Category Archives: Infectious Diseases

Coronavirus live news: Trump suspends WHO funding as Denmark begins to reopen schools

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US to investigate World Health Organization’s response to crisis; global cases pass 1.98m with 126,000 deaths; France summons Chinese envoy

Kandahar province went into full lockdown on Wednesday morning as Afghanistan reported its second biggest daily rise of new coronavirus cases in a week, triggered by a surge of infections in Kabul.

Afghanistan’s health ministry has reported 70 new positive cases of Covid-19 in the last 24 hours, pushing the total number of infections to 784.

Most of the new cases were in Kabul, which has so far recorded 201 cases, 31 today.

Kabul went into full lockdown last week, as all roads to the city of six million were blocked and 1,600 police officers were appointed to monitor movement inside the city.

Of the new Covid-19 cases, 22 were confirmed in the western province of Herat, the worst affected area in Afghanistan so far with 313 cases.

The southern province of Kandahar went into full lockdown on Wednesday morning in a bid to contain the spread of coronavirus in one of Afghanistan’s most populated areas.

Germany’s government will extend restrictions on movement introduced last month to slow the spread of the coronavirus until at least 3 May, Handelsblatt business daily reported on Wednesday, citing the dpa news agency.

The chancellor, Angela Merkel, is holding a video conference on Wednesday, first with cabinet ministers and later with the leaders of Germany’s 16 states, who will try to agree on whether to ease the measures given some improvement in the situation.

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‘Will we die of hunger?’: how Covid-19 lockdowns imperil street children

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For millions of young people, coronavirus restrictions have made access to food, water and shelter even more precarious

Timothy, a teenager on the streets of Mombasa, wonders how he will eat. “Rich people can stay home … because they have a store well stocked with food,” he says. “For a survivor on the street your store is your stomach.”

However, says another, if the rumours are true and street children are arrested in the city during the Covid-19 crisis, he’d be happy to go to Shimo women’s prison, because there “you are sure to get free food, shelter and medical services”.

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Deep inequalities of social distancing in South Africa – in pictures

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In densely populated townships and cities, the army and police have been patrolling the streets to enforce strict measures to curb the spread of coronavirus

All photographs by Jérôme Delay for AP

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Coronavirus live news: cases worldwide near 2 million as Trump repeats WHO funding threat

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UK daily deaths likely to rise this week; France to ease lockdown starting 11 May

The Slovak government will release a plan next Monday on when and how shops will reopen after forced closures due to the spread of the new coronavirus, Prime Minister Igor Matovic said on Tuesday.

Reuters reports him as saying that Slovakia aims to protect the 70% of the economy that is running from being affected by the spread of the virus and the reopening of retail will be cautious.

The European commission is urging EU states to coordinate as they begin to ease lockdown measures, warning that failure to do so could result in new spikes of the coronavirus epidemic.

Several EU states have announced plans or have already begun to relax restrictions imposed to contain the outbreak, as pressure grows to revive their battered economies.

It is time to develop a well-coordinated EU exit strategy. The exit strategy should be coordinated between the Member States, to avoid negative spillover effects.

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Coronavirus UK live: Lockdown could shrink GDP by 35% and see unemployment rise by 2m, says OBR

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Coronavirus lockdown in the UK could last at least another month, as Dominic Raab says country has not passed the peak

From BBC Newsnight’s Lewis Goodall

NEW: OBR publishes an economic scenario (not forecast) for what might happen to the UK economy as a result of #Covid19. It assumes a 3 month lockdown.

Unemployment: ⬆️by 2 million.

GDP (2020) ⬇️ 13% in 2020.

If so, would be the worst economic contraction for a century.

Here is an excerpt from the report published by the Office for Budget Responsibility today looking at what impact the coronavirus lockdown could have on the economy. It says GDP could fall by 35% in the second quarter of the year.

Here is an extract.

In addition to its impact on public health, the coronavirus outbreak will substantially raise public sector net borrowing and debt, primarily reflecting economic disruption. The government’s policy response will also have substantial direct budgetary costs, but the measures should help limit the long-term damage to the economy and public finances – the costs of inaction would certainly have been higher ...

We do not attempt to predict how long the economic lockdown will last – that is a matter for the government, informed by medical advice. But, to illustrate some of the potential fiscal effects, we assume a three-month lockdown due to public health restrictions followed by another three-month period when they are partially lifted. For now, we assume no lasting economic hit.

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Can you get coronavirus twice? – video explainer

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A serious concern since the emergence of Covid-19 has been whether those who have had it can get it a second time – and what that means for exiting this crisis.

