Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Changes to Japanese procedure could mean two more weeks on the Diamond Princess
Britons could face two more weeks trapped onboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship as Japan updates its quarantine procedure in an effort to halt the rapid spread of coronavirus among passengers.
Cruise ship guests received a letter on Sunday saying that while those who tested negative for the virus would be allowed to leave on Wednesday, anyone who shared a room with a passenger who tested positive would face another two weeks onboard, starting from the date they were separated from their cabin mate.
US, Canada and Hong Kong offer citizens on Diamond Princess flights home as death toll inside China reaches 1,665
A further 70 people on the Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined in Japan have tested positive for Covid-19, bringing the total to 355, as three countries say they will fly their citizens on the ship home. It comes as China’s National Health Commission announced the death toll inside the country had risen to 1,665, with 68,500 infections.
The US embassy in Japan announced on Saturday that more than 400 US nationals would be flown home from the quarantined Diamond Princess, currently docked in the port of Yokohama, south of Tokyo.
Pressure is growing on the British government to airlift citizens stranded on a cruise ship stricken by coronavirus, after a Chinese tourist in France became the first person to die from the disease in Europe.
The US announced late on Friday that it would be evacuating more than 400 nationals from the quarantined ship, which has had nearly 300 confirmed coronavirus cases, and British travellers called on their government to do the same.
Europe has recorded its first coronavirus fatality, a Chinese tourist in France, it has been confirmed.
The death of the 80-year-old man, who was visiting Paris with his daughter when he was taken to hospital three weeks ago after falling ill, also marks the first coronavirus mortality outside Asia since the start of the outbreak.
Mark Esper says countries using Chinese technology will put intelligence cooperation at risk
The US defence secretary, Mark Esper, warned that US alliances including the future of Nato were in jeopardy if European countries went ahead with using Chinese Huawei technology in their 5G networks.
Esper also warned future intelligence cooperation would be at risk, as the US would no longer be certain its communications networks were secure.
Covid-19 cases pass 66,000 in China as residents in capital who flout new restrictions told they will be ‘held accountable under the law’
Beijing has ordered people returning to the city from holidays to quarantine themselves for 14 days to try to contain the coronavirus spread, as the death toll in China from the outbreak passed 1,500.
On Saturday, the country’s National Health Commission said 2,641 new cases were confirmed in the previous 24 hours, taking the total number of confirmed infections across mainland China to 66,492. There were also 143 deaths in the 24 hours to midnight on Friday, taking total fatalities from the virus to 1,523.
With seven months to go, the internationally acclaimed PM must tackle queries over whether she has done enough at home
It’s time for morning tea at the Allen Bryant retirement home in Hokitika, New Zealand, and a rattling tea cart is doing the rounds as the 50 residents talk politics. The South Island district is a Labour party stronghold, and the party was born up the road at the Blackball pub 100 years ago.
The residents who live at the home in the West Coast region are overwhelmingly Labour supporters, with backgrounds in mining and lifetime union affiliation. It was on the west coast that the party celebrated its centenary. And it is here that it is beginning to alienate its once-loyal fans.
Treatment of refugees and asylum seekers ‘cruel, inhuman or degrading’, but does not warrant prosecution, ICC office says
Australia’s offshore detention regime is a “cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment” and unlawful under international law, the international criminal court’s prosecutor has said.
But the office of the prosecutor has stopped short of deciding to prosecute the Australian government, saying that while the imprisonment of refugees and asylum seekers formed the basis of a crime against humanity, the violations did not rise to the level to warrant further investigation.
It is estimated that more than 30,000 pets have been left stranded after the Chinese government sealed off Wuhan following the coronavirus outbreak.
In response, people trapped in Wuhan have been volunteering and checking in on the animals whose owners are stuck outside the city. Here's Ye Jialin's story of helping those who are currently not allowed to return home
A Channel 4 employee was taken to hospital to be tested for coronavirus on Thursday after being met at the channel’s London headquarters by health officials in protective clothing, it has emerged.
The person is understood to have been on holiday recently in China in the last month and had some concerns about feeling unwell. They are not a journalist and had not been to Wuhan, the Chinese region at the centre of the outbreak.
“On Thursday a member of staff at Channel 4 who had travelled to Asia within the last month felt unwell.”
“As a precautionary measure they decided to seek medical advice and, in line with the latest public health advice regarding the Coronavirus, they were taken to hospital for a precautionary test. We have informed our staff of this and continue to follow all the latest public health guidance.”
Singapore has reported nine new coronavirus cases – its biggest daily increase, according to the Straits Times. The new cases take Singapore’s virus tally to 67.
