Coronavirus latest: new outbreak warning as global death toll nears 300,000

New coronavirus clusters have appeared as nations struggle to balance reopening economies with preventing a second wave of infections and deaths.

Despite the risk that loosening restrictions could lead to infection spikes, European nations have been seeking to restart cross-border travel, particularly as the summer holiday season looms for countries whose economies rely on tourists flocking to their beaches, museums and historical sites.

Austria said its border with Germany would reopen fully on June 15, and that border checks would be reduced starting on Friday. Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said Austria was aiming for similar agreements with Switzerland, Liechtenstein and its eastern neighbours “as long as the infection figures allow”.

But Kurz said it’s too early to talk about such measures with Italy, one of the world’s hardest-hit countries, with more than 220,000 infections and 30,000 deaths. “There’s no perspective for opening the border soon.”

German Foreign Minister Heiko Mass said his country will lift a blanket warning against foreign travel for European destinations before other places, but didn’t specify when. Germany’s warning against all non-essential tourist travel abroad runs until at least June 14.

European countries have also begun slowly easing their their lockdowns, from barber shops being allowed to reopen next week in Belgium to some schools starting up again in a few days in Portugal. But a raft of safety rules are being put in place, including reducing the number of children in Belgian preschool classes and various forms of social distancing.

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In the United States, the country’s top infectious disease expert issued a blunt warning that cities and states could see more Covid-19 deaths and economic damage if they lift stay-at-home orders too quickly.

“There is a real risk that you will trigger an outbreak that you may not be able to control,” Dr Anthony Fauci said in a US Senate testimony on Tuesday after more than two dozen US states began to lift lockdowns.

His comments were a sharp pushback to President Donald Trump, who is pushing to right a free-falling economy that has seen 33 million Americans lose their jobs. The US has the largest coronavirus outbreak in the world by far: at least 1.37 million infections and some 82,000 deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Here are the developments:

Chinese city’s partial lockdown over virus spread

A northeastern Chinese city has partially shut its borders and cut off transport links after the emergence of a local coronavirus cluster that has fuelled growing fears of a second wave of infections in China.

Jilin, with a population of more than four million, suspended bus services on Wednesday and said it will only allow residents to leave the city if they have tested negative for Covid-19 in the past 48 hours and complete an unspecified period of “strict self-isolation”.

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All cinemas, indoor gyms, internet cafes and other enclosed entertainment venues must shut immediately, and pharmacies must report all sales of fever and antiviral medicines, the local government said in a statement.

The city is located in the eponymous province of Jilin.

A cluster of infections was reported in the suburb of Shulan over the weekend, with Jilin’s vice-mayor warning on Wednesday that the situation was “extremely severe and complicated” and “there is major risk of further spread”.

The city reported six new cases on Wednesday, all linked to the Shulan cluster, bringing the total number of cases linked to a local laundry worker to 21.

Singapore’s Covid-19 caseload tops 25,000

Singapore’s Health Ministry on Wednesday announced 675 new cases of the Covid-19 disease, taking the national total to 25,346.

Almost all the city state’s cases are among low-wage foreign workers confined to dozens of crowded dormitories.

Health Ministry data published on Tuesday showed 22,334 dormitory cases, while on Wednesday the ministry added that “the vast majority” of the day’s new cases are in the workers’ accommodation.

Singapore aims to test all 323,000 dormitory residents – mostly young men working in sectors such as construction and hailing from countries including Bangladesh, Indonesia and Myanmar.

Despite having East Asia’s second-highest caseload after China, Singapore has reported only 21 fatalities related to Covid-19, one of the lowest death tolls caused by a pandemic that has killed almost 300,000 people worldwide.

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So-called “community cases” – infections outside the dormitories – have dropped to single figures in recent days.

“We are steadily making progress in controlling the outbreak, both in the community as well as the migrant worker dormitories,” said National Development Minister Lawrence Wong on Tuesday.

The government permitted barbershops to reopen on Tuesday and said it plans further relaxations of a lockdown – officially a “circuit breaker” – which was imposed five weeks ago and will run until June 1.

Though the government expects the total number of cases among migrant workers to be “high”, 20,000 “will be ready for discharge” by the end of the month, Wong said.

Thailand reports no new cases for first time since March 9

Thailand reported no new daily cases for the first time in two months on Wednesday as the government considered easing more restrictions on businesses.

“We all can be relieved but not complacent,” said Taweesin Wisanuyothin, a spokesman for the government’s Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration. “We need to continue with the main measures ... wash hands, practice social distancing and wear masks.”

