Health

The World Health Organization is not sure whether the presence of antibodies in blood gives full protection against reinfection with the new coronavirus, Mike Ryan, the WHO's top emergencies expert, told a briefing on Friday.

A sharp upward revision in China's coronavirus death toll on Friday was "an attempt to leave no case undocumented" after medical services in Wuhan were overwhelmed at the start of the outbreak, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

Nearly 1,300 people who died of the coronavirus in the Chinese city of Wuhan, or half the total, were not counted in death tolls because of lapses, state media said on Friday, but Beijing dismissed claims that there had been any kind of cover-up.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday reported 661,712 cases of new coronavirus, an increase of 29,164 cases from its previous count, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 1,978 to 33,049.

The number of deaths worldwide linked to the novel coronavirus reached 150,000 on Friday, according to a Reuters tally.

In Fresno, California, 58-year-old grandmother Maria Luisa Salazar shares a mobile home with her family of 11. Afraid that going to work would put them at risk of the coronavirus, she has stopped working and is staying at home.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) plan to update guidance for airline flight crews about dealing with the coronavirus pandemic amid concerns from pilots, but regulators are not mandating new safety requirements.

Seattle Genetics Inc's add-on therapy for an advanced form of breast cancer that has progressed despite prior treatment was on Friday approved months ahead of schedule by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Ireland plans to expand its coronavirus testing capacity to 100,000 tests per week over the next 10 days as it considers easing stay-at-home restrictions on May 5, Chief Medical Officer Tony Holohan said on Friday.

Britain launched a new coronavirus taskforce on Friday to support efforts to make a vaccine available to the public as quickly as possible.

Mexico's president on Friday urged medical workers aged 60 to 65 to return to their jobs and treat non-coronavirus patients, in a bid to help the health system handle an expected surge of demand from the virus.

The COVID-19 pandemic will likely kill at least 300,000 Africans and risks pushing 29 million into extreme poverty, the U.N. Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) said on Friday, calling for a $100 billion safety net for the continent.

A sharp upward revision in China's coronavirus death toll on Friday was "an attempt to leave no case undocumented", World Health Organization (WHO) epidemiologist Maria van Kerkhove told a briefing.

Africa can still contain the outbreak of the COVID-19 respiratory illness caused by the new coronavirus, a senior World Health Organization official said on Friday.

Deaths from the COVID-19 epidemic in Italy rose by 575 on Friday, up from 525 the day before, while the number of new cases declined slightly and scientists warned that infections were now mainly happening among family members.

The British government was too slow to react on several fronts to the novel coronavirus outbreak that could cause the deaths of 40,000 people in the United Kingdom, a leading public health professor told lawmakers on Friday.

U.S. health agencies, the European drug regulator and 16 top drugmakers will collaborate on vaccine and drug development efforts to fight the coronavirus pandemic, the U.S. National Institutes of Health said on Friday.

Dutch scientists have pulled a British-made East Radcliff ventilator built in the 1960s from the shelves of a science museum to use as a template for cheap and easy-to-build ventilators in the fight against coronavirus.

Any "wet markets" that are allowed to reopen after coronavirus lockdowns must conform to stringent food and hygiene standards, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a briefing on Friday.

British healthcare staff have been advised to treat COVID-19 patients without full-length protective gowns due to shortages of equipment, the Guardian newspaper reported on Friday.