pandemics news, articles and features | New Scientist

Oldest known plague outbreak killed hunter-gatherer children

Michael Le Page — Wed, 17 Jun 2026 15:00:53 +0000

DNA evidence shows that plague bacteria devastated a community in Siberia more than 5000 years ago, challenging the idea that there were no major disease outbreaks before the advent of farming and large settlements

Waste surveillance at just 20 airports could spot the next pandemic

Jeremy Hsu — Wed, 12 Feb 2025 10:00:30 +0000

A network of airports like Hong Kong International Airport could effectively detect disease outbreaks

Yuen Man Cheung / Alamy

A global early-warning system for disease outbreaks and even future pandemics is possible with minimal monitoring: testing the waste water from a fraction of international flight arrivals at just 20 airports around the world.

When passengers fly while infected with bacteria or viruses, they can leave traces of these pathogens in their waste, which airports collect from a plane after the flight lands. “If you’re going to the bathroom on an aircraft, and if you blow your nose and put that in the toilet – or if you do whatever you have to do – there’s some chance that some of the genetic material from the pathogen is going into the waste water,” says at Northeastern University in Massachusetts.

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How worried should we be about a bird flu pandemic?

St-Onge and his colleagues used a called the Global Epidemic and Mobility model to analyse how airport waste-water surveillance networks could detect emerging variants of a virus like the one that causes covid-19. By testing the model using different numbers and locations of airports, they showed that 20 strategically placed “sentinel airports” worldwide could detect outbreaks nearly as quickly and efficiently as a network involving thousands of airports. The larger network was just 20 per cent faster but cost much more.

To detect emerging threats from anywhere in the world, the network should include major international airports in cities such as London, Paris, Dubai and Singapore. But the team also showed how networks involving a different set of airports could provide more targeted detection of disease outbreaks that were likely to originate in certain continents.

“This modelling study is the first to provide the actual number of sentinel airports required to support effective global surveillance while optimising resource use,” says at the University of Sydney in Australia.

Airport-based networks could also provide useful information about disease outbreaks early on during an epidemic, including estimates of how quickly the disease can spread from person to person and how many people are likely to be infected from exposure to a single case, says St-Onge.

Such waste-water surveillance could provide early warning for known diseases and possibly track new emerging threats too – if the bacterium’s or virus’s genomic data is available. “I don’t think we’d be able to look in the waste water and say: ‘There is a new pathogen that’s out there,’” says at Brown University in Rhode Island. “But when a new pathogen is announced, you can very quickly look at that previous waste-water data and say: ‘Is this present in our sample?’”

A map of sentinel airports, with colours indicating how quickly this network would detect a novel disease outbreak originating at various sites around the world

Northeastern University

There are still some nuances to work out, such as how often to take waste-water samples to track different pathogens. Other challenges include figuring out the most efficient ways to sample waste water from aircraft and evaluating the system’s real-world effectiveness, says Li.

A long-term monitoring programme would also require cooperation from airlines and airports, along with a consistent source of funding, she says.

Individual airports could hesitate to participate because of perceived risk to their operations if infectious disease statistics are made widely available – unless data-handling agreements could assuage such concerns, says at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He emphasised the importance of coordinated international funding to offset “local political considerations”.

But even coordination through an international body like the World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization carries its own political complications, given that President Donald Trump has initiated the US’s withdrawal from the organisation, says Ibitoye. Still, research such as this “contributes towards making [the monitoring network] a reality sooner rather than later”, she says.

Journal reference

Nature Medicine

H5N1 bird flu is closer to gaining pandemic potential than we thought

Michael Le Page — Thu, 05 Dec 2024 19:00:50 +0000

A highly infectious strain of bird flu has been circulating worldwide since 2020

ULISES RUIZ/AFP via Getty Images

The H5N1 bird flu virus that has spread worldwide is already better at infecting people than earlier strains. What’s more, a single mutation could allow it to infect the cells lining our noses and throats, making it more likely to go airborne. This change alone is not enough for the virus to be capable of causing a pandemic. However, if a virus with this mutation swapped genes with a human flu virus, it could acquire pandemic potential almost instantly.

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“The more people get infected, the more likely it is that something like this could arise,” says at the Scripps Research Institute in California. Despite this, Wilson thinks the risk remains low. A particularly virulent form of H5N1 bird flu evolved in the 1990s, probably in domestic birds in China, and spread worldwide. Around 2020, a new variant of this virus emerged and spread even more widely, reaching the Americas and Antarctica. It has infected domestic poultry in large numbers and is also spreading among dairy cows in the US, causing occasional human cases. A team led by at the Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands has now infected human nose and throat cells with H5N1 variants from 2005 and 2022. They have shown for the first time that the 2022 variant is better at binding to these cells and also better at replicating inside them. “It’s bad news,” says van Riel. “I don’t think the chances of the virus becoming pandemic are extremely high,” she says. But the fact that the virus is better at infecting humans will give it more opportunities to acquire additional mutations that increase its pandemic potential. Meanwhile, Wilson and his colleagues have been studying the crucial haemagglutinin protein of the flu virus. This protein binds to receptors on the outside of cells, determining which cells the virus can infect. Because it protrudes from the virus, it is also the main target of the immune system. At present, the H5N1 haemagglutinin binds mainly to receptors that in humans are found deep in the lungs. This means it can cause severe disease but it is unlikely to get out of the body and infect others. To do that, the virus needs to infect cells lining the nose and throat, meaning viruses can be coughed or sneezed out to infect others. Van Riel’s study suggests the virus can do this to some degree, but it’s not clear whether the virus is binding to the main receptors on these cells. It was thought that multiple mutations would be required for H5N1 to bind strongly to these receptors, but Wilson’s team has now shown that with the current H5N1 variant, a single mutation is all it would take.

