Health News at Your Fingertips

Medical journal the Lancet has published research about the long-term health impacts of Covid-19.

More than 1,700 people spoke to researchers six months after they had been discharged from hospital in Wuhan.

According to the study, fatigue or muscle weakness was the most reported symptom (63%) followed by sleep difficulties (26%) and anxiety or depression (23%).

Most of you reading this would have been in a Covid-19 enforced lockdown at some point in the past year. But did you have to wear a mask while driving alone in your own car?

That’s the advice in Brisbane, Australia, which just started a snap three-day lockdown. This was sent earlier today by the state’s health minister:

Here is a piece some of you may have missed earlier, about the countries that are waiting to see how Covid-19 vaccinations unfold elsewhere before launching programs of their own:

Hello and welcome to our continuing coverage of Covid-19 around the world.

Here are the major developments from the last few hours:

• The United States has recorded its highest daily increase in coronavirus cases, with 290,000 cases and 3,676 deaths reported in 24 hours.
• Mexico has reported 14,362 new confirmed cases of coronavirus and 1,038 deaths.
• In Australia, New South Wales has recorded one new case of Covid-19 in connection to the Berala cluster and five in hotel quarantine; Victoria has recorded no new locally acquired cases and one in hotel quarantine; and Queensland has recorded no new cases on the first day of a three-day lockdown of greater Brisbane.
• Health officials in Australia have changed the rules for releasing people who test positive to Covid-19 from hotel quarantine. It comes as a Queensland woman, who completed quarantine in Victoria and caught a domestic flight to Brisbane, was revealed to have the UK variant of the virus and to still be returning a positive test. States will now do rapid genomic testing of everyone who tests positive to Covid-19, extend the isolation period to 14 days, and require exit testing of positive cases.
• In the UK, all NHS health and social care staff will be offered a Covid vaccine as an “immediate” and “critical” priority, with most to receive their first jab by early February.
• The US Food and Drug Administration has said genetic variants of the Sars-CoV-2 virus, including the one first detected in the UK, could lead to false negative coronavirus test results.
• Spain has recorded its biggest one-day jump in new coronavirus cases since October.
• China has reported 33 new cases of Covid-19, mainly in Hebei province where authorities have suspended the subway service and announced tight new restrictions ahead of Lunar New year.
• And the World Health Organization director general director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has warned richer nations against hoarding Covid-19 vaccines, saying there is a “clear problem” that low- and middle-income countries are not yet receiving supplies of Covid-19 vaccines.