South Africa hits 500,000 confirmed cases, still not at peak.

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — South Africa on Saturday surpassed 500,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases, representing more than 50% of all reported coronavirus infections in Africa’s 54 countries.

Health Minister Zwelini Mkhize announced 10,107 new cases Saturday night, bringing the country’s cumulative total to 503,290, including 8,153 deaths.

South Africa, with a population of about 58 million, has the fifth-highest number of cases in the world, behind the U.S., Brazil, Russia and India, all countries with significantly higher populations, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University. Experts say the true toll of the pandemic worldwide is much higher than confirmed cases, due to limited testing and other reasons.ADVERTISEMENT

“Half a million is a significant milestone, because it shows we’ve entered a stage of rapid increases. We may reach 1 million cases very quickly,” said Denis Chopera, a virologist based in Durban. “What we know for sure is that the figures are an underestimate and that this virus will be with us for a long time to come.”

South Africa’s Gauteng province — which includes Johannesburg, the country’s largest city and Pretoria, the capital — is the country’s epicenter with more than 35% of its confirmed cases. Local hospitals have been struggling to cope, and health experts say the country could reach the peak of its outbreak in late August or early September.

Cape Town, a city beloved by international tourists at the country’s southern tip, was the first epicenter and reached its peak last month, according to health experts.

South Africa will have multiple peaks across the country, each challenging its different provincial health care systems, said Chopera, executive manager of the Sub-Saharan African Network for TB/HIV Research Excellence.

“The Western Cape had the first peak and did relatively well. Gauteng is the epicenter now and appears to be coping so far,” he said. “Other provinces, like the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, do not have reputations for well-organized health care systems. They may have serious problems.”

South Africa imposed a strict lockdown in April and May that succeeded in slowing the spread of the virus but caused such economic damage that the country began a gradual reopening in June.

South Africa was already in recession before the coronavirus hit and its unemployment stands at 30%. President Cyril Ramaphosa’s government has extended grants to the country’s poorest, increased supplies to hospitals and recently accepted a $4.3 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.ADVERTISEMENT

Corruption in the country’s pandemic response is a growing problem. On Thursday the top health official in Gauteng province was forced to step down over corruption allegations related to government contracts for COVID-19 personal protective equipment.

Ramaphosa has warned that now, more than ever, South Africa’s persistent problem with widespread graft is endangering people’s lives.

Chinese Scientist Who Fled To US Claims Coronavirus Came From a ‘military lab’

Dr Li Meng-Yan, a specialist in virology at Hong Kong’s School of Public Health, says she “clearly assessed” Covid-19 came from a lab linked to the People’s Liberation Army.

China has previously faced allegations it covered up the early days of the coronavirus outbreak and has angrily dismissed claims the virus may have come from a lab.

Dr Li however claimed the source of the outbreak was a military lab which she had discovered while studying person-to-person transmission of the virus.

Speaking during a livestream interview with Lude Press, she claimed she was not taken seriously when she reported her findings to her boss, reports Taiwan News.

Dr Li said: “At that time, I had clearly assessed that the virus came from a Chinese Communist Party military lab.

“The Wuhan wet market was just used as a decoy.”

Scientists currently believe that the virus may have originated at a wet market in Wuhan were it jumped from animals to humans.

Dr Li feared if she spoke up she would be snatched, so decided to flee to the US from Hong Kong in April.

“I knew that once I spoke up, I could disappear at any time, just like all the brave protesters in Hong Kong,” she said.

“I could disappear at any time. Even my name would no longer exist.”

The University of Hong Kong has previously denied that she carried out research on human-to-human transmission of the disease, and said her assertions do not “accord with the key facts”.

In an interview with Fox News, Dr Li previously claimed she was one of the first people to begin researching the new virus.

“The reason I came to the US is because I deliver the message of the truth of Covid,” she said.

Dr Li said she her supervisor first asked her to conduct a “secret” investigation into a new “SARS-like” virus in Wuhan on December 31.

She said she then spoke to a number of contacts, including one who worked at China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

She said the friend told her of an unknown virus that had emerged in Wuhan and that “family cluster cases”, an indicator of human-to-human transmission, had been observed.

Dr Li claims that when she took her findings to her superior she was told to “keep silent and be careful”.

“He warned me…, ‘Don’t touch the red line’,” Dr Li said, referring to the unspoken limits placed by Beijing on such investigations.

Since the coronavirus pandemic took hold, the Chinese government has faced accusations that it sought to silence anyone who had earlier tried to raise the alarm.

Doctors have reported being detained after speaking out on social media about what they were witnessing, while journalists have recounted being harassed and having their equipment confiscated after trying to report on the issue.

The virus spread out from China, and has now infected 18million people worldwide and killed almost 700,000.

China strongly denies any allegations of improper behaviour over its handling of the pandemic, but the US continues to hammer them over the pandemic.

US President Donald Trump continues to call the pandemic the “China Virus” and has accused China of a cover-up.

The Trump administration has even gone as far as suggesting the pathogen could be man-made – and that they have “evidence”.

China has recorded 84,385 cases and 4,634 deaths, while the US has seen 4.7million cases and 157,905 deaths.

Taking a tough line, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has called for “free nations” of the world to help take on China.

Mr Pompeo warned: “If the free world doesn’t change Communist China, Communist China will change us.”

The pandemic has seen diplomatic relations plunge, with both the US and China ordering the other to shut down consulates in a tit-for-tat row.

The US has pledged to pull its funding from the World Health Organisation over allegations it is “China-centric”.

Meanwhile, a bombshell spy dossier claimed China lied to the world about coronavirus by covering up the outbreak.

The dossier, from the Five Eyes intelligence agencies of the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and New Zealand, stated that China’s secrecy surrounding the virus led to an “assault on international transparency”.

It said: “Despite evidence of human-human transmission from early December, PRC authorities deny it until January 20.”

The scientific consensus is that Covid-19 originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan, but there is so far no concrete evidence linking it to a Chinese lab.

Russia Aims For Mass COVID-19 Vaccination From October

Russia is preparing to start a mass vaccination campaign against the novel coronavirus from October, the country’s health minister said on Saturday.

The vaccination will be free of charge, and doctors and teachers would be the first to be vaccinated, Mikhail Murashko told reporters.

People will be immunized with the first Russian vaccine developed by the Gamaleya National Research Centre, which is currently in process of getting the state registration, Murashko said.

However, clinical trials of the vaccine will continue along with its production and use in order to improve it as more details emerge.

The first Russian vaccine is based on adenovirus.

Another vaccine developed by the Defense Ministry is expected to get the same “conditional registration” in September and its production is likely to be launched in October, while two more vaccines are being examined by experts for approval of clinical trials.