Healthcare workers on the frontline of the coronavirus outbreak in Northern Ireland have made an appeal to the public. In a video, doctors and nurses from the Belfast trust respiratory team urge people to stay at home in order to save lives
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Australia shuts down, in the fight against Covid-19 – in pictures
Australia’s major cities, buildings and even beaches are either closed or deserted as the government steps up measures to try to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Prime minister Scott Morrison announced late on Sunday that from midday Monday venues such as bars, clubs, nightclubs, cinemas and gyms would be closed, and restaurants would be restricted to offering takeaway. Schools remain open but parents have the option to keep children at home, while Victoria is bringing forward school holidays from Tuesday
Continue reading...As Australia goes off the coronavirus cliff, the question is how hard will it land? | Katharine Murphy
A significant spike in cases and state lockdowns are signals that life has changed. It’s all now on the health system
Anyone watching events on Sunday will know the coronavirus story is now moving so fast it is hard to keep on top of what’s happening.
So let’s keep this simple. Let’s be very clear what happened.
Continue reading...UK military planners drafted in to help feed vulnerable in Covid-19 outbreak
Food stockpilers told they should be ‘ashamed’ as prime minister urges Britons not to make mother’s day visits
Key military officials are to help ensure food and medicines reach vulnerable people isolated at home during the coronavirus crisis, as part of a nationwide campaign to protect more than a million people most at risk of being hospitalised.
Community pharmacies, voluntary groups and food retailers are in talks with the government to ensure essential items reach people being told to remain in their home. Those believed to be at most risk are being contacted on how best to protect themselves, and being strongly advised to stay home for at least 12 weeks.
Continue reading...Doctors warn coronavirus could overwhelm NHS ‘within weeks’
Intensive care audit shows sharp rise in admissions to critical care as London hospitals struggle to cope
The numbers of coronavirus patients needing life-or-death care have been doubling every three days, a report by senior doctors has revealed. London is worst affected, but the rest of the UK will soon be hit with a similar surge, the document warns.
The audit of intensive care carried out since the epidemic began shows that patients needing the highest level of help soared from 50 on 9 March to almost 200 on 19 March – and doctors fear this spike could turn into a nationwide surge within a few weeks.
Continue reading...The US military would be superb at fighting coronavirus. Let’s use it | Ann Lee and Sean Penn
After the 2010 Haitian earthquake, we saw the US military in action as a humanitarian force. They can do this
In 2010, a devastating earthquake hit Haiti. In three minutes it killed more than 200,000 people and displaced two million more.
Our humanitarian aid organization, the Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE), was on the ground in Haiti. In Haiti – as well as on the front lines of other disasters, like Hurricane Florence in North Carolina and Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas just a few months ago – we saw how dangerous inaction and political paralysis can be, and how rapid mobilization saves lives. In a crisis, every minute – every second – counts.
Continue reading...How shopping and Sinatra are helping in coronavirus isolation
People from all walks of life are mobilising to support those coping with isolation
Amy Tan is preparing to burst into song with two fellow musicians on a deserted street in Acton, west London.
“We’ll do anything by Frank Sinatra or Ella Fitzgerald – the Rat Pack,” she says. “Or maybe they would like a song by Elton John or the Beatles?”
Continue reading...Coronavirus travel ban, stock market dive and Qantas cuts: Australia’s week in review – video
In one week, Australia intensified its approach to tackling the coronavirus. The government announced travel bans and restrictions on social gatherings, while the reserve bank and government introduced new financial policy in the face of major economic disruptions
Continue reading...How do I know if I have coronavirus and what happens next? – video explainer
What are the symptoms of the Covid-19 virus, what treatments are available and how do I protect myself and the people around me from infection? The Guardian's health editor, Sarah Boseley, answers some key questions as coronavirus spreads across the globe
- What is coronavirus – how did it start and what is the mortality rate?
- How to protect yourself and others from infection
‘We’re clearing the decks’: a GP on watching the coronavirus pandemic unfold
Despite the growing death toll and the unprecedented speed at which events are moving, the past few weeks feel like just a prelude of what is to come. By Gavin Francis
On 13 January, a bulletin from Health Protection Scotland was sent to all GP practices in the country describing a “novel Wuhan coronavirus”. I work in a small clinic in central Edinburgh with four doctors, two nurses and six admin staff. It was the first time I’d heard of the virus. “Current reports describe no evidence of significant human to human transmission, including no infections of healthcare workers,” it said reassuringly.
I cast my mind back to the Sars coronavirus of almost two decades ago, and briefly wondered how quickly the spread of this coronavirus would be stopped, as Sars was. A seafood market had been closed and sanitised. The bulletin said that although Wuhan was a city of 19 million people, there were only three flights per week from there to the UK, and the likely impact was “very low”. I shrugged, and carried on with my work.
Continue reading...Coronavirus: thousands who left cruise ship in Sydney told to self-isolate after three people test positive
Authorities fear that passengers from Ruby Princess might be unaware Covid-19 cases were onboard and be ‘wandering around’ city
About 2,700 passengers who disembarked a cruise ship in Sydney have been told to self-isolate after three people who were onboard tested positive for Covid-19.
Confirming the news on Friday, the NSW health minister, Brad Hazzard, said the doctor onboard had conducted 13 tests on the Ruby Princess, which had completed a relatively short cruise around the Pacific to New Zealand.