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This change alone would not result in a virus capable of going pandemic, says team member , also at the Scripps Research Institute. “We view this property as required – but importantly not sufficient – for transmission, for a pandemic virus,” he says. Other changes are also necessary for the virus to start to replicate and spread from person to person, says Paulson, and these are not well understood. “There’s a lot of biology that we don’t even know,” he says. Once an H5N1 virus infecting a human acquired the receptor-switching mutation, however, it would then have a chance of evolving these other changes as well. What’s more, in theory, it could acquire all the abilities it needs in one fell swoop by swapping genes with a human virus infecting the same individual. Several previous flu pandemics were caused by animal and human flu viruses swapping genes, says Paulson. “This is highly concerning,” says at the University of Oxford, who was not involved in either study. “Each spillover to a human gives the virus a roll of the dice.”

How deadly would an H5N1 pandemic be?

If H5N1 bird flu does manage to start spreading from person to person, the big question is how deadly it would be. Of the people confirmed to be infected with the virus since 2003, half have died. However, the true infection fatality rate could be lower as many cases have probably gone undetected, and milder ones are more likely to be missed. Among the 60 or so people infected in the US since the dairy outbreak began, almost all have had mild symptoms only. Why , but one explanation is that many were infected via the eyes. “That is known to have far milder outcomes,” says Katzourakis.

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It is also thought that when viruses switch from binding to receptors deep in the lungs to those higher in the respiratory tract, they become less dangerous. But the puzzling aspects of the cases in the US have left Paulson unsure that this will hold true with H5N1. “Now I just don’t know what to think, to be honest,” he says. “I don’t think there is any reason to be complacent in this respect, and anticipate ‘mildness’ should this virus become readily human-to-human transmissible,” says Katzourakis. Wilson’s team studied the haemagglutinin protein in isolation, so there was no chance of a lab leak of the mutant protein. “There was no virus used at all here,” he says.

Reference:

bioRxiv

Journal reference:

Science

Bird flu may be adapting to become more infectious to humans

Grace Wade — Wed, 27 Nov 2024 20:20:21 +0000

Three people in North America without known animal exposures have tested positive for the bird flu virus H5N1, and samples from two of them suggest the virus is adapting to humans

Risk of bird flu outbreak in cows causing pandemic is less than feared

Michael Le Page — Wed, 29 May 2024 16:00:29 +0000

Cow udders have lots of bird-like flu virus receptors but no human-like ones, a study has found, meaning there’s no reason for the virus to evolve to become better at infecting people

A 48,500-year-old virus has been revived from Siberian permafrost

Michael Le Page — Wed, 23 Nov 2022 05:50:53 +0000

Seven viruses from the Siberian permafrost have been revived and replicated themselves in the lab – including the oldest revived so far

Fewer boys born in England and Wales in early stage of the pandemic

Alice Klein — Tue, 04 Oct 2022 12:55:51 +0000

The covid-19 pandemic has been linked to a decline in the proportion of male babies being born, in line with previous findings that fewer boys are born after population-wide stressful events

Origin of Black Death finally found in bacteria from Kyrgyzstan graves

Clare Wilson — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 15:10:28 +0000

Issyk-Kul, a lake in Kyrgyzstan

Thiago B Trevisan/Shutterstock

The Black Death was one of the deadliest pandemics in history, but its origins have long been mysterious. Now, the bacteria that started it all may have been found in three graves in modern-day Kyrgyzstan in central Asia.

When a genetic family tree is drawn up of plague bacteria from historical graves as well as those infecting people and animals today, the Kyrgyzstan grave pathogens seem to be the most recent common ancestor of the other groups. “They are the strain that gave rise to the majority of strains that are circulating in the world today,” says at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. “It’s really like the big bang of plague.”

The Black Death’s first recorded emergence was in Crimea in 1346, when an army laying siege to the city of Caffa, now known as Feodosia, catapulted disease-ridden corpses over the walls. Those fleeing the resulting outbreak of plague by boat took the disease to Europe. But where the infection had been before Crimea was unknown – with suggested sources ranging from east to central Asia.

Krause’s colleague at the University of Stirling, UK, noticed that excavations of a pair of 14th-century graveyards near a lake called Issyk-Kul in Kyrgyzstan had uncovered a high number of tombs inscribed with the dates of 1338 and 1339 – several years before the siege in Crimea. Some of them had “pestilence” recorded as the cause of death. “When you have one or two years with excess mortality, it means that something funny was going on,” says Slavin.

