COVID-19

Although the Fiji National Blood Service has a regular pool of blood donors which kept blood supply sufficient, the current challenges of the country's COVID outbreak is keeping donors away, which is a huge problem for the country's three largest hospitals.

The Fiji Red Cross Society's Neomai Kafoa, who is the focal point for its COVID-19 work, said the situation was so serious that they had 85 volunteers on the phones urging friends and family to donate blood.

The Ministry's Chief Executive Leausa Dr Take Naseri said there have been reports of people giving false information to get out of being vaccinated.

Leausa said some people were telling staff they had been vaccinated but when asked for their vaccine cards, they didn't have them.

The spread of misinformation about vaccines on social media is causing delays to the progress of the current COVID-19 vaccine roll out according to health officials.

The government also confirmed six more deaths including an 18-year-old woman.

That compares with 752 cases and seven deaths in the previous 24-hour period.

Health Secretary Doctor James Fong said of the latest cases, 193 are from the Western Division and 489 cases from the Central Division.

Dr Fong said the latest victims died on 5 and 6 August, with three deaths in the Central Division and three in the Western Division.

He said all but two of the patients were not vaccinated.

The Friends and The Morning Show star said in an InStyle magazine interview published this week that there was still a "large group of people who are anti-vaxxers or just don't listen to the facts".

She added that she had, unfortunately, "lost a few people" from her weekly routine who would not disclose if they had been vaccinated.

One of those people travelling from Moscow had the Delta variant of COVID-19. After they left the plane, staff from the Nanjing Lukou airport swooped in to pick up their rubbish.

According to Chinese officials, when those cleaners exited the aircraft they brought the virus along with them to the outside world - sparking what has now become China's widest outbreak since Wuhan.

In the last few weeks, at the height of the summer travel season, Delta has been detected in at least 16 Chinese provinces and municipalities. Most cases are linked to Nanjing.

The Ministry of Health’s Permanent Secretary, Doctor Fong said 11 deaths were recorded between 2 and 5 August, Eight of the deaths are reported in the Central Division and three in the Western Division.

“A 15-year-old girl from Tavua presented to a medical facility in respiratory distress and she was transferred to Lautoka Hospital on 2 August. Her family reported that she had a fever, cough and shortness of breath two days prior to visiting the health centre. Clinical investigations revealed she had both leptospirosis and COVID-19.”

There were 1220 new cases reported in the 24-hour period that ended at 8am yesterday.

The Ministry of Health said there were seven deaths between 31 July and 2 August.

Six people died in the Central Division, and one death was from the Western Division.

The Western division has seen new cases escalate to 464 in a day.

There were 756 new COVID-19 cases in the Central Division.

There have been three more deaths of COVID-19 positive patients however doctors have determined that these were due to serious pre-existing medical conditions.

The Ministry of Health’s Permanent Secretary, Doctor James Fong confirmed that the 13 deaths were reported between 29th July and August 1st.

Seven of the deaths were in the Central Division, and six were in the West.

Most of these deaths are elderly, 90 being the oldest and 44 being the youngest.

Of the 13 individuals who died, 2 only have received their first dose of the vaccine while eleven have not being vaccinated.

A sufficient percentage of Americans have now been vaccinated to avoid lockdowns, Fauci said on ABC's "This Week".

"Not enough to crush the outbreak, but I believe enough to not allow us to get into the situation we were in last winter," he said.

The average number of new coronavirus cases reported nationwide has nearly doubled in the past 10 days, according to a Reuters analysis.

Even if states do not resort to lockdowns again, the spread of the Delta variant could still threaten the economy.

The government reported 1163 new cases and six deaths in the 24 hours to 8am yesterday.

That compares with 1301 cases and nine deaths in the previous 24-hour period.

Health Secretary Doctor James Fong said all the latest victims were unvaccinated.

He said severe disease and death due to the coronavirus among infants were rare.

"However the doctors overseeing this baby's care confirmed that he did die because of Covid-19," Dr Fong said. "And we know that once a very high level of infections are reached in the community, these rare events do occur.