| Trump offers competing coronavirus messaging, warning of death but lamenting lockdown Posted: 04 Apr 2020 06:39 PM PDT  Trump repeated a favorite refrain of some conservatives, who have said that the coronavirus "cure"—that is, a nationwide shutdown—cannot be worse than the disease itself.
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| Supreme Court rejects church challenge to ban on bus ads Posted: 06 Apr 2020 06:50 AM PDT  The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal from a Catholic church in Washington, D.C., that sought to place religious-themed ads on public buses. The justices are leaving in place a federal appeals court ruling that found no fault with the Washington transit agency policy that banned all issue-oriented advertisements on the region's rail and bus system. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington sought to place an ad on the outside of public buses in the fall of 2017.
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| Iran will never ask U.S. for coronavirus help: official Posted: 06 Apr 2020 02:35 AM PDT  Iran will never ask the United States for help in the fight against the new coronavirus, Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said on Monday. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has rejected offers from Washington of humanitarian assistance for Iran, the Middle Eastern country so far worst-affected by the coronavirus, with 3,739 deaths and 60,500 people infected according to the latest figures on Monday.
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| Boris Johnson's government reportedly believes the coronavirus may have accidentally leaked from a Chinese laboratory Posted: 06 Apr 2020 04:50 AM PDT  "Perhaps it is no coincidence that there is that laboratory in Wuhan," one UK government official told the Mail on Sunday.
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| Man who narrated an expletive-filled video depicting people not social distancing arrested Posted: 05 Apr 2020 11:29 AM PDT  The man who narrated a video depicting people not social distancing Friday night was arrested in Ohio Saturday afternoon.
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| U.S. coronavirus deaths top 10,000 as medical officials warn worst is yet to come Posted: 06 Apr 2020 05:02 PM PDT  "It's going to be the hardest moment for many Americans in their entire lives," Surgeon General Jerome Adams said on MSNBC's Meet the Press.
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| Whale sharks: Atomic tests solve age puzzle of world's largest fish Posted: 06 Apr 2020 02:55 AM PDT  Data from Cold War nuclear bomb tests help scientists accurately age whale sharks for the first time.
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| Trump takes coronavirus break to again question Joe Biden’s competence Posted: 06 Apr 2020 08:03 AM PDT  After calling on his Democrats to avoid "playing politics" during the coronavirus outbreak, Donald Trump lashed out at Joe Biden as he continues to find ways to raise questions about his likely general election foe's competence.The former vice president floated a "virtual" Democratic Party nominating convention in August, should the pandemic not allow American life to return to normal -- including large gatherings -- by then. He also said he intends to wear a mask in public, unlike the president, who says it's "okay" if Americans do but it's just not for him.
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| Governors see possible 'flattening' of the curve in latest coronavirus data Posted: 06 Apr 2020 03:31 PM PDT  Improvements in New York, New Jersey, California and Washington raise hopes, but "this isn't over," one governor warns.
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| A New Zealand man who drunkenly filmed himself coughing on people at a supermarket has been charged with endangering life Posted: 05 Apr 2020 11:23 PM PDT  The man later apologized, saying: "It never should've happened, the alcohol had really taken effect and I have no sensor when I get this messy."
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| Lebanese stranded abroad by coronavirus outbreak return home Posted: 05 Apr 2020 03:33 AM PDT  Lebanon's crippling financial crisis including tight capital controls has complicated the plight of Lebanese stuck abroad, with tough restrictions on accessing cash. Prime Minister Hassan Diab, speaking to reporters at Beirut international airport on Sunday, said about 21,000 Lebanese had registered for flights back to Lebanon. "Hopefully this cloud, the cloud that is the health situation with corona, passes quickly and infections are minimal for Lebanese whether at home or abroad," said Diab.
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| U.S. Deaths Top 10,000; Possible Plateau in N.Y.: Virus Update Posted: 06 Apr 2020 01:54 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- More signs emerged that the crisis may be easing in some areas, sending stocks soaring. Italy, France, Germany and Spain reported lower numbers of new cases. In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo said deaths were showing indications of hitting a plateau. U.K. deaths slowed for a second day, even as they passed the grim milestone of 5,000. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was hospitalized Sunday after 10 days in isolation, was moved to an intensive-care unit.JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon said he expects a major economic downturn and stress similar to the crisis that almost brought down the U.S. financial system in 2008.Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he'll propose a state of emergency in some prefectures.Key Developments:Global cases top 1.3 million; deaths exceed 73,000: Johns HopkinsU.S. deaths surpass 10,000: Johns HopkinsTrump, Biden spoke by phone about the outbreakMilken Conference postponed a second time to OctoberDenmark, Austria began to relax measuresNew York state lockdown extended to April 29Denmark Joins Austria in Easing Curbs (4:38 p.m. NY)Denmark joined Austria in announcing a gradual relaxation of measures imposed to slow the coronavirus's spread. The country will press ahead with a "cautious reopening" starting with kindergartens and primary schools on April 15 if the virus numbers remain stable, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said. The government will also start talks with business leaders on gradually moving employees back into offices.Austria said earlier that it would take its first steps toward restarting its economy. The two countries were among the first in Europe to shut down public life in response to the outbreak. Wisconsin Governor Delays Tuesday Primary (3:15 p.m. NY)Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers suspended in-person voting just hours before the state's primary was scheduled to begin, though the order could be subject to a court challenge.Although 15 states and Puerto Rico have already postponed their primaries amid the coronavirus pandemic, Wisconsin's Republican-controlled legislature has rejected requests by Evers, a Democrat, to delay the state's in-person voting on Tuesday.Evers's executive order delays in-person voting until June 9 unless the legislature acts to change it.French Cases Leveling Off (1:50 p.m. NY)France reported a continued leveling-off of cases, signaling that confinement measures are starting to contain the crisis.The country had 3,912 new confirmed cases on Monday, fewer than it reported in five out of the past seven days, according to figures presented by Health Minister Olivier Veran. Deaths from the virus rose by 833 to 8,911, Veran said."The pressure is still very great on hospitals, enormous -- the confinement has to continue," Veran said. Still, he said there was some reason for optimism. "We can see that the confinement has a palpable effect in France, we're starting to feel it."Read more hereWHO May Announce Move This Week to Accelerate Vaccine (1:30 p.m. NY)A new program to accelerate vaccine development and production may be announced this week, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press briefing in Geneva."The difficulty for governments right now is that lockdowns are proving effective in dampening the flames of the epidemic in those countries, but those lockdowns are also causing great economic hardship," said Mike Ryan, head of the WHO's health emergencies program. Still, he said it would probably be "very inadvisable" to lift a lockdown completely all at once."Once you raise the lockdown, you have to have an alternative method to suppress the virus -- active case finding, testing, isolation, tracking of contacts and strong community education," Ryan said.N.Y. Deaths May Signal Possible Plateau (1:10 p.m. NY)New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said deaths from the coronavirus pandemic were showing signs of hitting a plateau in the state that has become the epicenter of the U.S. outbreak.The challenge, he cautioned Monday, is to maintain the social distancing that has finally pointed New York toward a possible peak in fatalities. For a second day in a row, the percentage increase in the death toll was less than 10%, a turnabout from numbers about twice as large barely a week ago.The peak of the outbreak could fall on the earlier side of the state's models showing that it could take anywhere from a week to 30 days for the situation to hit its worse."I get that people are cooped up," Cuomo said in his daily press briefing. "But, we get reckless, we change and we're not compliant on social distancing, you'll see those numbers go up again."He doubled the fine for social-distancing violations to $1,000.Italy's New Virus Infections Lowest in Almost Three Weeks (12:20 p.m. NY)Italy reported the lowest number of new coronavirus infections in nearly three weeks, prompting debate over how and when the country should start emerging from a nationwide lockdown.Civil protection authorities reported 3,599 new cases of the disease on Monday, compared with 4,316 a day earlier. Italy registered 636 new deaths linked to the virus, compared with 525 the day before. That brings the total number of fatalities to 16,523.Italy, once the epicenter for Europe, now has fewer cases than Spain and the U.S.California to Send Ventilators to National Stockpile (12:16 p.m. NY)California, which has yet to see its hospitals overrun by patients, plans to loan 500 state-owned ventilators to the national stockpile."We're aggressively preparing for a surge -- but we can't turn our backs on Americans whose lives depend on having a ventilator now," Governor Gavin Newsom said in a statement.With the New York area experiencing a supply shortage, other states are stepping in to assist. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said this weekend that Oregon offered to send 140 ventilators to his state.Merkel Says Too Soon to Ease Lockdown (11:43 a.m. NY)It's too early for Germany to set a date for easing its lockdown, Chancellor Angela Merkel said, holding her first press conference since returning from 12 days of self-confinement after being exposed to Covid-19.She reiterated her support for the use of the European Stability Mechanism and the European Commission's proposal for job protection, and said the continent will need a plan for reconstruction after the pandemic subsides.At least three tests showed she was free of the virus.Philippines Likely to Extend Lockdown (11:43 a.m. NY)Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said he's inclined to extend a lockdown of more than half the country's population on its main island until April 30 to further stem the coronavirus outbreak.Duterte, in an address late Monday, also said he's considering tweaking this year's 4.1 trillion-peso ($80.8 billion) budget to allocate more funds to virus response, as some 200 billion pesos set aside for cash grants to poor families won't be enough.Israel Cuts Rates for First Time Since 2015 (9:33 a.m. NY)The Bank of Israel shifted course by cutting interest rates and adding new market-based tools. After playing down the potential for cheaper borrowing costs, the monetary committee on Monday reduced the key rate back down to the all-time low of 0.1% from 0.25%.Hong Kong Extends Ban on Nonresident Entry (9:22 a.m. NY)The city's airport will also continue to halt all transit services until further notice, according to a government statement. The original rules were set to expire by April 7.Germany Plans 'Limitless' Aid Program for Small Companies (8:44 a.m. NY)German Chancellor Angela Merkel's government announced a new "limitless" aid program for small- and medium-sized companies. The program for loan guarantees is the latest measure introduced by the government, which says Europe's largest economy might contract even more this year than the 5% drop caused by the global financial crisis in 2008 and 2009.Inovio Begins Phase 1 Human Trial of Vaccine (8:41 a.m. NY)Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc. began a phase 1 human trial of its Covid-19 vaccine, INO-4800. Animal studies show promising immune responses, the company said.Glaxo to Develop Covid-19 Drugs in $250 Million Partnership (8:14 a.m.)U.K. pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline Plc is joining dozens of companies in the hunt for therapies to treat the illness caused by the coronavirus, signing a partnership with Vir Biotechnology Inc. and agreeing to invest $250 million in the U.S. company.South Africa's Economy May Shrink as Much as 4%, Central Bank Says (8:09 a.m. NY)South Africa's economy could contract by 2% to 4% this year due to the coronavirus pandemic and measures to curb its spread, according to the Reserve Bank. The monetary policy committee projected in March that the economy will contract by 0.2%.U.K. PM Johnson Had 'Comfortable Night' and Is in 'Good Spirits' (8:07 a.m. NY)Prime Minister Johnson is in "good spirits" after spending a "comfortable" night in St. Thomas's hospital in central London, his spokesman, James Slack, said on Monday. Johnson went to the hospital on Sunday as a "precaution," he said.Mass Layoffs Push Canada's Consumer Confidence to All-Time Low (8:00 a.m. NY)The Bloomberg Nanos Canadian Confidence Index, a composite gauge based on a telephone survey of households, declined sharply for a third week as extensive lock downs triggered mass layoffs. The aggregate index dropped to 42.7 last week, the lowest reading since polling began in 2008.Romania to Extend State of Emergency Until Mid-May (7:53 a.m. NY)Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said that he plans to extend the state of emergency over the crisis by another month because "we haven't reached the peak of the epidemic, so it's not time to relax."Netherlands Has Slowest Death Growth in Week (7:40 a.m. NY)The Netherlands reported 101 new fatalities, the smallest increase since March 30. Total reported cases rose 5% to 18,803. An additional 260 patients were admitted to hospitals, according to the RIVM National Institute for Public Health and the Environment.China to Strengthen Transport Control Measures Along Borders (7:15 a.m. NY)China will tighten quarantines in border areas, following a meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases found in people who arrived through a land border has surpassed those that came by air.Dimon Sees 'Bad Recession' and Echoes of 2008 Crisis Ahead (7:11 a.m. NY)"At a minimum, we assume that it will include a bad recession combined with some kind of financial stress similar to the global financial crisis of 2008," the CEO said Monday in his annual letter to shareholders. "Our bank cannot be immune to the effects of this kind of stress."Nigeria to Borrow $6.9 Billion to Offset Virus Impact on Economy (7:03 a.m. NY)The government plans to raise as much as $6.9 billion from multilateral lenders to offset the impact of the pandemic. The state will seek $3.4 billion from the International Monetary Fund, $2.5 billion from the World Bank and a further $1 billion from the African Development Bank, Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed told reporters Monday.French Firms Have Requested Guarantees for EU20 Billion of Loans (6:58 p.m. NY)French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said 100,000 companies requested government loan guarantees for a total of 20 billion euros ($21.6 billion). In addition, more than 500,000 small companies have requested aid from France's solidarity fund.Redhill Announces First Covid-19 Patient Treated With Opaganib (6:19 a.m. NY)RedHill Biopharma said the first patient with a confirmed coronavirus diagnosis was dosed with opaganib in Israel, and additional patients are expected to be treated in the coming days. Pre-clinical data demonstrated anti-viral effects in other viruses, anti-inflammatory activities and the potential to reduce lung inflammation, the company said.Hungary Announces Virus Stimulus Plan of Up to 20% of GDP (6:17 a.m. NY)Hungary's government will pay some-private sector wages, offer loan guarantees and boost spending on infrastructure and pensions as part of a major fiscal stimulus plan aimed at averting a recession and mass unemployment as the coronavirus pummels the economy. The package, valued at 18% to 20% of gross domestic product including planned stimulus from the central bank, will also see the 2020 budget deficit rise to 2.7% of GDP from 1%, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Monday.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| China is trying to relax its severe coronavirus lockdown, but a series of forced re-closures shows how hard it is to get back to normal Posted: 06 Apr 2020 04:09 AM PDT  China — which is deeper than any other country in its coronavirus response — is struggling to snap back to reality. Others will likely struggle too.
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| Malaysia detains boatload of 202 presumed Rohingya refugees Posted: 05 Apr 2020 04:06 AM PDT  Malaysian authorities said they have arrested a boatload of 202 people believed to be minority Muslim Rohingya refugees after their boat was found adrift Sunday morning near the northern resort island of Langkawi. A Northern District maritime official, Capt. Zulinda Ramly, said the refugees included 152 men, 45 women and five children. Zulinda said maritime officials have taken precautionary measures to prevent any possible transmission of the COVID-19 virus while handling the group.
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| Doctor Scolds Fox News: It’s ‘Irresponsible’ to Promote Unproven Coronavirus Drug Posted: 06 Apr 2020 12:47 PM PDT  Amid Fox News' round-the-clock promotion of anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine as a potential coronavirus cure, renowned biologist Dr. William Haseltine told Fox News host Dana Perino on Monday that it was "irresponsible" to tout the unproven drug and called claims of its miraculous healing powers "complete and utter nonsense."Haseltine, who recently said Trump's response to the pandemic was "among the worst in the world" and "dangerous," was asked by Perino to give his thoughts on the drug which the president has called a "game-changer" despite limited evidence of its effectiveness."It is sad, to me, that people are promoting that drug," Haseltine, known for his HIV/AIDS research, responded. "We know, already, from studies, at best it will have a very mild effect. At very best."The doctor went on to note that there have been conflicting studies on the drug's efficacy in treating coronavirus, reiterating that even studies showing a positive effect show it to be "very mild." He also said that the drug has been used against other viruses to no effect."The thing that makes me sad about that story is some people may take it who are on other medications who have other underlying conditions and may have very serious, even life-threatening consequences," Haseltine declared. "It is not something to take unless a doctor prescribes it."Perino, meanwhile, defended the promotion of the drug, noting that the administration has left it up to doctors whether they want to prescribe the drug for off-label use to treat the disease before bringing up some of the more sensational stories of hydroxychloroquine's effectiveness."What about, I know you don't go by anecdotal evidence, but there are stories of people saying that they have had this Lazarus effect by using this drug," Perino wondered aloud."That is nonsense," Haseltine fumed. "Complete and utter nonsense. And in any situation, there are always going to be people who promote one kind of quack cure or another. And there are Lazarus effects."Last week, Fox News host Laura Ingraham was forced by Twitter to remove a tweet in which she claimed that a Lenox Hill coronavirus patient had a "Lazarus"-like recovery after taking hydroxychloroquine. The doctor who apparently told her the claim, however, was not an oncologist at Lenox Hill, as Ingraham had originally asserted."We know that at very best, this drug will have a very mild effect on changing the course of the disease, if it has any effect at all," Haseltine continued. "That is what the data has shown so far, and I am convinced that that is what further studies will show. And it is not without adverse consequence. It is irresponsible to promote this drug at this time.""I hear you loud and clear," Perino replied.Fox News hosts and commentators, along with frequent guest Dr. Mehmet Oz, have repeatedly pushed and endorsed hydroxychloroquine as an effective treatment of COVID-19, prompting the president to endlessly hype the drug. Besides calling it a "game-changer," Trump has suggested that he "may take it"—despite not being diagnosed with the disease—while encouraging Americans to use it. "What do you have to lose?" Trump asked over the weekend.MSNBC Host Stephanie Ruhle Shuts Down Marco Rubio's Coronavirus SpinRead more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Obama suggests lawmakers follow Elizabeth Warren's coronavirus recovery plans Posted: 06 Apr 2020 02:26 PM PDT  Former President Barack Obama is handing out an endorsement of sorts.Even though she ended her presidential campaign a month ago, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) has continued to crank out plans for how she'd like the government to be run. They've continued throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and, on Monday, got a stamp of approval from Obama.Linking to Warren's appearance on the Vox podcast The Ezra Klein Show, Obama described Warren as providing a "cogent summary of how federal policymakers should be thinking about the pandemic in the coming months." In the discussion, Warren outlined plans for protecting health care workers and stemming disease spread, federal deficit spending to save the economy, and collecting data to improve future response measures.> As she often does, @SenWarren provides a cogent summary of how federal policymakers should be thinking about the pandemic in the coming months. https://t.co/zkX0E7ncK5> > -- Barack Obama (@BarackObama) April 6, 2020To some observers, it looked like an endorsement of Warren's policy agenda. And to NBC News' Mike Memoli, it looked like a wholesale endorsement for former Vice President Joe Biden's potential 2020 vice presidential pick. > TO: J.Robinette.Biden@JoeBiden.com > FROM: 44@barackobama.com > SUBJECT: Your VP Search https://t.co/pnjjZhvGsP> > -- Mike Memoli (@mikememoli) April 6, 2020More stories from theweek.com Stocks rebounded after some hopeful coronavirus news but change 'doesn't necessarily reflect anything fundamental' New York City plans to temporarily bury coronavirus victims in a park Trump's fervor for an unproven COVID-19 drug is reportedly fueled by Rudy Giuliani, Dr. Oz
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| Russian white supremacists are terrorists says Trump Posted: 06 Apr 2020 10:01 AM PDT  It is the first time the government has labelled a white supremacist group a terror organisation.
