As warm weekend weather arrived in the UK, Matt Hancock said people needed to follow the rules on coronavirus or the government would be forced to ban all exercise outside
Continue reading...Category Archives: Coronavirus outbreak
YouTube to suppress content spreading coronavirus 5G conspiracy theory
Site will reduce recommendations of videos promoting misinformation
YouTube will reduce the amount of content spreading conspiracy theories about links between 5G technology and the coronavirus that it recommends to users and actively remove videos that breach its policies, the company has said.
Content that is simply conspiratorial about 5G mobile communications networks, without mentioning coronavirus, is still allowed on the site. YouTube said those videos may be considered “borderline content” and subjected to suppression, including loss of advertising revenue and being removed from search results on the platform.
Continue reading...Ecuador: cardboard coffins distributed amid coronavirus fears
Guayaquil, where mortuaries have been overwhelmed, creates helpline for removal of coronavirus victims
Authorities in Ecuador’s biggest city are distributing thousands of cardboard coffins and have created a helpline for families who need corpses to be removed from their homes.
Guayaquil has emerged as a regional hotspot for coronavirus, and hospitals and mortuaries have been overwhelmed, forcing some families to store bodies at home.
Continue reading...Drive-in church lets South Koreans congregate safely – video
Christians at a church in South Korea are taking part in 'drive-in' services to comply with the country's strict social-distancing rules. While most services have been taking place online, the Seoul City Church decided to also hold a drive-in.
South Korea has largely managed to its epidemic under control, but outbreaks still occur in churches, hospitals and nursing homes
Continue reading...Can I have sex? A guide to intimacy during the coronavirus outbreak
What are the risks associated with intimacy in the time of coronavirus? Three experts weigh in
With countries on lockdown and millions being made to stay at home, it’s unsurprising many couples and single people are wondering what coronavirus means for their sex lives. With this in mind, we asked three experts five of the most pressing questions about intimacy during the pandemic.
Continue reading...‘There will be a lot of death’: Trump warning as Covid-19 cases in US pass 300,000 – video
Donald Trump has warned Americans that the toll from coronavirus in the US will be 'the toughest' during the next two weeks, saying there will be 'a lot of death'. According to the Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, by Saturday evening more than 305,000 cases of Covid-19 had been confirmed in the US, resulting in more than 8,000 deaths
Matt Hancock tells sunbathers: ‘You are putting lives at risk’ – video
The health secretary has said people should not go outside to sunbathe, even if they practise social distancing.
Speaking to Sophy Ridge on Sky News, Matt Hancock said: 'We are absolutely clear that you should not leave your home unless it is for one of four reasons: for medical reasons, to buy food, to go to work if you can't work at home, or for exercise. We're crystal in the guidance on what people should do – that guidance is backed up by law. It is not a request, it is a requirement in law'
Whether in the UK or the developing world, we’re not all in coronavirus together
In the slums of Delhi or Lagos, social distancing is a dream while social exclusion is all too real and pernicious
‘The virus does not discriminate,” suggested Michael Gove after both Boris Johnson and the health secretary, Matt Hancock, were struck down by Covid-19. But societies do. And in so doing, they ensure that the devastation wreaked by the virus is not equally shared.
We can see this in the way that the low paid both disproportionately have to continue to work and are more likely to be laid off; in the sacking of an Amazon worker for leading a protest against unsafe conditions; in the rich having access to coronavirus tests denied to even most NHS workers.
Continue reading...Germany’s devolved logic is helping it win the coronavirus race
With 400 public health offices forging ahead with testing, the country is a model for others to emulate
As the coronavirus crisis tests the resilience of democracies around the globe, Germany has gone from cursing its lead-footed, decentralised political system to wondering if federalism’s tortoise versus hare logic puts it in a better position to brave the pandemic than most.
Under German federalism – which has roots going back to the Holy Roman Empire but was entrenched after the Nazi era to weaken centralised rule – key policy areas, such as health, education and cultural affairs, fall under the jurisdiction of the country’s 16 states, or Länder.
Continue reading...We are fighting a 21st-century disease with 20th-century weapons
Better and faster joined-up data systems are key to coping with and preventing pandemics such as Covid-19 – as well as more everyday diseases
Covid-19 has exposed the deficiencies of national disease detection and prevention systems in many countries of Europe, and in the United States. In the UK, contact tracing was abandoned early due to lack of capacity. Just three weeks ago the government was prepared to let thousands of Scots travel through England to Wales and back for a rugby match, and it has taken a month to develop a strategy for scaled-up testing. After a decade of austerity and decentralisation, we are trying to recover the lost muscle memory of the public health response.
It will not be 100 years until the next pandemic. Population growth, human invasion of animal habitats and the resumption of fast travel between continents will take care of that. More urgently, we need a system in place after the lockdown to prevent a second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic being worse than the first.
Continue reading...NHS heroes … and targets of racists
I cheered the role of BAME medics in the battle against Covid-19 – but I didn’t expect the torrent of abuse that followed
“Little China girl.” “Paki doctor.” “Black bitch.” These are just some of the racist slurs directed at NHS nurses and doctors as they work on the frontline. I remember feeling sick when I first read an ITV report detailing these incidents at the end of last year. And it was at the front of my mind as I whooped in support of our carers on Thursday night.