Krause and his team managed to recover DNA from the bacterium that causes plague, Yersinia pestis, from three of the graves’ human remains. Sequencing this DNA let them compare it with other historical and modern samples of plague bacterium DNA, to make a family tree.

Yersinia pestis bacteria currently infect several kinds of rodents in many countries. But plague bacteria affecting marmots in the same region in Kyrgyzstan are genetically most similar to the old samples from the graves.

That suggests this region could be the place where the plague jumped from animals to people, says Krause. “This is a second line of evidence. There are thousands of genomes that have been analysed from rodents all over the world. But the closest relatives to [the strain recovered from the graves] are found in that particular location.”

Nature

Article amended on 5 July 2022

We corrected which animals are affected by plague bacteria similar to the old samples.

Covid-19 news: Moderna’s omicron booster has promising immune response

Layal Liverpool — Thu, 09 Jun 2022 12:18:39 +0000

A Moderna covid-19 vaccine is prepared

Dinendra Haria/SOPA/Shutterstock

Latest coronavirus news as of 1pm 9 June

Moderna’s omicron-tailored booster candidate produces eight times as many virus-neutralising antibodies against the variant as its original booster vaccine

An updated version of Moderna’s covid-19 vaccine that targets the BA.1 sublineage of omicron leads to an eight-fold increase in antibody levels against the variant of concern, according to a small, preliminary .

Moderna’s new booster is the first covid-19 vaccine to combine the jab that targeted the original strain of the coronavirus – which emerged in Wuhan, China, at the end of 2019 – with a vaccine that specifically targets the omicron variant.

In the clinical trial, the updated vaccine was given to 437 people who had already received two full-dose Moderna vaccines and its booster.

One month after receiving the updated booster, the participants’ neutralising antibody levels against omicron had risen by about eight times.

“The data we show today are really important because we get a really strong antibody response against Omicron,” Moderna’s chief medical officer Paul Burton told on 8 June.

“For the first time, we could really be looking at the potential for just once-yearly boosting, because we can get people to such a high level that they will take longer to decay.”

Whether these raised antibody levels translate into a reduced risk of hospitalisation or death with covid-19 is unknown.

“These antibody measurements provide an indication that is likely to translate into clinical effects, but an element of uncertainty in extrapolating the results to clinical effectiveness must, inevitably, remain,” Stephen Evans at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine said in a statement to the Science Media Centre.

Other coronavirus news

India has its highest number of daily covid-19 cases since March. The country’s health ministry reported today that 7240 new coronavirus infections had occurred in the last 24 hours.

while it conducts mass coronavirus testing. This comes just one week after the city eased restrictions that had confined about 25 million people to their homes since March.

As of 11 June, people living in the south-western district of Minhang will be placed under “closed management” until they have all been tested.

Essential information about coronavirus

Where did coronavirus come from? And other covid-19 questions answered

What is covid-19?

Covid-19 vaccines: Everything you need to know about the leading shots

Long covid: Do I have it, how long will it last and can we treat it?

What’s the fairest way to share covid-19 vaccines around the world?

Covid-19: The story of a pandemic

What to read, watch and listen to about coronavirus

is a BBC Radio 4 series exploring how viruses can cross from animals into humans to cause pandemics. The first episode examines the origins of the covid-19 pandemic.

is a BBC documentary, which investigates what the high covid-19 death rates in ethnic minority patients reveal about health inequality in the UK.

is a BBC documentary about the inside story of the development of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine against covid-19.

is a Channel 4 documentary which tells the story of the coronavirus pandemic through the eyes of the scientists on the frontline.

is assessing the progress in development of potential drug treatments for covid-19, and ranking them for effectiveness and safety.

is a project highlighting the experiences of key workers on the frontline in the fight against coronavirus in the UK, through social media.

is a BBC Panorama investigation of the death of transport worker Belly Mujinga from covid-19, following reports she had been coughed and spat on by a customer at London’s Victoria Station.

on Netflix is a short documentary series examining the coronavirus pandemic, the efforts to fight it and ways to manage its mental health toll.

by Debora Mackenzie is about how the pandemic happened and why it will happen again if we don’t do things differently in future.

is about the new science of contagion and the surprising ways it shapes our lives and behaviour. The author, Adam Kucharski, is an epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK, and in the book he examines how diseases spread and why they stop.

People walking along Westminster Bridge in London in May

Amer Ghazzal/Shutterstock

1 June

An estimated 2 million people in the UK have lingering covid-19 symptoms more than four weeks after their initial coronavirus infection

Based on the latest of people living in private households in the UK, an estimated 3.1 per cent of the population were experiencing long covid symptoms as of 1 May.

This is 200,000 more people than , as of 3 April.

Of the estimated 2 million people with long covid, 1.4 million are thought to have been infected, or suspect they were infected, at least 12 weeks prior to their ongoing symptoms.

Meanwhile 826,000 are estimated to have been infected with covid-19, or had a suspected infection, at least one year earlier. About 376,000 would have first been infected at least two years ago.

Of those surveyed, 55 per cent with long covid had fatigue, the most commonly reported symptom. This was followed by 32 per cent of people experiencing shortness of breath, 23 per cent having a cough and 23 per cent experiencing muscle aches.

