Washington, Apr 24: The number of coronavirus cases in the US has surpassed 850,000, Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center data revealed on Thursday (local time).
The country now has registered 8,56,209 cases overall, according to the data, including 47,272 deaths.
The US currently leads the world in the number of reported COVID-19 deaths and confirmed cases.
There are more than 2.6 million COVID-19 cases around the world and more than 1,85,000 deaths, according to the data.
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.
The dollar's dominance will slowly melt away over the coming year on weakening global demand and a sombre U.S. economic outlook, according to a Reuters poll of currency forecasters whose views depend on there being no second coronavirus shock.
Despite fears a surge in new Covid-19 cases would delay economies reopening and stymie a tentative recovery, world stocks have rallied - with the S&P 500 finishing higher in June, marking its biggest quarterly percentage gain since the height of the technology boom in 1998.
Caught between bets in favour of riskier investments, weak U.S. economic prospects as well as an easing in the thirst for dollars after the Federal Reserve flooded markets with liquidity, the greenback fell nearly 1.0 per cent last month. It was its worst monthly performance since December.
While there was a dire prognosis from the top U.S. medical expert on the coronavirus' spread, the June 25-July 1 poll of over 70 analysts showed weak dollar projections as Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Monday reiterated the economic outlook for the world's largest economy was uncertain.
"The dollar rises in two instances: when you see risk off or when there is a situation where the U.S. is leading the global recovery, and we don't think that's going to be the case anytime soon," said Gavin Friend, senior FX strategist at NAB Group in London.
"The U.S. is playing fast and loose with the virus, and chronologically they're behind the rest of the world."
Currency speculators, who had built up trades against the dollar to the highest in two years during May, increased their out-of-favour dollar bets further last week, the latest positioning data showed.
About 80 per cent of analysts, 53 of 66, said the likely path for the dollar over the next six months was to trade around current levels, alternating between slight gains and losses in a range. That suggests the greenback may be at a crucial crossroad as more currency strategists have turned bearish.
But more than 90 per cent, or 63 of 68, said a second shock from the pandemic would push the dollar higher. Five said it would push the U.S. currency lower.
Much will also depend on debt servicing and repayments by Asian, European and other international borrowers in U.S. dollars.
While an early shortage of dollars in March from the pandemic's first shock pushed the Fed to open currency swap lines with major central banks, international funding strains have eased significantly since. In recent weeks, usage of the facility has reduced dramatically.
That trend is expected to continue over the next six months with major central banks' usage of swap lines to "stay around current levels", according to 32 of 46 analysts. While 13 predicted a sharp drop, only one respondent said use of them would "rise sharply".
The dollar index, which measures the greenback's strength against six other major currencies, has slipped over 5 per cent since touching a more than three-year high in March.
When asked which currencies would perform better against the dollar by end-December, a touch over half of 49 respondents said major developed market ones, with the remaining almost split between commodity-linked and emerging market currencies.
"The dollar is so overvalued, and has been overvalued for a long time, it's time now for it to come back down again, as we head towards the (U.S.) election," added NAB's Friend.
Over the last quarter, the euro has staged a 1.8 per cent comeback after falling by a similar margin during the first three months of the year. For the month of June, the euro was up 1.2 per cent against the dollar.
The single currency was now expected to gain about 2.5 per cent to trade at $1.15 in a year from around $1.12 on Wednesday, slightly stronger than $1.14 predicted last month. While those findings are similar to what analysts have been predicting for nearly two years, there was a clear shift in their outlook for the euro, with the range of forecasts showing higher highs and higher lows from last month.
"In comparison to even a month or two ago, the outlook in Europe has improved significantly," said Lee Hardman, currency strategist at MUFG.
"I think that makes the euro look relatively more attractive and cheap against the likes of the dollar. We're not arguing strongly for the euro to surge higher, we're just saying, after the weakness we have seen in recent years, there is the potential for that weakness to start to reverse."
If everything goes as Russia’s expectation, it will be world’s first country to approve a coronavirus vaccine for widespread in the second week of August despite safety and efficacy concerns, according to a report. The adenoviral vector-based vaccine developed by Russian military and government researchers is currently in phase 2 trials.
According to a report from CNN, Russian officials are hoping to get approval for the COVID-19 vaccine developed by the Moscow-based Gamaleya Institute on Agust 10 or even before that. The officials told the outlet that the vaccine will be approved for public use with frontline healthcare workers receiving it first.
“It’s a Sputnik moment,” said Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, which is financing Russian vaccine research, referring to the successful 1957 launch of the world’s first satellite by the Soviet Union, according to CNN.
“Americans were surprised when they heard Sputnik’s beeping. It’s the same with this vaccine. Russia will have got there first,” he was quoted as saying.
However, Russia is yet to release the scientific data on its coronavirus vaccine trials, hence, questions remain about the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, said the report. The vaccine is in the second phase of testing with developers planning to launch the phase 3 trials sometime after August 3.
Earlier, Interfax reported, citing Health Minister Mikhail Murashko, that the vaccine will be widely used in parallel with phase 3 trials. He said the country plans to vaccinate medics who are at high-risk for COVID-19 next month before clinical trials are completed.
Murashko added that individuals at higher risk of getting infected with the coronavirus such as older people or those with health conditions will also be prioritised for the vaccine, although he did not estimate or reveal when that would happen. The minister added 800 people will be recruited for the phase 3 trials.
Meanwhile, health officials were more cautious considering the fact that human testing of the vaccine is incomplete, and the state registration is expected to begin after August 3, reported The Moscow Times.
On Monday, Moderna and Pfizer announced the commencement of the final phase 3 trials of their candidate vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which has so far claimed at least 654,477 lives and infected 16,514,500 people worldwide.
Researchers will recruit up to 30,000 volunteers in separate trials both backed by the US government. India's first indigenous coronavirus vaccine, COVAXIN, is undergoing phase 1 human clinical trials across the country. More than 150 COVID-19 vaccines are being developed all over the world with at least six candidates already in late-stage clinical trials.
Comments
Add new comment