Health News at Your Fingertips

The actor and anti-lockdown campaigner, Laurence Fox, has announced he has tested positive for coronavirus.

Fox, the founder and leader of the Reclaim party, which came sixth in the race to be London’s mayor last year, tweeted this:

“General remarks” about Hong Kong’s coronavirus strategy are not illegal and do not violate the Chinese territory’s national security law, the government has said, according to Reuters.

Hong Kong has followed China in sticking to a zero-Covid policy with the economic and psychological tolls rapidly rising, and measures becoming more draconian than those first implemented in 2020.

Experts have said that the policy is unsustainable as cases continue to increase due to the highly transmissible Omicron strain.

Hong Kong’s policy to achieve “dynamic zero infection” was the most effective way to fight the outbreak and protect public health, the government said in a statement.

It came after local legislator Junius Ho said that experts who suggested Hong Kong should live with the virus the way western experts do may have violated its national security law.

More than 1 million of Hong Kong’s 7.5 million residents are not vaccinated, exposing them to high chance of infection or even a risk of death, the government said.

The city has recorded around 13,600 infections since 2020 and 213 deaths, far lower than other major cities.

Despite their concerns about misinformation on Spotify, Harry and Meghan have made it clear that they plan to continue work on their lucrative contracts with the platform.

The Archewell statement added:

We have continued to express our concerns to Spotify to ensure changes to its platform are made to help address this public health crisis.

We look to Spotify to meet this moment and are committed to continuing our work together as it does.

Harry and Meghan have waded into the row about Spotify spreading Covid misinformation.

A spokesperson for their Archewell foundation told Reuters:

Hundreds of millions of people are affected by the serious harms of rampant mis- and disinformation every day. Last April, our co-founders began expressing concerns to our partners at Spotify about the all too real consequences of Covid-19 misinformation on its platform.

The interventions comes after the veteran Canadian singer-songwriters Neil Young and Joni Mitchell removed their music from Spotify in protest at the platform hosting a popular anti-vax podcast.

Harry and Meghan have signed a series of corporate deals, including to produce and host podcasts for Spotify, as part of their efforts to make a living following their split with Britain’s royal family announced in 2020.

Spotify has yet to comment.

The Swedish company has previously said it worked to balance “both safety for listeners and freedom for creators” and had removed more than 20,000 podcast episodes related to Covid in accordance with its “detailed content policies”.

Young objected to his music being played on the same platform as Joe Rogan’s top-rated podcast “The Joe Rogan Experience”.

Rogan has stirred controversy with his views on the pandemic, government mandates and vaccines to control the spread of the coronavirus.

Earlier this month, 270 scientists and medical professionals signed a letter urging Spotify to take action against Rogan, accusing him of spreading falsehoods on the podcast.

Algeria has reported its first case of the BA.2 subvariant of the Omicron strain of the virus, according Reuters, citing the general director of the Pasteur institute speaking on Ennahar TV.

The North African country registered 1,742 new cases and 10 deaths, bringing the total number to 249,310 cases and 6,555 deaths, according to official figures.

Last week, the health ministry in Denmark said the BA.2 variant was more contagious than original strain of Omicron.

Iran has announced that the number of its new cases has almost doubled in the last 24 hours from 11,731 on Saturday to 21,996 on Sunday.

Iran is the grip of a fourth wave of the virus as the highly infectious Omicron variant take hold. Iran’s health ministry also announced a further 44 new Covid deaths.

Officials in Beijing have sealed off residential communities in the city’s northern district after two new Covid cases were found, AP reports.

Residents in the Anzhenli neighbourhood in Chaoyang district were sealed off on Saturday, and will not be allowed to leave their compound.

Beijing is on high alert as it prepares to host the Olympic Games opening on Friday.

While the cases are low compared with other countries in the region, China has double down on its “zero-tolerance” policy, which includes breaking the chain of transmission as soon as it is found.

The city is also setting up 19 points in the area to test residents every day until Friday, officials said at a briefing on the pandemic, according to state-backed Beijing News.

Here’s a roundup of the latest developments:

• The Winter Olympics, which begin in five days in Beijing, have been hit by 34 new infections among athletes and officials. Poland’s short track medal hopeful Natalia Maliszewska is among those who tested positive. Meanwhile, the city of Beijing has reported 20 new cases – its highest for 18 months.
• The UK’s foreign secretary, Liz Truss, has said it is the government’s “intention to publish the full report” into alleged lockdown breaking parties in Downing Street. She also admitted: “It is a bit of a mess that we have the police investigation alongside the Sue Gray report”.
• The NHS has announced it will begin offering vaccinations to children aged between five and 11 who are most at risk from the virus. Children in the cohort who were in a clinical risk group or who live with someone who is immunosuppressed would be able to get a first jab, in line with advice issued last month by the Joint Committee on Vaccine and Immunisation.
• Germany has reported 118,970 new infections, a 39% increase on last week’s figures. It also reported that a further 59 people died after testing positive for the virus.
• Russia has reported a record 121,228 new daily cases of the virus. The government’s coronavirus taskforce also reported 617 deaths in the last 24 hours.
• Voting in under way in Portugal in a parliamentary election marred by fears of a low turnout due to record coronavirus infections. The government has allowed those infected to leave isolation and cast ballots in person, recommending that they do so in the last hour before polling stations close at 7pm.
• New cases in South Korea’s have hit a record 17,532 as the highly infectious Omicron variant spreads. The daily count broke the record for the sixth consecutive day, risiing from 8,570 on Tuesday.

The UK’s foreign secretary, Liz Truss, has stopped short of the government’s previous commitment to publish the full report into alleged lockdown breaking parties.

Speaking to the BBC’s Sunday Morning show, she said: “It is our intention to publish the full report.”

She also admitted: “It is a bit of a mess that we have the police investigation alongside the Sue Gray report”.

Asked if Boris Johnson should resign if it emerges he lied to parliament, Truss said: “I’m not going to answer hypothetical questions. The future of the prime minister is assured.”

New cases in South Korea’s have hit a record 17,532 as the highly infectious Omicron variant spreads, the Yonap news agency reports.

The country reported 17,532 new infections, including 17,303 local cases, raising the total caseload to 828,637, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency said.

The daily count broke the record for the sixth consecutive day, spiking from 8,570 on Tuesday.

Authorities had earlier said Saturday’s tally reached 17,542 but corrected the figure to 17,526, citing erroneous reporting.