Japan is set to expand a state of emergency to eight more prefectures. It’s taking the total to 21, the minister in charge of coronavirus countermeasures said on Wednesday, as a surge in cases overwhelms its hospitals.

• AS it looks to quell the country's largest wave of coronavirus infections, government sources said that it’s set of emergency to eight more prefectures. They are: Hokkaido, Miyagi, Gifu, Aichi, Mie, Shiga, Okayama and Hiroshima will come under the measure.
• Public broadcaster NHK reported 21,570 new cases and 42 deaths on Tuesday. Japan's case fatality rate stands at about 1.2%, compared with 1.7% in the United States and 2.0% in Britain.
• Months of emergency curbs in the capital, Tokyo, and surrounding areas have failed to reverse a surge in infections and about 90% of the city's critical care beds are occupied.
• In Hawaii, governor has pleaded with tourists not to travel to the islands as the state struggles to control Covid-19 amid the growing spread of the highly contagious Delta variant.
• It’s “a risky time to be traveling right now,” David Ige warned on Monday, asking visitors and residents to limit their travel to essential businesses only. “I encourage everyone to restrict and curtail travel to Hawaii. It’s not a good time to travel to the islands,” he said
• The Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, has thrown his support behind the use of vaccine passports, saying the concept is sensible and has “nothing to do with ideology”.
• In the US, it could have the Covid pandemic under control and achieve a return to “normality” by next spring, Dr Anthony Fauci said, if the “overwhelming majority” of the population is vaccinated.

The chief White House medical adviser was speaking to a media outlet on Monday night after the federal Food and Drug Administration gave full approval to the Pfizer vaccine. More than 400,000 people have been vaccinated in the US  each day in August, with 171.1 million now fully protected.