Coronavirus positive: Good news round-up – an experimental antibody cocktail

As we drag ourselves into week 12 of lockdown, have you been thinking about adding a furry companion to your bubble? If so, you’re in luck.

Battersea Dogs and Cats Home in London has been holding ‘meet-and-greets’ with potential pet owners and cats and dogs on video calls to help re-home animals. The animal rescue centre closed to the general public in March but has managed to re-home hundreds of cats and dogs through virtual interviews since.

In medical news, a pharmaceutical company started human testing of an experimental antibody cocktail to treat coronavirus this week. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc has said that the trial’s adaptive design means it could be rolled out to thousands of patients quickly if found to be effective by the end of the summer.

With restaurants and businesses slowly starting to open around the world, a ‘new normal’ is starting to emerge. For a restaurant in Maastricht, the Netherlands, that means robots waiters.

Three of the new employees at Dadawan – Amy, Aker or James – now greet customers, take their temperature before entering, show them to their table and serve meals.

Meanwhile in Senayan City, Indonesia, shopping malls have been fitted with merchandise sterilizer lockers to disinfectant new purchases, and the Berliner Ensemble theatre in Germany has removed 500 of its 700 seats, leaving small islands of one of two seats together.

Over in America, a family in Chesterland, Ohio, has converted their mailbox into a “unity box”. With an ‘in’ and ‘out’ section, neighbours can leave a message of kindness or inspiration and take one from a stranger too. Meanwhile in Nashville, Tennessee, nurses in the palliative care unit at Vanderbilt University Medical Center have been writing and performing songs for their patients – between their 12 hour shifts – to sooth them in their final days.

A new internship experience means anyone over the age of 18 can apply to take part in a virtual internship with employers like Accenture, Vodafone and Goldman Sachs. The three-day placements, run by Internship Experience UK, hope to help those in the ‘Corona Class of 2020’ who have had graduate role offers fall through to gain work experience.

New Zealand hit 20 days with no new virus cases on Thursday, despite lifting almost all of its coronavirus restrictions. Social distancing is no longer required and weddings are back on the table – or rather, down the aisle.

In the Yorkshire Dales, the market town of Settle is set to become the UK’s first ‘rainbow town’, seeing local businesses, including shops, hotels and hospitality services, offer special discounts for front line NHS staff and care workers when restrictions are eased.

And something for the book lovers – the Edinburgh International Book Festival will be hosted online with more than 100 live and pre-recorded events, featuring leading writers and poets. Events, which will run August 15-31 will be free for all.

TODAY’S MOODBOARD

Three pleasant things to put into your head 

1.

How’s social distancing going? These ducks in Newcastle haven’t quite quacked it

2.

A mother's reaction when she finds out her daughter was accepted into law school and given a £40,000 scholarship

3.

An oldie but a goodie for some Friday feels

• Do you have some good news to share? What's made you happier in the past 24 hours? Have you seen a pleasing picture? Please send it all our way, either by commenting below or emailing coronapositive@telegraph.co.uk