Other coronavirus news

Three doses of a coronavirus vaccine, regardless of what type, are the most effective defence against covid-19, .

Researchers at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) analysed 53 vaccine studies conducted throughout the pandemic. The studies included over 100 million participants who together received seven different types of covid-19 vaccines in 24 dosing combinations.

Results suggest three doses of any mRNA vaccine, such as those manufactured by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna, is 96 per cent effective against asymptomatic and symptomatic covid-19 infections, accounting for the different variants.

An mRNA booster after two doses of an adenovirus vector vaccine, such as those manufactured by AstraZeneca/The University of Oxford and Johnson & Johnson, is 88 per cent effective.

Despite higher efficacy with a three-dose mRNA vaccine regimen, three doses of any covid-19 vaccine is still very effective, according to the researchers.

A third of people in the UK think the government is exaggerating the number of covid-19 deaths, .

Researchers at King’s College London surveyed 12,000 people about their views on covid-19 across six countries: the UK, Ireland, Italy, Germany, Norway and Poland.

A third (33 per cent) of people in the UK believe the government is exaggerating the number of covid-19 deaths, a figure that is even higher in Poland, at 43 per cent. Norway has the lowest proportion of people who do not trust the government’s mortality figures, at 24 per cent.

The researchers also found that 15 per cent of people in the UK do not believe that nearly all scientists think the covid-19 vaccines are safe.

“Across both the UK and other European countries included in this study, there is a stubborn minority who still question not only the scientific consensus on vaccine safety but also government reporting of Covid deaths,” Bobby Duffy at King’s College London in the UK said in a statement.

See previous updates from May 2022, April 2022, March 2022, February 2022, January 2022, November to December 2021, September to October 2021, July to September 2021, June to July 2021,��May 2021, April to March 2021, February 2021, January 2021, November to December 2020, and March to November 2020.

Covid-19 news archive: May 2022

Alexandra Thompson — Mon, 06 Jun 2022 12:33:39 +0000

Commuters at St Pancras International train station in London, England, in May

Dominika Zarzycka/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

25 May

When the omicron variant was dominant in the UK, the risk of reinfection was about eight times higher than when the delta variant prevailed In the UK, the risk of being reinfected with covid-19 was considerably more likely when the omicron variant was dominant, from 20 December 2021 to 13 May 2022, compared with when the delta variant was surging, defined as 17 May to 19 December 2021, . The finding is part of the ONS’ Coronavirus Infection Survey, which measures how many people are testing positive for covid-19 and the prevalence of antibodies against the virus across the UK. Early analyses of the omicron variant in South Africa suggested a higher reinfection risk. looked at reinfection in healthcare workers, similarly finding the risk was higher with omicron. , released on 11 May, found the risk of reinfection was 10 times higher when omicron was dominant in the UK, this time defined as 20 December 2021 to 25 April 2022, than when delta was dominant. Other coronavirus news Being hospitalised with covid-19 can impair function of the right side of the heart, according to a study of . Almost 1 in 3 of these participants showed abnormalities to the right side of their heart, which can affect blood supply to the lungs. The study was conducted from September 2020 to March 2021, before vaccines had been widely received across the UK. Exposure to air pollution can increase the risk of severe disease from covid-19, according to a and a separate study of . Both studies looked at individual medical records to examine links between covid-19 outcomes and exposure to fine particles, called PM2.5, and nitrogen dioxide. The Canadian study also analysed ozone exposure. In California, the participants who were exposed to higher levels of PM2.5 were 20 to 30 per cent more likely to require hospital care, ventilation or intensive care with covid-19, while exposure to nitrogen dioxide increased the risk by 12 to 18 percent. The researchers in Canada found that people exposed to pollution, even at relatively low levels, also had an elevated risk of intensive care, especially when it came to ozone exposure.

Essential information about coronavirus

Where did coronavirus come from? And other covid-19 questions answered What is covid-19? Covid-19 vaccines: Everything you need to know about the leading shots Long covid: Do I have it, how long will it last and can we treat it? What’s the fairest way to share covid-19 vaccines around the world? Covid-19: The story of a pandemic

What to read, watch and listen to about coronavirus

New Scientist Weekly features updates and analysis on the latest developments in the covid-19 pandemic. Our podcast sees expert journalists from the magazine discuss the biggest science stories to hit the headlines each week – from technology and space, to health and the environment. is a BBC Radio 4 series exploring how viruses can cross from animals into humans to cause pandemics. The first episode examines the origins of the covid-19 pandemic. is a BBC documentary, which investigates what the high covid-19 death rates in ethnic minority patients reveal about health inequality in the UK. is a BBC documentary about the inside story of the development of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine against covid-19. is a Channel 4 documentary which tells the story of the coronavirus pandemic through the eyes of the scientists on the frontline. is assessing the progress in development of potential drug treatments for covid-19, and ranking them for effectiveness and safety. is a project highlighting the experiences of key workers on the frontline in the fight against coronavirus in the UK, through social media. is a BBC Panorama investigation of the death of transport worker Belly Mujinga from covid-19, following reports she had been coughed and spat on by a customer at London’s Victoria Station. on Netflix is a short documentary series examining the coronavirus pandemic, the efforts to fight it and ways to manage its mental health toll. by Debora Mackenzie is about how the pandemic happened and why it will happen again if we don’t do things differently in future. is about the new science of contagion and the surprising ways it shapes our lives and behaviour. The author, Adam Kucharski, is an epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK, and in the book he examines how diseases spread and why they stop.

