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EMBL courses and conferences: learning lessons and looking ahead
The coronavirus pandemic has created unprecedented challenges for those trying to organise scientific courses and conferences. As the scale of the disruption first became clear, EMBL moved quickly to ensure that its events could still go ahead EMBL’s courses and conferences are accessible from your desk.
From the earliest days of the pandemic, the uncertainty of the situation and the requirement for physical distancing created a host of challenges. It also raised major questions about new formats. Would the technology stand up to running a conference entirely online? How would participants respond to a virtual course? Would attendees still feel engaged while sat at home?
MELBOURNE (Reuters) - A cluster of new coronavirus cases has emerged in Australia s New South Wales State, health officials said on Sunday, just as the country appeared on the verge of snuffing out all community transmission. Health authorities were still investigating a mystery case in a man who tested positive on Friday in the western Sydney suburb of Berala. All six locally acquired cases registered on Sunday were close contacts of the man. Australia, which has managed the coronavirus better than many other nations through targeted lockdowns and high rates of testing and contact tracing, last week recorded a day of zero locally acquired cases, raising hopes that outbreaks in three states over the summer holidays had been brought under control. The latest outbreak shows how easily the virus can spread, New South Wales state leader Gladys Berejiklian told reporters in Sydney as she called for more people to come forward for testing. What is really important is to make sure that, given
Apart from Covishield, the Serum Institute of India (SII) is working on four more vaccines against the novel coronavirus, according to Suresh Jadhav, executive director at one of the world s largest vaccine manufacturers. Jadhav informed during a webinar that the firm has been working on five vaccines against the novel coronavirus, including the Covishield which got approval for emergency use roll-out for mass immunization drive began on Saturday. For one (vaccine) we have received emergency approval, three others are in different stages of clinical studies while one is in the pre-clinical stage of the trial, he said. The SII has partnered with Novavax Inc to manufacture its potential Covid-19 vaccine for India and other countries.
BEIJING (Reuters) - Mainland China reported 109 new COVID-19 cases on Jan. 16, down from 130 a day earlier, the country s national health authority said on Sunday. The National Health Commission said in a statement that 96 of the new cases were local infections, 72 of them in Hebei province surrounding Beijing city, 12 in northeastern Heilongjiang province, 10 in northeastern Jilin province and two in Beijing. The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, rose to 119 from 79 a day earlier. Shijiazhuang, Hebei s capital and the hardest-hit spot in the latest surge of infections, reported 65 new locally transmitted confirmed cases on Jan. 16, Health Commission of Hebei Province said on its website. The total of confirmed COVID-19 cases in mainland China stands at 88,227, while the death toll remains unchanged at 4,635. (Reporting by Shivani Singh and Roxanne Liu; Editing by Daniel Wallis, Dan Grebler and William Mallard)