Six of the new cases are linked to the Grace Assembly of God church which is now the biggest cluster of cases in Singapore with 13 in total.
Coronavirus: 9 new cases confirmed in Singapore, 6 of these linked to Grace Assembly church which has become the biggest cluster https://t.co/eybB3Xrpwp
A senior White House official has called on Beijing to be more transparent over its handling of the coronavirus outbreak as Chinese authorities expanded “wartime” measures to limit its spread.
“We are a little disappointed that we haven’t been invited in and we’re a little disappointed in the lack of transparency coming from the Chinese,” said Larry Kudlow, the director of the US National Economic Council.
The 32-year-old had been missing for a week after she went walking in Mount Aspiring national park
The body of the missing British hiker Stephanie Simpson has been found more than a week after she went missing, New Zealand police have said.
The discovery was made at about 1.40pm on Friday in the Pyke Creek area, a region in which police had devoted significant search resources, including two dog teams, 12 specialist search and rescue staff, thermal imaging drones and a helicopter.
The true scale of the epidemic caused by the new coronavirus in Hubei province has been thrown into doubt after the Chinese authorities reported more than 13,300 extra cases going back over an unknown number of days or weeks.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said the huge jump in cases in Hubei, bringing the total to more than 60,000 worldwide, was due to a change in the way Chinese authorities was counting them.
Government has ignored laws intended to prevent stigma, discrimination and bullying, Human Rights Watch claims
Young people in Vietnam continue to be taught at home and at school that same-sex attraction is a “disease” and a “mental illness” that can be cured and treated, despite legislation designed to support and protect LGBTQ+ rights.
Stigma and discrimination about sexual orientation and gender identity contribute to the verbal harassment and bullying of LGBTQ+ young people, which in some cases leads to physical violence, according to a report published on Thursday by Human Rights Watch (HRW).
A hardliner notorious for the demolition of thousands of Christian crosses on churches has been appointed the new head of China’s office in Hong Kong, a sign that Beijing aims to further tighten control over the semi-autonomous city, analysts say.
Xia Baolong, an ally of president Xi Jinping, has been appointed director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office under the State Council, replacing Zhang Xiaoming, State media reported on Thursday. His appointment came amid a purge of officials in Hubei, the province wracked by the coronavirus outbreak.
Zhang has become the most senior Beijing-appointed official to lose his job in the wake of months of anti-government protests in Hong Kong. The city has been roiled by more than seven months of protests over an extradition bill that would have allowed suspects to be sent to mainland China for trial.
As our story makes clear, the World Health Organization (WHO) said the huge jump in cases in Hubei – bringing the total to more than 60,000 worldwide – was caused by a change in the way Chinese authorities were counting them.
The WHO is now working hard to get further details on when the extra cases of “Covid-19” occurred to paint a true picture of the development of the epidemic in Wuhan and other cities in Hubei.
Reuters reports that Donald Trump has praised China over its handling of the outbreak, adding that the United States was working closely with Beijing.
“I think they’ve handled it professionally, and I think they’re extremely capable,” Trump, who has previously been at loggerheads with the Chinese authorities over trade issues, said in a podcast broadcast on iHeart Radio on Thursday.
Even after declaring a crisis, government seemed focused on managing its image as well as the outbreak
China’s two new hospitals built in as many weeks were the official face of its fight against the coronavirus in Wuhan. As the city was locked down, authorities promised that thousands of doctors would be on hand to treat 2,600 patients on the facilities’ wards.
Timelapse videos tracked the almost incomprehensibly fast construction of the hospitals, and state media celebrated their opening in early February. The only thing missing a week later? Patients.
Thailand has become the fifth country to deny the MS Westerdam permission to dock over fears that some of its more than 2,000 passengers and crew may be infected with the new coronavirus. A passenger describes life onboard, with no cases of the virus yet found
Smugglers responsible for mass atrocities in Thailand may be linked to capsized boat carrying refugees from Bangladesh to Malaysia
Activists fear a dangerous transnational trafficking network is being revived after at least 16 Rohingya refugees drowned in the Bay of Bengal on Tuesday morning.
Bangladeshi officials said a wooden fishing boat carrying about 138 people capsized near Bangladesh’s St Martin’s island in the early hours.
A paper in the Lancet medical journal, published online, should dispel some of the worries around reported deaths of some babies born to women who have fallen ill with what is now being called COVID-19 infection.
The authors say preliminary evidence suggests the new coronavirus cannot be passed to the baby in the womb.
Hi, Amy Walker here taking over the blog from my colleague Simon Murphy.
Patients who were treated by the two Brighton GPs who have been diagnosed with coronavirus are being traced by health officials, the BBC has reported.