A person writes a message on the national covid-19 memorial wall in London, England

TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images

24 May

During the recent surge of the milder omicron variant in England and Wales, covid-19 caused a similar number of deaths as flu and pneumonia in the years before the pandemic emerged Covid-19 caused a similar number of deaths in England and Wales over the past winter as flu and pneumonia in previous years, . In January 2022, for instance, covid-19 was the underlying cause of 4100 deaths, while flu and pneumonia caused an average of 4328 deaths every January from 2016 to 2020, before the pandemic took hold. “In the latest winter, the number of deaths with covid-19 as the underlying cause has fallen more in line with those due to flu and pneumonia in pre-coronavirus pandemic years,” says the ONS report. Flu and pneumonia deaths are generally classed together as flu often causes lung damage that leads to bacterial pneumonia. In the past two years, flu and pneumonia caused far fewer deaths than normal, probably because of lockdowns and less social mixing between lockdowns, says the ONS. Flu is less easily passed on than the coronavirus, so social distancing reduced flu transmission even while covid-19 was spreading fast. Before the recent omicron surge, covid-19 caused more deaths than flu and pneumonia. Covid-19 was the leading cause of death in England and Wales in 2020 and provisional figures suggest that will also be the case in 2021. One difference between covid-19 and flu is that a higher proportion of covid-19 deaths affect middle-aged people. In the first two years of the pandemic, about 1 in 12 covid-19 deaths were in those aged under 60, compared with 1 in 20 deaths from flu and pneumonia. “That covid-19 deaths were both greater in number and affected a broader range of ages highlights just how much more lethal covid had been,” Rowland Kao at the University of Edinburgh said in a statement to the Science Media Centre. “It is, however, difficult to tell what this means for the future. The absence of physical distancing measures and the likely reduction in covid-19 vaccine booster coverage, and likely lower flu vaccine coverage, will mean that future mortality is difficult to predict.” Other coronavirus news Being vaccinated against covid-19 does reduce the severity of infection in people with cancer or a past cancer diagnosis, despite their immune systems being weakened from their disease or treatments, an. People with cancer do experience a faster waning of immunity within 3 to 6 months, however, showing how important it is for them to get booster jabs, say the researchers, who looked at a cancer registry from England. More than half of people admitted to hospital with covid-19 have probable heart inflammation, known medically as myocarditis, two months after being discharged, a.

A person receives the first of two Pfizer/BioNTech covid-19 vaccines at Guy’s Hospital in London, England, in December 2020

20 May

The UK vaccine advisory group has recommended that over-65s, people in care homes, frontline health and social care workers, and clinically vulnerable people aged 16 to 64 be offered a booster jab this autumn “Last year’s autumn booster vaccination programme provided excellent protection against severe covid-19, including against the omicron variant,” Wei Shen Lim at the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation , adding the recommendation will allow the NHS and care homes to “start the necessary operational planning” to deliver the jabs. Across the UK, a spring booster is already available to over-75s, care home residents and people aged 12 and over with suppressed immune systems. The Scottish, English and Welsh governments have confirmed they will follow this advice, while Northern Ireland is yet to announce its plans, . Other coronavirus news Covid-19 was the third leading cause of death in England in April, accounting for 6.1 per cent of all fatalities, . One month earlier, covid-19 was the sixth leading cause of death. As of 19 May, . Officials have not specified this is due to covid-19, however, fever is a key symptom of the infection. The country imposed a national lockdown earlier this month after reporting its first covid-19 case on 12 May. Covid-19 testing is limited and there is no official record of any of North Korea’s 25-million-strong-population being vaccinated.

The World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland

Richard Juilliart/Alamy

19 May

An economic downturn and lack of reforms has left the world in no better position to fight a new pandemic than before covid-19 emerged, according to the World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization (WHO) The world’s pandemic preparedness is the same or worse than it was before covid-19, . The report, led by former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark and former Liberia president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, accepted that some progress had been made, like moves to create a global health security fund inside the WHO and increased WHO funding. But progress on reforms such as international health regulations are moving too slowly, it added. “We have right now the very same tools and the same system that existed in December 2019 to respond to a pandemic threat,” Clark said at a press conference. “And those tools just weren’t good enough.” The report also suggests some measures that should be taken as soon as possible, including an independent health threats council led by heads of state, a worldwide pandemic treaty and an international agreement to improve pandemic preparedness. The WHO’s annual World 91ɫ��Ƭ Assembly will meet in Geneva next week to address issues raised in the report. Other coronavirus news other covid-19 variants, such as delta, according to mouse models and a small human study. Researchers at Gladstone Institutes in San Francisco, US, collected blood serum from mice seven days after they were infected with different covid-19 variants. In laboratory experiments, the serum collected after overcoming omicron only protected against the omicron variant. By contrast, the serum collected after infection with delta effectively protected against the alpha, beta and delta variants, as well as offering some protection against omicron. These findings were then supported in a study of 10 unvaccinated people who had recovered from omicron. By contrast, vaccinated people who catch omicron develop some level of immunity against all covid-19 variants of concern, the researchers found in a separate experiment. , such as gargling salt water or drinking herbal tea, to reduce the fever and pain that can come with covid-19. A state news agency said the unverified treatments are “effective in prevention and cure of the malicious disease,” a claim that is not supported by scientific research.