The Guardian's science correspondent Hannah Devlin looks at how our bodies fight coronavirus when infected, how we develop immunity and if we can get reinfected with Covid-19

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‘We’re abandoned to our own luck’: coronavirus menaces Brazil’s favelas

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Residents fearful how their families will cope as food runs out and Jair Bolsonaro undermines lockdown message

Renato Rosas knows what poverty feels like. The musician and biomedical salesman grew up in one of Brazil’s biggest favelas, in the Amazon city of Belém. Relatives still live in the wooden stilt houses that line the black, polluted rivers running into Guajará Bay.

“It is the most extreme poverty,” he said of the Baixadas da Estrada Nova Jurunas neighbourhood where floods, deadly sucuri snakes lurking in floating rubbish and armed drug gangs are among the challenges.

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Growth in surveillance may be hard to scale back after pandemic, experts say

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Coronavirus crisis has led to billions of people around the world facing enhanced monitoring

The coronavirus pandemic has led to an unprecedented global surge in digital surveillance, researchers and privacy advocates around the world have said, with billions of people facing enhanced monitoring that may prove difficult to roll back.

Governments in at least 25 countries are employing vast programmes for mobile data tracking, apps to record personal contact with others, CCTV networks equipped with facial recognition, permission schemes to go outside and drones to enforce social isolation regimes.

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Wounded by media scrutiny, Trump turned a briefing into a presidential tantrum

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President lashed out at reporters, swiped at Biden and refused to accept that he had put a foot wrong in coronavirus response

A toddler threw a self-pitying tantrum on live television on Monday night. Unfortunately he was 73 years old, wearing a long red tie and running the world’s most powerful country.

Donald Trump, starved of campaign rallies, Mar-a-Lago weekends and golf, and goaded by a bombshell newspaper report, couldn’t take it any more. Years of accreted grievance and resentment towards the media came gushing out in a torrent. He ranted, he raved, he melted down and he blew up the internet with one of the most jaw-dropping performances of his presidency.

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Italian death toll passes 20,000; more than 1.87m Covid-19 cases reported worldwide – as it happened

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Spain records another drop in daily death toll; Singapore sees biggest daily jump in infections; China reports highest daily cases in over five weeks. This blog is now closed

We’ve launched a new global coronavirus liveblog at the link below where I’ll be bringing you rolling coverage throughout the day:

Related: Coronavirus live news: cases worldwide near 2 million as Trump repeats WHO funding threat

Dr. Fauci opens by saying he does not claim to know anything about economics. “But the one thing we do know as health experts is... some people think it will be like a light switch on and off. But it won’t be.”

Each state is different, he says. There will be a “rolling re-entry,” says Dr. Fauci. “It’s not one size fits all.”

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Government criticised over PPE and tests as death toll hits 10,000

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Official adviser says UK could end up with highest number of coronavirus fatalities in Europe

The government has been warned that Britain risks having the highest death toll from coronavirus in Europe as the total number of fatalities from the disease in UK hospitals rose above 10,000.

As Boris Johnson left hospital on Sunday, criticism of the government’s response to the pandemic was mounting from senior medics and politicians, particularly over its failure to get enough personal protective equipment (PPE) and testing to NHS and care home workers.

Prof Sir Jeremy Farrar, an adviser to the government and director of the Wellcome Trust, said the figures of almost 1,000 daily hospital deaths showed the UK was in a similar situation to other European countries that had been badly affected.

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Documents contradict UK government stance on Covid-19 ‘herd immunity’

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List of possible interventions included simulating impact of allowing majority to be infected

The inclusion of “targeted herd immunity” as a possible UK government response to the Covid-19 pandemic – in a list of possible interventions considered for analysis by a contractor – appears to contradict strong denials by the health secretary 10 days earlier that it was any part of government policy.

Matt Hancock gave that response on 14 March after two senior government officials had said publicly that achieving “herd immunity” was a key aim, prompting widespread alarm among medical experts that the British government was planning to allow the majority of the population to become infected.

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UK could have Europe’s worst coronavirus death rate, says adviser

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Daily death toll shows situation is comparable with other badly hit countries, says Jeremy Farrar

The UK could end up with the worst coronavirus death rate in Europe, one of the government’s leading scientific advisers has said.

Prof Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust and a pandemics expert on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said the figures of almost 1,000 daily hospital deaths showed the UK was in a similar situation to other European countries that had been badly affected.

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‘It’s a very worrying time’: Sri Lanka’s recovery interrupted by coronavirus

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As the anniversary of the bombs that shook the country looms, survivors working to build harmony face multiple challenges

A year on from the Easter bombs that killed more than 250 people, Sri Lanka is now under pandemic lockdown and facing rising pressure.

