Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
A combination of students who feel they are at little risk and a governor who has lifted restrictions has experts worried, leading some schools to cancel spring break altogether
Covid-19 and spring break have never mixed well. Last March one young, shirtless man in Miami wearing a backwards-facing green cap went “viral” in the pre-pandemic sense when he told a reporter: “If I get corona, I get corona,” he said. “I’m not going to let it stop me from partying.”
A year later, even after Covid has killed over 500,000 Americans, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended against all travel, similar pictures and videos of spring breakers – no masks or social distancing in sight – are being seen again this year.
A new documentary shows that while the health impacts of the pandemic have - so far - been largely avoided, the effects of isolation on families, communities, and livelihoods has been profound
Faith, family, and a little bit of farming.
The Pacific’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic has been one of self-reliance and resistance: to turn to its communities and churches, its lands and seas.
Insiders tell of a Whitehall in panic mode and reveal virus spread far more widely than was acknowledged
Westminster is an infectious place. A tiny germ of controversy or rebellion can spread across parliament, through Whitehall and into the prime minister’s office within hours. The windowless offices are cramped, MPs sit elbow to elbow in a Commons chamber that can only squeeze just over 400 MPs into its seats, two-thirds of the number in parliament.
It is also a place of macho presenteeism, where the Greggs in Westminster tube station often serves as a nightly dinner spot for some of the most senior office-holders in the land.
Since the start of the pandemic, the most terrifying task in healthcare was thought to be when a doctor put a breathing tube down the trachea of a critically ill Covid patient.
The issues driving families and children to the border in the past decade remain: the climate crisis, violence, unemployment and poverty. Two devastating hurricanes in Honduras in November and the coronavirus pandemic have added to the desperate conditions. And each year migration increases when the weather warms up.
According to Congressional Budget Office estimates, to pay out his coronavirus relief package, president Joe Biden must spend an average of $3.7 billion every day for the rest of this year. That’s $43,000 every second of every day until midnight chimes on 2022.
Josh Boak at the Associated Press reports that the president signed the aid package into law yesterday without a comprehensive plan in place to distribute all of the funds, which will be a core focus of the administration in coming weeks.
Italy’s government is expected to announce the closure of schools, restaurants and shops across most of the country as a new wave of coronavirus infections puts hospitals under strain.
The prime minister, Mario Draghi, will hold a mid-morning cabinet meeting on Friday to decide new restrictions for the eurozone’s third-largest economy, which on Thursday recorded almost 26,000 new Covid-19 cases and 373 deaths.
Mexico's famed masked
wrestlers take the fight to Covid-19 at a wholesale market, the Central de Abastos in Mexico City. Stallholders and customers were encouraged to wear face masks and use sanitiser. Mexico has recorded more than 100,000
coronavirus deaths, the fourth country
to do so. It was the first country in Latin America to begin vaccinating its population
Success of schemes during pandemic has led many cities to plan vastly expanded bike networks
When the coronavirus pandemic led to global lockdowns a year ago, hundreds of cities reconfigured their streets to make walking and cycling easier to aid social distancing and reduce air pollution. Now, with an end to the lockdowns in sight, the measures have proved so successful that cities across Europe are betting on the bicycle to lead the recovery.
According to the European Cyclists’ Federation (ECF), the continent’s cities spent €1bn on Covid-related cycling measures in 2020, creating at least 600 miles (1,000km) of cycle lanes, traffic calming measures and car-free streets.
Some semblance of normal life will begin again in Wales from Saturday, with the country’s first minister, Mark Drakeford, expected to announce a change from the current “stay home” restrictions to more lenient “stay local” requirements.
Drakeford is expected to say: “We are taking a phased approach to unlocking each sector – starting with schools. We will make step-by-step changes each week to gradually restore freedoms. We will monitor each change we make, so we know what impact each change has had on Wales’s public health situation.”
Low-cost flights have enticed travelers, but relaxed restrictions have led to large gatherings, fights and Covid rule-breaking
At the Condado Vanderbilt hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Christian Correa clocked in to work the night-shift as a doorman and braced for the worst.
Correa, who is also a bellman at the hotel, has seen a surge in American tourists coming to the US territory in the last three months and the hotel has been busy. Although he used to enjoy high season before the pandemic, recently, many tourists arriving to Puerto Rico have enraged local residents and hospitality workers as the island eases its Covid-19 restrictions.
President warns Americans ‘this is not the time to let up’ in first prime-time address on pandemic anniversary
Joe Biden has directed states to make all American adults eligible for coronavirus vaccines by 1 May and set an audacious goal of 4 July for gatherings to celebrate “independence” from the deadly pandemic.