16 May

Six weeks into the vaccine roll-out for this age group, fewer than one in 10 children aged 5 to 11 have received their first dose The 7 per cent figure compares with the 24 per cent of 12 to 15-year-olds in England who received a first dose in the six weeks after they became eligible for the vaccine in September 2021. Children rarely become seriously ill with SARS-CoV-2 virus, however, testing positive can disrupt their schooling or put them at risk of long covid. Speaking of 5 to 11 year olds, Russell Viner at University College London told : “It’s a vaccination that probably isn’t particularly beneficial for this age group. “However, it has a very, very good safety profile. And given that we remain in a pandemic, there’s an argument that for individual parents, the balance of risks would appear to be towards vaccination.” Across England, Oxfordshire has the highest vaccine take-up among 5 to 11-year-olds at 12 per cent, while Knowsley in Merseyside has the lowest uptake at 3 per cent, according to the latest NHS statistics up to 8 May. Two covid-19 vaccines are being offered to children from 5 years old across the UK. On 15 March 2022, Wales became the first UK nation to offer 5 to 11-year-olds a covid-19 vaccine, receiving their first dose by 4 May. , 17 per cent of 5 to 11 year olds had received their first dose as of 3 May. In Northern Ireland, just 2 per cent of children in this age group had received their first vaccine dose as of 5 May, . “Getting vaccinated is a personal choice between families and their children, and we have now sent invites to everyone eligible, providing parents with information to allow them to make an informed decision, while they can also talk to their doctor or a local healthcare professional if they have questions,” an NHS spokesperson said. Other coronavirus news Shanghai will aim to return to normal life from 1 June after being in lockdown for more than seven weeks. “From June 1 to mid- and late June, as long as risks of a rebound in infections are controlled, we will fully implement epidemic prevention and control, normalise management and fully restore normal production and life in the city,” . suffering from what its state media is calling a “fever”, a key covid-19 symptom. This comes less than one week after North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un confirmed the country’s first covid-19 cases and deaths. Of the 1 million fever cases, . It is unclear whether these cases have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 virus. North Korea, which is in lockdown, is thought to have limited capacity for covid-19 testing. There is also no official record of any of its 25-million-strong-population being vaccinated. Kim instead prioritised keeping covid-19 out of the country via .

American flags on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., are lowered to half-mast to mark 1 million covid-19 deaths in the US

JIM LO SCALZO/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

13 May

The US has officially passed the ‘tragic milestone’, however, many more deaths are expected to have occurred than have been recorded The US has officially recorded more than 1 million covid-19 deaths, , calling the fatalities a “tragic milestone”. “One million covid deaths, one million empty chairs around the family dinner table, each irreplaceable losses,” said Biden. “We must remain vigilant against this pandemic and do everything we can to save as many lives as possible, as we have with more testing, vaccines, and treatments than ever before.” The scale of the death toll is far larger than originally anticipated, with Anthony Fauci at the US National Institutes of 91ɫ��Ƭ saying in March 2020 that between 100,000 and 200,000 people could die from covid-19. The US has a higher official covid-19 death toll than anywhere else in the world, but many fatalities are expected to go unrecorded in some countries. looked at “excess deaths”, defined as the number of fatalities from any cause in 2020 and 2021 compared with previous years. This included covid-19 deaths that were not recorded as such, as well as people who died from other causes because hospitals were full amid the pandemic. The report found that India had the highest number of overall excess deaths, while Peru and Russia had the highest number of excess deaths for their population size. Separately, 2 million covid-19 deaths have been recorded across the European region, which includes the UK, . Other coronavirus news Six covid-19 deaths have been officially reported in North Korea, where the pandemic is spreading “explosively”, . North Korea imposed a national lockdown on 12 May, after acknowledging its first covid-19 cases. Since late April, 350,000 people in North Korea have been treated for fever, but the country is thought to have little capacity for covid-19 testing. It has not reported carrying out any covid-19 vaccinations. outside of tightly regulated quarantine zones by mid-May. Cases outside the quarantine zones are an indicator of whether the outbreak is spreading. This comes after , because the omicron variant is so transmissible.

