(Reuters) – South Korea scrambled to build hospital beds in shipping containers and Japan said it would buy over 10,000 deep freezers to store vaccines, while health regulators in the United States and Britain issued allergy warnings on Pfizer’s vaccine.
DEATHS AND INFECTIONS
* For an interactive graphic tracking the global spread of COVID-19, open https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-maps/ in an external browser. * Eikon users, see COVID-19: MacroVitals https://apac1.apps.cp.thomsonreuters.com/cms/?navid=1592404098 for a case tracker and summary of news.
EUROPE
* Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech said that documents related to the development of their COVID-19 vaccine had been “unlawfully accessed” in a cyberattack on Europe’s medicines regulator.
* The Czech lower house approved giving the government an extension of state of emergency powers to Dec. 23.
* Slovakia ordered schools and most shops closed for at least three weeks from Dec. 21.
AMERICAS
* The United States on Wednesday crossed an ominous new threshold of more than 3,250 lives lost to COVID-19 in a single day, while public health officials stepped up preparations for a vaccine campaign of historic scope ahead of final regulatory review.
* Canada approved its first COVID-19 vaccine and said initial shots will be delivered and administered across the country starting next week.
* Brazil will “quite likely” begin vaccinations to stem the pandemic in January or February, Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello said.
ASIA-PACIFIC
* A Royal Caribbean “cruise-to-nowhere” from Singapore began disembarking its nearly 1,700 passengers who were confined to their cabins for more than 16 hours after a COVID-19 case was detected onboard, forcing the ship back to port.
* The governor of South Korea’s most populous province called for mass testing for coronavirus.
MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA
* Israel received its first shipment of coronavirus vaccines on Wednesday and a distributor predicted the country would have enough for about a quarter of the population by the end of the year.
* Abu Dhabi will resume economic, tourist and entertainment activity within two weeks, while Oman said it will exempt nationals of 103 counties from needing an entry visa for a stay of up to 10 days.
* South Africa has officially entered a second wave as the number of infections per day exceeds 6,000, the health minister said.
MEDICAL DEVELOPMENTS
* Johnson & Johnson said it has cut enrolment for its pivotal vaccine trial to 40,000 volunteers from its original plan for 60,000, as higher rates of COVID-19 infections should generate the data it needs with fewer study subjects.
* Australian scientists said they had developed a rapid genome sequencing method that would cut to within four hours the time taken to trace the source of coronavirus cases.
* India’s drugs regulator said it had sought more data to decide on emergency authorisation for AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine candidate.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
* Asian equities eased from a record high as stalled U.S. stimulus talks and a sell-off in tech stocks weighed, while sterling traders sat on a knife’s edge as last-ditch Brexit talks yielded only an agreement to keep talking. [MKTS/GLOB]
* The European Central Bank will unveil fresh stimulus measures to prop up the recession-hit currency bloc long enough for a vaccine to be deployed and its devastated economy to start to heal.
* Japanese wholesale prices in November fell 2.2% from a year earlier, marking the biggest drop in six months.
* Developing Asia is on course to contract this year, but probably less than previously thought as China recovers faster than expected, the Asian Development Bank said.
(Compiled by Ramakrishnan M. and Devika Syamnath; Editing by Anil D’Silva and Arun Koyyur)
