December 11 coronavirus news

Hong Kong has banned three international airlines from flying specific routes into the city for two weeks, under a new law aimed at stopping the spread of Covid-19, the city’s government said on Friday.

Flights by the three airlines were found to have one or more Covid-positive passengers aboard, according to the statement. 

They are:

Under strict new rules, the Hong Kong government is prohibiting the airlines from flying those routes into the city for 14 days.

What triggered the bans?

Passengers test positive: The ban is enforceable when an airline carries more than five Covid-19 positive passengers. The Nepal Airlines flight on December 1 had six passengers test positive on arrival.

Consecutive flights: The ban is also enforceable on an airline which operates two consecutive flights into Hong Kong carrying Covid-19 positive passengers. This was the case with the Emirates flights, which brought four cases to Hong Kong on December 2 and three cases on December 3. 

Failure to comply with measures: The flight operated by KLM from Amsterdam to Hong Kong on November 27 only had one Covid-19 positive passenger, but was also added to the 14-day blacklist. The Hong Kong government said it reserves the right to block the route for 14 days if a passenger on board an aircraft carrying Covid-19 fails to comply with pandemic control measures.

KLM’s Amsterdam-Hong Kong and Nepal Airlines’ Kathmandu route will be put out of action until December 17, while Emirates will be unable to fly into Hong Kong from Dubai or Bangkok until December 18, the Hong Kong government said.

CNN has reached out to Emirates, KLM and Nepal Airlines for comment.

The US Food and Drug Administration is likely to recommend against giving pregnant women the upcoming Pfizer vaccine, a member of the FDA’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee said Thursday.

Dr. Paul Offit's comments came after the committee voted to recommend the vaccine for an emergency use authorization (EUA).

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Offit said this will also happen when the vaccine rolls out to health care workers and people in long-term care facilities. Some of those vaccinated will invariably include pregnant women.

The committee voted 17-4, with one abstention, in favor of recommending the FDA grant Pfizer an EUA. The FDA will now decide whether to accept the recommendation but has signaled that it will issue the EUA for the vaccine.

Singapore will welcome travelers from Taiwan beginning December 18, according to a press release from Singapore's Civil Aviation Authority.

Visitors from Taiwan can apply for a single-entry "Air Travel Pass" to enter Singapore on or after next Friday.

Travelers must have stayed in Taiwan for 14 consecutive days prior to departure.

Visitors will be required to take a Covid-19 PCR test upon arrival. If negative, they will be allowed to move freely throughout Singapore without serving a stay-at-home notice, the aviation authority added.

The US Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission said Thursday they had warned Paradigm RE, LLC for selling unapproved products that claim to mitigate, prevent, treat, diagnose or cure Covid-19.

The FDA said it considers the product, which the company sells under the name “Thymosin Alpha 1,” an unapproved new drug sold in violation of US law. It is also misbranded.

The company’s website implies Thymosin Alpha 1 was tested in government-designated treatment centers and helps with treatment. The website claims “the findings were that there was a significant reduction of mortality in the 28-day variation” because it improved oxygen levels in the bloodstream and reduced lung injury, according to the FDA.

The FDA asked the company to stop selling the product immediately and gave it 48 hours to email the government and describe what specific steps it took to correct violations. 

Germany on Friday announced it had recorded 598 coronavirus fatalities in the previous 24 hours, according to data from the Robert Koch Institute, the country's center for disease control.

It was Germany's highest single-day coronavirus death toll since the pandemic began.

The nation also registered a record 29,875 new confirmed infections on Friday -- roughly 6,000 more than the day before. 

German lawmakers will meet in the coming days to tighten lockdown measures in a bid to get the surge in infections under control.

According to Johns Hopkins University, there are now 1,287,092 confirmed coronavirus infections in Germany, including 21,064 related deaths.

Actor and wrestler Thomas Lister Jr., also known as “Tiny,” was found dead in his home on Thursday after experiencing Covid-19 symptoms, his manager Cindy Cowan confirmed to CNN.

According to Cowan, the 62-year-old actor started feeling sick last Thursday, but his symptoms “got really bad, really quick.”

He couldn’t breathe and felt very weak, she said. “It literally went so fast," Cowan added.

Lister was supposed to visit a set for a new movie on Sunday, however he called Friday to cancel because he was feeling too weak and had a hard time breathing, according to Cowan.  

The actor then canceled plans for a panel scheduled on Wednesday for a TV festival via Zoom, according to Cowan. Calls to Lister also went unanswered.

According to a press release from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, deputies responded to Lister’s Marina del Rey home on Thursday afternoon when “friends and business associates of Mr. Lister hadn’t heard from him since the night before and were concerned about his wellbeing.”

When deputies entered the home, they found Lister dead. 

The death is still under investigation, according to the release. 

Lister was best known for his role as Deebo in the “Friday” movie franchise alongside rapper Ice Cube. He also appeared with Hulk Hogan in the World Wrestling Entertainment movie “No Holds Barred.”

Few sectors have been hit as hard by the coronavirus pandemic as the aviation industry. 

Last month, the International Air Transport Association forecast the crisis will cost airlines $157 billion this year and next -- and the sector has already cut tens of thousands of jobs. 

But Tim Clark, president of the Emirates airline, sees reason to be optimistic. He thinks business travel could bounce back in 2022.

Clark recently spoke with CNN's John Defterios about the recovery of business travel and Emirates' imminent role as a distribution center for future Covid-19 vaccines. 

Here's what he had to say on when business travel will get back to normal:

Read more here.

An Australian-produced coronavirus vaccine candidate has been scrapped after trial participants returned false positive test results for HIV, developers announced Friday.

The inoculation, which had yet to progress beyond Phase 1 trials, was being jointly developed by the University of Queensland and Australian biotech company CSL.

Australia had hoped the vaccine would be available by mid-2021.

In a statement, CSL said no serious adverse effects had been reported in the 216 trial participants, and the vaccine was shown to have a "strong safety profile." However trial data revealed that antibodies generated by the vaccine interfered with HIV diagnosis and led to false positives on some HIV tests, CSL said.

If the vaccine was rolled out nationally, CSL said it could undermine public health in Australia by causing a wave of false positive HIV tests in the community.

"Follow-up tests confirmed that there is no HIV virus present, just a false positive on certain HIV tests. There is no possibility the vaccine causes infection," the statement added.

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison told reporters Friday that the vaccine "will no longer feature as part of the country's vaccine plan." Australia had pre-emptively ordered 51 million doses of the CSL vaccine in October.

Morrison said Australia had backed four vaccines that showed promise but "at no stage ... believed that all four of those vaccines would likely get through that process."

Read more about the vaccine here.

The United States could be back to normal by next summer or early fall if everyone gets a Covid-19 vaccine, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, predicted Thursday.

The US Food and Drug Administration’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee voted to recommend emergency-use authorization (EUA) for Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine Thursday. The FDA is expected to approve an EUA for the vaccine in the next couple of days.