An employee disinfects a supermarket in Pyongyang, North Korea, in November 2021

Jon Chol Jin/AP/Shutterstock

12 May

North Korea has introduced a national lockdown after reporting its first covid-19 outbreak in the capital Pyongyang The country had never reported a covid-19 case before 12 May 2022. But many expect infections would have arisen in early 2020, before North Korea closed its borders, given its travel and trade relationships with China. According to the North Korean news outlet KCNA, , but state media has not confirmed the number of cases or where the infections may have originated. There is no official record of any of North Korea’s 25-million-strong-population being vaccinated. According to KCNA, state authorities, including North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un, recognise that a “most serious emergency case” has occurred, and Jong-un hopes to “quickly cure the infections in order to eradicate the source of the virus”. Other coronavirus news More than half of people who were hospitalised with covid-19 have at least one symptom two years later, that followed 1192 people living in Wuhan, China, after they were infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus in early 2020. The findings provide the longest known follow-up of covid-19 symptoms so far, with previous studies spanning around one year. The participants – who had an average age of 57 – were assessed via a six-minute walking test, questionnaires and lung tests at six months, 12 months and two years post-discharge. More than two thirds (68 per cent) reported at least one long covid symptom six months after leaving hospital, decreasing to 55 per cent after two years. The most commonly reported symptom was fatigue or muscle weakness. “Our findings indicate that for a certain proportion of hospitalised covid-19 survivors, while they may have cleared the initial infection, more than two years is needed to recover fully from covid-19,” Bin Cao at the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in China . The number of reported covid-19 deaths that occurred in the African region between 2 and 8 March was up 84 per cent on the previous week, according to the World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization. The African region also saw cases rise 12 per cent week-on-week. Globally, the number of reported covid-19 cases and deaths have been declining since the end of March.

Workers in personal protective equipment deliver food during the ongoing covid-19 lockdown in the Jing’an district of Shanghai in China on 7 May 2022

HECTOR RETAMAL/AFP via Getty Images

11 May

Lifting China’s zero-covid policy could trigger a large omicron wave, but the World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization (WHO) says maintaining the strategy is “unsustainable” Scrapping China’s zero-covid policy could lead to 1.55 million deaths and increase intensive care numbers by a factor of 15, according to a modelling study from Fudan University in China. China introduced the strategy, which aims to quickly cut off transmission to end outbreaks, in August 2021 in response to the faster-spreading delta variant. Officials are now said to be evaluating the sustainability of their policy. Fudan’s mathematical model, based on a fully vaccinated population with no mass testing or movement restrictions in place, predicts that lifting the zero-covid strategy could lead to as many as 5.1 million hospitalisations, 2.7 million intensive care unit admissions and 1.55 million deaths by September 2022. People over 60 who are unvaccinated would make up 74 per cent of these deaths, the model predicts. in place is sustainable, as the highly-transmissible omicron variant continues to drive cases in China. “When we talk about the zero-covid strategy, we don’t think that it’s sustainable, considering the behaviour of the virus now and what we anticipate in the future,” WHO’s director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference. “We have discussed about this issue with Chinese experts and we indicated that the approach will not be sustainable. “Transiting into another strategy will be very important.” Other coronavirus news Pregnant people who are vaccinated against covid-19 than their unvaccinated counterparts, according to a meta-analysis of 23 studies covering more than 117,000 vaccinated pregnant people. Vaccination in pregnancy is also 90 per cent effective at preventing covid-19 infection, with no evidence of an increased risk of complications, such as a lower birthweight or postpartum haemorrhage, the study found. New Zealand has recorded more than 1 million covid-19 cases, . Over 986,000 of these , with the government loosening its zero-covid strategy in March. More than 20 per cent of New Zealand’s 5-million-strong population is therefore known to have been infected, however, modelling suggests the true number could be three times larger.

A Moderna covid-19 booster jab is prepared at a vaccination site in London in April 2022

SOPA Images Limited/Alamy

10 May

Study suggests a fourth dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna vaccine generally provides increased protection from covid-19 A fourth dose of an mRNA covid-19 vaccine could provide a “substantial boost in antibody levels and cellular immunity”, according to a study conducted as part of the University of Southampton’s Cov-Boost vaccine trial and published in . A fourth vaccine has been rolled out across the UK for people aged 75 and over, and those who are immunocompromised. Off the back of the Cov-Boost study, a larger group of people in the UK may be offered a second booster jab later this year. In the trial, 166 participants who had received a third dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, following two initial Pfizer/BioNTech or University of Oxford/AstraZeneca doses in June 2021, were either given a full dose of Pfizer/BioNTech or a half dose of Moderna as a fourth jab, about seven months after their third vaccination. Results reveal the fourth jab generally offered higher antibody levels than a third dose and provided particularly strong protection for those aged 70 and over. However, the study also found that some participants maintained higher levels of immunity after a third dose and only received a limited boost from a fourth jab, suggesting there could be a ceiling to the immune response. If this ceiling effect is seen in further studies, it could suggest that a fourth booster shot is less effective in those who have recently been infected with covid-19 or with a window shorter than seven months between their third and fourth vaccine doses. “These results underline the benefits of the most vulnerable people receiving current spring boosters and gives confidence for any prospective autumn booster programme in the UK,” lead author Saul Faust said in a statement. Other coronavirus news Lockdowns and social distancing caused by the pandemic led to a “small but significant increase” in loneliness worldwide, according to a meta-analysis of 34 studies, covering 200,000 participants across four continents. Speaking to Mareike Ernst, of Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz in Germany, said: “Given the small effect sizes, dire warnings about a ‘loneliness pandemic’ may be overblown. However, as loneliness constitutes a risk for premature mortality and mental and physical health, it should be closely monitored.” Just 51 per cent of people who have tested positive for covid-19 are following isolation guidelines in England, issued by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The legal requirement to self-isolate after testing positive for covid-19 was removed in England at the end of February 2022. In April, new isolation guidance was issued for those who tested positive, urging them to avoid contact with other people until they no longer had symptoms or felt unwell. Similar guidance is in place in the rest of the UK. “Only half of those who tested positive for covid-19 adhered fully to self-isolation guidance,” Tim Gibb at ONS said in a statement. “While this is a similar proportion to what we reported in mid-March 2022, it however represents a significant decrease to levels of adherence seen earlier this year.”

