(Reuters) – China raced on Tuesday to stamp out COVID-19 outbreaks in the tourist hubs of Tibet and Hainan.
DEATHS AND INFECTIONS
* Eikon users, click on COVID-19: MacroVitals for a case tracker and summary of news. cpurl://apps.cp./cms/?navid=1592404098
EUROPE
* The European Medicines Agency has started a rolling review of a variant-adapted vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech.
ASIA-PACIFIC
* Toyota said it would suspend the night shift operation on Tuesday at one production line at its factory in central Japan due to an outbreak, after it suspended operations there also on Monday night.
* Hong Kong will shorten the hotel quarantine period for all arrivals to three days from seven.
* A number of Chinese Super League matches that were to be played in the southern city of Haikou will be rescheduled due to an outbreak on the tropical island and a third of the league’s teams currently based there will be temporarily unable to leave, state media reported on Monday.
* Shanghai reported zero new domestically transmitted cases for Monday, the same as a day earlier, the city government said on Tuesday.
* Mainland China reported 939 new cases for Aug. 8, of which 399 were symptomatic and 540 were asymptomatic.
AMERICAS
* A group of 23 state attorneys general led by Florida told a federal court on Monday that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lacks the legal authority to impose a nationwide transportation mask mandate.
MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA
* Israeli tourism continued to recover following the pandemic in July although it was 22.6% below its 2019 level, the Tourism Ministry said on Monday.
MEDICAL DEVELOPMENTS
* BioNTech expects to begin deliveries of two Omicron-adapted vaccines as soon as October, which will help spur demand in the fourth quarter, the German biotech firm said on Monday.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
* The yuan weakened slightly against the dollar on Tuesday, as fresh outbreaks, property sector woes and geopolitical tensions clouded the outlook for China’s economy, even as exports remained brisk.
* U.S. vaccine maker Novavax’s shares slumped nearly 31% on Tuesday as falling demand for its COVID-19 shot from low- and middle-income nations led the company to cut its annual revenue expectation by half.
(Compiled by Valentine Baldassari and Subhranshu Sahu; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)
