Latest On Coronavirus

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 29th July, 2020) The death toll from the coronavirus infection in the world topped 655,000, over 16.5 million cases of infection were detected, and over 9.6 million of those patients were cured, according to the US-based Johns Hopkins University, which tracks and compiles data from Federal and local authorities, media and other sources.

As of 19:30 GMT Tuesday, the number of people infected globally is 16,540,137, of them 655,300 died.

The United States still has the highest case count in the world, with 4,309,230, including 148,298 fatalities and 1,325,804 recoveries.

Germany is seeing a nationwide spike in coronavirus cases that could be the beginning of a second wave, the head of the Robert Koch Institute for disease control said.

The spread of the coronavirus infection in Poland is on the rise, with the latest daily increase exceeding 500 people, the country's health ministry said.

The spread of the coronavirus infection in the Russian capital of Moscow has been steadily low since the beginning of the month, with the majority of new cases detected in young adults, Russia's COVID-19 response center said in a situation report.

No COVID-19 infecting agents were found in water samples in Russia's most popular resort regions, the Krasnodar Territory and Crimea, Russian health and consumer rights watchdog Rospotrebnadzor said.

Iran's COVID-19 death toll has surpassed 16,000 after a record 235 fatalities have been registered in the past 24 hours, the health ministry said.

Vietnam has put over 15,000 people in quarantine over the past days, after infections have been detected in the popular resort city of Da Nang and among those airlifted from abroad, official news agency VNA reported.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said that, according to doctors, he had recovered from the coronavirus asymptomatically.

Beirut has decided to lock Lebanon down starting from Thursday for a 5-day period as part of the country's efforts to tackle the spread of COVID-19 amid a spike in new daily disease cases, Prime Minister Hassan Diab said.

The Kazakh government is planning to ease the country's COVID-19 social distancing measures from August 3 given that the epidemiological situation in the country has stabilized, Health Minister Alexey Tsoy said.

The authorities of Belgium's northernmost Antwerp Province have imposed curfew from 11:30 p.m. to 6:00 a.m., and also ordered companies to return to remote work where possible due to a sharp jump in the number of cases of the novel coronavirus disease.

All those who come to Latvia from countries with an unfavorable epidemiological situation to work will have to run two tests for the coronavirus disease with an interval of five to seven days starting from August 1, the Latvian government said.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte proposed to the national parliament to extend the state of emergency in the country over the coronavirus pandemic until October.

An updated forecast for the world's airlines predicts that the industry will take longer than expected to fully recover from the novel coronavirus crisis, with passenger traffic not expected to reach 2019 levels for more than four years, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said.

Brexit will significantly affect the UK economy, including those sectors that have not suffered losses during the coronavirus pandemic, irrespective of whether Prime Minister Boris Johnson reaches a trade deal with the EU or not, according to a report by the London school of Economics (LSE).

The coronavirus pandemic with months-long lockdowns will severely affect the economy of Mexico and Central American countries since the majority of the population need to go outside to make a living, Jordi Raich Curco, the head of the Regional Delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Mexico said. The new coronavirus disease may become another condition that disproportionately affects the poorest nations, he also said.

The European Union will earmark seven years' worth of funding for the first-of-a-kind experimental nuclear fusion reactor despite the financial burden of the coronavirus pandemic, Kadri Simson, the EU commissioner for energy, said.

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected bilateral trade between Israel and Russia, but the Jewish state sees its companies' determination to resume their business in Russia and believes that economic cooperation with Moscow will expand, charge d'affaires ad interim of Israel to Russia Yacov Livne told Sputnik.

UK luxury department store Selfridges announced that it would cut 450 jobs, or 14 percent of its workforce, with management citing poor sales amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

The plan to build the fourth terminal (T4) at the Paris Charles de Gaulle airport will be reconsidered in line with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on the air industry, France's Transport Minister Jean-Baptiste Djebbari said.

Clinical trials of the COVID-19 vaccine at Russian State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology Vector began on five volunteers, the first was vaccinated on Monday and is doing well, the next will be receiving the vaccine with an interval of 72 hours, Russian health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor said.

The COVID-19 vaccine developed by Vector does not contain a biological agent, therefore the number of negative reactions caused by its use is minimal, Anna Popova, the head of the Russian public health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, said.

All volunteers, who tested the coronavirus vaccine at Russia's Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, feel good, none of them asked for medical help, Elena Smolyarchuk, the head of the Center for Clinical Study of Medicines at Sechenov University, said.

Pharmaceutical company Janssen Vaccines will start trials of its coronavirus vaccine candidate in the Netherlands, Spain and Germany in September, the DutchNews portal reported, citing the company.

The first 100 days of a US campaign against COVID-19-related fraud resulted in the seizure of more than 900 shipments of bogus cures and counterfeit supplies, the Immigration and Customs (ICE) agency said.

Mouth spray with a cod enzyme that has shown promising results in a protection against COVID-19 will be available in more countries in Europe, as well as in China and Japan in the coming years, medication producer Enzymatica told Sputnik.

Uzbekistan has launched domestic production of test systems that detect RNA (Ribonucleic acid) of the coronavirus, the country's innovative development ministry said.