An aerial view of a burial site for people who died with covid-19 at the Nossa Senhora Aparecida cemetery in Manaus, in the Amazon forest in Brazil, taken on 21 November 2020

MICHAEL DANTAS/AFP via Getty Images

5 May

The covid-19 pandemic directly or indirectly caused 14.9 million deaths as of the end of 2021, according to a WHO report In a major analysis, officials from the World 91ɫ��Ƭ Organization (WHO) calculated the number of pandemic-related deaths that occurred globally between 1 January 2020 and 31 December 2022. The researchers combined national death data for each country with statistics from scientific studies carried out in the same country. They also used a statistical model to account for deaths that may have been otherwise overlooked. The team then estimated the number of fatalities that would have been expected had the pandemic not occurred, comparing the two figures to give an “excess” of 14.9 million. This excess includes deaths directly caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus, as well as those that were indirectly caused by the pandemic, such as people who died prematurely because healthcare systems were overwhelmed. According to John Hopkins University data, , not taking into account the pandemic’s indirect deaths. “These sobering data not only point to the impact of the pandemic but also to the need for all countries to invest in more resilient health systems that can sustain essential health services during crises, including stronger health information systems,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a statement. Other coronavirus news More than one in 10 people hospitalised with covid-19 could have severe neurological symptoms, . Researchers at studied more than 16,000 people who were hospitalised with covid-19 in 24 countries between March 2020 and March 2021. Nearly 13 per cent of the participants developed a serious neurological condition – like a stroke, seizure or encephalopathy, an umbrella term for disease that alters the brain’s function or structure – at admission or during their hospitalisation. Fighting off SARS-CoV-2 virus may , including those that cause common cold-like symptoms. , scientists at Scripps Research in the US found serum samples from people who had recently fought off SARS-CoV-2 virus reacted more strongly to the spike proteins of other coronavirus strains than samples taken from people pre-covid-19.

A stock image of a medic assessing an MRI brain scan

xijian/Getty Images

3 May

People hospitalised with covid-19 may lose 10 IQ points, equivalent to the natural cognitive decline that occurs between 50 and 70 years old Covid-19 can cause lasting cognitive and mental health issues, including brain fog, fatigue and even post-traumatic stress disorder. To better understand the scale of the problem, researchers at the University of Cambridge analysed 46 people who were hospitalised due to the infection between March and July 2020. The participants underwent cognitive tests on average six months after their initial illness. These results were compared against those of more than 66,000 people from the general population. Those hospitalised with covid-19 scored worse on verbal analogical reasoning tests, which assess an individual’s ability to recognise relationships between ideas and think methodically. They also recorded slower processing speeds. Previous studies suggest glucose is less efficiently used by the part of the brain responsible for attention, complex problem-solving and working memory after covid-19. Scores and reaction speeds improved over time, however, any recovery was gradual at best, according to the researchers. This cognitive impairment probably has multiple causes, including inadequate blood supply to the brain, blood vessel blockage and microscopic bleeds caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus, as well as damage triggered by an overactive immune system, they added. “Around 40,000 people have been through intensive care with covid-19 in England alone and many more will have been very sick, but not admitted to hospital,” Adam Hampshire at Imperial College London said in a statement. “This means there is a large number of people out there still experiencing problems with cognition many months later.” Other coronavirus news behind a rare and severe covid-19 response seen in some children may have been uncovered by researchers at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne, Australia. Doctors have so far been unable to identify why some children develop multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS) in response to covid-19, which can cause symptoms such as fever, abdominal pain and heart disease. After analysing the blood of 33 children with MIS, the researchers identified 85 proteins specific to the condition, . Covid-19 may worsen , according to a study of more than 61,000 people aged two to 17 with the respiratory condition in the US. The 7700 participants who tested positive for covid-19 went on to have more asthma-related hospitalisations, emergency inhaler use and steroid treatments in the six months post-infection, compared with the participants without a confirmed covid-19 infection. How covid-19 affects people with asthma is somewhat muddled. In November 2020, , potentially due to their steroid use or reduced exposure via shielding.

See previous updates from April 2022, March 2022, February 2022, January 2022, November to December 2021, September to October 2021, July to September 2021, June to July 2021,��May 2021, April to March 2021, February 2021, January 2021, November to December 2020, and March to November 2020.

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