UK dispatches 1,000 more ventilators to crisis-hit India – latest updates

Sunday, May 2:

UK sends 1,000 more ventilators to India as doctors rally

The UK has said it was sending an extra 1,000 oxygen ventilators to Covid-struck India, as a group of doctors staged their own intervention by offering long-distance telemedicine from Britain.

British authorities have already sent 495 oxygen concentrators and 200 ventilators to India as the country grapples with a devastating surge in coronavirus cases, and are shipping three larger production units, dubbed oxygen factories.

The 1,000 additional ventilators will come from British surplus capacity for Indian hospitals to help the most severe Covid cases, Downing Street said in a statement.

"The terrible images we have seen in India in recent weeks are all the more powerful because of the close and enduring connection between the people of the UK and India," Prime Minister Boris Johnson said.

"The UK will always be there for India in its time of need," he said, although Britain says it has no coronavirus vaccines to spare at this time.

Turkey reports nearly 26,000 new coronavirus cases

Turkey has reported nearly 26,000 new coronavirus cases on Sunday, the Health Ministry said.

A total of 25,980 infections, including 2,587 symptomatic patients, were confirmed in the last 24 hours.

Turkey’s overall tally is now over 4.87 million, while the nationwide death toll rose by 340 over the past day to reach 40,844.

As many as 75,182 more patients won the battle against the virus, taking the total number of recoveries past 4.48 million.

More than 47.74 million coronavirus tests have been conducted to date, with 240,145 done since Saturday.

France sees 113 new deaths 

France has reported 113 new coronavirus deaths in hospitals, down from 195 on Saturday, and the lowest since October, health ministry data showed, on the eve of an easing of the country's lockdown restrictions.

The number of people in intensive care rose by 4 over 24 hours, to 5,585, halting five consecutive days of decline.

There were also 9,888 new confirmed virus infections, taking the total to 5.65 million – the world's fourth highest.

France's death toll since the start of the epidemic stands at 104,819, the eighth highest tally globally.

Mexico records nearly 1,100 new cases 

Mexico's Health Ministry has reported 1,093 new confirmed coronavirus cases and 65more deaths, bringing the total number of cases in the country to 2,347,780 and fatalities to 217,233.

Separate government data published in March suggested the actual death toll may be at least 60% above the confirmed figure.

Saudi Arabia to open land, sea, air borders as of May 17

Saudi Arabia will lift its suspension on citizens travelling abroad and open land, sea and air borders on May 17, the Interior Ministry has said in a statement.

Saudi citizens who have received two vaccination shots, or one shot at least two weeks prior to travel, those who have recovered from coronavirus within the last six months and those who are under 18 years old will be allowed to travel, the interior ministry said. 

Italy reports 144 deaths, 9,148 new cases

Italy has reported 144 coronavirus-related deaths against 226 the day before, the Health Ministry has said, while the daily tally of new infections fell to 9,148 from 12,965.

Italy has registered 121,177 deaths linked to Covid-19 since its outbreak emerged in February last year, the second-highest toll in Europe after Britain and the seventh-highest in the world.

Britain reports 1,671 new cases, 14 deaths

Britain has reported 1,671 Covid-19 new infections as well as a further 14 deaths within 28 days of a positive test.

The official data also showed that 34.51 million people had received their first dose of the vaccine.

Indian court urges government action as hospitals cry help

With Indian hospitals struggling to secure a steady supply of oxygen, and more Covid-19 patients dying amid the shortages, a court in New Delhi has said it would start punishing government officials for failing to deliver the life-saving items.

On Sunday, India recorded a slight drop in new infections with 392,488 from a high of 401,993 in the previous 24 hours. It also reported 3,689 additional deaths, bringing the total to 215,542. 

Experts believe both figures are an undercount.

The government has been using the railroad, the air force and the navy to rush oxygen tankers to worst-hit areas where overwhelmed hospitals are unable to cope with an unprecedented surge in patients gasping for air.

Twelve Covid-19 patients, including a doctor, on high-flow oxygen, died on Saturday at a hospital in New Delhi after it ran out of the supply for 80 minutes, said S.C.L. Gupta, director of Batra Hospital.

The Times of India newspaper reported another 16 deaths in two hospitals in southern Andhra Pradesh state, and six in a Gurgaon hospital on the outskirts of New Delhi because of the oxygen shortage.

With the government unable to maintain a steady supply of oxygen, several hospital authorities sought a court intervention in the Indian capital where a lockdown has been extended by a week to contain the wave of infections.

"Water has gone above the head. Enough is Enough," said New Delhi High Court, adding it would start punishing government officials if supplies of oxygen allocated to hospitals were not delivered.
"We can't have people dying," said Justices Vipin Sanghi and Rekha Patil.

The court said it would start contempt proceedings.
New Delhi recorded 412 deaths in the past 24 hours, the highest since the pandemic started.

UK defends aid cuts after UN warnings of deadly impact

Britain has defended cuts to its aid spending, stressing the budget impact of the coronavirus pandemic, after several UN agencies warned they would translate into thousands of deaths among the world's poor.

"I've found the process of making those savings very difficult," Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told Sky News.

"We've had to make this extremely difficult decision to reduce and find savings in the aid budget, that's because of the impact Covid has had, the biggest contraction we've seen in the economy for 300 years," he said.

New Zealand resumes Perth travel bubble 

New Zealand has agreed to reopen its travel bubble with Western Australia, 24 hours after grounding flights when three people in Perth tested positive for the virus.

Health officials said that following consultation with their Australian counterparts they determined the risk to New Zealand was not significant and flight could resume on Monday.

However, anyone who has been at "locations of interest" identified by the Western Australian government cannot travel to New Zealand within 14 days of exposure.

