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The Indian state of Maharashtra, which has India’s largest city Mumbai, as its capital introduced tighter restrictions following a sharp spike in Covid-19 infections. India saw its highest day of infections since mid-September on Sunday, with 93,249 new cases. More than half of those were in Maharashtra.

The US economy added 916,000 jobs in March, a much greater number than economists had forecast and considerably more than the 468,000 positions created in February. The data added to the signs that America’s recovery is accelerating as the distribution of Covid-19 vaccinations ramps up and restrictions are eased, although there are still nearly 8.4m fewer jobs than before the pandemic. The news came two days after President Biden proposed a $2tn infrastructure plan.

EU nations fell out over how to divide up 10 million extra doses of coronavirus vaccine, with Austria, Slovenia and the Czech Republic refusing to help Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Latvia and Slovakia. A deal was agreed late in the day to distribute nearly three million doses to “those most in need”, but Austria, Slovenia and the Czechs had insisted on receiving their full quota of vaccines under the general shareout system according to population.

In a television address announcing further lockdown measures, French President Macron asked for a final push to defeat the third wave. French schools will close for at least three weeks. He also announced a 7 p.m. curfew. More than 5,000 people in France are currently in intensive care.

The U.K., U.S., Australia and Canada and 12 other countries have criticized a World Health Organization (WHO) report into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, suggesting China had “withheld access to complete, original data and samples.” WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus admitted the investigation was “not extensive enough,” that investigators had struggled with access during their visit to Wuhan, and that more examination was needed to rule out a theory that the virus originated in a lab.

According to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2021, the pandemic has increased the global gender gap and the estimated time to reach global parity has increased by a generation from 99.5 years to 135.6 years.

23 world leaders and the director-general of the World Health Organization signing an op-ed that outlines a potential new international treaty on pandemics. Leaders calling for an “all-of-government and all-of-society approach” to address future health emergencies included UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, European Council President Charles Michel, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron, as well as South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and leaders of Indonesia, Kenya and Chile.  

The United Arab Emirates will start producing the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine from April, as part of plans to supply coronavirus jabs around the world. The UAE was the first country to approve Sinopharm for general use in December, saying it was 86% effective. The UAE has now delivered 81 doses per 100 people using a combination of Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Sputnik and Sinopharm vaccines.

Tokyo 2020 President Seiko Hashimoto announced that the Tokyo games will take place without overseas spectators. Overseas residents will receive a refund on Olympic tickets. The rules for Japanese residents have yet to be decided.

President Joe Biden announced that the US was ‘way ahead of his schedule’ after it hit his target of vaccinating 100 million people within his first 100 days within 58 days and said that all American adults will have had a vaccination within 10 weeks. The US has also met requests from Canada and Mexico to share millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine which is made in Ohio but not yet approved for use in the US.