at a hotel used to quarantine people returning from overseas was found to have contracted the virus.
The state government said 66 people have been deemed close contacts of the unidentified guard and none of those already tested were infected. Tests on the rest of the close contacts were expected to be completed on Monday, state Premier Mark McGowan said.
Authorities seek to boost vaccination rates among Black New Yorkers
Black New Yorkers’ skepticism about vaccines developed at record speed to fight COVID-19 means they lag behind other racial groups in inoculations to fight the pandemic that has killed more than 400,000 people in the United States, officials said on Sunday.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said the state plans to run an advertising campaign that will seek to boost trust and dispel hesitancy among many Black New Yorkers to get the potentially life-saving vaccine. A similar pattern is seen among Black hospital workers in the state, according to Cuomo.
Israel extends lockdown, sees delay in COVID-19 turnaround
Israel extended a national lockdown on Sunday as coronavirus variants offset its vaccination drive and officials predicted a delay in a turnaround from the health and economic crisis.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promoted a speedy vaccination of Israel’s most vulnerable cohorts – around 24% of 9 million citizens – and the lockdown as dual pathways to a possible reopening of the economy in February. But a projected mid-January turnaround in curbing the pandemic did not transpire. Serious cases have surged among Israelis who have not yet been vaccinated. Officials blame that on communicable foreign virus strains and on lockdown scofflaws.
(Compiled by Karishma Singh; Editing by Ana Nicolaci da Costa)
