Reuters Health News Summary

DEATHS AND INFECTIONS Reopenings stall as U.S. records nearly 50,000 cases of COVID-19 in single day Governors of U.S. states hit hardest by the resurgent coronavirus halted or reversed steps to reopen their economies on Wednesday, led by California, the nation's most populous state and a new epicenter of the pandemic.

Following is a summary of current health news briefs. Factbox: Latest on the worldwide spread of the coronavirus

A Reuters tally showed new U.S. COVID-19 cases rose by nearly 50,000 on Wednesday, the biggest one-day spike on record, a day after the government's top infectious diseases expert warned that daily cases could double to 100,000 if the necessary steps were not taken. DEATHS AND INFECTIONS Reopenings stall as U.S. records nearly 50,000 cases of COVID-19 in single day

Governors of U.S. states hit hardest by the resurgent coronavirus halted or reversed steps to reopen their economies on Wednesday, led by California, the nation's most populous state and a new epicenter of the pandemic. New cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, shot up by nearly 50,000 on Wednesday, according to a Reuters tally, marking the biggest one-day spike since the start of the pandemic. Novartis pays $729 million to settle U.S. kickback charges

Novartis AG agreed to pay more than $729 million to settle U.S. government charges it paid illegal kickbacks to doctors and patients to boost drug sales, the U.S. Department of Justice said on Wednesday. The Swiss drugmaker will pay $678 million to resolve claims it organized tens of thousands of sham educational events where it lavished doctors with exorbitant speaker fees, expensive dinners and alcohol to induce them to prescribe its cardiovascular and diabetes drugs more often. Russia's coronavirus case tally passes 660,000

Russia on Thursday reported 6,760 new cases of the novel coronavirus, pushing its nationwide tally to 661,165. The authorities said 147 people had died in the last 24 hours, bringing the official death toll to 9,683. COVID-19 strain in Beijing outbreak may have come from Southeast Asia: Harvard study

A strain of COVID-19 that has infected more than 300 people in Beijing since early June could have originated in South or Southeast Asia, according to a study by Harvard University researchers. The outbreak in Beijing has raised concerns about China's vulnerability to a "second wave" of infections. The virus found in Beijing cases is an imported strain of COVID-19, according to the China Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. Africa does not have manifold undetected coronavirus infections, WHO says

The World Health Organization (WHO) does not think there are manifold undetected coronavirus infections in Africa with people dying unreported, the regional director of the organisation said on Thursday. "We think that there is a certain underestimation of cases," Matshidiso Moeti told a news conference, adding that the WHO was working with countries to improve their surveillance. Indonesia seeking its own COVID-19 vaccine amid worry about access

Indonesia is working to produce its own COVID-19 vaccine next year, amid growing anxiety that developing countries could have difficulty getting access to a future jab, the head of Indonesia’s national COVID-19 research team said Thursday. “The production capability and capacity of biotech companies in the world is, we know, limited, and global supply chains also have challenges,” Ali Ghufron Mukti, head of the innovation team at Indonesia’s research and technology ministry, told a streamed press conference alongside the country’s foreign minister. China urges coronavirus testing capacity ramp-up in preparation for potential outbreaks

China's local governments and medical institutes should ramp up and reserve coronavirus testing capacity in preparation for increased demand amid potential outbreaks, national health authorities said on Thursday. Local authorities should have emergency response plans to be able to swiftly expand nucleic test capacity, the National Health Commision said in a guideline on its website. Sweden's confirmed COVID-19 cases surpass 70,000

Sweden's number of confirmed COVID-19 crossed the 70,000 mark on Thursday, while deaths rose by 41 to 5,411, health agency statistics showed on Thursday. Sweden recorded 947 new cases to put the total at 70,639. Expanded testing has seen daily new cases soar over the past month, eclipsing rates elsewhere in the European Union, but deaths and hospitalisations have tumbled from peaks in April. Other deaths spike in Indian city ravaged by coronavirus

A large Indian city badly hit by the coronavirus has recorded a sharp rise in deaths not attributed to the outbreak, according to official data and burial records, highlighting how the pandemic has affected general healthcare. The spike in deaths in Ahmedabad, the most populous city in western Gujarat state, is due to patients with serious illnesses either not able to go to hospitals or being afraid to visit them because of the virus, doctors said.