Health

According to the World Health Organization the Congo has successfully ended an Ebola outbreak while fighting Covid-19 at the same time.

WHO Africa chief Matshidiso Moeti has stated that "Overcoming one of the world's most dangerous pathogens in remote and hard to access communities demonstrates what is possible when science and solidarity come together," adding that "This constituted a major logistical challenge in terms of the implementation of response activities in a health system already weakened by previous epidemics and by a weak involvement of the community."

"Tackling Ebola in parallel with COVID-19 hasn't been easy, but much of the expertise we've built in one disease is transferable to another and underlines the importance of investing in emergency preparedness and building local capacity."

According to a proclamation in Thailand's new Royal Gazette, the sale and possession of 102 substances classified as Category 2 drugs by the 1979 Narcotics Act may be sold or used under very specific limitations. Possession and use will be granted to governmental organizations, approved pharmacies, and health workers such as pharmacists, dentists, and veterinarians for the purposes of producing approved medical formulas or approved research.

The regulatory shift is similar to that made in the wake of December 2018 legislation that cleared the way for medical marijuana. Included in the new regulation, which will come into effect in July 2021, are opium, fentanyl, codeine, cocaine, and other substances.

Since the Polish court put a near-total-ban on a law that allowed abortion in cases of severe fetal anomalies there has been a noticeable increase in calls to German charities.

One of them being the charity group "Ciocia Basia" located in Berlin who helps and supports Polish women who want to follow through with an abortion in Germany. A volunteer reported that there has been drastic inflation of calls from Polish women who had an abortion planned in Poland but are now not finding a doctor who is willing to treat them. Women who, if the verdict goes through, will be forced to deliver a sick baby and maybe even put their own life at risk.

Worldwide 38 million people are infected with HIV and despite the long fight against the virus and education about it, there are still 1.7 million newly infected people every year. With drugs for HIV prevention, attempts are being made to reduce this number. In clinical studies, the new drug Cabotegravir has now proven to be particularly effective.

It only needs to be injected every eight weeks instead of having to be taken daily in pills as before. Especially for women, the drug is more effective than the previously available pill Truvada, but the new drug is also more effective for men and transwomen

The UK study has found that debilitating problems thought to be caused by statins are seldom caused by the actual drug.

It points to a 'nocebo effect' which is causing the problems, with users believing that the drug will make them sick. The study found a stark 90% of cases may be caused by the 'nocebo effect'.

The British Heart Foundation has said the results are undeniable.

Statins are one of the most commonly prescribed drugs in the UK, with nearly 8 million prescriptions.

A new Covid-19 vaccine, from the US company Moderna, is nearly 95% effective, early data show. The trial involved 30,000 people in the US, with half being given two doses of the vaccine, four weeks apart.

"These effects are what we would expect with a vaccine that is working and inducing a good immune response," said Prof Peter Openshaw, from Imperial College London.

Marijuana for medicinal use is now permitted to be grown at home in Argentina following a decree issued by President Alberto Fernández. In addition pharmacies will be allowed to sell cannabis-derived oils, creams and other products, and it orders public and private insurance systems to cover these medications for patients who obtain a prescription.

The World Health Organization has reported that measles cases and deaths have soared globally since 2016, with the global death tally of 2019 reaching 207,500 - 50 percent higher than just three years earlier.

Ethiopia set up a vaccination campaign in June which reached 14.5 million children. Alarmingly, the numbers of "zero-dose" children - those who had received no vaccines whatsoever - are beginning to rise again, with middle-income countries, including Brazil, Mexico and the Philippines, accounting for 9.5 million, or 69 percent.

According to the latest Government figures, the UK has become the first country within Europe to pass the bleak mark of 50,000 deaths related to the coronavirus.

Passing this mark, the UK joins as the 5th member of the 'over 50,000' club with the United States, Brazil, India and Mexico.

Since the coronavirus began, there have been over 1.2 million confirmed cases within the UK and more than 185,000 hospital admissions.

Reacting to the news, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said "we are not out of the woods". "Every death is a tragedy," he added, "I do think we have got now to a different phase in the way that we treat it."

Researchers from Britain’s Oxford University have found that 20% of Covid-19 patients are diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder within 90 days. The study analyzed over 62,000 cases of Covid-19 in the United States and has been published in The Lancet Psychiatry journal.

Mental health specialists not directly involved with the study evaluated the findings and stated that it adds to growing evidence that Covid-19 can increase the risk of a range of psychiatric illnesses as it can affect the brain and mind. People who had recovered, including those no longer reporting symptoms, exhibited significant cognitive deficits when controlling for age, gender, education level, income, racial-ethnic group and pre-existing medical disorders.

In news that has angered many Animal activists, the Government of Denmark have admitted that their mink cull had no legal basis.

Denmark's Prime Minister, Mette Fredericksen, admitted to the Danish Parliament on Tuesday "Even if we were in a rush, it should have been completely clear to us that new legislation was required, and it was not. I apologise for that,".

With this news, the Government shall be putting forward legislation of their own to create the necessary legal basis to continue and 'back up' the mink culling.

The cull is expected to affect the mink fur market, with Denmark being the biggest producer of mink fur in the world.

Germany's health minister Jens Spahn said he still does not expect a shot to be available before the first quarter of 2021, even after the announcement by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech that their Covid-19 vaccine proved to be 90% effective.

"If this should prove true ... then it would be a good signal because it shows that this vaccine makes a difference," Jens Spahn told a news conference Monday.

According to a preliminary analysis, the vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech can prevent more than 90% of people from getting Covid-19. However, the data presented is not the final analysis as it is based on only the first 94 volunteers to develop Covid-19 so the precise effectiveness of the vaccine may change when the full results are analysed.