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| Asia virus latest: Japan proposes state of emergency, Singapore quarantines dorms Posted: 06 Apr 2020 04:33 AM PDT  Japan's prime minister proposed a state of emergency for several major regions seeing a sharp rise in coronavirus cases, as well as a stimulus package worth $1 trillion to cushion the impact on the world's third-biggest economy. The official declaration of the state of emergency would likely come as soon as Tuesday, Shinzo Abe told reporters, as the country grapples with a recent spike in coronavirus cases, especially in the capital Tokyo.
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| Philippine police reportedly shot a man dead under Duterte's orders to kill any lockdown troublemakers Posted: 05 Apr 2020 10:27 PM PDT  The man attacked local officials with a scythe after they told him to wear a face mask, according to a police report.
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| Black mistrust of medicine looms amid coronavirus pandemic Posted: 05 Apr 2020 08:32 AM PDT  Roughly 40 million black Americans are deciding whether to put their faith in government and the medical community during the coronavirus pandemic. Historic failures in government responses to disasters and emergencies, medical abuse, neglect and exploitation have jaded generations of black people into a distrust of some public institutions.
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| The coronavirus can live on a surgical mask for 7 days, cloth for 2 days, and paper for 3 hours. Here's how to disinfect surfaces properly. Posted: 06 Apr 2020 01:52 PM PDT  The coronavirus tends to spread via droplets passed between people. But viral particles can also live on surfaces for hours or days.
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| Wisconsin moves forward with election despite virus concerns Posted: 06 Apr 2020 07:43 AM PDT  Voters in Wisconsin will face a choice Tuesday of participating in a presidential primary election or heeding warnings from public health officials to stay away from large crowds during the coronavirus pandemic. Hours after Democratic Gov. Tony Evers issued an order postponing the election for two months, the conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court on Monday sided with Republicans who said he didn't have the authority to reschedule the race on his own. Conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court quickly followed with a ruling blocking Democratic efforts to extend absentee voting.
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| New York coronavirus deaths 'effectively flat' as U.S. braces for peak cases in hot spots Posted: 06 Apr 2020 02:44 PM PDT  New York state remains at the center of the coronavirus outbreak with more than one-third of all cases in the United States. "Now is not the time to be lax," Gov. Andrew Cuomo warned.
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| The biggest and brightest full moon of 2020 will be a pink supermoon Tuesday night Posted: 06 Apr 2020 01:44 PM PDT  Here's some good news amid the coronavirus: You'll get to see the brightest full moon of 2020 on Tuesday.
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| 430,000 People Have Traveled From China to U.S. Since Coronavirus Surfaced Posted: 05 Apr 2020 07:59 AM PDT  Since Chinese officials disclosed the outbreak of a mysterious pneumonialike illness to international health officials on New Year's Eve, at least 430,000 people have arrived in the United States on direct flights from China, including nearly 40,000 in the two months after President Donald Trump imposed restrictions on such travel, according to an analysis of data collected in both countries.The bulk of the passengers, who were of multiple nationalities, arrived in January, at airports in Los Angeles; San Francisco; New York; Chicago; Seattle; Newark, New Jersey; and Detroit. Thousands of them flew directly from Wuhan, the center of the coronavirus outbreak, as American public health officials were only beginning to assess the risks to the United States.Flights continued this past week, the data show, with passengers traveling from Beijing to Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York, under rules that exempt Americans and some others from the clampdown that took effect on Feb. 2. In all, 279 flights from China have arrived in the United States since then, and screening procedures have been uneven, interviews show.Trump has repeatedly suggested that his travel measures impeded the virus' spread in the United States. "I do think we were very early, but I also think that we were very smart, because we stopped China," he said at a briefing on Tuesday, adding, "That was probably the biggest decision we made so far." Last month, he said, "We're the ones that kept China out of here."But the analysis of the flight and other data by The New York Times shows the travel measures, however effective, may have come too late to have "kept China out," particularly in light of recent statements from health officials that as many as 25% of people infected with the virus may never show symptoms. Many infectious-disease experts suspect that the virus had been spreading undetected for weeks after the first American case was confirmed, in Washington state, on Jan. 20, and that it had continued to be introduced. In fact, no one knows when the virus first arrived in the United States.During the first half of January, when Chinese officials were underplaying the severity of the outbreak, no travelers from China were screened for potential exposure to the virus. Health screening began in mid-January, but only for a number of travelers who had been in Wuhan and only at the airports in Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York. By that time, about 4,000 people had already entered the United States directly from Wuhan, according to VariFlight, an aviation data company based in China. The measures were expanded to all passengers from China two weeks later.In a statement Friday, Hogan Gidley, a White House spokesman, described Trump's travel restrictions as a "bold decisive action which medical professionals say will prove to have saved countless lives." The policy took effect, he said, at a time when the global health community did not yet "know the level of transmission or asymptomatic spread."Trump administration officials have also said they received significant pushback about imposing the restrictions even when they did. At the time, the World Health Organization was not recommending travel restrictions, Chinese officials rebuffed them and some scientists questioned whether curtailing travel would do any good. Some Democrats in Congress said they could lead to discrimination.In interviews, multiple travelers who arrived after the screening was expanded said they received only passing scrutiny, with minimal follow-up."I was surprised at how lax the whole process was," said Andrew Wu, 31, who landed at Los Angeles International Airport on a flight from Beijing on March 10. "The guy I spoke to read down a list of questions, and he didn't seem interested in checking out anything."Sabrina Fitch, 23, flew from China to Kennedy International Airport in New York on March 23. She and the 40 or so other passengers had their temperature taken twice while en route and were required to fill out forms about their travels and health, she said."Besides looking at our passports, they didn't question us like we normally are questioned," said Fitch, who had been teaching English in China. "So it was kind of weird, because everyone expected the opposite, where you get a lot of questions. But once we filled out the little health form, no one really cared."In January, before the broad screening was in place, there were over 1,300 direct passenger flights from China to the United States, according to VariFlight and two American firms, MyRadar and FlightAware. About 381,000 travelers flew directly from China to the United States that month, about a quarter of whom were American, according to data from the Department of Commerce's International Trade Administration.In addition, untold others arrived from China on itineraries that first stopped in another country. While actual passenger counts for indirect flyers were not available, Sofia Boza-Holman, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said they represented about a quarter of travelers from China. The restrictions, she added, reduced all passengers from the country by about 99%.Trump issued his first travel restrictions related to the virus on Jan. 31, one day after the World Health Organization declared the outbreak a global health emergency. In a presidential proclamation, he barred foreign nationals from entering the country if they had been in China during the prior two weeks. The order exempted U.S. citizens, green-card holders and their noncitizen relatives -- exceptions roundly recognized as necessary to allow residents to return home and prevent families from being separated. It did not apply to flights from Hong Kong and Macao.About 60% of travelers on direct flights from China in February were not U.S. citizens, according to the most recently available government data. Most of the flights were operated by Chinese airlines after American carriers halted theirs.At a news conference about the restrictions, Alex Azar, the health secretary, repeatedly emphasized that "the risk is low" for Americans. He added, "Our job is to work to keep that that way."Health officials also announced an expansion of the screening beyond arrivals from Wuhan. Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, explained that people would be screened for "significant risk, as well as any evidence of symptoms." If there was no reason for additional examination, "they would be allowed to complete their travel back to their home, where they then will be monitored by the local health departments in a self-monitoring situation in their home."The procedures called for screening to be conducted in empty sections of the airports, usually past customs areas. Passengers would line up and spend a minute or two having their temperature taken and being asked about their health and travel history. Those with a fever or self-reported symptoms like a cough would get a medical evaluation, and if they were thought to have been infected or exposed to the virus, they would be sent to a hospital where local health officials would take over.Passengers would also be given information cards about the virus and symptoms. Later versions advised people to stay at home for two weeks.In a statement Thursday, the CDC described the entry screening as "part of a layered approach" that could "slow and reduce the spread of disease" when used with other public health measures."We cannot stop all introductions," the CDC added, noting that the coronavirus pandemic was "especially challenging due to asymptomatic and presymptomatic infections and an incubation period of up to two weeks."Separately, on Friday, the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the administration's measures were "unprecedented" and allowed "the U.S. to stay ahead of the outbreak as it developed."Passengers including Wu described a cursory screening process when they arrived in the United States.Wu, who has had no symptoms and has not become ill, said he was told to stay inside for 14 days when he landed in Los Angeles. He said he received two reminder messages the next day by email and text, but no further follow-up.Another traveler, Chandler Jurinka, said his experience on Feb. 29 had an even more haphazard feel. He flew from Beijing to Seattle, with stops in Tokyo and Vancouver.At the Seattle-Tacoma airport, he said, an immigration officer went through his documents and asked questions unrelated to the virus about his job and life in China. At no point did anyone take his temperature, he said."He hands me my passport and forms and says, 'Oh, by the way, you haven't been to Wuhan, have you?'" Jurinka said. "And then he says, 'You don't have a fever, right?'"Like others, he left the airport with a card that recommended two weeks of self-quarantine and a promise that someone would call to check up on him. He said he never got a call.Other travelers also said the follow-up from local health departments was hit-or-miss. Some received only emails or texts.Jacinda Passmore, 23, a former English teacher in China who flew into Dallas on March 10, after a layover in Tokyo, got a thorough screening at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. It took about 40 minutes, she said, before she was cleared for her flight home to Little Rock, Arkansas.State health workers later dropped off thermometers at her house and insisted her entire family stay home for two weeks and provide updates on their condition."They asked us every day: 'Have you stayed inside? Have you met anyone? Have you been quarantined?'" Passmore said. "They're really nice about it. They said, 'If you need anything, we can go grocery shopping for you.'"Nineteen flights departed Wuhan in January for New York or San Francisco -- and the flights were largely full, according to VariFlight. For about 4,000 travelers, there was no enhanced screening.On Jan. 17, the federal government began screening travelers from Wuhan, but only 400 more passengers arrived on direct flights before Chinese authorities shut down the airport. Scott Liu, 56, a Wuhan native and a textile importer who lives in New York, caught the last commercial flight, on Jan. 22.Liu had gone to Wuhan for the Spring Festival on Jan. 6, but decided to come back early as the outbreak worsened. At the Wuhan airport, staff checked his temperature. On the flight, he and other passengers filled a health declaration form, which included questions about symptoms like fever, cough or difficulty breathing.After they arrived at JFK in New York, the passengers were directed to go through a temperature checkpoint. "It was very fast," he said. "If your temperature is normal, they will just let you in."Liu said no one asked him questions about his travel history or health, and he received a card with information about what to do if he developed symptoms. At the time, there were no instructions to isolate. Liu said he and his friends all decided to do so anyway."I stayed at home for almost 20 days," he said.About 800 passengers on five charter flights were later evacuated from Wuhan by the U.S. government and directed to military bases, where they waited out two weeks of quarantine.The charter flights began on Jan. 29. Instagram posts from one showed CDC officials in full protective gear on the plane and escorting passengers after landing.One group of passengers was eventually flown to Omaha, Nebraska, to be taken by bus to a National Guard camp for quarantine. Video showed them accompanied by a full police escort, with lights flashing, helicopters overhead and intersections blocked off along the way.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| Japan’s Abe Set to Declare Virus Emergency As Cases Jump Posted: 05 Apr 2020 11:55 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is set to declare a state of emergency, media reports said, after coronavirus cases in Tokyo jumped over the weekend to top 1,000, raising worries of a more explosive surge.After last week saying the situation didn't yet call for such a move, Abe changed course and will announce the plan as soon as Monday, media reports said. The formal declaration for the Tokyo area will be coming as early as Tuesday, the Yomiuri newspaper reported without attribution. The declaration could also cover the surrounding prefectures of Chiba, Saitama and Kanagawa, as well as Osaka, and be given a time limit of six months, broadcaster TBS said, citing sources close to the matter.The process for making the declaration picked up pace Monday, with Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who is handling the virus response, meeting Abe alongside the government's top expert adviser on the pandemic. The premier may unveil his plan at a meeting of his virus task force after 6 p.m.The declaration could go into effect as Japan's biggest-ever stimulus package worth 60 trillion yen ($550 billion) is set to be announced Tuesday.No LockdownThe state of emergency, which comes after pressure from local governors and the medical community, doesn't enable a European-style lockdown.Declaring a state of emergency hands powers to local governments, including to urge residents to stay at home for a certain span of time during the emergency period. By contrast with some other countries though, there is no legal power to enforce such requests due to civil liberties protections in Japanese law.Abe's government saw its approval rating slip to its lowest since October 2018 in a poll from broadcaster JNN released Monday with a majority of respondents faulting the way the government has managed the virus crisis. The poll taken April 4-5 showed that about 80% of respondents said the declaration should be made.The governors of Tokyo and Osaka have been pushing for the declaration as the recent spike in cases sparked concerns Japan is headed for a crisis on the levels seen in the U.S. and several countries in Europe.Japan was one of the first countries outside of the original epicenter in neighboring China to confirm a coronavirus infection and it has fared better than most, with about 3,650 reported cases as of Monday -- a jump from less than 500 just a month ago. That's the lowest tally of any Group of Seven country, although Japan might be finding fewer mild cases because it has conducted a relatively small number of tests.Last week, the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo advised American citizens who live in the U.S. but are currently in Japan to return home, "unless they are prepared to remain abroad for an indefinite period." It added Japan's low testing rate makes it hard to accurately assess the prevalence of the virus. The Japan Medical Association warned last week that the jump in cases in the nation's most populous cities is putting more pressure on medical resources and that the government should declare a state of emergency.Tokyo reported 143 new coronavirus infections on Sunday, the largest number in a single day. It marked the second straight day the city's daily infection tally exceeded 100.Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike is already pressing residents to avoid unnecessary outings, and television showed many of the capital's main shopping areas almost deserted over the weekend. The Tokyo local government is set to begin leasing hotels this week to accommodate mild cases, making room in its hospitals for the seriously ill.(Updates with media reports on area, time period)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Congo mine attack kills three Chinese nationals: Xinhua Posted: 06 Apr 2020 01:55 AM PDT |
| When Coronavirus Is Over, Middle East Chaos Will Only Be Worse Posted: 05 Apr 2020 02:23 AM PDT  For a time the Middle East seemed like it just froze, the conflicts of yesterday put in quarantine—as so many of us have been—while various countries strive to contain an epidemic of biblical scale. Don't expect that to last. The coronavirus outbreak is not the great equalizer, nor is it the crisis in which past rivalries will be forgotten.Trump's Most Vital Mideast Allies Are Trending Fast Toward TyrannyLike an earthquake, the coronavirus is magnifying the foundational weaknesses of the least prepared countries, exacerbating existing inequalities across the region. And like a particularly lethal aftershock, the crash of the oil price further debilitates petroleum-based economies that lack the financial reserves to weather the secondary blow to their system. For Gulf countries, the "double whammy" of the coronavirus and the oil shock, while major disruptions, can be weathered with mass injections of capital. Moreover, these countries appear to have been some of the best prepared to deal with the pandemic, likely because they already faced the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) outbreak. They acted relatively quickly and decisively to identify cases and close down their borders. That's not to say that things aren't going to be bad for Gulf countries—they will—but there will be different shades of bad. By contrast, Algeria, Iraq, Egypt, and Lebanon are certain to be hit especially hard by the twin blows. Algeria and Iraq's budgets are so tied to the price of oil that they have no margin to maneuver. The economic crisis will also hit Egypt, especially with the loss of tourism, while Lebanon was in the process of defaulting on its sovereign debt even before the outbreak really took off. Refugee and internally displaced communities across the region also are going to be hit very hard, which is likely to increase refugee flows both within and outside the region—with potential recipients of these flows having another reason to close their doors. As a result, the burden of these new refugees is poised to be borne most by the states that can least afford to do so and those that already are host to massive displaced populations.This widening gap will have an impact on the region's geopolitics. Desperate people do desperate things, and desperate regimes even more so. The recent escalation in attacks against coalition forces in Iraq which resulted in the killing of two U.S. and UK soldiers in the Taji military base is one example of what could become a trend: namely, the growing need for countries weakened by the outbreak to project strength. Iran has been at the epicenter of the crisis in the region and its lack of transparency