I returned to that report last week after posting what I thought was an uncontroversial tweet, noting the fact that all four doctors who had tragically lost their lives to coronavirus at that point were people of colour, and that it was a reminder of how much the NHS relies on BAME and migrant doctors and nurses. Just over four in 10 NHS medical staff are BAME, and almost one in three doctors are not from the UK. From the first Caribbean nurses who arrived after the second world war, the NHS has been built on the backs of both migrant and British workers; in the late 1960s, half of all doctors below consultant level were non-British.
Continue reading...The Observer view on coronavirus, a tragedy for poorer nations
If Europe, the US and China are struggling to contain it, what chance for millions of people in less developed countries?
It is a terrible thing to see a disaster in the making and be unable to prevent it. Yet this is the prospect confronting us if we dare to look beyond the walls and parapets of a Britain besieged by the coronavirus invader. Tens of millions of people in poorer, less developed countries across the world face a looming catastrophe that appears as unstoppable as it is potentially lethal.
The moment has not quite arrived. But an axe is poised to fall on untold numbers of largely defenceless heads, a massacre almost too appalling to contemplate. As the relatively wealthy countries of the northern hemisphere engage in a noisy struggle to repulse Covid-19, alarm bells are ringing from south Asia to the Middle East and Africa. Mostly they have not yet been heard.
Continue reading...Australia’s coronavirus victims: Covid-19 related deaths across the country
As the number of cases rises, so does the number of those who have died. Here is a state-by-state list of virus-related fatalities
- Sign up for Guardian Australia’s daily email
- Coronavirus in Australia: charts, maps, cases, latest numbers and stats
The Australian death toll from Covid-19 related illnesses stands at 34, as of 4 April. This story will be updated as further deaths are confirmed and Australia’s coronavirus victims are identified.
Continue reading...Queen to tell nation to ‘take pride’ in response to pandemic
In a rare TV broadcast, the monarch will praise public efforts and thank the NHS and other frontline workers
The Queen will praise the nation for its “self-discipline” and “resolve” during the coronavirus pandemic in a rare televised address broadcast on Sunday night.
In what is described as a “deeply personal” message, she will reflect on her own experience in other difficult times during the broadcast at 8pm. It was filmed under strict measures to protect the monarch, who will be 94 this month.
Continue reading...Coronavirus: trekkers climb height of Everest at home – video
Trail runner Rory Southworth launched a challenge to climb the height of Everest, an altitude of 5,364 metres, in five days in and about trekkers' homes. The virtual basecamp challenge was taken up by a team of about 30 climbers, who completed the task on the evening of 3 April. Southworth said: 'There was a lot of negativity among the outdoor community about being confined at home and I wanted to give people a reason to exercise indoors.'
Continue reading...Fears for wildlife recovery after bushfires as coronavirus crisis stymies scientists’ fieldwork
Monitoring work suspended due to restrictions on travel and physical contact, in a blow for research into threatened species
Scientists are being forced to shut down or scale back fieldwork to assess the impact of last summer’s devastating bushfires on threatened species amid the coronavirus crisis, prompting concerns it could affect wildlife recovery.
Several universities have shut down fieldwork to comply with restrictions on travel and physical contact and government agencies working on the recovery have had to scale back some of their operations.
Continue reading...Australian children remain trapped in al-Hawl camp as region braces for coronavirus
Fresh calls for Australia to repatriate its citizens amid fears the camp is vulnerable to a Covid-19 outbreak
Forty-seven Australian children remain trapped in the abject al-Hawl camp in north-east Syria, as the region braces for a potential Covid-19 outbreak.
Syria has reported only a handful of cases, and there are none confirmed in the camp housing 68,000 women and children, most of them family of Islamic State fighters, but there has been little Covid-19 testing across the war-torn country.
Continue reading...Lockdowns around world could last weeks more, officials warn
Spain, Germany and UK among countries to says measures could stay in place as deaths in Italy push past 15,000
Officials from Germany to Spain said they expect the stringent lockdown conditions to stretch for weeks longer as Italy saw its deaths from the coronavirus pandemic push past 15,000 and infections in the United States neared 300,000.
The virus has claimed 15,362 lives in Italy, officials said on Saturday, while the total number of confirmed cases in the country rose to 124,632.
Continue reading...Andrew Cuomo thanks China for ventilators as New York prepares for coronavirus peak – video
The New York governor said the Chinese government would facilitate a donation of 1,000 ventilators to arrive into JFK airport on Saturday. Cuomo said: ‘This is a big deal and it’s going to make a significant difference for us. We’re not at the apex so we’re still in the stage where we have the luxury – if you will – of gathering as much as we can.’
Five-year-old child among latest UK coronavirus deaths
Death toll increases by 708 in one day, largest amount since outbreak began
A five-year old child is among 708 people whose deaths with coronavirus were announced on Saturday in the UK, as Britain’s death toll rose to 4,313, the biggest increase since the outbreak began.
The latest figures show the recorded death toll from the virus in the UK has risen by 20%, and above 4,000 for the first time.
Continue reading...