Thailand detected its first coronavirus case, a tourist from China on January 13. Since then it has recorded a total of 3,017 infections and 56 deaths.

Taweesin said areas that were still most at risk included Bangkok and surrounding provinces, as well as southern Thailand, where there has been a large number of cases in the past two weeks.

Fuelling the rise in southern cases has been a cluster at an immigration detention centre in Songkhla province and in provinces bordering Malaysia. Thailand’s neighbour to the south has had 6,742 coronavirus cases and 109 deaths.

The last day Thailand recorded no new cases was March 9, but within two weeks the daily numbers jumped to double digits and then to more than 100 a day.

South Korea testing increases due to anonymity

Coronavirus screening has surged in South Korea since authorities introduced anonymous testing, officials said on Wednesday, as they scrambled to tackle a nightclub cluster amid concerns anti-gay prejudice could impede the response.

The country has been held up as a global model in how to curb the virus, but a spike of new cases, driven by the cluster in venues in Seoul’s Itaewon district – including several gay clubs – forced authorities to delay this week’s planned re-opening of schools.

Many nightclub customers are believed to be reluctant to come forward because of the stigma of being gay in the socially conservative country.

Seoul authorities began carrying out tests anonymously this week to address such concerns, and mayor Park Won-soon said than 8,300 people were tested in the city on Tuesday, compared to about 1,000 per day last week.

“This is proof that ensuring anonymity encourages voluntary tests,” Park told reporters.

Authorities are using mobile phone data to trace nightclub visitors and will deploy police to track down those who cannot be reached.

Officials in the East Asian nation of 52 million announced 26 new cases on Wednesday, taking its total to 10,962, after recording only single-digit increases for eight of the preceding 14 days – many of them overseas arrivals.

US Senate threatens sanctions on China

US Republican senators proposed legislation Tuesday that would empower President Donald Trump to slap sanctions on China if Beijing does not give a “full accounting” for the coronavirus outbreak.

“The Chinese Communist Party must be held accountable for the detrimental role they played in this pandemic,” said Senator Jim Inhofe, one of the sponsors of the “Covid-19 Accountability Act”.

“Their outright deception of the origin and spread of the virus cost the world valuable time and lives as it began to spread,” he said in a statement.

The legislation will give Trump 60 days to certify to Congress that China has provided a full accounting on the Covid-19 outbreak to an investigation that could be led by the United States and its allies, or a United Nations body like the World Health Organisation.

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Trump must also certify that China has closed its highest-risk wet markets and released Hong Kong activists arrested in post-Covid-19 crackdowns.

Without certification, Trump would be authorised under the legislation to impose sanctions like asset freezes, travel bans and visa revocations, as well as restricting Chinese businesses’ access to US bank financing and capital markets.

“China refuses to allow the international community to go into the Wuhan lab to investigate,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, another sponsor of the bill.

“They refuse to allow investigators to study how this outbreak started. I’m convinced China will never cooperate with a serious investigation unless they are made to do so.”

Russia records over than 10,000 new cases

Russia reported more than 10,000 new coronavirus cases Wednesday, bringing Russia’s total number of infections to 242,271.

Health Minister Mikhail Murashko told parliament more than 100,000 patients are now hospitalised with confirmed or suspected coronavirus, a significant jump from the figure of 80,000 he gave on Friday.

Nearly 1,500 patients are currently on ventilators, the minister said.

The Kremlin this week began easing a national lockdown to slow the spread of the virus, despite a steady rise in numbers that on Tuesday brought Russia to second place in a global tally of infections, behind the United States.

A majority of Russia’s new cases were registered in the capital, a government virus tally said, where Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin has extended a lockdown until the end of May.

New Zealand has no new cases for 2nd day

New Zealand reported zero new cases of the coronavirus on Wednesday, the second day in a row without any and the fourth such day since early last week.

Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield said it was encouraging news as the country prepares to ease many of its lockdown restrictions from midnight. Most businesses, including malls, retail stores and sit-down restaurants, will be able to reopen. Social distancing rules will remain in place and gatherings will be limited to 10 people.

“The sense of anticipation is both palpable and understandable,” Bloomfield said.

The lifting of restrictions will coincide with the release of the government’s annual budget on Thursday. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the country faced the most challenging economic conditions since the Great Depression because of the virus.

“New Zealand is about to enter a very tough winter,” she said. “But every winter eventually is followed by spring, and if we make the right choices we can get New Zealanders back to work and our economy moving quickly again.”