and effort to maintain ties with one of its last trading partners, China, turned the crisis into a nightmare—making us, as geopolitical analysts, wonder what does Iran have to lose and where could its proxies strike next?Beyond that, as the crisis shifts America's focus even more inwards, local actors will test Washington's willingness to respond to escalation. Given what happened in Iran, and the possible geopolitical consequences, this raises the questions of what would (or more likely will) happen if/when the crisis will reach these levels in areas such as Syria, Yemen, Libya or Gaza? In an already unequal world, the crisis may well make asymmetric warfare even more relevant than it already was.While some regimes struggling against popular protest movements may have perceived a silver lining in the outbreak, a day of reckoning is not far over the horizon. In Algeria and Lebanon the streets are emptying fast. Now that the scale of the outbreak has set in, most if not all protesters won't be marching for weeks or months to come. But there will be some reluctance to call off the demonstrations. Some protesters view their local regimes as worse than the virus. Those who decide to continue demonstrating will face a crackdown rationalized by the outbreak—Algeria already issued a ban on protests. The pandemic will break the momentum of these popular movements, but, once the dust settles, these may also come back swinging at governments that mishandled the crisis. The Middle East and North Africa were in the middle of a second Arab Spring. There's every reason to expect the uprisings to regain their momentum when "coronavirus season" is over.On a domestic level, the crisis likely won't bring people together, at least not in the long term—and not only because of the need for social distancing. Sectarian tensions are liable to increase, particularly as a result of Iran's catastrophic mishandling of the situation. In the Gulf, where much of the initial outbreak was the result of Iran-related travels—which are difficult to track given that Gulf citizens who travel to Iran don't get their passports stamped—fear of a broader outbreak due to such travel is already having an impact, with Saudi Arabia closing the Shiite-majority region of Qatif, and other Gulf countries reluctant to repatriate their own citizens from Iran. The lack of testing capabilities in Sunni areas of Iraq (when compared to Kurdish and Shiite-majority areas), a similar lack of balance between testing numbers among the Jewish and Arab communities in Israel alongside tensions prompted by lockdown measures in Jaffa, all highlight the possibility that the outbreak will widen domestic divides rather than bridge them.In Israel, the crisis has revealed—overnight—the government's willingness to approve massive spying on its own population at a time when parliament can't convene to monitor the use of data gathered by the Israeli Security Agency. This is not an isolated case: more broadly, containment measures and the subsequent reaction by their respective populations will widen the gap between governments who managed to gain public trust, and those who didn't.All of these factors suggest the coronavirus pandemic will turn into a defining moment for the region, not simply because of its magnitude, but because it came at a time when most countries were experiencing their own political crises—and failed to build any immunity to the one that suddenly knocked at their doors.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Illinois man who feared girlfriend had COVID-19 fatally shoots her, himself Posted: 06 Apr 2020 08:11 AM PDT  The sheriff's office said that during the COVID-19 pandemic, the vast majority of service calls involve domestic disputes and crisis intervention.
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| Hydroxychloroquine: Can India help Trump with unproven 'corona drug'? Posted: 06 Apr 2020 03:57 AM PDT  India may 'reconsider' a ban on exporting hydroxychloroquine after a call from the US President.
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| Spain’s New Virus Infections Fall as Austria Eases Lockdown Posted: 06 Apr 2020 04:20 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Spain reported the lowest number of new coronavirus cases in more than two weeks and German infections were the fewest in six days, tentative signs that the spread of the deadly disease is slowing in Europe's worst-hit countries.The most recent figures from Spain, Italy, Germany and France suggest containment measures that have idled millions of workers are having an effect. While most leaders pleaded for patience, Austria became the first country in Europe to ease restrictions and Denmark may follow later.After weeks of measures designed to limit contact between people, European governments are seeing growing evidence that shutting down much of the economy is containing the disease. Italy, Spain, France and the U.K. have suffered the most deaths worldwide, accounting for nearly 60% of all fatalities.New infections in Spain were 4,273, the lowest since March 22, according to Health Ministry data on Monday. The death toll in Europe's biggest outbreak rose by 637, the lowest number of daily fatalities since March 24.German infections rose by 4,031 to surpass 100,000, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. With 140 fatalities, it was the lowest daily increase in nearly a week. The coming days will show if the trend holds. New cases and deaths in Germany have consistently dropped over weekends as regional health authorities have been slower to report figures.Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief of staff said it's critical to reduce the number of infections before taking decisions on easing social-distancing rules. The concern is that patients require ventilation for a longer period of time than initially anticipated "because more and more older people get infected," Helge Braun told Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung on Sunday.Reports on Covid-19 related outbreaks in nursing homes and hospitals are increasing, and the number of deaths is relatively high in some of these outbreaks, Germany's health authority said. Europe's largest economy continues to have the third-highest number of confirmed cases in Europe.Spain and Italy -- the epicenters of the pandemic in region -- have the highest death tolls worldwide. That means officials have to weigh any attempts to restart parts of the economy against the risk of reigniting the outbreak.In Spain, public opinion of the government's management of the crisis has consistently deteriorated. Just 27.7% of voters approve of the efforts by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's administration, compared with 35.1% three weeks ago, according to a GAD3 poll published Monday by Spanish newspaper ABC."It's the lockdown measures that are helping us," Silvio Brusaferro, head of Italy's public health institute, said in Rome on Sunday. Rules designed to limit contact between people have led to a "significant slowdown in the spread," he said.Italy reported 525 new deaths on Sunday, the lowest daily number in more than two weeks, and new confirmed cases also declined. France reported an additional 518 deaths, the fewest since last Tuesday.Crisis ExitIn Austria, small retailers, hardware stores and gardening shops will reopen next week after national lockdown measures succeeded in slowing the spread. The number of active coronavirus patients has declined, with recoveries outnumbering new positive tests for three consecutive days.Despite easing restrictions, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz called on Austrians to sacrifice traditional Easter holiday celebrations with friends and family this weekend and stick to social-distancing rules at least until the end of April. Should Covid-19's spread be contained, more shops could reopen in May and schools in mid-May."We have reacted faster and more restrictive than other countries," Kurz said in Vienna. "We'll also get out of the crisis faster if everybody continues to stick to the measures."Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen may also announce initial steps toward a return to normal life as early as Monday. Still, she's made clear that any slight uptick in the number of cases would be followed by an instant return to tight restrictions.Italy is heading into its fifth week under lockdown, and Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday that he can't say when it will be lifted.He is expected to announce revised rules and timelines by the end of next week, Il Messaggero newspaper reported. Italy's measures have been extended through at least April 13, and Spain's will now be in force at least until April 25.Italy's new confirmed cases totaled 4,316 on Sunday, lower than the day before. Total infections rose to 128,948 cases, slightly fewer than Spain.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Brazil minister offends China with 'racist' virus tweet Posted: 06 Apr 2020 09:33 AM PDT  China demanded an explanation from Brazil Monday after the far-right government's education minister linked the coronavirus pandemic to the Asian country's "plan for world domination," in a tweet imitating a Chinese accent. In the latest incident to strain ties between Brasilia and Beijing, Education Minister Abraham Weintraub insinuated China was behind the global health crisis. "Geopolitically, who will come out stronger from this global crisis?" he wrote on Twitter Saturday.
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| Scramble for masks as Italian region orders coronavirus cover-up Posted: 06 Apr 2020 08:10 AM PDT  Residents in Lombardy, the Italian region worst hit by the coronavirus, have been forced to scrounge scarce protective face masks or to improvise solutions of their own after authorities ordered anyone moving outside to cover their nose and mouth. With protective gear in short supply across the world, the northern region pledged to distribute at least 3 million masks to the public through supermarkets, pharmacists and tobacconists. "We can't find protective masks," Milan resident Giulio Colombo said.
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| 'Together we are tackling this disease’: Queen Elizabeth II delivers speech during coronavirus crisis Posted: 05 Apr 2020 12:24 PM PDT  Queen Elizabeth II delivered a brief speech on Sunday during the growing coronavirus crisis.
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| Leaked memo: Amazon is now recommending the workers sorting and moving your online orders wear face masks, but will have only 'limited' quantities Posted: 06 Apr 2020 09:00 AM PDT  Amazon employs some 400,000 warehouse workers across 175-plus facilities. Workers at more than 50 warehouses have tested positive for the coronavirus.
