Participants sit with social distancing as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus during a coming-of-age ceremony in Namie, Fukushima Prefecture on Jan 9, 2021. (STR / JIJI PRESS / AFP)

NEW DELHI /JAKARTA / JERUSALEM / DUBAI / BAGHDAD / BEIRUT / ULAN BATOR / MALE / YANGON / WELLINGTON / ISLAMABAD / DOHA / 

SEOUL / BANGKOK / MANILA / ANKARA / HANOI - Japan's government is considering approving Pfizer Inc’s COVID-19 vaccine for use by individuals aged 16 years and above, broadcaster NHK reported.

Authorities will approve the vaccine for the age group as Japan’s clinical trials are conducted on people from 20 years old, so data on those younger isn’t unavailable, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter that it didn’t identify. Inadequate data in overseas trials on people aged 15 and below, along with fewer severe COVID-19 cases among children, were also cited as reasons for excluding youngsters, NHK reported.

Pfizer and BioNTech SE, which applied for regulatory approval of their coronavirus vaccine in Japan last month, have agreed to provide 120 million doses to the country in the first half of 2021. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has saidthe government is working to start vaccinations in late February.

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Australia


Australia’s New South Wales state reported three locally acquired coronavirus cases overnight, all linked to known clusters, including Sydney’s Northern Beaches, Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters Sunday.

The Northern Beaches region was the center of an outbreak that caused Australia’s other states to close their borders to Greater Sydney’s 5 million residents, disrupting travel plans over Christmas and the peak summer holiday season. NSW removed so-called ‘stay at home’ orders for Northern Beaches residents on Sunday.

Australia’s Queensland state recorded no new cases of coronavirus overnight as its capital city Brisbane remains in lockdown to prevent an outbreak after a cleaner at a quarantine hotel in the city was infected with the more transmissible U.K. strain, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk told reporters Sunday. Palaszczuk will provide an update Monday on whether the lockdown will lift later that evening as planned, she said.

Victoria state recorded no new cases of local transmission for the fourth consecutive day.

Shoppers, some wearing face masks as a precaution against the coronavirus, walk past each other at a busy market in Bengaluru, India, Jan 9, 2021. (AIJAZ RAHI / AP)

India

India will start its COVID-19 vaccination drive from Jan. 16 with priority given to about 30 million healthcare and frontline workers, a government statement said on Saturday.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi reviewed the preparedness for COVID-19 vaccination programme on Saturday, it said. India hopes to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people free of charge in the first six to eight months of this year.

With the highest number of infections in the world after the United States, India is developing two indigenous COVID-19 vaccines. On Saturday it reported 18,222 new coronavirus cases, taking the total to 10.43 million.

India’s drug regulator has approved two coronavirus vaccines for emergency use, Covishield, developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University and Covaxin by local company Bharat Biotech and a state-run institute.

After healthcare and frontline workers, the vaccines will be given to “those above 50 years of age and the under-50 population groups with co-morbidities, numbering around 2.7 million,” the statement said.

Indonesia

The COVID-19 cases in Indonesia rose by 9,640 within one day to 828,026, with the death toll adding by 182 to 24,129, the Health Ministry said on Sunday.

According to the ministry, 7,513 more people were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of recovered patients to 681,024.

The virus has spread to all the country's 34 provinces.

Specifically, within the past 24 hours, Jakarta recorded 2,711 new cases, West Java 1,468, Central Java 1,045, East Java 1,004 and South Sulawesi 585.

Israel


The Israeli Ministry of Health on Saturday reported the first four cases of the new COVID-19 strain that was detected in South Africa and other countries.

This brought the total number of patients tested positive for COVID-19 variants in Israel to 151.

The four new cases were detected from 15 samples taken from coronavirus patients returning from South Africa and patients who were probably infected by them.

The detection of the variant was made with a unique 24-hour genetic test developed by the ministry, compared with the standard test that takes five days.

Three weeks after receiving the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccination, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu received the second dosage of the vaccine at Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening.

Netanyahu is the first Israeli to receive both doses of the vaccine, weeks after a major roll-out of the vaccinations began in the country.

Iran


Foreign companies will not be allowed to test COVID-19 vaccines on the Iranian people, President Hassan Rouhani said on Saturday, a day after Iran’s Supreme Leader banned vaccine imports from the United States and Britain.

“Foreign companies wanted to give us vaccines so they would be tested on the Iranian people. But the health ministry prevented it,” Rouhani said in televised remarks, without naming the companies or giving further details.

“Our people will not be a testing device for vaccine manufacturing companies,” he added. “We shall purchase safe foreign vaccines.”

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s highest authority, said on Friday the U.S. and Britain were “untrustworthy” and possibly sought to spread the infection to other countries.

Shiite faithful pilgrims visit the shrine of Imam Moussa al-Kadhim in Baghdad, Iraq, Jan 9, 2021. (HADI MIZBAN / AP)

Iraq


The Iraqi Ministry of Health warned on Saturday of reimposing a nationwide curfew if the coronavirus infections increased due to the non-compliance of citizens with the health-protective measures, while the ministry reported 907 new COVID-19 cases.

The ministry's health teams spotted non-compliance with health-protective measures and resumption of social customs such as shaking hands, hugging, and kissing like situation before the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic, the ministry said in a statement.

Lebanon


Lebanon recorded on Saturday 5,414 new COVID-19 infections and 20 more deaths from the pandemic amid a warning by caretaker Health Minister Hamad Hassan that the cabinet may impose complete lockdown if figures continue to rise.

