Malaysia has reported its biggest rise in new Covid-19 cases since 4 June.
On Thursday, the country’s health ministry recorded 260 new infections in the past 24 hours, which it said was mostly due to an outbreak in Sabah state on Borneo Island.
Malaysia has so far recorded a total of 11,484 cases, including 136 deaths.
The jump in new cases came after travel increased to and from Sabah ahead of state elections last Saturday.
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Over in Athens an outbreak of coronavirus in a nursing home has caused further alarm among health officials, who say they are increasingly concerned by the rising number of cases in the Greek capital, writes Helena Smith, the Guardian’s correspondent in Greece.
As many as 45 people in a nursing home in downtown Athens tested positive for the virus with authorities rushing to transfer the infected men and women to hospitals in the city.
The operation came after Greece’s top infectious disease expert professor Sotiris Tsiodras told reporters after visiting the care home (double-masked) “things aren’t going well in Athens”.
With the exception of three days over the course of the last 10, the caseload of confirmed coronavirus cases has exceeded 300. On Wednesday, the national organisation of public health, EODY, announced infections had risen by 354, bringing the total to 18,475. With 78 people in intensive care, officials have voiced fears of the pressures being placed on the public health system.
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Turkey accused of hiding true extent of outbreak
The government in Turkey has been accused of hiding the true extent of the country’s coronavirus outbreak after the health minister let slip that daily figures only account for patients with symptoms, not all positive cases.
In a news conference on Wednesday night, Fahrettin Koca said that since 29 July the count did not include asymptomatic positive cases, the Associated Press reports. He ignored a question about the number of new positive coronavirus cases per day, a key indicator of where the outbreak is headed in any country.
“We are talking about people with symptoms. We are giving this as the daily number of patients,” he told reporters.
The revelation led to an outcry on social media, with people calling on the government to reveal the true spread of the coronavirus among the population of 83 million.
The minister’s admission came after an opposition legislator, Murat Emir, claimed that the true number of daily new infections in Turkey was 19 times higher than the daily figures reported by Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government.
Koca denied the claim, insisting that all information published on a table showing Turkey’s daily coronavirus count is correct.
Turkey on Wednesday reported 1,391 new coronavirus patients and 65 deaths. Since the pandemic began, Turkey says 318,000 residents have been infected and 8,195 have died.
Russia confirmed its highest daily tally of new coronavirus cases since June 12 on Thursday as authorities reported 8,945 new infections, pushing the national total to 1,185,231, Reuters reports.
The capital, Moscow, the heart of the outbreak earlier this year, registered 2,424 new cases overnight, officials said. Authorities said 169 people had died nationwide in the last 24 hours, bringing the official death toll to 20,891.
The Spanish government has warned the Madrid regional authorities that new measures to halt the spread of Covid-19 are obligatory as political intransigence threatens to undermine efforts to tackle the pandemic in the western European nation hardest hit by the virus, writes Sam Jones, the Guardian’s correspondent in Madrid.
On Wednesday, 13 of Spain’s 19 self-governing regions backed a plan to impose partial lockdowns on town and cities, allowing people to enter and exit affected areas only on work, school, or medical grounds, or for other pressing reasons.
Under the rules, the limited confinements will be imposed on municipalities of 100,000 people or more: if there are more than 500 cases per 100,000 people; if more than 10% of tests during the previous fortnight are positive, and if the proportion of intensive care unit (ICU) beds occupied by Covid patients is 35% or higher.
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More than 1.5 million people in Merseyside, north west England, are expected to be banned from mixing in pubs and restaurants under new coronavirus rules due to be announced on Thursday, writes Josh Halliday, the Guardian’s north of England correspondent.
Joe Anderson, the mayor of Liverpool, said he expected an announcement on further restrictions for the region on Thursday morning following a meeting chaired by Boris Johnson.
He said households were likely to be banned from mixing in public venues, as they have been for 2 million people in the north-east of England.
“We’ve already been told there will be restrictions and regulations put in place similar to Newcastle and the north-east, so we expect that, but potentially also the government might introduce even stricter measures so we’ve just got to wait now and see what they announce,” he told BBC Breakfast.
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