Hereâs why paramedics lined a Coventry street this week
They paid their respects to a much-loved colleague
Updated
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Off-duty paramedics and NHS staff lined the streets this week in Coventryâs Longfellow Road to pay their respects to a much-loved hospital receptionist.
Covid-19 vaccine: Timeline on nine countries which started rolling out vaccines; details here
Britain was the first to approve the shot for emergency use on December 3, followed by Canada on December 9 and the US FDA on December 11. (Representational Photo)
Updated: Dec 19, 2020, 11:04 PM IST
In the latest developments, eight countries in the World have begun or granted approval for vaccinating their people against the Covid-19 pandemic. Earlier in November 18, Pfizer/BioNTech became the first in the world to release full late-stage trial data.
Britain was the first to approve the shot for emergency use on December 3, followed by Canada on December 9 and the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on December 11. Moderna became second in the vaccine race after it released a full data analysis for a late-stage trial on November 30, showing a 94.1 per cent efficacy rate for its vaccine.
Hospitals are seeing record numbers of coronavirus patients as fears over NHS capacity saw Boris Johnson refuse to rule out a third lockdown. We re hoping very much that we will be able to avoid anything like a third lockdown in the new year, the Prime Minister said, but added: the reality is that the rates of infection have increased very much in the last few weeks.
A fifth of hospital trusts in England are treating more patients with Covid-19 than they were at the height of the first wave, while the number of people in hospital across the UK are reaching similar levels to those seen in the spring.
Following a two-month-long review, Switzerland Saturday became the latest country to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for use.
“After a meticulous review of the available information, Swissmedic concluded that the Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer/BioNTech is safe and that its benefit outweighs the risks,” the Swissmedic regulatory authority said in a statement. A vial of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. (AP)
It is the first vaccine against the new coronavirus authorised so far in the country.
According to AFP, the alpine nation has secured around 15.8 million Covid-19 vaccine doses, in deals with three separate manufacturers. It has signed contracts for around three million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, around 7.5 million doses of Moderna’s vaccine, and around 5.3 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. All three vaccines require two doses per person.
When?
Over the last 12 months, the whole world has battled against the greatest pandemic it has faced in 100 years. Retrospective studies consider that the 2019 Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) evolved in China in November 2019. In late December, 2019, scientific comprehension of this new kind of coronavirus took place in Guangzhou Province, and clinical apprehension of a pending epidemic started at Hubei Provincial Hospital in Wuhan. Soon after that the Wuhan Health authorities issued a case statistic, and this information reached the World Health Organization (WHO), as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in USA, soon after that.
What?
COVID-19, which undoubtedly is the worst pandemic during our lifetime, but it is not the worst pandemic that the world has faced. The Spanish Flu, also known as the 1918 Flu Pandemic, lasted over two years from February 1918. In four successive waves, it infected 500 million people – close to a third of the world’s po