US records 53,000 new cases, Brazil passes 1.5m, Russia nears 675,000

Cases of the coronavirus are surging worldwide with far reaching effects from South Africa to Brazil and India.

There have now been more than 11 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide with the US only reporting a daily global record of more than 55,000 new cases on Thursday. 

Infections rose in the majority of states and America’s top public health expert spoke of a “very disturbing week”. Thursday’s US tally smashed the previous single-day record of 54,771 set by Brazil on 19 June.

The US will be on a “red list” of high-risk countries that people in England are advised not to visit for non-essential reasons because of its continued high level of coronavirus cases.

England is to relax travel restrictions for more than 50 countries including nearly all EU countries, British territories, and Australia and New Zealand.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has, as promised, permitted pubs, bars and restaurants to reopen in England on Saturday despite concerns from the public that it could overwhelm the police and the health service. In a radio interview, the prime minister suggested that the day of the week for reopening would not make a difference.

Cases of coronavirus are surging in South Africa, a month after the country lifted most of the restrictions brought in with one of the world’s strictest lockdowns. The country’s biggest single-day jump in the number of cases, adding 8,728 confirmed infections and taking the total count to 168,061, took place on Thursday.

Confirmed cases of coronavirus in Iraq increased sevenfold in June, the International Rescue Committee said as it urged a redoubling of efforts to contain the spread of the disease in the country. By 1 July, there had been 53,708 infections detected in the country, up from 6,868 on 1 June. The ministry of health said that hospitals are almost at full capacity.

Once again, a state of emergency was declared in Belgrade, with some restrictions restored after a new increase in coronavirus cases in the Serbian capital. Local authorities had already declared emergencies in several other municipalities where a rise in the infections had threatened to disrupt the functioning of the health system.

Russia has reported 6,632 new cases, raising the nationwide tally of infections to 674,515. The authorities said that 168 people had died in the last 24 hours, bringing the official death toll to 10,027.

India has reported as many as 442 deaths due to COVID-19 in the last 24 hours taking the number of patients succumbing to the deadly virus across the country to 18,655.

The European commission has granted conditional approval for the use of antiviral remdesivir in severe Covid-19 patients following an accelerated review process, making it the region’s first therapy to be authorized to treat the virus. The move comes just a week after the European Medicines Agency (EMA) gave its go-ahead for the drug, produced by Gilead Sciences.

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