Continue reading...This week we have brought New Zealand’s abortion laws into the 21st century | Andrew Little
Seeking an abortion was a crime until now, but new legislation has removed the stigma and given women a choice
New Zealand’s current abortion laws are more than 40 years old and were enacted when there were more MPs in Parliament named Bill than MPs who were female. This week we brought the laws into the 21st century.
Up to now, women seeking an abortion in New Zealand were committing a crime under our main criminal statute but had a defence if they followed the requirements of the abortion legislation. These requirements included the woman being referred by their doctor to two specialists who each had to certify she faces a serious danger to her life or physical or mental health. Other conditions also applied, such as whether the pregnancy was a result of incest or the woman lacked capacity to consent. For abortions after 20 weeks, conditions were more stringent.
Continue reading...I saw colleagues die of Ebola. Health workers must not become coronavirus martyrs
We will be the group most affected by this outbreak. Governments must bury austerity and ensure care is adequately staffed and well-resourced
Imagine working in an underfunded, understaffed hospital facing a devastating disease outbreak. Imagine being forced to make impossible choices about who to treat and who to let die. Imagine coming home to your family, knowing you might be putting them at risk.
These are the awful situations we health workers faced in dealing with the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Libera. For me the greatest tragedy is hearing similar stories emerge from colleagues around the world who are up against the coronavirus. It terrifies me to see that developed countries health systems are at breaking point – I hate to imagine what this virus might do to my region next.
Continue reading...True numbers of FGM victims could be far higher as countries fail to record cases
New report calls for national surveys by governments to underline scale of worldwide abuse
The number of women and girls who have undergone female genital mutilation (FGM) could be much higher than previously estimated, as a new report shows the practice is carried out in more than 90 countries around the world.
The UN estimates that 200 million women and girls have undergone FGM. But this figure is drawn from only 31 countries – 27 in Africa – where national data has been collected.
Continue reading...Aboriginal people who work for dole told to attend group activities despite coronavirus risk
Minister’s spokesperson says arrangements ‘consistent with other employment programs’ but few require group activities
Aboriginal people who work for the dole will have to show up for group activities as usual, despite the government telling service providers that there is a “high likelihood that larger scale community outbreaks [of Covid-19] will occur in the near future”.
The National Indigenous Australians agency (NIAA) wrote to CDP (community development program) providers on Monday to tell them “mutual obligations remain in place at this stage”, meaning that Aboriginal people will still be expected to turn up for work or risk losing their welfare payments.
Continue reading...African nations impose stricter measures as coronavirus spreads
Governments warn disease will cause huge challenges for continent’s health services
Countries across Africa have imposed wide-ranging and stringent new measures as the coronavirus begins to spread more rapidly across the continent.
Though the continent is still far behind Europe and Asia in the total numbers of Covid-19 cases, the disease has now reached about half of its countries. Algeria has 48 confirmed cases, Egypt 110, while South Africa has 62, according to the World Health Organization and national governments on Monday. Other countries have fewer cases, mostly in single figures.
Continue reading...‘It became part of life’: how Haiti curbed cholera
When cholera broke out just months after a devastating earthquake, Haiti’s health system was pushed to the brink. The extraordinary rearguard action that followed offers an object lesson in dealing with a public health crisis
Marie Millande Tulmé was at work in a prison when she received a call confirming her fears: the gruesome sickness spreading rapidly across her nation was indeed cholera.
The head nurse for Haiti’s Central Plateau region at the time, Tulmé was investigating rumours that prisoners were getting violently ill and that two had died. “I thought: ‘Haiti will perish,’” she says, recalling her reaction when Haiti’s national laboratory phoned with the news. “Because I knew that cholera was grave. That it spreads easily.”
Continue reading...UK ministers will no longer claim ‘no successful examples’ of Russian interference
Change of official line is first admission that Kremlin may have distorted UK elections
Ministers have been told they can no longer say there have been “no successful examples” of Russian disinformation affecting UK elections, after the apparent hacking of an NHS dossier seized on by Labour during the last campaign.
The dropping of the old line is the first official admission of the impact of Kremlin efforts to distort Britain’s political processes, and comes after three years of the government’s refusal to engage publicly with the threat.
Continue reading...Madrid claps for healthcare workers amid coronavirus lockdown – video
People living in Madrid stood on balconies and leaned out of windows to clap and cheer doctors and healthcare workers on Saturday evening following a campaign launched on social media to show appreciation after the Spanish government declared a state of emergency over the coronavirus.
People have been ordered to stay at home for two weeks unless they have to buy food or medicine or go to work or hospital as Spain has become the country most affected by the coronavirus in Europe after Italy.
We are old and in love, but she left me after my cancer diagnosis | Dear Mariella
We might assume better treatment from maturing adults but at least she was decisive, says Mariella Frostrup
The dilemma In the summer I met a wonderful woman online. She is kind, clever, good looking and many other positive things. We clicked from the outset and became lovers after a couple of months. We have a combined age of 127, but we both said the sex was the best we’ve ever enjoyed. She told me she loved me – and it was reciprocated. We live 100 miles apart, but that suited our busy lifestyles.
Everything was wonderful and we seemed to be very much on the same wavelength until November, when I was diagnosed with bladder cancer. The treatment is extensive, but hasn’t yet started. She broke up with me over Christmas. She still professes love for me (though we haven’t been in contact for a few weeks), but says she is too busy with work, family and friends to commit to me, and that I would become too needy of her and her time. I don’t agree that I would, but I can see why she might say that. I have recently retired. I miss her terribly and don’t know how to deal with it.
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