Ukraine has registered 7,925 new cases of COVID-19 as of 9 a.m. on Jan. 14, bringing the total number of cases in the country since the start of the pandemic to over 1.13 million.
In the past 24 hours, 10,192 patients have recovered and 162 have died.
A total of 837,063 patients have recovered and 20,376 have died in Ukraine since the beginning of the pandemic.
In the past 24 hours, Ukrainian laboratories have carried out 33,349 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests and 20,916 antibody tests. Over 5.8 million PCR tests have been conducted since the start of the pandemic.
Ukraine’s daily new COVID-19 cases and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, the most accurate way of diagnosing the novel coronavirus, between Dec. 1, 2020 and Jan. 13, 2021.
The largest numbers of new cases have been recorded in the city of Kyiv (794), Donetsk Oblast (588), Zaporizhia Oblast (554), Lviv Oblast (482) and Mykolayiv Oblast (460).
Starting on Jan. 14, Ukraine will fine business owners if their employees or customers don’t wear face masks. The fines can range between $122 and $183.
According to the law passed by the government on Jan. 13, when employees notice a customer without a mask, they have to stop servicing them and call the police if the person refuses to put on their mask. A mask has to cover both the nose and mouth.
During the briefing on Jan. 13, Ukrainian Health Minister Maksym Stepanov said that Ukraine will be under quarantine until Feb. 28. Meanwhile, strict quarantine, when all non-essential businesses are closed, will last until Jan. 24.
Here’s a full list of businesses that will be closed.
The Ukrainian Ministry of Healthcare will not cancel the lockdown earlier because that could increase the burden on the country’s hospitals, Stepanov said. According to him, the number of COVID-19 cases in Ukraine is expected to go up after the winter holidays because many Ukrainians traveled across the cities, visited New Year’s celebrations and didn’t follow quarantine rules.
Ukraine’s daily COVID-19 cases, deaths and recoveries from Dec. 1, 2020 to Jan. 13, 2021. All data were released by the Ministry of Health.
Ukrainian pharmaceutical company Lekhim announced on Jan. 11 that it will supply the country with 5 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine produced by Chinese biopharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech in April–May along with 1.9 million doses the company had previously agreed to bring from China to Ukraine.
Lekhim has also become the exclusive supplier of this vaccine in Ukraine after it signed a 5-year memorandum of cooperation with the Chinese. From now on, the health ministry will have to buy all the vaccines from Sinovac Biotech through Lekhim.
Meanwhile, the efficacy of the Sinovac vaccine remains disputed. After a large-scale clinical trial of the Sinovac vaccine, Brazilian officials claimed that its efficiency rate is at a high level of 78%, the New York Times reported on Jan. 7. Several days later, on Jan. 11, Indonesia said that a local trial showed an efficacy of 65%. A month ago, Turkey stated that the vaccine was 91.25% efficient.
During the briefing, Stepanov said that Ukraine will wait until more data about Sinovac trials will be published. Ukraine and the company agreed that the efficiency rate of the vaccine should be higher than 70%. If the company doesn’t meet these standards, it will refund the money, Stepanov said.