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, whose decision to include individuals accused of atrocities during the country’s 25-year civil war among his political appointments has been a source of international opprobrium, is now under fire over the country’s repressive, militarised response to Covid-19.

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Coronavirus statistics: what can we trust and what should we ignore?

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The flurry of figures, graphs and projections surrounding the pandemic is confusing. Two experts guide us through the maze

The past few weeks has seen an unstoppable epidemic … of statistics. The flood threatens to overwhelm us all, but what do all these numbers mean? Here are eight statistics you may see, with some warnings about how much we might trust them.

1 The number of new cases each day This can be a very poor reflection of the number of people who have actually been infected, as it depends crucially on the testing regime – up to 9 April, 1.3 million tests had been carried out in Germany, versus 317,000 in the UK.

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Coronavirus live news: Assange ‘at risk from virus’, as lockdowns tighten worldwide

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Partner says Wikileaks founder should be freed from UK prison; Christians adapt to Easter without ceremonies; Italy, India, Saudi Arabia, Puerto Rico extend lockdown

From AFP:

It’s a grim truth that times are good for the coffin business when they’re bad for people, and the coronavirus pandemic is no exception.

Mathematician John Horton Conway has died after contracting Covid-19, his colleagues have reported.

I am sorry to confirm the passing of my colleague John Conway. An incomparable mathematician, a pleasant neighbor, and an excellent coffee acquaintance.

His passing was sudden (fever started only Wednesday morning). Part of coronavirus's hard toll in New Jersey.

He is Archimedes, Mick Jagger, Salvador Dalí, and Richard Feynman, all rolled into one. He is one of the greatest living mathematicians, with a sly sense of humour, a polymath’s promiscuous curiosity, and a compulsion to explain everything about the world to everyone in it. According to Sir Michael Atiyah, former president of the Royal Society and arbiter of mathematical fashion, “Conway is the most magical mathematician in the world.”

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Coronavirus live news: Pope gives Easter mass by live stream as global death toll passes 110,000

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Jordan, Italy, India, Saudi Arabia, Puerto Rico extend lockdown; Britain pledges £200m to WHO; partner of Julian Assange calls for prison release

Criticism of the UK government’s response to the crisis is growing, report Rowena Mason and Haroon Siddique, particularly over its failure to get enough personal protective equipment and testing kits to NHS and care workers.

It comes as a government adviser also warned that the UK could experience the highest death toll from coronavirus in Europe on a day when the number of fatalities in British hospitals passed 10,000. Read the full story here:

Related: Government criticised over PPE and tests as death toll hits 10,000

The Italian opera singer Andrea Bocelli performed inside the empty Milan Duomo on Sunday as millions tuned in via livestream.

Bocelli said: “I will cherish the emotion of this unprecedented and profound experience, of this Holy Easter which this emergency has made painful, but at the same time even more fruitful, one that will stay among my dearest memories of all time.”

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One in three UK surgeons lacks enough protective kit, survey finds

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Royal College of Surgeons says lack of PPE when treating Covid-19 patients is a disgrace

Surgeons treating Covid-19 patients have a “terrifying” lack of personal protective equipment that is risking lives, the profession’s leaders warn today.

Almost a third (32.5%) of UK surgeons say they do not have access to enough masks, gowns and other clothing to keep them safe, a new survey reveals.

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Australia coronavirus update live: Victoria extends state of emergency as travellers fly in from cruise nightmare – latest news

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Premier Daniel Andrews says state of emergency will be extended for a further four weeks as Australians trapped on Antarctic cruise ship arrive in Melbourne. Follow updates live

McGowan says he took his kids camping ... in his backyard ... over Easter because obviously other locations were unavailable.

And that’s the end of the press conference.

“We’ve successfully flattened the curve, but now we’ve got to figure out how to keep it there but also find out a long-term solution to the problem we face,” McGowan says.

He says he is working on getting commercial tenancy legislation in parliament this week. He’s not sure whether residential tenancy legislation will be ready this week but it will be brought in when it is.

The former will be brought into WA parliament for debate on Wednesday.

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Calls for debt relief to help world’s poorest nations fight coronavirus

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Australia urged to use its influence to push for the permanent cancellation of all debt due from vulnerable countries in 2020

Low-income countries need their debts for 2020 forgiven, alongside billions in emergency grants to survive the Covid-19 crisis, civil society groups around the world have said, arguing the viral pandemic will hit hardest the poorest people in the poorest countries.

More than 100 civil society organisations internationally have called on creditor nations to permanently cancel all debt repayments as the “fastest way to keep money in countries and free up resources to tackle the urgent health, social and economic crises resulting from the Covid-19 global pandemic”.

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