Japan declares emergency in Tokyo ahead of Olympics as UK considers help for India

Good morning, and welcome to The Independent’s liveblog following the latest developments in the coronavirus pandemic.

As of 4am on Friday, India was officially added to the UK’s coronavirus travel red list.

This means that passengers on flights into the UK from India must now enter hotel quarantine in a government-approved facility for 10 days.

However, anyone who is not a UK or Irish resident, or a British citizen, will be banned from entering the country if they have been in India in the previous 10 days.

The restrictions come as the number of coronavirus cases in India undergo a severe surge and concerns grow over the emergence of a new variant of the virus, known as B1617.

On Monday, prime minister Boris Johnson was forced to cancel a planned trip to India due to the dramatic uptick in infections.

An additional 55 cases of the so-called “double-mutated” variant of the coronavirus first observed in India has been found in the UK, the latest findings from Public Health England have revealed.

It brings the total number of B1617 variant infections in the UK to 132, the health body said - with the latest data running up to the week ending 21 April.

Our reporter Vincent Wood has the story:

The vast sums the government has borrowed during the Covid-19 pandemic have pushed the deficit to its highest point since the end of the Second World War, according to figures.

Public sector net borrowing - the government’s deficit - reached £303.1bn in the financial year to the end of March, the Office for National Statistics said.

My colleague Emily Goddard has further details:

Two cats in the UK caught Covid-19 from humans last year, with the actual number of cases transmitted from humans to animals likely to be higher, scientists have said.

Researchers from the University of Glasgow made the discovery during a feline screening program and revealed how both animals are thought to have become infected by their owners.

Rory Sullivan reports:

Indoor hospitality and all tourist accommodation in Wales is expected to reopen on 17 May.

First minister Mark Drakeford added further dates to the country’s coronavirus roadmap, amid falling infection rates in Wales.

He said it would be for the incoming Welsh government to confirm the reopening, but the main opposition parties have already committed to the same date if they win the Senedd election on 6 May.

From 17 May, indoor entertainment venues and attractions are also expecting to reopen, with more changes “subject to the public health situation remaining favourable”.

Wales has the lowest level of virus infections in the UK and is third in the world in terms of vaccine delivery.

Wales’ first minister Mark Drakeford said bringing forward the easing of some coronavirus restrictions by two weeks in Wales was down to “extra headroom” in the public health situation and not to do with the Senedd election.

Mr Drakeford told BBC Radio 5 Live: “The rates of coronavirus in Wales are now the lowest in the United Kingdom, our vaccination rates are the highest in the United Kingdom, and that has created some extra headroom for us to be able to continue what we’ve been doing now for quite a few cycles.

“We continue to proceed in Wales in a cautious step-by-step way. But the fact that we have these low rates is the product of that way of doing things.

“It’s because we’ve done it in the way we have that we’re now able to accelerate some of the decisions because the prevalence of coronavirus has fallen to the lowest extent we’ve seen since the summer.”

The UK’s two main vaccines provide all age groups with high levels of protection against the Kent coronavirus variant and are cutting community infections, a real-world study in Britain has confirmed.

A team of experts from the University of Oxford, which led the research, said their findings offer hope that vaccines will be able to control the pandemic in the long-term.

Our Science Correspondent Samuel Lovett reports:

A fire has left 13 Covid-19 patients in a Mumbai hospital dead amid an extreme surge in coronavirus infections sweeping through the country.

Prime minister Narendra Modi described the fire as “tragic” on Twitter and approved payouts for the victims’ relatives.

It was the latest accident to hit a facility in India, where the health system is straining under pressure as infections and deaths continue to climb.

On Wednesday, 22 Covid patients died at a public hospital in Maharashtra state when their oxygen supply ran out due to a leak in the tank.

India registered another new record in daily infections for the second day in a row, with 332,730 new cases on Friday, up from 14,835 the previous day.

The head of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said Covid vaccines are still out of reach in the poorest countries in a report on Friday to mark the first anniversary of the Covax vaccine-sharing initiative.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “Nearly 900 million vaccine doses have been administered globally, but over 81 per cent have gone to high- or upper middle-income countries, while low-income countries have received just 0.3 per cent.”

He has repeatedly denounced inequities in vaccine distribution and urged wealthier countries to share excess doses to low-income countries.

Covax aims to secure two billion doses by the end of 2021, but said on Thursday it was looking to bolster vaccine supplies from new manufacturers amid supply problems of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is its main shot so far.

“Low-income countries test less than 5 per cent as much as high-income countries, and the majority of countries still have trouble accessing sufficient oxygen and dexamethasone,” Mr Adhanom said. He was referring to an inexpensive steroid found to help patients suffering severe COVID-19, the only WHO-approved treatment for the disease.