Young sumo wrestler dies in Japan

A 28-year-old Japanese sumo wrestler from the sport’s fourth-highest division died on Wednesday morning due to multiple organ failure caused by the novel coronavirus, the Japan Sumo Association said.

Shobushi, whose real name was Kiyotaka Suetake, is the first sumo wrestler to die from the pneumonia-causing virus. He is also thought to be the first person in their 20s to die from the virus in Japan.

The Yamanashi Prefecture native became the first sumo wrestler to test positive for the novel coronavirus on April 10. According to the JSA, his condition worsened on April 19 and he was treated at an intensive care unit at a hospital in Tokyo.

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Shobushi made his professional debut in 2007 out of the Takadagawa stable and reached the No. 11 rank in the sandanme division.

“I can only imagine how hard it must have been, battling illness for over a month, but like a wrestler he endured it bravely and fought the disease until the end,” JSA Chairman Hakkaku said. “I just want him to rest peacefully now.”

The Takadagawa stablemaster and Shobushi’s stablemate Hakuyozan also tested positive for the coronavirus but both have already been discharged from hospital.

Sweden extends no-travel recommendation

Sweden on Wednesday extended its recommendation against all non-necessary travel abroad until July due to the novel coronavirus, but loosened its stance on travel within the country.

The extension to the guidelines, which will now remain in place until July 15 and include travel to all foreign countries, was announced as the country reported more than 3,400 dead from Covid-19.

Speaking at a news conference in Stockholm, Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said that domestic travel, limited to trips within one to two hours’ drive from people’s homes, could be undertaken on certain conditions.

“I want to emphasise that this doesn’t mean that everything is back to normal,” Lofven said. “During these trips, common sense still applies, great caution, and even greater responsibility.”

Italy sees spike in calls to gender violence helpline

Calls to a national helpline for victims of gender violence and stalking have increased by 73 per cent during the coronavirus lockdown period, Italian authorities said on Wednesday.

The year-on-year increase refers to the March 1 to April 16 period, statistics agency Istat said in a statement. Italy’s nationwide lockdown started on March 10 and was eased on May 4.

Out of 5,031 calls, just over 2,000 came from people seeking help, including around 1,500 people who suffered physical or verbal abuse. Some 97 per cent of callers were women.

Many experts have expressed concern that women could be more at risk during the lockdown period, as some of them would be confined in violent households.

But Istat said the increase in calls might not “necessarily” be due to an increase in domestic violence, but rather to the success of a public campaign encouraging women to use it.

The agency noted that in the March 1-22 period reports to police for domestic violence fell by 43.6 per cent. But it also said that 72.8 per cent of victims who call the 1522 number do not go to the police.

Pakistan tops 2,000 for a single-day total of new cases

Pakistan crossed 2,000 new positive coronavirus cases in a single day for the first time since the outbreak earlier this year.

The increase comes just days after Prime Minister Imran Khan eased lockdown restrictions and stepped up the return of Pakistanis stranded overseas, ignoring please for stricter controls by Pakistan’s medical professionals.

Scenes of crowds of people crammed into markets throughout the country greeted the let up in restrictions despite the government’s call for safe distancing, which has been largely ignored by many of Pakistan’s 220 million people. The latest figures show 34,312 positive cases following a 24-hour high of 2,255 new cases.

Khan has been criticised for downplaying the severity of the pandemic, refusing to close down mosques particularly since the start of Islam’s fasting month of Ramadan which ends in two weeks with the holiday of Eid-ul-Fitr. Islamic clerics in Pakistan wield considerable control, often frightening political leaders with their ability to bring angry mobs onto the street.

Khan has argued the lockdown has hurt the country’s poorest the hardest. A vast majority of Pakistanis earn barely US$75 a month mostly doing construction and daily wage work.

Pence ‘keeping his distance’ from Trump for a few days

US Vice-President Mike Pence is keeping his distance from President Trump for a few days in the wake of his press secretary testing positive for the coronavirus, White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany told reporters on Tuesday.

Pence was not at Trump’s Rose Garden news conference on Monday nor at a White House meeting with US military and national security officials on Saturday after Katie Miller received the test result last week.

“The vice-president has made the choice to keep his distance for a few days,” McEnany told a news briefing. She said it was up to Pence to decide when to end the distancing.

Pence has tested negative for the virus since Miller’s test. But her infection has forced changes throughout the West Wing with staff members asked to wear masks and practice social distancing.

Many senior officials were seen wearing masks in the White House Rose Garden on Monday during Trump’s news conference. Trump has not been spotted publicly wearing a mask.

Trump’s senior aides are tested daily for the virus, as are many other officials in the White House. Members of the White House press pool are now expected to be tested daily as well.