But in his first prime-time address, which marked the anniversary of America’s shutdown, the president warned that restrictions could be reinstated if the nation lets down its guard against the virus.
Joe Biden has pledged all US adults will be eligible for coronavirus vaccines by 1 May as he addressed the nation on the one year anniversary of the Covid-19 pandemic. Biden outlined plans to speed up vaccinations around the country and hoped for a return to normalcy by 4 July. The president condemned the hate crimes against Asian Americans, and repeated his calls for unity, as he urged Americans to continue to wear masks
It’s been a busy day in Washington ahead of Biden’s prime-time address this evening. Before we hand over the reigns to Maanvi Singh in California, here’s a look back at what happened on this unusually warm spring day in the nation’s capital.
In an astonishing piece of attempted backside-covering,former acting defense secretary under the outgoing Donald Trump, Chris Miller, tried to explain in an interview with Vice that the delay in National Guard troops deploying to the US Capitol on the afternoon of 6 January to help overwhelmed police was basically because “it’s complicated”.
Miller said: “It’s not like a video game” ie going up and down the chains of government and command to deploy troops is a complex process.
Chris Miller translator: " Hey, I had to take orders from the White House on this." https://t.co/ihRrvlvjGc
The PM has rejected claims of favouring Coalition and marginal seats through subsidised flights; and WA opposition leader Zak Kirkup insists he has no regrets as he prepares for landslide defeat. Follow all the latest updates, live
Good news for NSW residents in Auckland, they will once again be allowed to return to Australia without quarantine, as the New Zeland cluster dies out with no more new cases reported in the recent Auckland cluster since 28 February.
NSW health released a statement last night confirming the (one-way) travel bubble will reopen:
People who have been in Auckland in the past 14 days will be exempt from hotel quarantine provided that they seek testing for Covid-19 after arriving in NSW. They must self-isolate in their accommodation until they receive a negative result.
NSW Health will follow up arrivals from Auckland if a negative test is not recorded for them, to inform them of their obligations.
The OECD has so far been unable to find a clear winner in the contest between former Australian finance minister Mathias Cormann and former European trade commissioner Cecilia Malmström – so the decision may not be finalised until later this month.
Cormann and Malmström, the Swedish candidate, are the final two nominees for the role of secretary general of the Paris based OECD. The selection process is based on seeking to find consensus among OECD member states.
Following discussion with the Selection Committee, the Chair’s conclusions were finalised and these were communicated first to the nominating ambassadors, and then to the Heads of Delegations in plenary. Following these consultations, the Chair has been unable to identify which candidate has the most support. Further steps will be taken in March, with the aim of concluding the process.
A north London business centre previously used to host almost a million people across hundreds of events each year has reopened as an NHS Covid-19 mass vaccination centre. Up to 4,000 people a day will receive shots in dozens of private booths at the Business Design Centre in Islington, treated by trained staff and an army of volunteers. Patients arriving on its opening day expressed excitement and hope that the vaccine programme could eventually end lockdowns
Joe Biden signed the historic $1.9tn Covid-19 relief package into law on Thursday, hours before he will deliver his first primetime TV address as US president to mark one year since the virus triggered widespread shutdowns across the country.
“This historic legislation is about rebuilding the backbone of this country,” Biden said in brief remarks before signing the landmark legislation.
Delaying the second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine must be urgently reviewed for cancer patients after a single shot was found to offer inadequate protection, researchers have said.
A study from King’s College London and the Francis Crick Institute – which has not yet been peer reviewed – found that three weeks after the first jab antibody responses were found in 39% of people with solid cancers and 13% of people with blood cancer.
The European Medicines Agency has said the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid vaccine can continue to be used during an investigation into cases of blood clots that have prompted several European countries to pause their use of the shot.
The EMA said 30 cases of “thromboembolic events” or blood clots had been reported among 5 million people who had received the jab in Europe so far. “The vaccine’s benefits continue to outweigh its risks,” the regulator said in a statement.
The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine appears to give high protection against asymptomatic Covid-19, according to data from Israel – a finding that will boost hopes that mass vaccination can stop the spread of the virus.
The top line of the real-world results, issued by the Israeli ministry of health and the companies but not yet peer-reviewed by scientists, is efficacy of 97% against disease and death and 94% against infection without symptoms.
Governor Greg Abbott lifted the mask mandate on 2 March but not everyone in the state is ready to embrace the change
The parking lot was packed at The Shops at La Cantera, a partially outdoor mall in north-west San Antonio, on the day that Texas officially ended mandatory mask wearing. But it was clear not everyone was ready to embrace the change, with most people who wandered in and out of stores still donning face coverings, and many shops requiring customers to wear one before entering.