Coronavirus live: one in 440 people infected in England last week; Israel reintroduces indoor mask rules | World news

Uzbekistan has announced that it will limit entry to its capital Tashkent and restrict activities at hospitality venues after a surge in Covid cases.

As of yesterday the country was registering 476 new cases a day (compared to 100-150 cases a day last month), its highest level this year, reports Reuters.

Its health ministry said on Friday that there will be restrictions on vehicles entering Tashkent and that all entertainment facilities across the country can only operate between 8am and 8pm and at no more than 50% capacity.

The new restrictions apply from Monday until July 12.

England’s estimated R number remains the same at 1.2 to 1.4, reports Reuters.

An R value of 1.2 to 1.4 means that on average every 10 people infected will spread coronavirus to between 12 and 14 others.

The daily infection growth rate was estimated at 3-5%, a slight change from last week’s figure which was 3-6%.

The Guardian’s Steven Morris reports:

Welsh first minister Mark Drakeford has said the Delta variant is spreading “freely in communities right across Wales.”

Last Friday there were just under 500 cases; today that number has more than doubled to around 1,100 cases. Fifteen people have been admitted to hospital suffering with the Delta variant. The case rate is highest in the north.

Drakeford told a press conference in Cardiff that Wales was two to three weeks behind the rest of the UK – but said that schools and care homes were being affected.

The first minister said modelling suggested the peak of hospitalisations and deaths was expected in August. He said it was not known what impact the high rates of vaccinations in Wales will have on the picture.

However he said that experts from Swansea University were predicting that in “the most likely scenario” between June and the end of August there would be 900 extra hospital admissions as a result of the Delta variant.

He said that – as in the rest of the UK – many more young people were being affected. In Flintshire in north Wales the infection rates are more than seven times higher for the under-25s compared with the over-60s.

Tanzania’s president, Samia Suluhu Hassan, has urged people not to ignore the pandemic, warning: “There are signs of the third wave in our country.”

Hassan said in a speech to Catholic bishops in Dar es Salaam that “this pandemic is here and we should not ignore it”, reports Reuters.

It marks a stark change from her predecessor, the late John Magufuli, who dismissed the threat of Covid-19 and downplayed the pandemic.

Since taking office in March, Hassan has called for social distancing and highlighted the need to wear masks. But Tanzania does not yet have a vaccination programme.

The country has applied to join Covax – the international vaccine-sharing scheme – and the World Health Organization has said it is working to develop a distribution plan. The government has also requested a $571m loan to help tackle coronavirus from the International Monetary Fund.

The Welsh first minister, Mark Drakeford, has said the Delta variant is “spreading freely in communities right across Wales”.

The number of confirmed cases has more than doubled from nearly 500 to around 1,100 in the last week, he said during a press conference in Cardiff, according to PA Media.

There are now 37 cases per 100,000 people in Wales, he said, with prevalence highest in north Wales, where 97% of new cases are caused by the Delta variant.

Around 1 in 220 people in Scotland are estimated to have had coronavirus last week, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the highest level since February.

The figures for the week to 19 June, reported by PA Media, are a significant rise from the previous week when 1 in 600 were estimated to have Covid-19.

The ONS said the picture for Wales and Northern Ireland was “uncertain”.

One in 830 people are estimated to have had Covid-19 last week in Wales, up from 1 in 1,500 the previous week, and 1 in 720 people in Northern Ireland, down from 1 in 610 the previous week.

At least 3,903,064 people have died of Covid since the start of the outbreak in December 2019, AFP reports, and at least 179,931,620 cases have been registered.

On Thursday, 8,601 deaths and 403,975 cases were recorded worldwide. Brazil had the highest death toll with 2,032, followed by India with 1,329 and Colombia with 689.

The US remains the worst affected country with 33,590,549 cases and 603,178 deaths.

Health officials in Denmark said on Friday that they would continue to exclude the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines from the country’s inoculation rollout after a review of new safety data, Reuters reports.

“The balance between possible benefit and possible harmful effects is still not favourable, even when we include assumptions in our analyses that benefit the vaccine,” the Danish health authority said in a statement.

Denmark was the first country to suspend and drop the two vaccines due to fears over potential links to rare but serious blood clots.

The prevalence of coronavirus infections in England is estimated to have risen to 1 in 440 people in the week to 19 June, compared with 1 in 520 the week before, according to new figures from Britain’s Office for National Statistics.

About 122,500 people in England were estimated to have had Covid-19 during the week, Reuters reports, up from 105,000.

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Police in India are investigating vaccine scams in two cities after around 2,500 people were injected with fake inoculations, AFP reports.

About 2,000 people are thought to have been injected with saline solution in Mumbai and a further 500 – including some with disabilities – were given fake vaccines in Kolkata.

Police in Mumbai said 10 people, including two doctors, had been arrested and 1.24 million rupees (£12,000) of “fraudulently obtained” cash had been recovered.

Police in Kolkata have arrested a man claiming to be a civil servant with a master’s degree in genetics who reportedly ran eight fake vaccination camps.