COVID-19 | Weekly Update

Friday, July 23rd | COVID-19 Daily Update

CURRENT OUTLOOK

In the last 24 hours, 16 people have died in Portugal and there are 3,794 new cases of COVID-19 infection.

According to data released today in the epidemiological bulletin of the DGS, there are now a total of 947,038 confirmed cases in the country, with 17,264 deaths still to be regretted since the beginning of the pandemic. As for the number of people who recovered from the disease, 3,232 cases were counted, increasing the total to 876,240.

 

THE PANDEMIC IN PORTUGAL

Yesterday, the Government carried out a new assessment of the pandemic in Portugal. Without advancing new measures, and sending them to the meeting next Tuesday at Infarmed, the Minister of State and the Presidency updated the councils on alert, high and very high risk, with 116 municipalities at greatest risk.

Mariana Vieira da Silva also said that the level of transmission in Portugal is lower than it has been in recent weeks. The minister also explained that the COVID-19 self-tests carried out by hotel and restaurant customers, as well as the respective results, should not be saved. At the same time, the Government extended the situation of the calamity in mainland Portugal until the 8th of August.

However, the coordinator of the vaccination plan against COVID-19 in Portugal said today, in a parliamentary hearing, that 49% of the population has already completed the inoculation. Henrique Gouveia e Melo underlined that in two weeks Portugal vaccinated 1.7 million people, and the vaccination of the 50-year-old group “is practically closed”. However, the vice-admiral indicated that Portugal will receive 400,000 fewer vaccines from Janssen in August than planned, having confirmed that the Ministry of Health is “trying to compensate for these shortfalls” with “acquisitions” of vaccines from other countries.

Miguel Guimarães, president of the Medical Association, believes that the reinforcement of vaccination against COVID-19 “is inevitable” and that it is just a matter of knowing at what time interval.

According to estimates by researchers from the Institute of Public Health of the University of Porto, vaccination against COVID-19 will have prevented approximately 700 deaths since the beginning of May.

 

THE PANDEMIC IN EUROPE AND THE WORLD

More than 600,000 people in England and Wales received a self-isolation alert in the week between 8 and 15 July via the NHS COVID-19 app. This wave of mandatory self-isolation is causing major disruptions in various sectors such as food retail, gas stations, freight transport and security forces. However, the British Government has announced that key workers in the food industry may not comply with prophylactic isolation, and instead undergo daily testing of COVID-19.

In France, the Scientific Council that advises the Government today warned that in early August the country will have 50,000 daily infections caused by the new coronavirus, due to the Delta variant.

However, although no date has yet been set, Spain decided to apply a third booster dose to vaccines against COVID-19 that are based on the principle of messenger RNA, as is the case with Pfizer and Moderna.

On the other side of the world, Brazil registered, in the last 24 hours, 1,412 deaths and 49,757 cases of COVID-19, reported in the epidemiological bulletin of the Ministry of Health.

In turn, according to the African Union Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of infected in Africa since the start of the pandemic is 6,374,393, plus 38,691 in the last 24 hours, with the number of deaths rising. to 161,638, representing over 990 deaths on the continent.

However, New Zealand announced the suspension, for eight weeks, of the “air bubble” that allowed unrestricted flights with Australia, after the appearance of several outbreaks of COVID-19 in the neighbouring country.

 

MEDICAL PROGRESS

Infarmed announced yesterday that Guillain-Barré syndrome will become part of the side effects of the vaccine against COVID-19 developed by Johnson & Johnson, and which in the European Union is marketed by Janssen.

 

ECONOMIC IMPACT

Yesterday, the President of the Republic promulgated the parliamentary decree that extends the bank moratoriums until the end of the year but said that the established principles will still depend on the legislative intervention of the Government and the actions of the European Banking Authority.

On the other hand, tourism is only expected to return to levels prior to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2023, according to an EY report released yesterday, which highlights public support for the sector. According to the consultant, “the main challenge for the recovery of tourism is the fear of travelling, aggravated by the successive mutations of the viruses and the advances and setbacks in travel restrictions policies”. 

There are companies that are refusing to pay the day on which workers are vaccinated against COVID-19, and there are also reports of cases where workers are not allowed to take the day when they do not have a scheduled time for the vaccine.

Casinos and bingos in municipalities with a high or very high risk of COVID-19 contagion may reopen as of tomorrow. The measure was published today in “Diário da República”. 

The European Central Bank kept the benchmark rate at 0% at yesterday’s meeting. However, the institution led by Christine Lagarde gave indications on what to expect for the evolution of interest rates, which will remain at lows for a prolonged period of time. As for the debt purchase program to respond to the pandemic crisis, it will be accelerated in the coming months, and there is no foreseeable date for the end of the active role of the monetary authority in the markets.

 

FINANCIAL MARKETS

European shares are rising for the fourth day in a row, as investors focus on the mid-term earnings season and on maintaining support for the economy from the European Central Bank. Thus, the PSI-20 was this morning rising 0.52% to 5,041.42 points.

Outside, the main European markets also continued to appreciate, with Frankfurt advancing 0.48%, Madrid gaining 0.79%, Paris rising 0.55% and London reaching 0.65%.