Saudi authorities said Monday only people immunised against Covid-19 will be allowed to perform the year-round umrah pilgrimage from the start of Ramadan, the holy fasting month for Muslims. The hajj and umrah ministry said in a statement that three categories of people would be considered “immunised” — those who have received two doses of […]

*Vaccinates 0.2% of population By Sola Ogundipe Nigeria, with 818,865 COVID-19 vaccine doses administered as of 3rd April 2021, has inoculated 0.2 percent of its population. This is the development as more than 652 million COVID-19 vaccine shots have been given worldwide – enough to vaccinate 4.3 percent of the global population. According to data […]

Argentina’s President Alberto Fernandez, who has been vaccinated against Covid-19, announced late Friday that he had tested positive for the coronavirus. “At the end of today, after presenting a fever of 37.3 (99 Fahrenheit) and a slight headache, I performed an antigen test, which was positive,” he tweeted. A PCR test later confirmed the diagnosis. […]

Jordan’s Prince Hamzah said that he was told by the head of the armed forces not to leave his house or communicate with people, in videos released to international broadcasters hours after the army denied the prince was under house arrest. The head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Yousef Ahmed al-Hunaiti, denied reports that […]

The UK medical regulator said Saturday that out of 30 people who suffered blood clots after receiving the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, seven have died. The British acknowledgement of deaths comes as several European countries have paused the use of the AstraZeneca jab over a potential link to blood clots. The UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory […]

The Netherlands is halting AstraZeneca coronavirus jabs for people aged under 60 after fresh reports of rare blood clots, Dutch health authorities said on Friday. The move comes after five new cases in the Netherlands affecting women between 25 and 65 years of age, the health ministry said in a statement. “We must err on […]

The French parliament on Thursday massively criticized the coronavirus crisis management of President Emmanuel Macron’s government, the day after he announced new national restrictions. “We are not here to recognize your repeated failures,” said Damien Abad, head of the Republican faction in parliament, after a speech by Prime Minister Jean Castex. Left-wing politician Jean-Luc Melenchon criticized […]

Nearly one in seven Britons who tested positive for Covid-19 continued to have symptoms for at least 12 weeks, according to a UK study released Thursday. The Office for National Statistics said the study of over 20,000 people who had tested positive from April last year to March this year found 13.7 percent had symptoms […]

India on Thursday launched the third phase of its Covid-19 vaccination drive to cover people above 45 years of age, as the country faces a second wave of the pandemic. India began inoculating its 1.3-billion population in mid-January, in what is the world’s largest vaccination programme. Doses were initially limited to front-line workers, followed by […]

Three men on Thursday appeared in an Ikeja Magistrates’ Court in Lagos for allegedly forging COVID-19 certificate. The police charged Emmanuel Adelegan, 32; Ibrahim Abubakar, 30; and Tope Shoaga, 28, with conspiracy, obtaining money under false pretences and forgery. The prosecution counsel, Lucky Ihiehie, told the court that the defendants committed the offences on Feb. […]

An official of the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Thursday warned of a possible surge in coronavirus infections in the Middle East region during the Islamic month of Ramadan and the Easter holiday. Some Christians will celebrate Easter this weekend, while others, such as Egypt’s Coptic Christians, will celebrate in May. Ramadan, where observant Muslims […]

African disease authorities have detected a new coronavirus variant in a traveller travelling from Tanzania to Angola. The African Centres for Disease Control (CDC) said the variant had about 40 mutations. The head of the CDC, John Nkengasong, said in a news conference on Thursday that it was “certainly a variant of concern.’’ Tracking the […]

 Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who is currently imprisoned in a labour camp outside of Moscow, has gone on hunger strike to protest a lack of medical care. “I declared hunger strike with the demand to respect the law and to let the invited doctor see me,” Navalny said in a statement published on Instagram on […]

Days ahead of Easter and two weeks before Ramadan, the World Health Organization on Wednesday cautioned against crowded indoor celebrations that could trigger a fresh surge in coronavirus infections. “In countries experiencing widespread community transmission of the virus, virtual meetings, postponing or reducing such gatherings should be seriously considered,” said a WHO statement. “Regardless of […]

AstraZeneca says it respects this week’s decision by Germany to restrict the use of its coronavirus vaccine – but reiterated that the jab has been deemed safe by other health bodies. “We respect the decision taken by STIKO [the Standing Committee on Vaccination] in their advisory capacity for use of vaccines in Germany,” the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company […]