Health News Roundup: UK overtakes Italy, highest COVID death toll; U.S. sends Mexico planeload of ventilators to fight COVID and more

Following is a summary of current health news briefs.

UK overtakes Italy with Europe's highest official coronavirus death toll

The United Kingdom has overtaken Italy to report the highest official death toll from the new coronavirus in Europe, figures released on Tuesday showed, increasing pressure on Prime Minister Boris Johnson over his response to the crisis. Weekly figures from Britain's Office for National Statistics (ONS) added more than 7,000 deaths in England and Wales in the week to April 24, raising the total for the United Kingdom to 32,313.

U.S. sends Mexico planeload of ventilators to fight coronavirus

The U.S. government has sent Mexico a plane loaded with ventilators to treat coronavirus patients, part of an agreement between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Mexican counterpart, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said on Tuesday. Trump and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador spoke by telephone in mid-April to discuss a prior request from Mexico for the United States to sell it thousands of ventilators to help treat COVID-19 patients.

From bunting to the big picture: Isle of Wight becomes UK's virus app test bed

The coronavirus outbreak put paid to May Day festivities on the Isle of Wight this week and brought the spotlight to the island for a very different reason: it has been designated a testing ground for a tracing app aimed at stemming the virus's spread. Walking down the unusually quiet High Street in Cowes, where visitors usually step off the ferry from the south coast of England, local councilor and health service employee Anni Adams said her home town would have been preparing street parties.

White House looking at winding down coronavirus task force, Pence says

The White House is having conversations about when to wind down its coronavirus task force, and is looking at the possibility of starting to move coordination of the U.S. response to federal agencies around the Memorial Day weekend, Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday. Pence said President Donald Trump's administration was starting to look at the Memorial Day window of time at the end of the month to begin transitioning to having agencies manage the coronavirus response in a more traditional manner.

U.S. coronavirus deaths exceed 70,000 as forecasting models predict grim summer

U.S. deaths from the novel coronavirus surged past 70,000 on Tuesday, according to a Reuters tally, as a key forecasting model nearly doubled its previous estimate for fatalities. Nearly 1.2 million people in the United States have tested positive for COVID-19 - more than the combined total of the next largest outbreaks in Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, France and Germany.

Belgian, U.S. scientists look to llama in search for COVID-19 treatment

A llama called Winter could prove useful in the hunt for a treatment for COVID-19, according to U.S. and Belgian scientists who have identified a tiny particle that appears to block the new coronavirus. The scientists, from Belgium's VIB-UGent center for medical biotechnology and the University of Texas at Austin, published research on Tuesday in the journal Cell, with the llama in Belgium central to their studies.

WHO urges countries to investigate early COVID-19 cases

The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that a report that COVID-19 had emerged in December in France, sooner than previously thought, was "not surprising", and urged countries to investigate any other early suspicious cases. The disease later identified as COVID-19 was first reported by Chinese authorities to the WHO on Dec. 31 and was not previously believed to have spread to Europe until January.

U.S. traffic deaths fell in 2019 for third straight year

U.S. traffic deaths fell in 2019 for the third straight year even as overall road use increased, according to preliminary government data released Tuesday. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reported an estimated 36,120 people died in motor vehicle traffic crashes last year, down 1.2% from 36,560 in 2018, even as travel rose 0.9% to 3.23 trillion miles.

Remdesivir may be approved in Japan on Thursday - health minister

Gilead Sciences Inc's antiviral drug remdesivir may be approved in Japan for domestic COVID-19 patients when the health ministry's review board is held on Thursday, Japanese Health Minister Katsunobu Kato said. Remdesivir was granted emergency use authorization last week by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for COVID-19, the highly contagious lung disease caused by the new coronavirus, and Gilead filed for fast-track approval in Japan on Monday.

CDC reports 1,171,510 coronavirus cases, 68,279 deaths

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday reported 1,171,510 cases of the new coronavirus, an increase of 19,138 cases from its previous count, and said the number of deaths had risen by 823 to 68,279. The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by a new coronavirus, as of 4 p.m. ET on May 4, compared with its count a day earlier. (https://bit.ly/2SGLijD)