Tokyo, Jun 18: Several people were feared dead, including a nine-year-old girl, after a strong quake shook the city of Osaka in western Japan, local media reported today.
Public broadcaster NHK and private station TV Asahi both reported "several" deaths, with the Kyodo news agency saying a nine-year-old girl had been trapped by a damaged wall in a swimming facility north of Osaka city.
Local police said they could not confirm the reports.
Washington, Aug 8: The United States has reported 58,173 new coronavirus cases on Friday, bringing the total past 4.9 million, according to Johns Hopkins University.
"The first case of COVID-19 in the US was reported 198 days ago on 22.01.2020.Yesterday, the country reported 58,173 new confirmed cases and 1,243 deaths," it said.
The country is expected to cross the 5 million thresholds in the coming days. It leads the world both in terms of coronavirus cases and deaths estimated at over 161,300.
Overall, there have been 19.4 million cases confirmed globally and almost 721,800 people have died from virus-related complications. Another 11.7 million have recovered.
Paris, Apr 10: French pharma major Sanofi said on Friday it has decided to donate 100 million doses of hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malaria drug which could be a potential weapon against novel coronavirus, across 50 countries.
The company has already doubled its incremental production capacity on top of the usual production for current indications across its eight hydroxychloroquine manufacturing sites worldwide and is on track to quadruple it by the summer.
"In this global health emergency, Sanofi stands ready to assist as many countries as possible, starting with countries where its medicine is registered for current approved indications as well as countries where there are no hydroxychloroquine suppliers or countries with underserved populations," it said in a statement.
Sanofi called for coordination among the entire hydroxychloroquine chain worldwide to ensure the continued supply of the medicine if proven to be a well-tolerated and effective treatment in COVID-19 patients.
"The COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented health and economic crisis which is shaking some of the very fundamentals of international solidarity and cooperation among countries," said Chief Executive Officer Paul Hudson. "This virus does not care about the concept of borders, so we should not either," he added.
"It is critical that international authorities, local governments, manufacturers and all other players involved in the hydroxychloroquine chain work together in a coordinated manner to ensure all patients who may benefit from this potential treatment can access it. If the trials prove positive, we hope our donation will play a critical role for patients," said Hudson.
While hydroxychloroquine is generating a lot of hope for patients around the world, said Sanofi, it should be remembered that there are no results from ongoing studies and the results may be positive or negative.
To date, there is insufficient clinical evidence to draw any conclusion over the safety and efficacy of hydroxychloroquine in the management of COVID-19 patients.
It is one of several medicines being investigated by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in its international clinical trial seeking a treatment solution for COVID-19. "Sanofi is supporting ongoing trials by providing the medicine to some participating investigator sites and other independent research centres," it said.
A shrimp seller at the wet market in the Chinese city of Wuhan believed to be the centre of the coronavirus pandemic, may be the first person to have tested positive for the disease, a media report said on Saturday.
The report by the London-based Metro newspaper said that 57-year-old woman, named by the Wall Street Journal as Wei Guixian, was selling shrimp at the Huanan Seafood Market when she developed what she thought was a cold last December.
Chinese digital news outlet, The Paper has said that she may be epatient zero'.
Wei was told by doctors her illness was "ruthless" and other workers at the market had come to the Wuhan Union Hospital with the same symptoms, the Metro newspaper report quoted the outlet as saying.
"Every winter, I suffer from the flu, so I thought it was the flu," the woman was quoted as saying by The Paper news outlet.
The shrimp seller added that she believed she contracted the coronavirus from the shared toilet in the market.
She said the fatal disease would have killed fewer people if the government had acted sooner.
Wuhan Municipal Health Commission has confirmed that Wei was among the first 27 people to test positive for the coronavirus.
It said she was one of 24 cases with direct links to the market, the Metro newspaper reported.
Though Wei may be "patient zero", it does not mean she is the first person to have contracted the virus, added the Metro report.
Chinese researchers have claimed that the first person diagnosed with the airborne virus had no contact with the seafood market and was identified on December 1, 2019.
Wei was later quarantined when a connection was made between the bug and the market before recovering in January.
As of Saturday, the global number of coronavirus cases stood at 104,837 with 27,862 deaths, according to the latest update by the Washington-based Johns Hopkins University.
The US has the highest number of cases at 104,837, followed by Italy 86,498 and China 81,948.
Italy has recorded the highest number of fatalities with 9,134 deaths, followed by Spain and China, at 5,138 and 3,299, respectively.
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