DevelopmentAid weekly review of the coronavirus situation across the world

(June 11 – 17, 2020)

“We cannot force people to stay at home anymore. We don’t have the resources for that. If we don’t relaunch the economy, the situation may collapse” announced the Prime Minister of Moldova during his weekly briefing on Monday, June 15. One of the poorest countries in Europe, on June 11 Moldova registered a record of 406 cases of COVID-19 in a single day (on the same day, the total cases recorded at global level was 138,400). The total number of infected people in this small landlocked country has reached 12,254, of whom 423 people have died and over 6,900 have recovered. Despite a two month state of emergency and social and economic restrictions, the curve of coronavirus cases has not yet flattened.

Globally, the number of coronavirus victims continues to grow. This week, the eighth million patient was recorded with the total number of cases reaching 8,126,000 according to Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center. The United States of America continues to be the most affected country with over 2.1 million infected people. Brazil continues to struggle to contain the spread, with almost 1 million cases registered while Russia has apparently managed to contain the outbreak with the daily number of new cases having held constant at the eight thousand level for several weeks now.

A new COVID cluster has been located in Beijing where, according to the WHO, as of 13 June, 41 symptomatic laboratory-confirmed cases and 46 laboratory confirmed cases without symptoms of COVID-19 have been identified in Beijing.

“Preliminary investigations revealed that some of the initial symptomatic cases had a link to the Xinfadi Market in Beijing.  Preliminary laboratory investigations of throat swabs from humans and environmental samples from Xinfadi Market identified 45 positive human samples (all without symptoms at the time of reporting) and 40 positive environmental samples”.

Last week, the WHO also warned of the coronavirus accelerating in Africa where there has been more than 200,000 cases and over 5,600 deaths.

More than 200,000 #COVID19 cases have been confirmed on the African continent, with over 5,600 deaths. While #Africa accounts for a small fraction of the global caseload, case numbers are growing at an accelerating pace. Read more: https://t.co/TIzXcCbeyF pic.twitter.com/Qx5HosLn5v

— WHO African Region (@WHOAFRO) June 11, 2020

In a news release issued yesterday, the World Health Organization welcomed good news from the United Kingdom (UK) where scientists have discovered a drug capable of addressing the symptoms of severe cases of COVID-19.

Initial clinical trial results show dexamethasone, a corticosteroid, can be lifesaving for patients who are critically ill with COVID-19. “For patients on ventilators, the treatment was shown to reduce mortality by about one third, and for patients requiring only oxygen, mortality was cut by about one fifth, according to preliminary findings shared with WHO. The benefit was only seen in patients seriously ill with COVID-19, and was not observed in patients with milder disease”.

Earlier, WHO experts announced that there is still much to learn about the new coronavirus.

Answering a journalist’s question about COVID behavior during winter, as the southern hemisphere is entering this season, Dr. Michael Ryan, the head of WHO’s emergencies program, said that there is no certainty of knowledge about exactly how the new coronavirus will react under winter conditions.

Although winter historically signals the start of the flu season, “right now, we have no data to suggest that the virus will behave more aggressively, or transmit more efficiently, or not”, added Ryan,

Likewise, there is no data as to whether the virus responds differently under summertime conditions.

Dr. Ryan said that while warmer weather tends to draw people outdoors, air conditioning also allows them to spend more time inside too. “There may be risks that are driven by climate that aren’t specifically related to the viruses themselves, but are more specifically related to the human behaviours that are driven by temperature or driven by the season,” he said.

But COVID-19 is not the only virus that is out there.

The southern hemisphere influenza season is about to begin. The WHO has warned that “co-circulation of COVID-19 and influenza can worsen the impact on health systems that are already overwhelmed.”

Influenza affects every country every year taking its own deadly toll.

International aid

PAHO – the Pan American Health Organization – has announced that around US$5.3 million will be provided by the Government of Canada to support 15 Caribbean countries in their fight against COVID-19.

“The collaboration will primarily support increased access to Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and other critical supplies”.

In Europe, the European Investment Bank has approved a €7.5 billion support package for COVID-19 response and investment in health, clean transport, education and energy. The package includes:

• • • €3.2 billion for COVID-19 public health, elderly care and targeted business support
    • €1.5 billon for clean transport, including electric vehicles, high-speed rail and public transport
    • Additional backing for higher education, renewable energy and urban development
    • €1.9 billion for health and private sector investment outside Europe

Travel restrictions to be lifted in Europe

The European Commission has recommended that Schengen Member States and Schengen Associated States lift internal border controls by June 15 and extend the temporary restrictions on non-essential travel into the EU zone until June 30.

The EC will then set out an approach to progressively lift the restrictions thereafter. However, given that the health situation in certain third countries remains critical, the EC did not recommend a general lifting of travel restrictions at this stage.

The DevelopmentAid news team is working hard to keep you up to date with the most important headlines and events during the COVID-19 pandemic. Become a member and subscribe to our newsletter in order to remain fully informed about the latest news in the International Development Sector.

The next DevelopmentAid weekly coronavirus review will be released on June 24, 2020.

About COVID-2019

Coronaviruses are a large family of viruses that are common in many different species of animals including camels, cattle, cats and bats. Rarely, animal coronaviruses can infect people and then spread between them such as was the case with MERS (2012) and SARS (2003).The symptoms of the virus are very similar to those of a common cold – runny nose, headache, cough, sore throat, fever, a general feeling of being unwell. Blood tests are necessary in order to prove the presence of the virus in the organism.

Named by scientists as the “Wuhan seafood market pneumonia virus”,  COVID-19 is a coronavirus, like MERS and SARs, all of which have their origins in bats. Initial reports show that, in the early stages of the outbreak (early January 2020), many of those infected in Wuhan had some link to a large seafood and live animal market – the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, mainly its western wing where wildlife animals are traded. This suggests that the virus initially affected an animal and subsequently spread to a person in a what a CDC has called “the species barrier jump”.