People wearing face masks due to COVID-19 travel on a Setagaya Line tram decorated with "maneki-neko" or beckoning cat statue images in Tokyo on Jan 30, 2022. (PHILIP FONG / AFP)
DHAKA / PHNOM PENH / YANGON / JERUSALEM / SINGAPORE / HANOI / SEOUL / NEW DEHLI / TOKYO – Japan has canceled the purchase of about 40 million Astrazeneca Plc COVID-19 vaccine doses it agreed to buy last year, a health ministry official said in parliament on Monday.
The contract allowed the government to cancel a portion of the supply if it was unneeded, the official said in response to lawmakers' questioning. Japan had originally agreed to buy 120 million of the shots, with the bulk made domestically by Daiichi Sankyo Co and other local partners.
About Astrazeneca 200,000 doses have been supplied to local governments in Japan, while 63 million doses have donated overseas, the official added.
Japan has predominantly relied on the mRNA-type vaccines developed by Pfizer Inc and Moderna Inc for its COVID inoculations and boosters so far.
Garment workers wait in a queue to receive a dose of the Moderna vaccine against the COVID-19 coronavirus in Konabari, Bangladesh about 40 km from Dhaka on Jul 18, 2021. (MUNIR UZ ZAMAN / AFP)
Bangaldesh
Bangladesh reported its sixth straight day without any COVID-19 deaths on Sunday, the longest stretch without any fatalities from the virus in about a month, the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) said.
The country reported 42 cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours by 8:00 am local time (0200 GMT) Sunday, up from 28 on Saturday, and no deaths for six consecutive days.
The latest addition took the country's case tally to 1,952,065 while the death toll remained unchanged at 29,123.
Bangladesh reported its first three COVID-19 cases on March 8, 2020, and the first death on March 18 the same year.
According to official data, the COVID-19 fatality rate in Bangladesh is now 1.49 percent and the current recovery rate 96.75 percent.
A young girl receives a shot of the Sinovac's COVID-19 vaccine at a Krang Thnong health center outside Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Nov 1, 2021. (HENG SINITH /AP PHOTO)
Cambodia
World Health Organization Representative to Cambodia Li Ailan said on Sunday that Cambodia's successful vaccine rollout has saved lives, stabilized the health system and contributed to the kingdom's economic recovery.
"Cambodia has achieved the impressively high COVID-19 vaccination coverage of the primary doses at the very early stage," she wrote on social media. "The successful vaccine rollout helped save many lives, protect health and contribute to economic recovery."
"A booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine is essential in Cambodia to help protect you and your loved one as it helps increase your immunity, reduce the risk of getting severe diseases, and enjoy your social functions in a safer way," she said. "The Omicron virus is still here with us."
Meanwhile, Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen decided to lift a mask mandate for four provinces as a trial after there were no new cases or very few infections in those provinces.
In an audio message released publicly, Hun Sen said the provinces are Ratanakiri, Mondulkiri, and Stung Treng in the northeast and Preah Vihear in the northwest.
India
India's COVID-19 tally rose to 43,036,132 on Monday, as 861 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours across the country, showed the federal health ministry's latest data.
Besides, six deaths due to the pandemic since Sunday morning took the total death toll to 521,691.
A medical staff member wearing protective gear tends to a coronavirus patient in the COVID-19 ward at Beilinson Hospital Rabin Medical Centre in Israel's central city of Petah Tikva on Feb 1, 2022. (JACK GUEZ / AFP)
Israel
A group of Israeli researchers has designed wearable smart sensors to help monitor the process of vaccine trials, Tel Aviv University (TAU) in central Israel said on Sunday.
The researchers said that wearable sensors can better help vaccine developers make early identifications of abnormal reactions and therefore improve the process of the trials.
The new method is better than the current practice in vaccine trials, which is primarily based on self-reported questionnaires and may lead to biased results, it added.
The TAU said the study was conducted between Jan 1 and March 13, 2021, during the mass COVID-19 vaccination campaign in Israel.
The researchers gave chest-patch sensors to 160 adult participants to monitor them and use a mobile application for collecting the information the sensors updated automatically every day.
A woman receives a shot of China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine in Yangon, Myanmar, Aug 29, 2021. (PHOTO / XINHUA)
Myanmar
More than 51.53 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines had been administered in Myanmar as of Saturday, the Health Ministry's latest data showed.
The Southeast Asian country has fully vaccinated over 22.23 million people as of Saturday.
Myanmar's COVID-19 tally rose to 612,341 on Sunday with 63 new cases registered in the past 24 hours, the ministry said Sunday.
No new deaths from the pandemic were reported on Sunday, leaving the death toll at 19,434.
A notice warning people not to gather in groups larger than five persons as part of restrictions to hald the spread of the coronavirus is displayed at Raffles Place financial business district in Singapore on Jan 4, 2022. (ROSLAN RAHMAN / AFP)
SIngapore
Singapore reported 2,573 new cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, bringing the total tally to 1,138,001.
Of the new cases, 255 were detected through PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests and 2,318 through ART (antigen rapid test) tests, according to statistics released by the Ministry of Health.
South Korea
South Korea reported 90,928 new COVID-19 cases as of midnight Sunday compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 15,424,598, the health authorities said Monday.
The daily caseload was down from 164,481 the previous day, falling below 100,000 in 48 days due to fewer virus tests over the weekend, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA).
The health authorities estimated that the daily caseload has been on the decline after the resurgence, driven by the spread of the highly contagious Omicron variant and its subvariant BA.2, which peaked in mid-March.
Vietnam
Vietnam posted the lowest daily COVID-19 tally in nearly two months on Sunday with 28,307 cases, down 5,833 cases from Saturday, according to its Ministry of Health.
The new infections, logged in 62 localities nationwide, were all domestically transmitted.