Asia

Singapore quarantines migrant workers after virus cases

SINGAPORE, Singapore (AFP) — Singapore has quarantined about 1,200 migrant workers from a dormitory after coronavirus cases were discovered among men thought to have already recovered from infections, officials said. Vast dormitories housing mostly South Asian workers were at the centre of Singapore’s initial outbreak last year, with the majority of the city-state’s cases in the self-contained complexes. The country’s outbreak has largely been brought under control with just a handful of infections detected daily, […]

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Japan faces new virus emergencies, three months before Olympics

TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japan’s government is to declare virus states of emergencies in Tokyo and three other regions on Friday, exactly three months before the Olympic opening ceremony, as new infections surge. The measures will be stricter than Japan’s last state of emergency, imposed in parts of the country from January, but still fall short of the harsh lockdowns seen in some parts of the world. “We have a strong sense of crisis,” Japan’s […]

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Record infections overwhelm India’s hospitals

by Bhuvan Bagga with Ammu Kannampilly in Mumbai NEW DELHI, India (AFP) — Delhi hospitals issued desperate appeals for oxygen on Friday and 13 Covid patients died in a fire, as India’s healthcare system buckles under a new wave of infections. The surge in cases, blamed on a new virus variant and the government allowing “super spreader” public events to go ahead, saw another 330,000 new infections and 2,000 deaths reported in the past 24 […]

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Syria government receives first Covax jabs

DAMASCUS, Syria (AFP) — The Syrian government received more than 200,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine via the Covax programme Thursday, state media said, in the first such shipment to government-held territory. The delivery comes as Syria’s war-ravaged medical sector grapples with a Covid-19 outbreak that has accelerated rapidly in recent months. The health ministry “received the first batch of vaccines provided by the Covax platform, which consist of 203,000 doses,” the official SANA news […]

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Germany expects to offer Covid jabs to all adults from June

BERLIN, Germany (AFP) — Germany is expecting to open up Covid-19 vaccinations to all adults in June at the latest, German Health Minister Jens Spahn said Thursday. Spahn told the Bundesrat upper house of parliament he expected Europe’s biggest economy to be able to “lift the prioritisation in June”, referring to current lists deciding who gets the jabs first. He added that the move may be possible even earlier. After a sluggish start to its […]

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Pakistan Taliban claim deadly blast at luxury hotel

QUETTA, Pakistan (AFP) — The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility Thursday for a deadly suicide blast at a luxury hotel hosting the Chinese ambassador in the southwest of the country, as officials raised the death toll to five. Beijing said it strongly condemned the attack, although the Taliban said Pakistan security officials were the target of the blast. The bomber detonated the explosives late Wednesday while inside a vehicle in the car park of the Serena […]

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Virus reaches Everest as climber tests positive

by Paavan MATHEMA KATHMANDU, Nepal (AFP) — A Norwegian climber hoping to summit Everest confirmed Thursday that he has tested positive for Covid-19, in a blow to Nepal’s hopes for a bumper mountaineering season on the world’s highest peak. The pandemic wiped out last year’s season but Nepal has eased quarantine rules in an effort to attract more climbers despite the difficulties of treating them if they contract the virus. “My diagnosis is Covid-19,” Erlend […]

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3 rockets hit Baghdad airport base housing US troops: security sources

  BAGHDAD, Iraq (AFP) — Three rockets crashed into a base at the Iraqi capital’s airport housing US troops Friday, security sources said, in the latest attack coinciding with tensions between Baghdad’s allies Tehran and Washington. One of the sources told AFP the projectiles hit the section of the airbase occupied by Iraqi troops, who share the base with soldiers deployed by Washington as part of the US-led anti-jihadist coalition. One Iraqi soldier was wounded, […]

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UAE warns of restrictions for unvaccinated as doses near landmark

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AFP) — The UAE announced Wednesday it had given nearly 10 million vaccine doses, equal to one for every resident, after warning that those who remained unvaccinated would face restrictions on their movement. The United Arab Emirates has mounted an energetic coronavirus vaccination campaign for its citizens as well as the foreigners who make up the majority of the population. However, daily infection rates remain high after it became one of […]

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Sinkholes fill Turkey’s breadbasket in drought

by Raziye Akkoc KARAPINAR, Turkey (AFP) — Sinkholes wide enough to swallow a bus dot the drought-stricken breadbasket of the Turkish plains, worrying farmers as they spread and creep closer to residential homes. “The drought situation is getting worse,” said farmer Tahsin Gundogdu, whose harvest includes potatoes he sells to the US food giant PepsiCo. The 57-year-old has seen the huge holes yawn open in the past 10 to 15 years as the overuse of […]

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India posts global record of 315,000 daily Covid cases

by Abhaya SRIVASTAVA NEW DELHI, India (AFP) — India posted a global record of almost 315,000 new Covid infections on Thursday as hospitals in New Delhi sent out desperate warnings that patients could die without fresh oxygen supplies. India’s long-underfunded health system is being stretched to the limit by a devastating second wave blamed on a “double mutant” variant and “super-spreader” mass gatherings. Health ministry data on Thursday showed 314,835 new infections in the past […]

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22 Covid patients die in India after oxygen supply disrupted

MUMBAI, India (AFP) — Twenty-two Covid-19 patients at a hospital in India were killed on Wednesday when the oxygen supply to their ventilators was disrupted by a leak. The tragedy comes as India battles severe shortages of medical supplies during a fierce second wave of coronavirus infections. The 30-minute leak from an oxygen tanker stationed outside Dr Zakir Hussain Hospital in Nashik, about 200 kilometres north of Mumbai, cut off supply to the ventilators of […]

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