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| Taliban warn peace deal with US near breaking point Posted: 05 Apr 2020 11:48 AM PDT  The Taliban said their peace deal with the United States was nearing a breaking point, accusing Washington of violations that included drone attacks on civilians, while also chastising the Afghan government for delaying the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners promised in the agreement. The Taliban said they had restricted attacks against Afghan security forces to rural outposts, had not attacked international forces and had not attacked Afghan forces in cities or military installations. The Taliban said these limits on their attacks had not been specifically laid out in the agreement with the U.S. signed in February.
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| From 271 to 13: American suspends most NYC flights amid coronavirus crisis; demand 'evaporating' Posted: 05 Apr 2020 07:36 PM PDT  American, a big player in New York, usually operates more nearly 300 daily flights from New York's three major airports.
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| Has Sweden Found the Right Solution to the Coronavirus? Posted: 06 Apr 2020 03:30 AM PDT  If the COVID-19 pandemic tails off in a few weeks, months before the alarmists claim it will, they will probably pivot immediately and pat themselves on the back for the brilliant social-distancing controls that they imposed on the world. They will claim that their heroic recommendations averted total calamity. Unfortunately, they will be wrong; and Sweden, which has done almost no mandated social distancing, will probably prove them wrong.Lots of people are rushing to discredit Sweden's approach, which relies more on calibrated precautions and isolating only the most vulnerable than on imposing a full lockdown. While gatherings of more than 50 people are prohibited and high schools and colleges are closed, Sweden has kept its borders open as well as its preschools, grade schools, bars, restaurants, parks, and shops.President Trump has no use for Sweden's nuanced approach. Last Wednesday, he smeared it in a spectacular fashion by saying he'd heard that Sweden "gave it a shot, and they saw things that were really frightening, and they went immediately to shutting down the country." He and the public-health experts who told him this were wrong on both counts and would do better to question their approach. Johan Giesecke, Sweden's former chief epidemiologist and now adviser to the Swedish Health Agency, says that other nations "have taken political, unconsidered actions" that are not justified by the facts.In the rush to lock down nations and, as a result, crater their economies, no one has addressed this simple yet critical question: How do we know social-isolation controls actually work? And even if they do work for some infectious epidemics, do they work for COVID-19? And even if they work for this novel coronavirus, do they have to be implemented by a certain point in the epidemic? Or are they locking down the barn door after the horses are long gone?In theory, less physical interaction might slow the rate of new infections. But without a good understanding of how long COVID-19 viral particles survive in air, in water, and on contact surfaces, even that is speculative. Without reliable information on what proportion of the population has already been exposed and successfully fought off the coronavirus, it's worth questioning the value of social-isolation controls. It is possible that the fastest and safest way to "flatten the curve" is to allow young people to mix normally while requiring only the frail and sick to remain isolated.This is, in fact, the first time we have quarantined healthy people rather than quarantining the sick and vulnerable. As Fredrik Erixon, the director of the European Centre for International Political Economy in Brussels, wrote in The Spectator (U.K.) last week: "The theory of lockdown, after all, is pretty niche, deeply illiberal — and, until now, untested. It's not Sweden that's conducting a mass experiment. It's everyone else."We've posed these simple questions to many highly trained infectious-disease doctors, epidemiologists, mathematical disease-modelers, and other smart, educated professionals. It turns out that, while you need proof beyond a reasonable doubt to convict a person of theft and throw them in jail, you don't need any actual evidence (much less proof) to put millions of people into a highly invasive and burdensome lockdown with no end in sight and nothing to prevent the lockdown from being reimposed at the whim of public-health officials. Is this rational?When we asked what evidence is available to support the utility of quarantine and social isolation, academics point to the Diamond Princess cruise ship, with 700 COVID-19 passenger cases and eight deaths. But the ship is an artificially engineered, densely packed container of humans that bears little resemblance to living conditions in most countries.The other major evidence academics often cite is the course run by the 1918 swine flu, which swept the globe 102 years ago and was not a coronavirus. Philadelphia did not practice social distancing during the 1918 pandemic, but St. Louis did and had a death rate lower than Philadelphia's. But how is that relevant to today's crisis? Apart from the post hoc, ergo propter hoc nature of the argument, a key difference was that the GIs returning from World War I Europe who were carrying the swine-flu virus couldn't fly nonstop from Paris to St. Louis. They had to land at East Coast ports such as Philadelphia. It's therefore not surprising that the sick GIs rested and convalesced while spreading the virus on the East Coast, and they got better before continuing to St. Louis and other interior cities.Basing the entire architecture of social distancing on the evidence from the 1918 swine flu makes no sense, especially when that architecture causes significant destruction in the lives and livelihoods of most of the American population.But the social-isolation advocates frantically grasp at straws to support shutting down the world. It bothers them that there is one country in the world that hasn't shut down and that hasn't socially isolated its population. It bothers them because when this coronavirus epidemic is over, they would probably love to conclude that social isolation worked.Sweden has courageously decided not to endorse a harsh quarantine, and consequently it hasn't forced its residents into lockdown. "The strategy in Sweden is to focus on social distancing among the known risk groups, like the elderly. We try to use evidence-based measurements," Emma Frans, a doctor in epidemiology at Sweden's Karolinska Institute, told Euronews. "We try to adjust everyday life. The Swedish plan is to implement measurements that you can practice for a long time."The problem with lockdowns is that "you tire the system out," Anders Tegnell, Sweden's chief epidemiologist, told the Guardian. "You can't keep a lockdown going for months -- it's impossible." He told Britain's Daily Mail: "We can't kill all our services. And unemployed people are a great threat to public health. It's a factor you need to think about."If social isolation worked, wouldn't Sweden, a Nordic country of 10.1 million people, be seeing the number of COVID-19 cases skyrocket into the tens of thousands, blowing past the numbers in Italy or New York City? As of today, there are 401 reported COVID-19 deaths in Sweden.The really good news is that in Sweden's ICU census, which is updated every 30 minutes nationwide, admissions to every ICU in the country are flat or declining, and they have been for a week. As of this writing (based on currently available data), most of Sweden's ICU cases today are elderly, and 77 percent have underlying conditions such as heart disease, respiratory disease, kidney disease, and diabetes. Moreover, there hasn't been a single pediatric ICU case or death in Sweden — so much for the benefits of shutting down schools everywhere else. There are only 25 COVID-19 ICU admissions among all Swedes under the age of 30.Sweden is developing herd immunity by refusing to panic. By not requiring social isolation, Sweden's young people spread the virus, mostly asymptomatically, as is supposed to happen in a normal flu season. They will generate protective antibodies that make it harder and harder for the Wuhan virus to reach and infect the frail and elderly who have serious underlying conditions. For perspective, the current COVID-19 death rate in Sweden (40 deaths per million of population) is substantially lower than the Swedish death rate in a normal flu season (in 2018, for instance, about 80 per million of population).Compare that with the situation to Switzerland, a similar small European country, which has 8.5 million people. Switzerland is practicing strict social isolation. Yet Switzerland reports 715 cumulative Wuhan-virus deaths as of today, for a death rate nearly double the number in Sweden. What about Norway, another Nordic country that shares a 1,000-mile open border with Sweden, with a language and culture very similar to Sweden's? Norway (population 5.4 million) has fewer reported COVID-19 deaths (71) than Sweden but a substantially higher rate of coronavirus ICU admissions.On Friday, one of us spoke with Ulf Persson in his office at the Swedish Institute for Health Economics. He said that everyone he knows is calm and steady, behaving with more caution than normal, following such government-mandated social controls as a 50-person limit on gatherings and only sit-down service at bars and restaurants. Persson estimates that the Swedish economy will drop about 4 percent because of the global economic shutdowns. But that's nothing compared with the Great Depression unemployment levels of 32 percent that the U.S. Federal Reserve Board of St. Louis recently forecast for the United States.Nature's got this one, folks. We've been coping with new viruses for untold generations. The best way is to allow the young and healthy -- those for whom the virus is rarely fatal -- to develop antibodies and herd immunity to protect the frail and sick. As time passes, it will become clearer that social-isolation measures like those in Switzerland and Norway accomplish very little in terms of reducing fatalities or disease, though they crater local and national economies -- increasing misery, pain, death, and disease from other causes as people's lives are upended and futures are destroyed.John Fund is a columnist for National Review and has reported frequently from Sweden. Joel Hay is a professor in the department of Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy at the University of Southern California. The author of more than 600 peer-reviewed scientific articles and reports, he has collaborated with the Swedish Institute for Health Economics for nearly 40 years.
