Today’s covid-19 news: · UK approaching record cases · Shanghai imposes two-stage nine-day lockdown · Over half of immunocompromised people in England not boosted
The researchers are calling for increased genomic surveillance around sotrovimab’s use. “What we don’t want to see is resistant virus disseminating in the community, because that will mean that a lot of other people can’t use this drug as well,” said Rockett.The WHO has warned the pandemic is “far from over”. The number of global recorded deaths between 28 February and 6 March declined by 8 per cent compared to the previous week, with recorded infections also falling by 5 per cent.
A surveillance programme that looks for SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater has been rolled out across Northern Ireland, thereported. Wastewater samples from 31 sites are being collected every day and sent to a Queen’s University Belfast laboratory for testing. Gauging infection levels in specific areas may help to prevent large SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks, with the technology also looking for new variants.
In the week starting 28 February, more than 10 million new covid cases and 52,000 deaths were reported across the WHO’s six regions. The surge in infection caused by the omicron variant appears to have peaked in February. But the WHO has stressed that countries vary in their testing strategies and therefore any trends should be interpreted with caution.,322,917 people reported a positive test between 2 and 8 March, an increase of 90,944 from the previous week. Hospital covid admissions are also rising, with 8763 people admitted between 26 February and 4 March, an increase of 11.1 per cent from the previous week.