The total number of infections reached on Saturday 215,553 while death toll stands at 1,590, the Health Ministry said.

Head of the Health Parliamentary Committee Assem Araji emphasized on Saturday the importance to impose complete lockdown without any exception for one week.

Mongolia

Mongolia's National Center for Communicable Diseases (NCCD) on Sunday confirmed 21 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the nationwide tally to 1,429.

"A total of 22,993 tests for COVID-19 were conducted across the country in the last 24 hours, and 21 of them tested positive," Amarjargal Ambaselmaa, head of the surveillance department of the NCCD, said at a daily press conference.

Twenty of the latest confirmed cases were locally transmitted, and the remaining patient was a serviceman of the Mongolian Armed Forces who had recently returned home from Afghanistan, said Ambaselmaa.

More than two-thirds of the COVID-19 infections in Mongolia were locally transmitted. The country confirmed its first locally transmitted case in November.

The Asian country with a population of 3.3 million has so far registered two COVID-19-related deaths and 896 recoveries.

Maldives 

The number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the Maldives has crossed 14,000, local media reported on Sunday.

According to data from the Health Protection Agency (HPA), the total number of COVID-19 cases in the country is 14,065 out of which 13,308 patients have fully recovered and 49 have died.

Myanmar

The confirmed COVID-19 cases rose to 130,049 with 2,826 deaths in Myanmar on Saturday, according to a Health Ministry release.

The Asian country recorded 566 new infections and 14 more deaths from the coronavirus epidemic in the past 24 hours, the release said.

New Zealand 

New Zealand has identified 31 new cases of COVID-19 during the past three days, said the Ministry of Health in a statement on Sunday.

While there was no new case of COVID-19 in the community, there has been an average of around 10 new and historical cases of COVID-19 at the New Zealand border per day, totalling 31 cases since its last media statement on Thursday, according to the ministry.

Pakistan

A total of 2,899 people have been tested positive of COVID-19 in Pakistan over the last 24 hours, taking the national tally of the virus-infected people to 502,416, the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) of Pakistan said on Sunday.

The country's southern Sindh province has been the worst-hit with 225,509 cases followed by east Punjab province where 144,909 people have been tested positive, the NCOC said in a statement.

Forty-six people died across the country during the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to 10,644, the official statement said, adding that 2,804 patients are being treated in hospitals across Pakistan.

Qatar

The Qatari health ministry on Saturday announced 206 new COVID-19 infections, raising the total number of confirmed cases in the Gulf state to 145,672, the official Qatar News Agency (QNA) reported.

South Korea

South Korea reported 665 more cases of COVID-19 as of midnight Saturday compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 68,664.

The daily caseload stayed below 700 for three straight days, but it hovered above 100 for 63 days since Nov. 8 due to small cluster infections in Seoul and its surrounding Gyeonggi province as well as imported cases.

The daily average number of confirmed cases for the past week was 774.

Of the new cases, 179 were Seoul residents and 189 were people residing in Gyeonggi province.

Thirty-four were imported from overseas, lifting the combined figure to 5,727.

Twenty-five more deaths were confirmed, leaving the death toll at 1,125. The total fatality rate stood at 1.64 percent.

Thailand

Thailand on Sunday confirmed 245 cases of coronavirus infection, mostly domestic, according to the Center for the COVID-19 Situation Administration (CCSA).

The total new cases included 224 domestic ones while 21 others referred to those who had returned from abroad and tested positive in Thailand, the CCSA's spokesman Taweesin Visanuyothin said.

Thailand has so far confirmed 10,298 cases of infection, with 8,157 from local transmission and 2,141 others referred to foreign arrivals, Taweesin said.

READ MORE: Japan's new virus cases hit record as state of emergency looms

The Philippines

The Department of Health (DOH) of the Philippines on Sunday reported 1,906 new confirmed COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number in the country to 487,690.

The death toll climbed to 9,405 after eight more patients died from the viral disease, the DOH said. It added 8,592 more patients had recovered, raising the total number of recoveries to 458,198.

Two men cross an empty street in Ankara during the weekend curfew to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus COVID-19 on Jan 09, 2021. (ADEM ALTAN / AFP)

Turkey


Turkey reported on Saturday 9,537 COVID-19 cases, including 1,103 symptomatic patients, as the total number of positive cases in the country reached 2,317,118, its health ministry announced.

The death toll from the virus in Turkey rose by 181 to 22,631, while the total recoveries climbed to 2,190,047 after 7,902 more cases recovered in the last 24 hours.

The rate of pneumonia in COVID-19 patients stands at 4.3 percent and the number of seriously ill patients is 2,903 in the country, said the ministry.

Vietnam

Vietnam will limit flights bringing citizens home from now until the end of the Lunar New Year in mid-February, when big gatherings indoors are expected, to reduce coronavirus risks, the country’s prime minister said.

With a new COVID-19 variant spreading around the globe and the upcoming Lunar New Year, the country’s most important holiday, only necessary flights approved by health, foreign, defence, public security and transport ministry are allowed to enter the country, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said.

After the Lunar New Year, which falls on February 10-16, the transport ministry will study the possibility of international flights resumption, Phuc added.

Vietnam has suspended all inbound international commercial flights since late March, but the government has been operating repatriation flights to bring home Vietnamese citizens stuck abroad amid the pandemic.