South Africa may be entering fifth Covid wave: Min

JOHANNESBURG/BEIJING: South Africa may be entering a fifth Covid-19 infection wave earlier than expected, after a sustained rise in infections over the past 14 days, health minister Joe Phaahla said on Friday.

“What remains stable ... is hospital admissions including ICUs (intensive care units), not a very dramatic change,” Phaahla told a news conference. “There was also a rise in deaths, not very dramatic from a low base.”

He said at this stage health authorities had not been alerted to any new variant, other than changes to the dominant one circulating, Omicron.

Beijing closes businesses

China’s capital Beijing closed more businesses and apartment blocks on Friday, with authorities ramping up contact tracing to contain a Covid-19 outbreak, while resentment at the draconian month-long lockdown in Shanghai continued to grow.

In the finance hub Shanghai, fenced-in people have been protesting against the lockdown and difficulties in obtaining provisions by banging on pots and pans in the evenings, according to a Reuters witness and residents. The Chaoyang district, the first to undergo mass testing in Beijing this week, started the last of three rounds of screening on Friday among its 3.5 million residents. Most other districts are due for their third round of tests on Saturday.

Meanwhile, China said it halted railroad freight traffic with North Korea as it deals with the spread of Covid-19 in the border town of Dandong.

IMF chief tests positive

IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva has tested positive for Covid-19, a spokesman said on Thursday, stressing she had only “mild symptoms”.

Meanwhile, South Korea will ease its outdoor mask mandate starting next week as infections and hospitalisations continue to decline.

H5 bird flu case in US

The first known human case of H5 bird flu in the US has appeared in a person in Colorado, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Thursday. The person tested positive for avian influenza A(H5) virus and was involved in the culling of poultry presumed to have had H5N1 bird flu, the CDC said.