Facebook removes 2.5 million posts selling masks, Covid-19 kits

Facebook said it has removed 2.5 million posts since March 1 offering masks, sanitisers, cleaning wipes and Covid-19 test kits, in an attempt to prevent users from price-gouging or selling counterfeit and dangerous products.

To do it, the social media company relied on the same image-recognition technology it uses to remove sales of guns and drugs.

Facebook has had to quickly train its artificial intelligence to handle an increase in coronavirus content that violates company policies, including hundreds of thousands of posts removed for displaying information that could lead to physical harm, like encouraging users to drink bleach as a cure.

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The coronavirus statistics released Tuesday are the latest addendum to the company’s twice-yearly report about enforcement to combat the dark side of the way its platforms are used.

With each report, Facebook becomes more reliant on computer solutions to human problems.

The company has about 15,000 content moderators working around the world, some of whom can’t work from the office as a protection against the spread of the virus. Between October 2019 and March 2020, about 90 per cent of the content Facebook removed was found first by the software, not user reports, the company said.

Bryan Adams apologises for racist rant

A day after an expletive-filled Instagram rant blaming animal cruelty at Chinese wet markets for the coronavirus outbreak caused a social media backlash, Canadian singer-songrwriter Bryan Adams apologised for the comments deemed racist and offensive.

Writing on his Instagram account on Tuesday the Canadian rock musician apologised “to any and all that took offence” to his previous post.

“No excuse, I just wanted to have a rant about the horrible animal cruelty in these wet-markets being the possible source of the virus, and promote veganism,” wrote Adams, known for songs like (Everything I Do) I Do It for You and Summer of ‘69.

But in Monday’s post, Adams lamented that instead of starting a series of live gigs at the Royal Albert Hall he was forced to share snippets of his new album with his fans on Instagram.

“...Thanks to some f****** bat eating, wet market animal selling, virus making greedy b*******, the whole world is now on hold, not to mention the thousands that have suffered or died from this virus,” Adams wrote.

“My message to them other than ‘thanks a ******* lot’ is go vegan,” he added.

The rant drew an immediate firestorm of condemnation on social media, where “Bryan Adams” was trending on Monday, and from the members of Canada’s Chinese community.

Amy Go, president of the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice, dismissed the singer’s apology, saying his rant “will cause harm to specific communities, like Chinese and Asian communities.”

London police investigate spitting incident

British police are investigating after a railway ticket office worker who was spat at by a man claiming to have the coronavirus died with Covid-19.

The TSSA trade union said Belly Mujinga was working at London’s Victoria station on March 22 when a man spat and coughed at her and a colleague. Both workers fell ill within days, and the 47-year-old Mujinga died in a London hospital on April 5. Mujinga’s husband said his wife had underlying respiratory problems when she was admitted to a hospital three days before she died.

The union says the two railway workers reported the spitting incident to a supervisor, but police were not initially informed. The British Transport Police said Tuesday that it was now investigating

Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the attack “despicable”.

Australia’s treasurer tests negative after coughing fit

Australia’s Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said he had tested negative for the new coronavirus after breaking into a sustained coughing bout while giving a speech to parliament on Tuesday about plans for an economic recovery from the pandemic.

“Yesterday I was tested for Covid-19 out of an abundance of caution on the advice of the Deputy Chief Medical Officer,” Frydenberg said in a tweet on Wednesday. “This morning I received the result of the test which was negative.”

Frydenberg was advised to be tested for the new coronavirus by Australia’s deputy chief medical officer as soon as he finished his speech to the parliament.

Australia’s parliament resumed on Tuesday with a smaller number of lawmakers attending than usual in person, seated further apart, to reduce the chances of the spread of any infection.

Coronavirus was in Brazil before carnival: study

The new coronavirus was circulating in Brazil in early February, weeks earlier than initially detected, and just before millions of people were partying in the streets for carnival, according to a new study.

Brazil is the Latin American country hardest hit in the pandemic, with more than 12,400 deaths and 177,589 confirmed infections so far. Experts say under-testing means the real figures are probably far higher.

The study used statistical analysis to work backwards from the number of reported Covid-19 deaths and establish the probable time-frame of the virus’ early spread in Brazil and other countries, said the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), the country’s leading public health institute.

“The new coronavirus began spreading in Brazil around the first week of February. That is to say, more than 20 days before the first case was diagnosed in a traveller returning from Italy, on February 26... and more than 40 days before the first official confirmation of communal transmission,” the institute said.

