Nov 9 (Reuters) - Here's what you need to know about the
coronavirus right now:
Biden to launch COVID-19 task force
President-elect Joe Biden will convene a coronavirus task
force on Monday to examine the No. 1 problem confronting him
when he takes office in January.
Biden is due to meet with an advisory board led by former
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy and former Food and Drug
Administration Commissioner David Kessler to examine how best to
tame the pandemic.
The Democratic former vice president will then give remarks
in Wilmington, Delaware, about his plans for tackling COVID-19
and rebuilding the economy. The United States became the first nation worldwide since
the pandemic began to surpass 10 million coronavirus infections,
according to a Reuters tally on Sunday, as the third wave of the
COVID-19 virus surges across the nation. India's Tata launches faster test
India's Tata Group launched a COVID-19 test kit on Monday
that it says will process results more easily and faster than
the RT-PCR method considered the gold standard for detection, at
a time when cases are still rising in the country.
The nasal swab test, developed jointly by Tata and the
government, is also more accurate than the rapid antigen test
currently favoured in India.
Tata Medical and Diagnostics, the healthcare arm of the
cars-to-clothes conglomerate, will begin manufacturing 1 million
kits a month at its plant in the southern city of Chennai and
can then scale up rapidly, CEO Girish Krishnamurthy told
Reuters. Hungary shuts secondary schools, extends curfew
Hungary will close secondary schools, universities and
restaurants and extend its night-time curfew from Tuesday to
curb a fast rise in infections, Prime Minister Viktor Orban
said.
The premier, who has up to now refrained from imposing tough
measures in a bid to protect the economy, said on Monday large
gatherings will also be banned and sports events held behind
closed doors.
"If coronavirus infections rise at the current pace ...
Hungarian hospitals will not be able to cope with the burden,"
Orban said. Iran reports record daily cases
Iran's health ministry reported on Monday a rise of 10,463
in the number of daily coronavirus cases, bringing total cases
in the Middle East's worst-affected country to 692,949.
Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari told state TV that 458
people had died from COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, pushing the
death toll to 38,749. In Nigeria, looters target warehouses stocked with COVID-19
relief
Looters have been targeting state warehouses across Nigeria
stocked with COVID-19 relief supplies which they say should
already have gone to the poor and hungry.
Authorities denied accusations of food hoarding or plans to
sell the supplies. The National Governors Forum, which brings
together the heads of Nigeria's 36 states, said some of the
looted items were a "strategic reserve ahead of a projected
second wave of COVID-19."
But stores of so-called "palliatives", some rotting, months
after lockdowns ended, provoked outrage in a nation reeling from
spiralling food prices, high unemployment and anti-police
brutality protests.