The companies stated they would be able to supply 50 million doses by the end of this year and around 1.3 billion by the end of 2021. Each person needs two doses.

Dr Albert Bourla, the chairman of Pfizer, said: "We are a significant step closer to providing people around the world with a much-needed breakthrough to help bring an end to this global health crisis."

Mink variants of the Covid-19 virus have been found in 214 people in Denmark. 200 people are infected with these variants in the North Jutland Region, while 14 others are infected outside North Jutland. These are different variants of the virus, where the virus is mutated in mink, and then passed on to humans.

The so-called cluster 5 variant is the most prevalent and has been found on five mink farms in twelve affected people. So far no evidence of reduced sensitivity to antibodies has been found, but it will take most likely weeks before studies show more conclusive results.

Voters have approved Measure 109 that directs the Oregon Health Authority to create a state-licensed, psilocybin-assisted therapy program over the next two years. In addition, a regulation plan for the substance should be developed by the authorities as psilocybin remains a Schedule I substance under federal rules.

The measure aims to help patients with chronic mental health issues like PTSD, depression and addiction as well as reducing anxiety for patients who are dying.

The Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, has announced that twelve people have been infected with a mutated version of Covid-19 that has been transmitted from mink to human. The mutated Covid-19 version is feared to be a greater public health risk and could cause possible interference with a future vaccine.

The entire Danish herd of 15 million mink will therefore be culled to prevent the mutated Covid-19 version from spreading further.

German Health Minister Jens Spahn said at a press conference that "the current pandemic challenges us very acutely, but it is very important that the [WHO] reform debate is to be held in parallel".

The draft EU document, which will represent the bloc's position at a WHO assembly in mid-November, calls on the agency to make public more quickly how and whether its member countries meet their obligations on information sharing in health crises.

Kate Bingham, the chair of the UK's vaccine task force, has warned that a first-gen Covid-19 vaccine "is likely to be imperfect" and "may not prevent infection."

"The Vaccine Taskforce aims to ensure that the UK population has access to vaccines as soon as possible, while working with partners to support equitable access for populations worldwide, whether rich or poor," Bingham wrote on The Lancet. "However, we do not know that we will ever have a vaccine at all. It is important to guard against complacency and over-optimism. The first generation of vaccines is likely to be imperfect, and we should be prepared that they might not prevent infection but rather reduce symptoms, and, even then, might not work for everyone or for long."

There have been more than 43 million confirmed Covid-19 infections and over 1,15 million deaths since the start of the pandemic, according to data of the Johns Hopkin's University.

A volunteer in the clinical trial of the Covid-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University has died on October 15 in Brazil, the Brazilian health authority (Anvisa) announced.

The volunteer, João Pedro R. Feitosa, has died due to complications from Covid-19. Still, according to the Brazilian newspaper, O Globo Feitosa has been given a placebo and not the trial vaccine.

Oxford confirmed the clinical trial would not be paused, stating that after careful assessment "there have been no concerns about the safety of the clinical trial."

Japanese researchers have found that the SARS-CoV-2 virus strain can survive for nine hours on human skin, while the flu survives 1.8 hours.

They state that "the longer survival of SARS-CoV-2 on the skin increases contact-transmission risk", though "hand hygiene can reduce this risk".

Dmitriy Stuzhuk, a fitness influencer promoting healthy living, had contracted Covid-19 on a trip to Turkey. After his return to Ukraine, he had tested positive and subsequently been taken to a hospital. After eight days of treatment, he had been discharged but rushed back soon after due to heart complications.

His ex-wife has announced his death via Instagram stating that "only warm memories remain, three beautiful kids and valuable experience".

According to the New York Times data, the United States have recorded over 70,450 new Covid-19 cases in one single day, the highest single-day increase since July 24. Among the states that set a single-day case record are Wyoming, Minnesota, Wisconsin, West Virginia, North Dakota, Indiana, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado.

On Friday, the United States have surpassed 8 million confirmed Covid-19 cases, and almost 220,000 people have died from the virus, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. President Donald Trump has insisted that the virus would "peter out" and that the country was "rounding the turn."

In a plenary session the Spanish Congress unanimously approved a bill that seeks to reform the penal code to outlaw non-consensual sterilizations of judicially incapacitated persons. All the parliamentarians present in the House stood up and applauded the unanimous support for this initiative that will now return to the Senate for its final ratification.

With 348 votes in favor, it seeks to eliminate the second paragraph of Article 156, which currently decriminalizes non-consensual sterilizations of persons whose legal capacity has been modified when authorized by a judicial body.

Austria has recorded 1,552 Covid-19 cases within a 24-hour period on Thursday – the highest daily number since the start of the pandemic in March.

The Chinese city of Qingdao will be testing all of its 9 million citizens following the discovery of 12 cases linked to a hospital, including six asymptomatic infections. All of the city's citizens will be tested within 5 days, so the National Health Commission.

Under a new imposed three-week partial lockdown, the Czech Republic is closing schools, bars and clubs. Restaurant service will be limited to deliveries and takeaways. Until the end of the shutdown on November 3, public consumption of alcohol will also be banned.

Researchers from the Netherlands have reported the death of a woman, aged 88 years, that has died from a reinfection of Covid-19. After her first hospitalization due to Covid-19 early in 2020 the woman had tested positive again nearly two months later and subsequently died to the sympthoms.

The woman is the first known patient to die from a reinfection of Covid-19.

India's Health Ministry confirmed the country has surpassed 7 million Coronavirus cases, after registering another 74,383 infections on Sunday. It's expected that India will surpass the United States as the worst-hit country in the coming weeks.

Government health expert Dr. Randeep Guleria: “We have been able to keep the curve rise slow, but I do agree that we have not been able to get it to move aggressively down. That’s related to our population density, diversity of our country and socioeconomic challenges in our country.”