While You Were Sleeping: 5 stories you might have missed, Dec 23
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The data on the new variant was still "messy" as countries reported its arrival and spread.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Coronavirus: Still too soon to say if Omicron more transmissible than Delta, says WHO
The World Health Organisation does not yet have enough data on the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus to say if it is more transmissible than the Delta variant, an official said on Wednesday (Dec 22), almost a month after South Africa first raised the alarm about its emergence.
"We do have some data suggesting that rates of hospitalisation are lower," WHO's technical lead on Covid-19, Maria van Kerkhove, said in a briefing with media.
But she cautioned against drawing conclusions from the early data because "we have not seen this variant circulate long enough in populations around the world, certainly in vulnerable populations".
HK university's Tiananmen statue covered up amid removal fears
Hong Kong's oldest university erected security barriers around a statue mourning those killed in Beijing's Tiananmen Square and posted guards at the site late Wednesday (Dec 22), in a move that may signal the artwork's imminent removal.
The eight-metre high "Pillar of Shame" by Jens Galschiot has sat on the University of Hong Kong's (HKU) campus since 1997, the year the city was handed back to China.
In October, HKU officials ordered the removal of the sculpture, which features 50 anguished faces and tortured bodies piled on one another and commemorates democracy protesters killed by Chinese troops around Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Britain to vaccinate vulnerable younger children against Covid-19
Britain on Wednesday (Dec 22) said it would start vaccinating vulnerable children aged five to 11 against Covid-19 after the country's medicines regulator approved the use of a lower dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech shot in that age group.
The children will receive two 10-microgram doses - a third of the adult dose - of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, with an interval of eight weeks between the first and second jabs, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) said.
A decision on whether to offer vaccination in general to younger children would be taken after additional data on the rapidly spreading Omicron variant and the effect of immunising young children could be considered, the JCVI said.
Brigitte Macron takes legal action against false rumours she was born a man
The wife of French President Emmanuel Macron, Brigitte, is launching legal proceedings over the spread of false claims that she is a transgender woman who was born a man, her lawyer said Wednesday (Dec 22).
Conspiracy theorists, including those in anti-vaccine and far-right circles, have attacked Brigitte Macron on social media after a far-right publication published the baseless rumours in the autumn.
The unfounded rumours say she was born a male under the name Jean-Michel Trogneux. Trogneux is Brigitte Macron's maiden name.
Basketball: NBA postpones Toronto at Chicago, Nets at Portland games
The NBA announced the postponement of two games on Wednesday (Dec 22) because teams hit by Covid-19 could not field the league minimum of eight players to compete.
The league called-off Toronto's game Wednesday at Chicago because the Raptors could not produce eight healthy players and also Brooklyn's match Thursday at Portland.
In all, the NBA has postponed nine contests due to Covid-19 issues, with NBA commissioner Adam Silver saying no pause in the season is planned and teams would have to learn to live with the virus.