World Coronavirus Dispatch: Aussie PM urges inquiry into origin of Covid-19

One million more UK workers may lose jobs, Deutsche Bank revamps WFH rule, Nations divided as Europe battles to contain virus surge, and other pandemic-related news across the globe

The world’s nations must do all they can to understand the origins of Covid-19, Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Saturday, comments that could worsen tensions with China. Addressing the United Nations General Assembly, Morrison said an inquiry into the roots of the virus would minimise the threat of another global pandemic.

“There is a clear mandate to identify the zoonotic source of the COVID-19 virus and how it was transmitted to humans,” said Morrison. Read more here

Let’s look at the global statistics:

Total Confirmed Cases: 32,566,695

Change Over Yesterday: 335,772

Total Deaths: 988,965

Total Recovered: 22,488,380

Nations hit with most cases: US (7,033,430), India (5,903,932), Brazil (4,689,613), Russia (1,131,088) and Colombia (798,317)

Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center 

One million more British workers set to lose jobs this year, warn economists: A further 1 million people will lose their jobs by the end of the year, with chancellor Rishi Sunak’s new work support scheme failing to stop a wave of redundancies that will hit young and low-skilled workers the hardest, economists predicted on Friday. Read more here 

Covid antibodies endure over six months in China trial subjects: The amount of Covid-19 antibodies in trial subjects who received China’s experimental vaccines remained high six months after the first shots, said a top Chinese scientist. Tianjin-based CanSino Biologics Inc, which is co-developing a coronavirus shot with the Chinese military, was the first in the world to administer an experimental vaccine. Read more here 

Two million deaths 'very likely' even with vaccine, WHO warns: The global coronavirus death toll could hit two million before an effective vaccine is widely used, the WHO said.

Dr Mike Ryan, the WHO's emergencies head, said the figure could be higher without concerted international action. Almost one million people have died with Covid-19 worldwide since the disease first emerged in China late last year. Read more here 

Deutsche Bank revamps work-from-home rule in permanent shift: The new policies will eventually allow employees to have binding agreements on how many days per week they want to work away from the office. The lender has developed estimates of how big a share will work from home. Deutsche Bank is joining lenders such as Mizuho Financial Group Inc. and Fifth Third Bancorp in cutting office costs. Read more here 
 

Mitsubishi Motors to cut 500-600 jobs to reduce costs: sources: Japan’s Mitsubishi Motors Corp will seek voluntary retirement from 500 to 600 employees, mostly in management, in Japan from mid-November to cut costs, sources told. The auto company is expected to post a net loss of 360 billion yen in the financial year to March 2021, hurt by a plunge in sales due in part to the coronavirus pandemic. Read more here 
 

Australia's Covid-19 hotspot to ease curbs ahead of schedule as cases slow: The Australian state of Victoria, a hotspot in the country’s outbreak, said on Saturday social distancing restrictions will be eased earlier than previously announced as daily new infections held near three-month lows. Victoria said 12 infections have been detected over the past 24 hours, near a three-month low of 11 recorded on September 21. Read more here 
 

Nations divided as Europe battles to contain virus surge: In Spain, Madrid’s conservative-run regional administration defied a call government to place the whole capital under controls limiting residents’ movements. In Marseille, one of the hardest hit regions of France, bar-owners and restaurateurs took to the streets in protest at a two-week hospitality ban which comes into effect on Saturday. Read more here 

Specials 

Girls are quitting school to work in virus-battered rural Asia: 

One of the first cutbacks that many poor families consider during tough financial times is education for their daughters. During the pandemic with in-class learning shuttered, some girls in rural areas of Asia countries are being pushed to drop out. To determine the impact of the virus outbreak on girls’ education, Room to Read conducted a survey of 28,000 girls in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Laos, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Vietnam. It found that 42% of girls surveyed reported a decline in their family’s income during the Covid-19 pandemic and that one in two girls surveyed was at risk of dropping out. Read more here

The nose needed for this coronavirus test isn’t yours. it’s a dog’s.

Several animals are now working on a trial at Helsinki’s airport have been trained to detect the virus by scent on arriving passengers. Read more here
 

Info-graphics:

These are the 12 global economic indicators to watch 

It’s hard to navigate every twist and turn of the $90 trillion global economy. To help you, Bloomberg created this real-time dashboard of key economic indicators from every corner of the world. See here