Category Archives: Coronavirus outbreak

Experts sound alarm over lack of Covid-19 test kits in Africa

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Global competition for kits and national constraints cause concern as lockdowns ease

Public health experts have warned about the risks of low supplies of coronavirus test kits as lockdowns in African countries begin to ease and urban populations become more mobile.

Different countries on the continent have adopted a range of testing strategies, but international competition for test kits and a lack of global coordination of resources have meant many African countries are testing with significantly limited reach.

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‘A lot of benign neglect’: how Ghana’s social changes are isolating older people

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The modernising economy is changing family structures – but can ‘western’ residential homes be accepted culturally?

After breakfast on a Friday morning, a small group of elderly people are engaging in gentle exercises – walking to one end of a walled compound and back. Some of them need the assistance of nurses or walkers, or both, to complete the journey.

“Usually, we do this a couple of times but it is a little bit cold today so we are going just once,” says Henry Ofori Mensah, administrator at Comfort For The Aged, a residential care home in Kasoa, a dormitory town west of Accra, Ghana’s capital.

At the turn of the century, a facility like this would have been hard to imagine in Ghana.

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Franco-German plan for European recovery will face compromises

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Macron-Merkel plan to borrow on behalf of EU to help worst-hit countries is already being challenged by ‘frugal four’

When France and Germany announced a plan to raise €500bn (£448bn) on financial markets to fund a European coronavirus recovery plan, leaders sought to underscore the magnitude of the moment.

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, hailed “a real change of philosophy”, with the plan for the European commission to borrow money on behalf of the entire EU and issue grants to the most stricken industries and regions. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, declared: “The nation state has no future standing alone,” and the German finance minister, Olaf Scholz, evoked the legacy of the US founding father Alexander Hamilton, who helped to transform the US into a true political unit with his scheme for the national government to take on debts accrued by individual states.

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Donald Trump delivers Memorial Day address, returns to golf course – video

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US president Donald Trump marked the Memorial Day weekend with visits to Arlington National Cemetery, Fort McHenry and his Trump National Golf Club. Trump delivered a speech at Fort McHenry thanking those serving in the military as the country battles the 'invisible enemy', Covid-19. The president also returned to the golf course for the first time since early March on the same weekend US coronavirus deaths closed in on 100,000

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Joe Biden re-emerges for Memorial Day after two months in quarantine – video

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Joe Biden has made his first public appearance since March, emerging from isolation to lay a wreath to mark Memorial Day at a park in Delaware. "It feels good to be out of my house,” the 77-year-old said. After abruptly cancelling a campaign rally in Cleveland on 10 March, Biden built a television studio in his home which he has used to appear on news programs and campaign fundraising events.

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Coronavirus live news: Putin says Russia past peak of outbreak despite highest daily death toll

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WHO warns of second peak as global cases pass 5.5m; Irish taoiseach Leo Varadkar denies picnic with friends was rule breach; world health leaders urge green recovery

I’m handing over to my esteemed colleague Kevin Rawlinson shortly, so I’ll leave you with a summary of today’s main global developments on the coronavirus pandemic:

A diplomatic rift has broken out between Tanzania and the US. The East African nation said it had summoned the top official at the US embassy to object to an advisory that warned of “exponential growth” of Covid-19 cases in the country.

Tanzania’s divisive leader John Magufuli has repeatedly played down the gravity of the coronavirus pandemic, appearing to model his response on the early approach taken by Donald Trump in the US.

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Mexico City records thousands more deaths than usual, amid doubt over official Covid-19 toll

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Research found 8,000 more death certificates have been issued so far this year than the four-year average

This year, Mexico City has issued 8,072 more death certificates than the average for the same period in the past four years, according to a new study that suggests the country’s coronavirus death toll could be significantly higher than the official figure of nearly 7,400.

Research published in the Mexican magazine Nexos on Monday used information from the capital’s 52 civil registries to estimate the number of death certificates created between 1 January and 20 May.

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Dominic Cummings refuses to resign or apologise for lockdown breach

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Press conference raises more questions but Boris Johnson gives full backing to adviser

The crisis that has engulfed the government over Dominic Cummings’ conduct continued to rage unabated after an unprecedented press conference in which the prime minister’s chief aide repeatedly refused to resign or apologise for breaking lockdown rules.

After an outpouring of public anger rattled No 10, he attempted to explain why he drove 264 miles from London to his parents’ estate in Durham despite suspecting that both he and his wife had coronavirus.

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Kentucky lockdown protesters condemned for hanging effigy of governor from tree

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Incident at conservative rally draws backlash from Democrats and Republicans

Political leaders in Kentucky have condemned rightwing protesters against the state’s measures to fight the coronavirus, after the demonstrators hanged an effigy of Democratic state governor Andy Beshear from a tree.

The incident happened on Sunday during a protest in favor of gun rights and other mostly conservative causes. Several men produced a rope and an effigy and strung it from a tree outside the state capitol building in Frankfort.

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WHO halts hydroxychloroquine trial for coronavirus amid safety fears

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Malaria drug taken by Trump could raise risk of death and heart problems, study shows

The World Health Organization has said it will temporarily drop hydroxychloroquine — the malaria drug Donald Trump said he is taking as a precaution — from its global study into experimental coronavirus treatments after safety concerns.

The WHO’s director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in light of a paper published last week in the Lancet that showed people taking hydroxychloroquine were at higher risk of death and heart problems than those who were not, it would pause the hydroxychloroquine arm of its solidarity global clinical trial.