Nigeria bans travellers from India, Brazil, Turkey 

Nigeria will ban travellers coming from India, Brazil and Turkey because of concerns about the rampant spread of coronavirus in those countries, a presidential committee has said. 

"Non-Nigerian passport holders and non-residents who visited Brazil, India or Turkey within Fourteen (14) days preceding travel to Nigeria, shall be denied entry into Nigeria," Boss Mustapha, chairman of the presidential steering committee on Covid-19, said in a statement.

Russia reports 8,697 cases

Russia has reported 8,697 new cases, including 2,699 in Moscow, taking the official national tally since the pandemic began to 4,823,255.

The government coronavirus task force said 342 people had died of virus-linked causes in the past 24 hours, pushing Russia's death toll to 110,862.

The federal statistics agency has kept a separate count and reported a toll of more than 225,000 from April 2020 to February.

UK sends 1,000 more ventilators to India

The UK has said it is sending an extra 1,000 oxygen ventilators to virus-struck India, as a group of doctors staged their own intervention by offering long-distance telemedicine from Britain.

Britain has already sent 495 oxygen concentrators and 200 ventilators to India as the country grapples with a devastating surge in coronavirus cases, and is shipping three larger production units, dubbed oxygen factories.

"We're going to be sending out another package of 1,000 ventilators, very shortly," Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told BBC television.

Vaccine campaign kicks off amid case-surge in northern Syria's Idlib

A Covid-19 vaccine campaign has kicked off in Syria’s last opposition-held enclave, with a 45-year-old front-line nurse becoming the first to receive a UN-secured jab.

Nizar Fattouh, a nurse in Ibn Sina Hospital in Idlib city, received one of 53,800 AstraZeneca vaccines delivered to northwest Syria through Turkey on April 21.

The vaccines come amid a new surge of infections in the war-torn country. Syria's supplies of oxygen are depleted and its hospitals were already overwhelmed from 10 years of conflict and deteriorating health care services.

India's daily deaths spike

India's new coronavirus cases have dipped marginally but deaths due to the infection jumped by a record 3,689, with one more state going into lockdown as the nation's creaky healthcare system is unable to cope with a massive caseload.

Authorities reported 392,488 new cases in the previous 24 hours to push total cases to 19.56 million. So far, the virus has killed 215,542 people.

Indian hospitals, morgues and crematoriums have been overwhelmed as the country has reported more than 300,000 daily cases for more than 10 days straight.

Thailand sees second day of record-high virus deaths

Thailand's Health Ministry has reported 1,940 new virus cases, while deaths hit 21 for a second day, the highest daily number of fatalities since the pandemic began.

Thailand largely controlled the virus early in the pandemic through shutdowns and strict border controls. But a deadly third wave that begin in early April includes the highly transmissible B.1.1.7 variant and has accounted for about half of its total cases and deaths.

Sunday's numbers brought the country's total confirmed infections since the pandemic began last year to 68,984.

Australia's Perth at risk of second snap-lockdown with three new infections

Australia's fourth-largest city is facing prospects of its second snap lockdown in two weeks, officials have said, after a hotel quarantine security guard in Perth and two of his housemates tested positive for the virus.

Western Australia (WA) Premier Mark McGowan said late on Saturday he had yet to decide whether the state's capital city, which last week emerged from a three-day snap lockdown after reporting one infection, would go into lockdown on Sunday.

"Our restrictions in place, and the use of masks, and the ability of our contact tracers and testing give us the ability to hold on a lockdown decision," McGowan told reporters late on Saturday.

Cambodia reports 730 cases

Cambodia has reported 730 new virus cases, the health ministry has said in a statement, as the country struggles to contain a wave of infections that emerged about two months ago.

The Southeast Asian nation has recorded one of the world's smallest virus caseloads, but the recent outbreak that was first detected in late February has caused infections to climb to 14,520, with 103 deaths.

Germany's cases rise by 16,290

The number of confirmed virus cases in Germany has increased by 16,290 to 3,416,822, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases has showed. 

The reported death toll rose by 110 to 83,192, the tally showed.

Brazil registers 2,656 deaths

Brazil has registered 2,656 Covid-19 deaths and 66,964 new confirmed cases, according to data released by the nation's Health Ministry.

The South American country has now registered 406,437 total coronavirus deaths and 14,725,975 total confirmed cases.

New cases in Brazil have fallen off a late March peak, but remain high by historical standards. Total deaths in the country are second only to the United States.

Mexico's confirmed death toll rises to 217,168

Mexico's health ministry has reported 3,025 new confirmed coronavirus cases and 261 more deaths, bringing the total number of cases in the country to 2,347,780 and fatalities to 217,168.

Separate government data published in March suggested the real death toll may be at least 60 percent above the confirmed figure. 

China reports 15 new cases

China reported 15 new mainland Covid-19 cases, down from 16 cases a day earlier, has said the country's national health authority.

All of the new cases were imported infections originating from overseas, the National Health Commission said in a statement. The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, stood at 16 compared with 16 cases a day earlier.

The total number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in mainland China now stands at 90,686, while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,636.

Jordan detects three cases of Indian Covid-19 variant

Jordan detected three cases of the Indian Covid-19 variant in people who had not travelled, the health minister has told state-owned Al Mamlaka TV.

"Two cases were recorded in Amman and one in Zarqa in people who did not travel, which confirms that the emergence of mutated cases does not necessarily have to come from outside, but rather as a result of specific reproduction," Minister Firas Al Hawari told Al Mamlaka TV.

Jordan recorded on Saturday 704 cases of Covid-19 with 35 deaths, bringing the total cases detected in the kingdom to 712,077 with 8,871 deaths, according to the health ministry.