That means the local outbreak was already well under way when Brazil celebrated carnival from February 21 to 25, an event that draws millions of tourists and brings throngs of revellers into the streets in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Salvador and other cities.

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The study, which also analysed data from Europe and the United States, found the virus was probably also spreading locally two to four weeks before the first cases were detected in Italy, the Netherlands and the United States.

“This lengthy phase of hidden communal transmission of the new coronavirus... indicates that containment measures should be taken at least as soon as the first imported cases are detected,” said the lead researcher on the study, Gonzalo Bello.

On Tuesday, Brazil registered its highest Covid-19 death toll for a single day, with 881 new deaths confirmed over the past 24 hours.

Venezuela extending its lockdown another month

Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro said the nationwide lockdown aimed at curbing the spread of the new coronavirus will last another month.

Maduro said Tuesday the measure is necessary to protect the nation. He says one new case had been diagnosed for the day, bringing Venezuela’s reported illnesses amid the pandemic to 423. Officials say 10 people have died since the first coronavirus cases were discovered in mid-March.

Venezuela, with an estimated population of 25 million, is gripped by a political and social crisis. Most residents don’t have access to running water and regular electrical service. Health care workers warn that the country’s broken hospitals could easily be overwhelmed by the spread of the virus.

US ‘cleaner’ tries to duck into Germany to see lover

A lovesick 20-year-old American man tried dressing up as a cleaner to cheat coronavirus border controls in Germany so he could see his girlfriend, police said.

After arriving at Frankfurt airport from Washington on Sunday, the young US national donned a high-visibility vest and picked up two bags of rubbish.

“He then tried to convince security staff that he was a cleaner and was supposed to empty the bins behind the security area,” federal police said in a statement.

However, his plan was foiled when a member of staff noticed he was not wearing a security pass and couldn’t speak German.

He confessed at a police station that he was desperate to see his girlfriend and couldn’t think of another way of entering the country.

Even if he had managed to reach the bins, the man would still have been in the airport’s transit area, police said - meaning he would still have faced more border controls.

After being questioned, the young romantic was sent back to Washington on Monday.

Germany has imposed tough border controls to try to stop the spread of Covid-19, which has infected more than 170,000 people in the country.

Philippines extends lockdown in high-risk areas

The Philippine government on Tuesday extended a lockdown in the capital and two other coronavirus-stricken areas until the end of May, but allowed for some modification to jump-start the economy.

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said Metropolitan Manila, the province of Laguna and the central city of Cebu would remain under “enhanced community quarantine” until May 31.

The three heavily-populated areas account for more than 80 per cent of all confirmed coronavirus cases in the Philippines, which on Tuesday stood at 11,350, according to the Department of Health.

It added that 751 people have died from Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.

113-year-old Spanish woman survives Covid-19

A 113-year-old woman, believed to be the oldest person living in Spain, has beat the coronavirus at retirement home where several other residents died from the pandemic.

Maria Branyas, who was born in the US, was infected with the virus in April at the Santa Maria del Tura care home in the eastern city of Olot where she has lived for the past 20 years and fought the infection in isolation in her room.

“She survived the disease and is doing fine,” a spokeswoman for the residence said, adding Branyas had only displayed mild symptoms of the disease.

“She feels good now, she took a test last week and the result was negative,” the spokeswoman said without giving further details.

Branyas, a mother of three, was isolated in her room for weeks, with only a single employee decked in protective gear allowed in to check on her.

The care home, which was founded in 1969 and has room for just over a hundred residents, has recorded “several” coronavirus-related deaths during the pandemic, the spokeswoman for the residence said.

Several articles have been published in Spanish media in recent years about Branyas, considered to be the oldest person in the country.

She was born on March 4, 1907 in San Francisco, where her father who was from northern Spain worked as a journalist.

Branyas moved to Spain with her family aboard a boat during World War I and also lived through the Spanish flu pandemic that swept the world in 1918-19 as well as Spain’s 1936-39 civil war.

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French death toll overtakes Spain's

France’s cumulative death toll from coronavirus infection rose by 348 to 26,991 on Tuesday, overtaking Spain’s 26,920, making France the country with the world’s fourth-highest death toll from the virus after the US, Britain and Italy.

The health ministry said in a statement the number of people in hospital with coronavirus infection fell again to 21,595 from 22,284 on Monday, continuing an uninterrupted downward trend that has lasted four weeks.

On the second day after the end of a 55-day lockdown, the number of people in intensive care also continued a similar downtrend and fell by 170 to 2,542.

Agence France-Presse, Reuters, Associated Press, Bloomberg and DPA