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| Trump's fervor for an unproven COVID-19 drug is reportedly fueled by Rudy Giuliani, Dr. Oz Posted: 06 Apr 2020 06:45 AM PDT  President Trump is very excited about hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19, frequently touting it as a "game changer," and he isn't alone in his enthusiasm. His economic adviser Peter Navarro, who reportedly sparred with top U.S. infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci about hydroxychloroquine, told Fox & Friends on Monday morning he would "bet on President Trump's intuition on this." Other boosters Trump is apparently listening to include his lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Dr. Mehmet Oz, the controversial television personality.At Sunday night's press briefing, Trump said he hopes doctors use the drug, "because I'll tell you what, what do you have to lose?" He added: "I may take it. I'll have to ask my doctors about that." When a reporter asked Fauci about hydroxychloroquine, Trump stepped in and shut it down.> "I answered this 15 times. You don't have to answer." -- Trump prevents Dr Fauci from answering a question about hydroxychloroquine pic.twitter.com/8R1K1hDsaX> > — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2020Most health officials and medical scientists, like Fauci, are unconvinced about the malaria drug's effectiveness at treating the coronavirus, noting that the evidence so far is anecdotal and contradictory. "I think we've got to be careful that we don't make that majestic leap to assume that this is a knockout drug," Fauci said on Friday's Fox & Friends. Hydroxychloroquine also has heath risks, including cardiac arrest in some cases.> Well, there's a chyron for you. pic.twitter.com/Uq4ViGi18y> > — Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) April 6, 2020Giuliani has been pushing hydroxychloroquine on Twitter, his podcast, and, he tells The Washington Post, in one-on-one calls with Trump. He said he has no financial stake in hydroxychloroquine. After watching Dr. Oz repeatedly tout the drug on Fox News, Trump said he wants to speak with Oz and told health officials it would be "a good idea" if they did, too, The Daily Beast reports. At least one official, Medicare administrator Seema Verma, spoke with Oz privately.In mid-March, Reuters reports, "Trump personally pressed federal health officials" to green-light hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment, and "shortly afterward, the federal government published highly unusual guidance informing doctors they had the option to prescribe the drugs, with key dosing information based on unattributed anecdotes rather than peer-reviewed science." When asked about its guidance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Trump's coronavirus task force had requested the document.More stories from theweek.com Stocks rebounded after some hopeful coronavirus news but change 'doesn't necessarily reflect anything fundamental' New York City plans to temporarily bury coronavirus victims in a park Obama suggests lawmakers follow Elizabeth Warren's coronavirus recovery plans
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| Coronavirus: Japan to declare emergency as Tokyo cases soar Posted: 06 Apr 2020 04:54 AM PDT  The measures aim to avert a major outbreak in its major cities but fall short of a lockdown.
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| Staff Shortages and Calls of 'Code Blue': A Brooklyn ICU Is Pushed to the Brink Posted: 05 Apr 2020 08:08 AM PDT  NEW YORK -- The night had been particularly tough. Patient after patient had to be intubated and put on a ventilator to breathe. At one point, three "codes" -- emergency interventions when someone is on the brink of death -- occurred at once.Dr. Joshua Rosenberg, a critical care doctor, arrived the next morning at the Brooklyn Hospital Center. Within hours, he was racing down the stairwell from the main intensive care unit on the sixth floor to a temporary one on the third, where he passed one of his favorite medical students."Shouldn't you be home?" he asked, registering surprise. Clinical rotations for students had been halted to avoid exposing them to the coronavirus. "My mom's here," the student replied.Rosenberg, 45, let out an expletive and asked which bed she was in. "I'm rounding there now," he said and made sure the student had his cellphone number.Earlier, residents from the ICU had presented their cases to Rosenberg and others, speaking in shorthand and at auctioneer-like speed. There were so many patients to get through last Monday:"Admitted for acute hypoxic respiratory failure secondary to likely COVID-19.""Admitted for acute hypoxic respiratory failure secondary to confirmed COVID-19.""Admitted for acute hypoxic respiratory failure, high suspicion of COVID-19."Nearly every person lying in a bed in the new intensive care unit, just as in the main one, was breathing with the help of a mechanical ventilator.There were patients in their 80s and in their 30s. Patients whose asthma and diabetes helped explain their serious illness. And patients who seemed to have no risk factors at all. Patients from nursing homes. Patients who had no homes. Pregnant women, some of whom would not be conscious when their babies were delivered to increase their odds of surviving to raise their children.This was the week that the coronavirus crisis pummeled the Brooklyn hospital, just as it did others throughout New York City, where the death toll reached more than 2,000, as the governor warned that vital equipment and supplies would run short in just a few days, as the mayor pleaded for more doctors and as hospital officials and political leaders alike acknowledged that the situation would get even worse.At the Brooklyn center -- a medium-size independent community hospital -- that misery was evident. Deaths attributed to the virus more than quintupled from the previous week. The number of inpatients confirmed to have COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, grew from 15 to 105, with 48 more awaiting results. Hospital leaders estimated that about a third of doctors and nurses were out sick. The hospital temporarily ran out of protective plastic gowns, of the main sedative for patients on ventilators, of a key blood pressure medication. The sense of urgency and tragedy was heightened by a video, circulating online, showing a forklift hoisting a body into a refrigerated trailer outside the hospital.Amid the unfolding disaster, in a week in which he would see more deaths, counsel some families to let loved ones go and scramble to save others, a weary Rosenberg paused to watch his team tend to their patients. "It's making the best of what you can do," he said.A Crisis Gathers StrengthRosenberg had to stay home the previous week, battling a fever and intense fatigue from what he assumed was COVID-19 (a test, taken after he felt better, later came back negative). He could barely climb the stairs to his bedroom. Returning to work this past Monday, he told a reporter, was like walking into a storm."This is insanity," Rosenberg said to a colleague that day.Before he left, the intensive care unit had its usual 18 beds. The surge was then hitting the emergency department, leading the hospital to construct a tent outside and screen scores of people a day. Many, mildly ill, were reassured and sent home.But during the time he was gone, the number of people progressing to severe illness skyrocketed, and the ICU had to expand, then expand again, effectively doubling. "In a week's time, we've transitioned from a crowding outside to a crowding inside," said Lenny Singletary, the hospital's senior vice president for external affairs.Even before the morning report had started, Rosenberg and other staff members had to rush to an outpatient unit. A middle-aged man had come to the hospital for dialysis but was sweating profusely. Staff members were about to help him breathe using a mask with pressurized air, known as a BiPAP machine.But Rosenberg, chair of the hospital's infection control committee, thought it was a poor idea. There was no way to know right then whether the man's illness might be caused by the coronavirus, and there were fears that the device could release virus particles into the air, potentially spreading the disease. The patient was moved to the emergency room. "He has a high chance of getting tubed" and needing a ventilator, Rosenberg told colleagues.In the new ICU, a repurposed chemotherapy infusion unit, blue plastic gowns fluttered from door hinges, drying after being wiped down for reuse. A patient bed, tilted up like a slide, held pink plastic bins overflowing with patient supplies. Rosenberg's critical care team assembled in mismatched clothing, masks and protective eyewear, hair and foot coverings -- wearing much of the scarce equipment all day, not changing between patients.With so many staff members out and so many new patients, the array of doctors, nurses, pharmacists and respiratory therapists who were accustomed to working in the ICU needed reinforcements. Rosenberg welcomed a podiatrist and two of her resident trainees, a neurosurgery physician assistant, surgery residents and a nurse anesthetist. "All people who are good with knives and big needles," Rosenberg quipped.Now, some nurses were caring for five critically ill patients at a time, a ratio he called "crazy." The norm for experienced ICU nurses at the hospital was just two.At 10 a.m., Rosenberg and Dr. James Gasperino, chief of medicine and critical care, jumped on a call with the hospital leadership about challenges the center was facing and how it was coping with them.The chief medical officer, Dr. Vasantha Kondamudi, later summed it up: Staff was short, medical residents were falling ill every day, and the number of patients with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 was ballooning in nearly every area of the hospital. Yet the crisis had not peaked.Nurses and others from departments that had cut back on services, like elective surgery and outpatient clinics, were being trained and redeployed. "You're working completely differently," said Judy McLaughlin, senior vice president and chief nursing executive. But even that wasn't enough: The hospital had requested more than 100 volunteer doctors and nurses from the city's Medical Reserve Corps and was rapidly working to vet them.After the call, Gasperino conferred in the hallway with the director of respiratory therapy. The hospital had 98 ventilators, many acquired in recent days, including small portable devices from the national stockpile. Employees were running simulations to practice how they might use each ventilator to treat two patients, a difficult and risky proposition. "We're doing this because the alternative is death," Gasperino said.An alert sounded on the loudspeaker, interrupting the conversation: "Code blue, 6B. Code blue, 6B."The critical care team was designed to respond to emergencies anywhere in the hospital. Although he was supposed to be on his way home after an overnight shift, Gasperino joined more than than a dozen others pouring into the patient's room."COVID?" someone asked."No, not COVID," came the answer.Young residents stood on either side of the man's bed and took turns doing chest compressions. Nurses