During the aforesaid period, IRCS forces have screened 309,347 passengers for COVID-19, 15,749 of whom with symptoms underwent PCR and 41,736 rapid tests, he said, IRNA reported on Friday.

He went on to lament that some 58 individuals, who tested positive, have so far been temporarily quarantined, under a plan to rapidly identify suspected cases of coronavirus and prevent the spread of new UK strain.

Some 471 members of the IRCS cooperate for carrying out the plan in 16 provinces across the country, Valipour concluded.

With the cooperation of ministries of health and transport, a plan is being implemented with the goal of rapidly identifying and testing incoming passengers and keeping them in quarantine facilities, if necessary.

Thirty border checkpoints have been selected, including 18 land borders, nine air borders, and three sea borders, all incoming passengers will be tested and referred to the quarantine facilities in case of necessity.

Around 8,000 individuals enter the country via borders on a daily basis.

New cases and mortalities

In a press briefing on Friday, Health Ministry’s spokesperson, Sima-Sadat Lari, confirmed 11,250 new cases of COVID-19 infection, raising the total number of infections to 2,815,882. She added that 2,304,824 patients have so far recovered, but 5,015 remain in critical conditions of the disease.

During the past 24 hours, 200 patients have lost their lives, bringing the total number of deaths to 78,194, she added.

So far, 18,683,814 COVID-19 diagnostic tests have been performed in the country.

The post +41,000 coronavirus tests conducted at border points appeared first on Iran News Daily.

Bruno Rodriguez made the comments in a post on his Twitter page on Friday, adding that the commercial and financial persecution by the US administration against Cuban companies, counterparts and third parties was delaying the purchase of supplies needed to rein in the deadly pathogen.

The Business Group of the Cuban Biotechnology and Pharmaceutical Industries also recently condemned the effects of Washington’s policy toward Havana that prevented the purchase of resources to guarantee medicines for the national health system.

The group mentioned, among other obstacles, the increase in the cost of materials essential for the development of vaccine and said, “The usual suppliers refused to supply them for fear of the impact of the brutal blockade policy on their companies.”

Moreover, Cuba’s Foreign Trade and Investment Minister Rodrigo Malmierca reiterated on Friday his rejection of the US economic, commercial and financial blockade against the Caribbean nation that has been extended even in Covid-19 times.

Back in January, Iran and Cuba signed an agreement to cooperate in the coronavirus vaccine project with the use of a technology that will be transferred to Iran by the Cuban government.

The US sanctions have hampered both country’s access to medical equipment and medicines and complicated the process of importing vaccines from abroad, making them two of the hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

Cuba has five Covid-19 vaccine candidates, with two of them — Soberana and Abdala — being in Phase 3 of clinical trials. Should the effectiveness of the vaccines be proven, Cuba will have the first Covid-19 vaccines conceived and produced in the South American region.

Cuba is facing multiple challenges exacerbated by US-led sanctions as well as the coronavirus pandemic.

Cuba’s economy shrank 11 percent last year due to the deadly viral pathogen and tightened US sanctions which have caused a decline in aid from its allies in Latin America, namely Venezuela.

The US returned Havana to its so-called list of “state sponsors of terrorism” just nine days before Republican President Donald Trump left office.

The then US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said Cuba was being blacklisted for “repeatedly providing support for acts of international terrorism,” and cited Cuba’s security support for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

The post Cuba says US ban hinders vaccine production amid joint Iran plan appeared first on Iran News Daily.

The total number of confirmed cases on mainland China has now reached 78,497, the health authority said.

The number of new deaths stood at 29, the lowest daily rate since Jan 28, and down from 52 the previous day. The outbreak has now killed a total of 2,744 people.

Hubei, the central Chinese province at the epicenter of the outbreak, reported 409 new cases and 26 deaths on Wednesday. Beijing and the provinces of Heilongjiang and Henan were the locations of the other three fatalities.

The number of new cases outside Hubei stood at 24, up from 5 on the previous day and reversing five days of declines.

The number of new confirmed coronavirus cases in Beijing on Feb 26 had jumped to 10 from zero the previous day. Pang Xinghuo, deputy head of Beijing Centre of Disease Control, told a news briefing on Thursday that it was a cluster case.

The new cases all stemmed from a property management agency in Beijing’s Chaoyang district, and had either been working in the same office or sharing the same dormitory, Pang said, Reuters reported.

Chinese authorities are also turning their attention to potential sources of infection from abroad, as the number of new cases outside China are now exceeding those domestically.

The Shanghai government said it is trying to identify anyone who came into contact with a coronavirus patient who arrived in the city from Iran, another coronavirus hotspot.

More than 40 countries and regions outside mainland China have reported infections. On Wednesday, cases were detected for the first time in Brazil, Pakistan, Norway, Greece, Romania and Algeria. The coronavirus has infected more than 80,000 people and killed nearly 2,800, the majority in China.

A senior medical advisor in the Chinese government who won fame for combating the SARS epidemic in 2003 on Thursday said the original source of the coronavirus remains unclear.

“Though the virus was first discovered in China, it may not have originated from China,“ said Zhong Nanshan, an 83-year-old epidemiologist.

Zhong said he believes there are other wildlife species apart from the pangolin, which is suspected as the original source in a wildlife market in Wuhan, that carry coronavirus.

Zhong said China would present a video report to the European Respiratory Society to share China’s experience in addressing the virus outbreak.

He again repeated an earlier forecast that the coronavirus outbreak in China will be contained by end-April after peaking in mid-to-late-February.

The post 433 New Coronavirus Cases, 29 Deaths on Mainland China appeared first on Iran News Daily.

According To Iran News, A coordination council meeting was held at the Interior Ministry this morning with the participation of different relevant organizations to counter the outbreak of coronavirus.

Following the announcement of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education on cases of ‘coronavirus’ in the country, an expert-level meeting was held at the Interior Ministry in the presence of representatives of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education, Head of Passive Defense Organization, deputies and representatives of other relevant organizations in the field of managing the disease.

In this meeting, measures and strategies taken by the Ministry of Health and Medical Education for combating the deadly virus were exchanged and then, representatives of different organizationsو including Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), Law Enforcement Forces (Police), Intelligence Ministry, Plan and Budget Organization (PBO), Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (ICT), Ministry of Roads and Urban Development, Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), and Red Crescent Society submitted their proposals and executive capacities to deal with the virus.

The meeting was headed by the Interior Minister Rahmani Fazli who emphasized the readiness of the Interior Ministry to establish necessary cooperation and coordination with the Ministry of Health in this respect.

Minister of Interior also ordered governor generals across the country to make necessary cooperation and use their optimal resources for realizing objectives of the Ministry of Health in the relevant field.

The post Interior min. hosts emergency coordinating meeting on coronavirus appeared first on Iran News Daily.