 | | | | U.S. firm Johnson & Johnson is likely to apply for EU approval for its COVID-19 vaccine candidate in February, a top lawmaker said on Wednesday. | | | | | | President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian officials on Wednesday to open up Russia's vaccination programme against the coronavirus to more people and to begin mass inoculations starting from next week. | | | | | | China's Sinovac Biotech defended the safety and efficacy of its experimental coronavirus vaccine after disappointing data from Brazil. Meanwhile, Indonesia launched one of the world's biggest COVID-19 vaccination drives, aiming to inoculate 181.5 million people, using the vaccine made by Sinovac. | | | | | | Britain's minister in charge of COVID-19 vaccinations said once everyone in the top priority groups had been reached, he favoured moving onto groups such as teachers and the police rather than bringing forward second doses. | | | | | | Here's what you need to know about the coronavirus right now: | | | | | | China's Sinovac Biotech defended the safety and efficacy of its experimental COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday, after researchers in Brazil released late-stage clinical data showing efficacy that was much lower than initially announced. | | | | | | Hungary has detected a new, more easily transmissible variant of coronavirus first found in Britain, its surgeon general said on Wednesday, a week after the country lifted a ban on passenger flights from the United Kingdom. | | | | | | Japan expanded a state of emergency in the Tokyo area to seven more prefectures on Wednesday amid a steady rise in COVID-19 cases as a survey by public broadcaster NHK showed most people want to cancel or postpone the already delayed Summer Olympics. | | | | | | More than 6,000 people in Singapore have received their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, the health ministry said on Wednesday, with numbers expected to rise substantially in the coming weeks as the city-state ramps up its immunisation drive. | | | | | | AstraZeneca is scaling up releases of COVID-19 vaccine doses to the United Kingdom to the point where it expects to be providing 2 million a week by or before the middle of February, a top executive told lawmakers on Wednesday. | | | | | | Thailand's Red Cross Society appealed for people to give blood on Wednesday as donations hit a record low, with volumes collected halved amid public concern about getting infected with the coronavirus. | | | | | |