ran out of the room and back in with supplies. Gasperino threaded a catheter into a large vein to infuse medication into the patient's body. The man's pulse returned.At about the same time, one of the pregnant patients was wheeled from the intensive care unit and into an operating room for a cesarean section. She was in her early 30s and her baby was being delivered nearly two months early in an effort to save the mother's life. Over the past day, doctors had ordered two doses of steroid medication to help the infant's lungs mature.During rounds earlier that morning, a resident presented the woman's case. She had been put on a ventilator and sedated the previous evening. Rosenberg cursed under his breath: This disease was cruel.Grasping for SolutionsAs Rosenberg walked down the corridor, nearly every door he passed had a neon colored sticker warning that personal protective equipment must be worn inside. "COVID" was handwritten on many of them.Staff members had separated control boards from some of the ventilators, so they could adjust their settings and monitor patients without going inside their rooms unless necessary, reducing exposure to the virus. Nurses were making a similar adjustment with the pumps that delivered intravenous medications, adding extension tubing that snaked across floors into hallways.Workers rushed in and out of the rooms preparing for procedures. "Watch out, don't trip!" Rosenberg warned a colleague. Moments later, he had to repeat the warning. "Watch out, don't trip!"Later that day, when a patient became unstable, Rosenberg passed out masks with a face shield -- "they're clean, save them, they're gold" -- to staff members before they entered the man's room. Rosenberg put on a sterile gown and ski goggles, which he said he preferred because they didn't fog up. He inserted a narrow tube into a patient's artery to better monitor his vital signs. Procedures performed inside the room, close to the patient, posed the greatest risk of exposure.Amid the grimness, Rosenberg tried to keep the mood positive, his energy fueled by espresso from an automatic machine in his office. He called his colleagues "dude," made sports analogies to explain his points and sometimes asked how their families were dealing with the stress. Even in the thick of a crisis, he directed questions to trainees that forced them to think hard about the next step in care for each patient.Being a teacher came easily to him. He had studied science at Wesleyan -- earning his degree in three years to save on tuition costs -- and then taught it to first graders at the Choir Academy of Harlem, a now shuttered public school that was the home of the famous Boys Choir. He went on to medical school in Israel, later returning to New York, where he now lives with his wife and two daughters.Rosenberg and his team reviewed the status of one of the many patients who were receiving a "COVID cocktail" of the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine, held up by President Donald Trump as a potential cure, and the antibiotic azithromycin. Rosenberg referred to it as a "maybe-maybe-this-will-work cocktail," because only a couple of tiny studies supported its effectiveness against COVID-19. Still, the doctors were prescribing it aggressively now, early in the course of hospitalization, in the hopes that it could prevent the lung damage that led patients to need ventilators.The cocktail is generally considered safe, though it may have serious side effects in certain patients. One man in the ICU developed a deadly arrhythmia and had to be shocked back to life the night before Rosenberg's Monday shift. The doctor told his residents that the patient should not go back on the drug."I don't think the public realizes how often we don't really know" whether something works, Rosenberg said. Different coronaviruses can cause the common cold, which "affects all of us," he said. "There's no medicine to get better from it -- it's just time, patience." What scared him with this new coronavirus, though, was the thought that "time and patience when somebody's on a ventilator is different from time and patience when someone has the sniffles."His team had also begun treating some patients with another medication, an experimental antiviral drug called remdesivir. But the hospital had to apply to the manufacturer, Gilead, for emergency permission to use it on each patient, who had to have a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19."Do we have a positive test?" Rosenberg asked about one patient. A colleague replied, "Not yet." Test results from a Quest commercial laboratory in California had been taking about a week, making it harder to isolate infected patients within the building, provide certain treatments and even discharge people. Laboratory workers at the Brooklyn hospital managed to retrofit equipment and start their own testing last weekend, which doctors considered a game changer.But with one problem resolved, another arose.This past week, there were days when the hospital ran short of a drug to treat life-threatening low blood pressure in many of Rosenberg's ICU patients, as well as a sedative that many were receiving to relieve the distress of being on a ventilator. The doctors ordered substitutes.The chief pharmacist at the Brooklyn hospital, Robert DiGregorio, worked until after 2 a.m. on Thursday to try to source more of one drug. Going forward, Rosenberg predicted, "the biggest threat will be medication shortages."Painful ConversationsRosenberg was struck by the range of the patients felled by this illness -- various ages, ethnicities and medical histories. Some who had been critically ill, most of them younger, were starting to recover enough to be taken off a ventilator and breathe on their own.But as he and his team stopped outside each room, they saw many who were from nursing homes and had multiple medical problems -- the type of patients who filled the intensive care unit during flu season. Now some were extremely sick, with failing organs."Very poor prognosis," Rosenberg said about one man, in his 70s, who had developed kidney damage. "He's going to pass from this.""Has anyone been in contact with the patient's family?" he asked. He asked a variation of that in front of other rooms. "All of these patients need a palliative care" consultation, the physician said of the seriously ill.The patients were alone. Visitors were no longer allowed into the hospital, and doctors had to call family members to update them, get their permission for doing procedures and -- for many -- discuss end-of-life care.That day and continuing through the week, Rosenberg had many difficult conversations, on the phone and often through translators, about shifting from trying to extend life to withdrawing life support and focusing on comfort."A lot of family members don't realize how sick the patients are or how bad the prognosis is with this disease if you develop respiratory failure," he said, particularly in the context of advanced age and other health conditions. "The families really want to see their loved ones." The team was using iPads and smartphones to connect them.He said that the state's laws governing withdrawing patients from ventilators were complicated. The default, generally, is for doctors to initiate and continue providing life support unless the patient or proxy has clear directives otherwise. "It reflects on the need for these conversations in primary care well before somebody gets sick and for that information to be disseminated to family members."He added, "There are an awful lot of really young patients in their 50s and 60s who I'm sure never thought about this."There were fears throughout the week that New York's hospitals would soon run out of ventilators and be forced to ration them, but doctors at the Brooklyn center said they had enough for now. Rosenberg worried more about having enough staff members and medications.Still, Rosenberg said that he and his colleagues were looking at protocols for how to ration care, developed by intensive care doctors at other medical centers, in case conditions worsened.The goal was to expand capacity to avoid the need to limit treatment. Gary Terrinoni, the hospital's president and chief executive, said he had received donations of food and supplies, but was appealing to the city and state for physical beds, equipment and funds to "ensure we can serve the community" as his clinical colleagues fought "the good fight."But even discharging those who no longer needed hospital care to make space for new patients was sometimes proving difficult. Rosenberg worried about getting one of his patients, ready to leave the ICU, accepted back into a nursing home, where across the city staffing had fallen short. Government officials were working on sites to accept released patients, but those had not yet opened.Even death did not always guarantee an exit. By the end of the week, the hospital had accepted two refrigerated trailers from the city's medical examiner. Workers were building shelves in one of them to make space for more bodies, as overwhelmed funeral homes were failing in some cases to retrieve them. A tent discouraged onlookers from recording more cellphone videos.Meanwhile, patients continued to arrive at the ICU -- some of them with ties to the 175-year old institution, near Fort Greene. "It's like home for us," said Kondamudi, the chief medical officer.Dr. Antonio Mendez, the vice chair of the emergency department, was born at the hospital, and his mother, Josefina, was admitted as an ICU patient. "She is a fighter and so are her doctors," he said.On his first day back, Rosenberg checked her blood gas, a measure of the effectiveness of her breathing support. It "looks pretty darn skippy," he said and praised his team for their management of her care.Late in that long day, Rosenberg learned that one of the hospital's own medical residents, whom he knew well, was in the emergency room, with symptoms of COVID-19 and a worrisome chest X-ray."He comes right up," he told his team, "because he's at high risk of getting intubated."To admit the physician to the ICU, however, Rosenberg had to get more staff. "We need more nurses," he said. Given how overwhelmed they are, "they're getting killed."Soon after, two nurses who normally worked in the cardiac catheterization lab walked into the unit to offer their assistance. Rosenberg applauded. "This is the cavalry," he said.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| Scots' medical chief resigns after flouting own coronavirus rules Posted: 05 Apr 2020 09:40 AM PDT  Scotland's Chief Medical Officer Catherine Calderwood resigned on Sunday after she broke her own advice to stay at home to help slow the spread of the coronavirus by visiting her second home this weekend and last. Calderwood said that during discussions with Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon on Sunday evening they agreed her actions risked distracting from the "hugely important job that government and the medical profession has to do in getting the country through this coronavirus pandemic". Police had earlier issued a warning to Calderwood about her behaviour and Sturgeon had removed her as the public face of the campaign to tackle the coronavirus.
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