Daily COVID Tracker: Brazil eases restrictions for international travellers

Brazil has eased its COVID restrictions for international travellers. Here are five updates about the pandemic this Monday.

Shanghai asks entire city to self-test for COVID

Shanghai on Sunday ordered its residents to undergo two more rounds of tests for COVID-19.

It said residents should self-test using antigen kits and report any positive results, while a nucleic acid test would be conducted citywide on Monday.

“The main task is to completely eliminate risk points and to cut off the chain of transmission so that we can curb the spread of the epidemic as soon as possible,” Wu Qianyu, an inspector from Shanghai municipal health commission, said.

Shanghai reported 7,788 daily locally transmitted asymptomatic cases on Sunday.

New cases won’t affect re-opening plans, says Taiwan

Taiwan says its COVID-19 cases will not affect plans to gradually re-open as hardly any of the new infections have caused serious illness.

Su Tseng-chang, Taiwan’s premier, said this on Sunday.

Su said the “new Taiwan model” in combating COVID-19 was a “normal life, active epidemic prevention and steady opening”.

“Although the number of confirmed cases will increase, more than 99.7% of them are mild or asymptomatic, so don’t worry, we can open up step by step steadily and live a normal life,” he added.

Taiwan has so far kept the pandemic well under control owing to strict and early control measures.

WHO suspends UN supply of Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin vaccine

The World Health Organisation says it has suspended supply of COVID-19 vaccine Covaxin, produced by India’s Bharat Biotech.

It said this was done to allow the manufacturer to upgrade facilities and address deficiencies.

It said the suspension is in response to the outcomes of WHO post-emergency use listing (EUL) inspection conducted from March 14 to 22. It, however, noted that the vaccine is effective and no safety concerns exist.

The WHO asked countries that have received the vaccine to take appropriate actions.

Brazil eases COVID restrictions for international travellers

The Brazilian health agency has eased COVID-19 restrictions as the health crisis subsides in the country.

It said vaccinated Brazilians and foreigners are now exempt from presenting proof of a COVID-19 test with a negative or non-detectable result. They are only required to present proof of vaccination, printed or electronically.

Under the rules, a traveller is considered fully vaccinated after taking two doses or a single dose of a anti-COVID vaccine, depending on the type of vaccine.

Travellers not fully vaccinated — as long as they are Brazilians and foreigners residing in the country — must present a COVID-19 test with a negative or non-detectable result.

Deliberate infection trial finds COVID symptoms don’t indicate transmissibility

The world’s first “human challenge” trial in which volunteers were deliberately exposed to COVID-19 has found that symptoms had no effect on how likely an infected person is to pass the infection on to others.

The research project, run by Open Orphan with Imperial College, London, showed that among the 18 participants that caught COVID-19, the severity of symptoms, or whether they developed symptoms at all, had nothing to do with the viral load in their airways.

“There was no correlation between the amount of viral shedding by qPCR or FFA and symptom score,” the researchers said.