Hong Kong authorities said Sunday that one of 77 hamsters handed in by pet owners for a COVID cull has tested positive, as thousands of city residents remain under lockdown to combat an outbreak. The financial services hub adheres to mainland China's strict "zero-COVID" policy under which even the slightest sign of the virus is stamped out with contact tracing, targeted lockdowns and long quarantines. More than 2,000 hamsters have been culled after some imported from the Netherlands by a local pet shop were found to be COVID-positive, raising fears of animal-to-human transmission. The risk

Scientists are keeping a close watch on a recently-discovered sub-variant of the Omicron version of the COVID-19 virus to determine how its emergence could affect future pandemic spread. The initial Omicron variant has become the dominant virus strain in recent months but British health authorities have notably identified hundreds of cases of the latest version, dubbed BA.2, while international data suggest it could spread relatively quickly. The United Kingdom (UK) Health Security Agency (UKHSA) identified more than 400 cases in Britain in the first 10 days of this month and has indicated

Hundreds of Malaysians rallied in the capital Saturday, demanding the country's powerful anti-graft chief resign over a stock trading controversy where he owned millions of shares. Wearing masks and shouting "reject corruption", the mostly black-clad crowd of about two hundred called for immediate action against Azam Baki, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission's (MACC) top official. Protests in the Southeast Asian nation have been rare since the beginning of the pandemic due to virus curbs and fears of infection. But public anger over corruption has previously led to mass demonstrations