Health

Brazil registered 11,598 new confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus and 623 additional deaths in the last 24 hours, the nation's Health Ministry said on Monday evening.

China registered 5 new coronavirus cases on June 1, down from 16 a day earlier, the National Health Comission said on Tuesday.

Public health experts and government officials, including New York's governor, are warning that large street protests over racial inequities and excessive police force could worsen the spread of the novel coronavirus.

World Health Organization experts and a range of other scientists said on Monday there was no evidence to support an assertion by a high-profile Italian doctor that the coronavirus causing the COVID-19 pandemic has been losing potency.

Egypt confirmed 1,399 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Monday, the health ministry said, its first decline for a week.

Wildlife advocates are pushing drugmakers to curb the use of horseshoe crab blood by switching to a synthetic alternative for safety tests, including those needed before a COVID-19 vaccine can be used on humans.

The following is a brief roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

The French health ministry said on Monday that people should continue taking protective measures against the coronavirus even as cases in hospitals and intensive care continue to fall.

There is no evidence the new coronavirus has been altering either in its form of transmission or severity of the disease it causes, a World Health Organization (WHO) expert said on Monday.

Italy on Monday released a contested mobile app to trace coronavirus infections in four regions before extending it to the whole country, despite widespread resistance from people concerned about invasion of privacy.

The first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic may be waning. For vaccine developers, that could be a problem.

Canada's drug pricing agency said on Monday that new regulations aimed at lowering costs would come into force in January next year instead of next month after receiving extensive feedback on its proposed rules.

Eli Lilly and Co said on Monday it had started an early-stage trial to test its potential treatment for COVID-19, in the world's first study of an antibody treatment against the disease.

Authorities in Congo announced a new Ebola outbreak in the western city of Mbandaka on Monday, adding to another epidemic of the virus that has raged in the east since 2018.

The World Health Organization (WHO) should have enough information in 24 hours to decide whether to continue suspending its trial of hydroxychloroquine for use against coronavirus, its chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said on Monday.

Britain's AstraZeneca has clinched expanded regulatory backing for two medications, including one for blockbuster cancer treatment Lynparza, in a development pipeline that now includes a possible coronavirus vaccine.

Britain's new coronavirus test-and-trace system is working well and some of the thousands of contact-tracers who have been recruited are not yet fully occupied, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Monday.

More than a quarter of the confirmed novel coronavirus cases in Brazil's southernmost state of Rio Grande do Sul are among meat plant workers, the labor prosecutors' office said on Monday.

The United Kingdom's death toll from people who have tested positive for COVID-19 has risen by 111 to 39,049, the government said on Monday.

The World Health Organization (WHO) should have enough information in 24 hours to decide whether to continue suspending its trials of hyrdroxychloroquine for use against the new coronavirus, its chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said on Monday.