Latest On Coronavirus

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th April, 2021) The death toll from the coronavirus infection in the world topped 2.94 million, almost 136.3 million cases of infection were detected, according to the US-based Johns Hopkins University, which tracks and compiles data from Federal and local authorities, media and other sources.

As of 20:20 GMT Monday, the number of cases globally is 136,299,006, including 2,940,670 fatalities.

The United States still has the highest case count in the world, with 31,242,193, including 562,360 fatalities.

India has become the 60th country to authorize use of Russian coronavirus vaccine Sputnik V, and the vaccine is now approved in countries with a total population of 3 billion, or 40 percent of the world's population, the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) said.

Brazil is grateful to Russia for allowing officials from the Brazilian national sanitary inspection agency Anvisa to inspect the production facility of coronavirus vaccine Sputnik V in Russia this week, Brazilian Ambassador to Russia Tovar da Silva Nunes told Sputnik on the sidelines of Prodexpo 2021, adding that he himself got vaccinated with Sputnik V.

Deliveries of Russian coronavirus vaccine Sputnik V to Turkey may begin within four or five months, Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said.

Egypt's authorization of Russia's COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V has created good prerequisites for more active contacts on its possible deliveries to the Arab republic, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the Al-Ahram newspaper.

Slovak President Zuzana Caputova announced plans to meet the next day with Health Minister Vladimir Lengvarsky to discuss why the access to the contract for Russian coronavirus vaccine Sputnik V had been restricted, to see the document herself and find out if it could be made public.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro says the country's Carvativir treatment was effective against the Brazilian strains of the coronavirus.

India has regained the second position in the global chart of confirmed COVID-19 cases as the country recorded nearly 170,000 cases in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to over 13.4 million � about eight million cases short of the United States.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) latest data shows there has been an increase in the number of people who have tested positive for the novel coronavirus and hospitalized, while the number of virus-related deaths continues to decrease, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said.

Russia registered 8,320 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours, down from 8,702 the day before, taking the overall tally to 4,649,710, the coronavirus response center said.

Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca believes that the country is going through the most difficult period since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga refuted speculation that the fourth wave of the coronavirus pandemic had begun in the country as some parts of Japan, including Tokyo, Osaka and Kyoto prefectures, have seen a spike in infections.

The Russian COVID-19 Response Center has made a decision to suspend air traffic with Turkey from April 15 to June 1, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said. Russia's COVID-19 response center also made a decision to suspend air traffic with Tanzania from April 15 to June 1, Golikova added.

Russia's decision on flights with Turkey is not related to the recent visit of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to Ankara, the cause was an alarming epidemiological situation, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Sputnik.

Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca hopes that the Russian authorities might change their approach to assessing the safety of Russians' recreation in the country after the visit of a delegation that will assess the situation on the spot.

The Austrian capital region is extending tough coronavirus restrictions until May 2 due to the critical situation in hospitals, Vienna mayor and governor Michael Ludwig said.

A number of European nations including the United Kingdom, Czech Republic and Greece are taking tentative steps to ease lockdown measures on Monday with national authorities allowing a number of non-essential facilities to reopen.

Almost half of the UK workers (47 percent) benefiting from the furlough scheme set up by the government a year ago to avoid mass layoff during the COVID-19 pandemic have been forced to dip into their savings to make ends meet, according to a YouGov poll.

Inflation is expected to increase in the coming months due to base effects, supply chain disruptions and pent-up demand and subside thereafter as the US economy recovers from the coronavirus pandemic, the White House said in a guidance.

The US budget deficit stands at $1.71 trillion in the first six months of fiscal 2021, after growing by a record $660 billion in March, the Treasury Department said in its monthly balance sheet.

More than 70 percent of people in Japan think that the summer Olympic and Paralympic Games in Tokyo should either be canceled or postponed as public concerns mount over the fourth coronavirus wave and slow vaccine rollout, a poll by Japanese news agency Kyodo showed.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has observed a significant increase in the proliferation of counterfeit therapeutics and medical products throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Angela Me, the chief of the agency's research and trend analysis branch, told Sputnik.

The UNODC is also hoping to see greater cooperation between national agencies to protect women from violence, Angela Me also told Sputnik, adding that the COVID-19 pandemic had turned many "fragile" domestic situations violent.

The European Commission proposed that vital goods and services distributed by EU bodies during times of crisis be made exempt from the Value Added Tax (VAT).