Health

France on June 2 will lift an 100 km (62 mile) travel restriction imposed to contain the new coronavirus outbreak, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Thursday.

The European Commission launched a new global fundraising campaign on Thursday to finance the development and worldwide distribution of testing, vaccines and treatments against COVID-19, seeking to address concerns they may not be equally shared.

Major sporting events in France will remain suspended for now until at least June 21, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Thursday.

Deaths from the COVID-19 epidemic in Italy climbed by 70 on Thursday, against 117 the day before, the Civil Protection Agency said, while the daily tally of new cases edged up to 593 from 584 on Wednesday.

France will accelerate a plan a plan to re-open high schools and junior high schools across the country, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Thursday.

The chief executive of AstraZeneca , which is developing a leading coronavirus vaccine with Oxford University, said it is too early to deliberately expose trial participants to the pathogen, but it may become an option if ongoing tests hit a snag.

The reproduction rate of the coronavirus infection is below 1 in most of France's national territory, Health Minister Olivier Veran said on Thursday.

British drugmaker GSK said on Thursday that its previous flu pandemic vaccine, which used some of the same ingredients as COVID-19 vaccines currently under development, was not linked to a rise in cases of the sleep disorder narcolepsy.

Health results have been good so far in France, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Thursday, as the country prepares to enter a second phase in its relaxation of lockdown rules on June 2.

As India's financial capital Mumbai battled a growing number of coronavirus cases, local DJ Sanjay Meriya set aside his turntable and dusted off a long-unused medical degree in order to help out.

AstraZeneca has partnered with British cell therapy company Oxford Biomedica to make its experimental COVID-19 vaccine, as the drugmaker looks to bolster its manufacturing capacity to produce one billion doses.

The European Commission said on Thursday it wanted to set up a permanent reserve of essential drugs and medical equipment to address shortages that have dogged the EU for years and worsened throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings (LabCorp) said on Thursday it was partnering with software provider Medable to speed up the adoption of virtual clinical trials, as many participants are dropping out of ongoing studies due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Indonesia will continue to prescribe two anti-malaria drugs for coronavirus patients but monitor their use closely, a spokesman for Indonesia COVID-19 taskforce said on Thursday, after some European nations banned the drug over safety concerns.

CVS Health Corp said on Thursday it would open more COVID-19 testing sites at some of its pharmacy drive-thru locations, completing the last leg of the drugstore chain's planned 1,000 sites across more than 30 U.S. states.

GSK , the world's largest vaccine maker, laid out plans on Thursday to produce 1 billion doses of vaccine efficacy boosters for COVID-19 shots next year, as the race to develop a successful solution to the coronavirus crisis heats up.

Hospitals in Indonesia's second largest city of Surabaya have been overwhelmed by a surge of new coronavirus cases, forcing them to turn patients away, the Indonesian Medical Association said on Thursday.

About 159,000 more people in 24 European countries have died since early March than would have ordinarily been expected, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Thursday, with a "significant proportion" of the spike linked to COVID-19.

Cases of community transmission of the new coronavirus are growing in Africa, particularly in Ethiopia, and a new strategy for testing is needed to prevent this, the head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday.

Nobody will get preferential access to a potential COVID-19 drug developed by vaccine maker Themis Bioscience, which is being bought by U.S. pharmaceuticals firm Merck & Co Inc, the Austrian firm's chief executive said on Thursday.