Coronavirus live news: UK food banks ‘preparing for worst’; record cases in Australian state of Victoria

Meanwhile, India recorded a further 311 Covid deaths today, according to its latest government figures.

It brings its overall death toll up to 448,062 since the pandemic began last year.

It also registered some 23,529 new infections within the past 24 hours, bringing the total number to 33.74 million.

In the US, a Covid outbreak within Disney’s stage show Aladdin prompted an 11th-hour cancellation of Wednesday evening’s performance.

It came just one night after the production joined the return of Broadway’s biggest musicals from a pandemic-induced hiatus, reports Reuters.

In a notice posted on Twitter shortly before the curtain was due to go up, producers said testing protocols had detected an unspecified number of “breakthrough” infections among vaccinated members of the Aladdin company at The New York Amsterdam Theatre.

“Because the wellness and safety of our guests, cast, and crew are our top priority, tonight’s performance, Wednesday, September 29th, is canceled,” the tweet said, adding that tickets would be refunded at their points of purchase.

It said the status of future performances of Aladdin, based on Disney’s 1992 animated hit film, would be announced on Thursday.

Good morning, I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you the latest Covid news from the UK and around the world this morning.

We start with the news that people who experienced depression or anxiety before the Covid pandemic were more likely to lose their jobs and suffer delays to medical treatment at the height of the crisis.

The new study, one of several set up by the UK’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance, found those with higher levels of anxiety and depression pre-pandemic were 24% more likely to have had delays to medical procedures and 12% more likely to have lost their job than those with average levels of anxiety and depression.

They were also 33% more likely to have suffered delays or missed out on prescriptions or medication during the first eight to 10 months of the pandemic, according to the Press Association.

The UK Research and Innovation-funded Covid-19 Longitudinal Health and Wellbeing National Core Study is looking at the health, social and economic impacts of the pandemic.

The new analysis, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, looked at data from 59,482 people who are surveyed regularly as part of ongoing studies.

Dr Praveetha Patalay, senior author on the paper from University College London (UCL), said:

Our findings highlight that the wider health and economic impacts of the pandemic have been disproportionately experienced by those with mental health difficulties, potentially leading to worsening longer-term outcomes, even post-pandemic, for those already experiencing poor mental health.

Rishi Sunak’s decision to wind up the furlough scheme today will intensify Britain’s economic woes, an array of unions, business groups, employment experts, City firms and politicians have warned.

With signs of activity slowing even before pressures on supply chains began to mount over the past few weeks, the chancellor was criticised for cutting off a wage-subsidy lifeline that is still supporting well over a million jobs.

Frances O’Grady, the TUC general secretary, said the end of the furlough scheme coupled with the £20 a week cut in universal credit next week meant the government was heading into the winter with no plan to protect workers.

“Ministers should rethink the end of furlough. Many workers in hard hit industries are still furloughed and need support for longer. Otherwise, we may see a rise in unemployment,” O’Grady said.

Business leaders warned of an “autumn storm” from the government dismantling emergency pandemic support schemes at a time when the economic recovery from Covid-19 was faltering.

Larry Elliott and Richard Partington report:

Blomberg has ranked the Philippines last in its list of the best and worst places to be during the pandemic.

The news organisation explains why:

The monthly snapshot – which measures where the virus is being handled the most effectively with the least social and economic upheaval – ranks 53 major economies on 12 datapoints related to virus containment, the economy and opening up.

The Philippines’ drop to No. 53 reflects the challenges it’s facing from the onslaught of the delta variant, which has hit Southeast Asia particularly hard amid difficulties containing the more contagious strain and slow vaccination rollouts. The region, which recently had the worst outbreak in the world, populates the September Ranking’s lowest rungs, with Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam all in the bottom five.

Charity food banks in Britain are “preparing for the worst” as the government starts winding up emergency aid measures put in place to cushion the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on millions of workers and low-income households, Reuters reports.

An extra weekly payment of £20 (US$27) to support the country’s poorest families will be cut next month, and more than a million workers face an uncertain future as Britain becomes the first big economy to halt its Covid jobs support scheme.

Food banks, which hand out staple goods from dried pasta to baby food, are especially concerned about the loss of the top-up to the Universal Credit (UC) benefit, which is claimed by almost 6 million people, according to official statistics.

The British move comes as other countries start wrapping up state aid programmes announced last year as Covid battered the global economy.

In the United States, pandemic unemployment benefits that supported millions of jobless, gig workers and business owners came to an end in early September, a month after a moratorium on residential evictions expired.

Australia and Canada have also announced plans to end income subsidies in the near future.

A British government spokesperson said the income benefit increase was always intended to be temporary and had been effective in softening the pandemic’s impact on family finances, adding that the focus now was on helping people back to work.

Nationwide, more than 800,000 people will be pushed into poverty by the benefit cut, according to British think-tank the Legatum Institute.

A fifth of the benefit’s claimants said they would “very likely” need to skip meals once the uplift is withdrawn, found a survey of more than 2,000 people carried out for the Trussell Trust.

A similar number said they would struggle to afford to heat their homes.

Hello and welcome to today’s live coronavirus coverage.

Britain’s charity food banks are “preparing for the worst”, Reuters reports, as the government starts winding up emergency aid measures put in place to cushion the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on millions of workers and low-income households.

Meanwhile in Australia, the Victorian state of Melbourne has reported its highest one-day case total of the pandemic so far, as its Delta outbreak overtakes infections in the neighbouring state of New South Wales.

More on these stories shortly. In the meantime, here are the other key recent developments:

• Latvia has reported 1,203 new coronavirus cases – the country’s highest daily figure since February. It is the first time infections have crossed the threshold of 1,000 since May.
• There have been 1,847 new coronavirus cases in Lithuania over the past 24 hours, the country’s statistics office has said – the highest number of cases since early January.
• The number of Covid fatalities recorded in Scotland hit the highest level since February last week, with 165 deaths registered that involved Covid-19, 30 more than the previous week.
• Slovenia has temporarily suspended use of the one-dose Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine while it investigates the death of a 20-year-old woman. Health minister Janez Poklukar said the benefits of receiving the vaccine “continue to outweigh the risks”.
• Singapore has reported 2,268 new cases – its highest number since the pandemic began. Its previous highest daily increase was 2,236 reported on Tuesday.
• The UK has reported 36,722 new cases, an increase on Tuesday figure of 34,256. It also report 150 deaths within 28 days of a positive test.
• Merck & Co’s experimental oral Covid-19 antiviral drug molnupiravir is likely to be effective against known variants of the coronavirus, the company has said following laboratory studies.
• The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) is in advanced talks with vaccine manufacturers to purchase further vaccine doses for its members after reaching a deal with Sinovac to buy 8.5 million vaccine doses for 2021 and some 80 million doses next year.
• Cuba reported 5,617 new cases – the first time since July that the island has reported fewer than 6,000 new cases. It also reported 48 more deaths from the virus.