[EN DIRECT 15 AVRIL] All the developments of the pandemic

Whether in Quebec or elsewhere on the planet, the COVID-19 pandemic has been disrupting our lives for over a year.

Here you will find all the news throughout the day related to this crisis affecting the population, governments and the economy.

LAST BALANCE SHEET

PLANETARY

Case: 138 302 131

Dead: 2 973 974

CANADA

Case: 1,087,152 cases, of which 331,031 in Quebec

Death: 23,445, whose 10 763 in Quebec

All the news for Thursday, April 15

5:09 am | New Zealand: Testing an app to detect virus before symptoms appear.

NZL: Wellington New Zealand border officials on Thursday began testing an app designed to detect the coronavirus before the user shows symptoms.

The app, called “elarm,” connects to smartwatches or mobile devices that measure athletic performance and uses artificial intelligence to check variables such as heart rate and temperature to look for warning signs of. COVID-19.

The developer of this app, Datamine, based in New Zealand, says it can detect the virus with 90% accuracy up to three days before symptoms such as cough, difficulty breathing and fatigue appear.

The health ministry said the system will allow early warning of border workers who are most exposed to the coronavirus. Indeed, the archipelago currently records almost no local cases, the only people tested positive for COVID-19 being travelers arriving from abroad.

“If the elarm application is what we expect, it could provide a quick warning to our staff,” said Shayne Hunter, deputy director at the Department of Health.

“This means they can take the appropriate steps, like going into self-isolation and getting tested for COVID-19,” she added.

New Zealand has largely been successful in containing the coronavirus pandemic, with just 26 COVID-19-related deaths per five million people.

The rare local cases generally relate to people working at the border and having worked with travelers who, on their return from abroad, were placed in quarantine.

According to Hunter, around 500 cross-border workers will take part in the one-month trial of this application.

This technology uses artificial intelligence to establish, for each user, a point of reference in terms of health status and alert them in the event of physiological changes corresponding to COVID-19.

5:03 am | COVID-19: France is preparing to exceed 100,000 deaths.

France is preparing to overcome the heavy toll of 100,000 deaths since the start of the COVID-19 epidemic, in the midst of the third wave which lasts and leaves open the questions on a reopening of the country from mid-May.

By crossing this symbolic bar, probably Thursday according to the daily count of Public Health France, the country joins in Europe Great Britain (127,000 dead) and Italy (115,000 dead), but other countries (Belgium , Portugal) have a higher mortality per inhabitant.

“All our forces are thrown into the battle against the epidemic (…) but will obviously come this moment of tribute and mourning for the Nation”, assured the government spokesman Gabriel Attal on Wednesday.

Despite the violence of the first wave (nearly 30,000 deaths between mid-March and mid-May 2020), the vast majority of deaths have occurred since the end of October (around 65,000), the consequence of a second wave which did not occur. has never failed, then a new strong epidemic recovery during the winter, carried by the more contagious English variant of the coronavirus. And if the mass vaccination in institutions for the elderly has borne fruit, nearly 300 deaths are still added every day in the hospital in April.

5:00 am | The number two in the main ruling party in Japan has estimated that the Tokyo Olympics could be canceled as a last resort, as the Japanese archipelago is currently suffering a sharp resurgence of the epidemic, local media reported Thursday.

4:20 | The rise in cases of COVID-19 contamination puts Cambodia “on the verge of death,” warned Prime Minister Hun Sen, after the kingdom imposed a lockdown on residents in the capital Phnom Penh.

TO READ | Protesters reluctant to curfew who have taunted the police for a few days are organizing themselves through ephemeral publications on social networks, which seems to complicate the work of the police.

TO READ | Vaccinators are twiddling their thumbs while Quebecers shun AstraZeneca’s vaccine, for which many time slots are available.

3h11 | Nobel laureates and former heads of state or government are calling on Joe Biden to join a proposal to temporarily lift patents on COVID-19 vaccines.

2h59 | India has recorded a record 200,000 new cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, according to official data released Thursday, as a second wave of massive contaminations continues to gain momentum in the country of 1 , 3 billion inhabitants.

0h00 | Exhausted, anxious, out of breath, disgusted: the union health representatives are short of qualifiers to describe the atmosphere before the return of the load shedding and displacement of personnel in Quebec.

0h00 | Pool specialists denounce the inconsistency of the government which prevents them from opening their business deemed non-essential, while products for swimming pools are available in several large chain stores which are still open.

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