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News and analysis
- Six critically ill Covid-19 patients in Israel have survived after being treated with placenta-based cell therapy.
- Ministers are to start a review of the UK lockdown measures. But with Boris Johnson still in hospital, no change is expected.
- A&E attendance was down almost a third last month, compared with March 2019. Calls to NHS 111 more than doubled.
- The boss of a healthcare firm has promised to make 100,000 UK Covid-19 antigen tests by the end of this month.
- A dispatch from New York’s front line, by intensive care doctor Qanta Ahmed.
- Lancashire police have arrested two men suspected of licking their hands and wiping their saliva over meat and fresh food at a Sainsbury’s in Morecambe.
Six coronavirus patients survive after placental cell therapy
As the global hunt for Covid-19 treatments continues, an Israeli biotech company has said six critically ill coronavirus patients have been successfully treated with its placenta-based cell therapy. All patients were considered high risk, according to Pluristem, with four showing signs of organ failure. Its therapy involves injecting cells derived from placenta to treat the pneumonia resulting from Covid-19: the aim is to halt or reverse the harmful overactivation of the immune system. The Jerusalem Post has the story. Pluristem statement here (pdf).
‘I fear our pay could be reduced from obscene to disgusting.’
In words
ECB President Christine Lagarde when asked whether the bank had contingency plans for a ‘worst case scenario’ when it comes to economic damage from coronavirus:
Yes, but I’m not going to tell you which ones, because the impact will also be linked to the element of surprise.
Found: a magic money tree
The Bank of England, wholly owned by the UK government, has today agreed to directly finance the Treasury given that it is unable to wait long enough to complete this month’s sale of £45 billion of IOU notes. Facing worldwide madness, markets reacted with a shrug: the pound has barely moved and there was plenty of interest in the government’s debt issuance early this week.
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