Slovakia cuts infections ‘by half’ as UK hopes for new vaccines by turn of year
As the world appears to be about to end its dithering about Coronavirus, Britain claims it will ‘almost certainly’ have three coronavirus vaccines ready for the fight by the end of the year.
And Slovak Prime Minister Igor Matovic said the country’s coronavirus testing and quarantine programme, has cut infections by more than half.
Sir John Bell, professor of medicine at Oxford University and a member of Number 10’s vaccine taskforce, said he expects three jabs – including those made by Pfizer and Oxford University – soon.
He also said there was an ’80 per cent chance’ life in the UK will be back to normal by spring.
Matt Hancock today confirmed the NHS and the military are on standby to start rolling out Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine from the start of next month, with care home staff and residents at the front of the queue.
World leaders have welcomed the new vaccine and Pfizer said it plans to ask for emergency use authorisation from the US Food and Drug Administration.
Meanwhile, Slovakia tested 3.6 million people over Halloween and repeated the tests for just over 2 million last weekend in badly affected areas.
The scheme has been watched by other countries battling with a spike in coronavirus cases with the UK’s Boris Johnson praising Slovakia’s efforts in one of his ‘state of the nation’ speeches.
Figures appear to show that Slovakia’s infection rate dropped from 1.47per cent on the first weekend to 0.62per cent of those who took the test on the second weekend.
Mr Matovic said; “We are going into a tough winter. We have an extraordinarily effective tool in antigen testing that cuts the share of infected people by 58per cent.
His government says that while it knows the tests may miss a large number of those infected, it was still doing AND repeating them to narrow the probability of falsely negative results.
Slovakia saw an growth of cases in October and testing was designed to avoid a surge like that in the Czech Republic, which suffered Europe’s worst infection and death rates recently.
In other reports the Central Crisis Management Team are said to be toughening its attitude to borders with the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Austria.
In other news Romani communities also took part in testing confirming that they are resisting the pandemic well
In a video posted to the ROMEA TV YouTube channel, Romani communities are calling on people to stay ahead of the disease by wearing face masks and by not gathering until it is safe. They are also asked not share disinformation on social media.
And pharmaceutical regulators in Slovakia have warned against taking alcohol together with cough medicine as a home-made cure.
Marian Kotleba, head of the opposition ultra-right LSNS recommended mixing vodka with two different decongestants on social media.
He said; “I have used the methods of our ancestors. I began mixing Stopkašel syrup and Bromhexin with vodka. It has saved my health.”
Slovakia’s State Institute for the Control of Pharmaceuticals immediately warned against the risk of using alcohol together with drugs of any kind. “It is not appropriate to consume either Bromhexin or any other drug with alcohol. Moreover, drinking alcohol not only does not protect one from COVID-19, but can also be dangerous. Consuming alcohol will not destroy the virus but, on the contrary, can increase the risk to one’s health should one become infected,” the Institute said.
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3 Replies to “Slovakia cuts infections ‘by half’ as UK hopes for new vaccines by turn of year”
Zayn Chaudhary
There is no vaccine…
The second wave of testing excluded all those who tested positive in the first wave. Anything but a sharp drop in average levels of infection would have been… well, bizarre.
Thank you Lusalien