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Trump spends Memorial Day weekend golfing and insulting female politicians

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President tweets and retweets personal attacks against Pelosi and Abrams as US approaches 100,000 coronavirus deaths

Even by Donald Trump’s standards, it was a wild ride. On a Memorial Day weekend when coronavirus deaths in the US closed in on 100,000, and a grateful nation paid respects to its war dead, its president took to the golf course and turned to social media to unleash a barrage of personal attacks on foes old, new and perceived.

On Saturday and Sunday, both days on which Trump visited his golf club in Sterling, Virginia, he followed his time on the links with late-night Twitter sessions tweeting or retweeting insults to prominent female politicians.

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Californians pack beaches on Memorial Day weekend, defying social distancing rules – video

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Americans across the country appeared to abandon social distancing guidelines as they sunbathed on beaches and gathered for pool parties on Memorial Day weekend. The long weekend traditionally signals the start of the US summer, and despite the country’s Covid-19 death toll approaching 100,000, many revellers dismissed any safety concerns to celebrate.

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Boris Johnson’s senior adviser refuses to apologise for lockdown breach – as it happened

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Dominic Cummings will not resign; WHO drops hydroxychloroquine from global study into experimental coronavirus treatments. This blog is now closed

We’ve fired up a brand new blog at the link below – follow me there for the latest:

Related: Coronavirus live news: WHO drops hydroxychloroquine trial as Mexico death toll questioned

The White House on Monday issued a statement amending the timing of the start of new restrictions on travel from Brazil to the United States to 11.59pm Eastern Time on Tuesday, 26 May.

The White House announced on Sunday that it was restricting travel from Brazil to the United States, two days after the South American nation became the world’s No. 2 hotspot for coronavirus cases.

In its original announcement, it said the restrictions would come into force on 28 May.

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‘We’re expendable’: black Americans pay the price as states lift lockdowns

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Experts warn reopening states could have dire consequences on public health, and black Americans already face greater risk

Donald Trump recently shared a doctored video of his head superimposed on to actor Bill Pullman’s character in the 1996 film Independence Day’s crowd-rallying scene, likening frontline workers to warriors.

But it rang hollow for Denita Jones, a Dallas-area call center worker. For many black, essential workers like her, the message is about reopening the economy, but the real meaning is more subtle.

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From Kenya to Bangladesh mask-making has become a thriving cottage industry

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Charities, NGOs and garment factories are adapting to provide protective gear, generating income and keeping communities safe

From crowded informal settlements to conservation areas teeming with wildlife, cottage industries have popped up around the globe producing and distributing face masks for frontline workers, taxi drivers, market sellers and more. Usually comprised of two fabric layers with a disposable filter, mask-making enterprises are stoking local economies and helping communities.

In Bangladesh, where there have been over 25,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19, shopping malls are once again open, and garment factories – which provide 84% of the country’s total exports – have resumed operations despite worker claims that mask-wearing and social distancing are not enforced.

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Lockdown gives asylum seekers reprieve and hope for change in policy

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After Covid 19 pauses threat of detention and deportation, campaigners call for rethink on UK immigration

As Britain takes its first small steps out of lockdown, there is one group of people quietly wishing that it wouldn’t.

For many asylum seekers, the two-month hiatus has meant reprieve. Freed from detention centres, liberated from the threat of imminent deportation and no longer obliged to report to the Home Office, many have welcomed the relief. And all this at a time when the general population have learned something of what it is like to live with severe curbs on civil liberties.

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Global report: US suspends travel from Brazil as schools reopen in parts of Australia

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Chile’s president says hospitals are ‘very close to limit’, France records lowest number of daily Covid-19 cases since March, India restarts domestic flights

President Donald Trump has further limited travel to the US from the world’s coronavirus hotspots by denying entry to foreigners coming from Brazil, which is second to the US in the number of confirmed cases.

Trump had already banned certain travellers from China, Europe, the United Kingdom and Ireland and, to a lesser extent, Iran. He has not moved to ban travel from Russia, which has the world’s third-highest caseload, approximately 20,000 fewer than Brazil’s.

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Exclusive: big pharma rejected EU plan to fast-track vaccines in 2017

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World’s top drug firms turned down proposals for work on pathogens like coronavirus

The world’s largest pharmaceutical companies rejected an EU proposal three years ago to work on fast-tracking vaccines for pathogens like coronavirus to allow them to be developed before an outbreak, the Guardian can reveal.

The plan to speed up the development and approval of vaccines was put forward by European commission representatives sitting on the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) – a public-private partnership whose function is to back cutting-edge research in Europe – but it was rejected by industry partners on the body.

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Americans defy Covid-19 social distancing rules to celebrate Memorial Day holiday

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Hundreds gather at pool party at Lake of the Ozarks and at Daytona Beach in Florida, defying safety restrictions

Americans across the country appeared to abandon social distancing guidelines as they sunbathed on beaches and gathered for pool parties on Memorial Day weekend.

The long weekend traditionally signals the start of the US summer, and despite the country’s Covid-19 death toll approaching 100,000, many revellers dismissed any safety concerns to celebrate.

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Johnson’s defence of Cummings sparks anger from allies and opponents alike

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Possible police investigation of aide is latest in series of Guardian disclosures that have rocked the government

Boris Johnson has staked his political reputation on saving the career of Dominic Cummings, amid growing anger among Conservative MPs that the No 10 chief adviser has not been forced out for breaking lockdown rules.

Under intense pressure to explain why Cummings drove his wife, who was suffering coronavirus symptoms, and son 264 miles to his parents’ farm in Durham, the prime minister said on Sunday that Cummings had “acted responsibly, legally and with integrity”.

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