Coronavirus Still Spreading From China to White House
Nations on Monday struggled to balance public and economic health amid mounting pressure to reopen economies despite an uptick in coronavirus cases ranging from China to even the White House.
Nations on Monday struggled to balance public and economic health amid mounting pressure to reopen economies despite an uptick in coronavirus cases ranging from China to even the White House.
An international pledging marathon has begun where world leaders are to raise at least 7.5 billion euros ($8.2 billion) to find a coronavirus vaccine. With social distancing the world’s new norm, world leaders choose video conferencing to raise the billions of dollars needed for research into a possible vaccine.
A senior World Health Organization (WHO) official has praised Sweden for its strategy in managing the coronavirus outbreak, the NY Post reported. Executive director of Emergencies Program Mike Ryan told reporters Wednesday: “I think in many ways Sweden represents a model if we wish to get back to a society in which we don’t have lockdowns.”
After the U.S. unveiled similar measures, the European Union has approved a $580 billion aid package to help limit the devastating economic consequences of coronavirus pandemic lockdowns in member states. However, beyond the immediate aid, the dispute remains over the structure – and funding – of a long-term recovery plan. It emerged this weekend that the European Commission, the EU’s executive, has now been tasked to make proposals by May 6, when another video conference will be held.
The US COVID-19 death toll was 45,343 on Wednesday morning, Worldometers.info reports. The first known US fatality from coronavirus came on February 28 in Washington State. Currently, New York has the highest number of deaths with 19,693; Wyoming has the fewest with 6.
Several European Union member states are slowly reopening their doors in lockdowns that have impacted millions of people, many of them children. The lockdowns were introduced by authorities citing concerns about the spread of the new coronavirus disease COVID-19.
European countries hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic as well as New York, the epicenter of the outbreak in the US, have reported progress in fighting the coronavirus. There have been reports of lower daily death counts, slowing rates of infection and reductions in the numbers of patients admitted to intensive care units.
Europe’s death toll from the new coronavirus COVID-19 approached 100,000 on Sunday, and over 1 million Europeans were infected, a European health agency announced.
Germany’s health minister says the month-long lockdown has brought the coronavirus outbreak in his country under control. Jens Spahn spoke while several other European Union nations struggled to contain the new virus disease COVID-19.
World powers scrambled on Thursday to build a global response to the human tragedy and once-in-a-century economic collapse caused by the coronavirus epidemic, as death tolls in the US and Europe soared higher.
European Union finance ministers agreed Thursday on a half-a-trillion euro ($550-billion) rescue package for European nations hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic. The chairman of the Eurogroup, Mário Centeno, confirmed the deal following marathon talks in Brussels where Italy warned the EU would collapse without financial solidarity.
A disagreement over eurozone loans on Wednesday halted European Union (EU) efforts to agree on a deal on managing the economic fallout of the coronavirus pandemic. Negotiations between European finance ministers were suspended until Thursday after 16 hours of talks brought no resolution. Yesterday’s discussions followed similar talks that were held last month, when no agreement was reached either.
The United States and Britain braced Monday for what officials viewed as one of their darkest weeks in post-war memory as the social and financial toll of the coronavirus pandemic mounted and the British prime minister was in the hospital with the virus. Monday’s glooming scenario came as Italy, Spain, and France saw signs that they were flattening the pandemic curve, despite many people still dying there.
China has been appointed to a panel on the controversial U.N. Human Rights Council, where it will help vet candidates for important posts — despite its decades-long record of systematic human rights abuse that the U.S. has said fueled the coronavirus pandemic.
Thirteen European Union nations say they fear that emergency measures to contain the new coronavirus pandemic could threaten “democracy and fundamental rights.” Their statement came after EU-member Hungary introduced coronavirus legislation that allows the increasingly authoritarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to rule by decree without parliamentary approval.
Global coronavirus cases surpassed 1 million on Thursday with more than 52,000 deaths as the pandemic further exploded in the United States and the death toll climbed in Spain and Italy, according to a Reuters tally of official data.
Nearly all of the people in Europe who have died from the coronavirus were more than 60 years old, the World Health Organization announced Thursday.
On Thursday on Capitol Hill, a lawmaker and international observers called for an end to blasphemy laws and other measures that direct religious thought.
About 350,000 people have protested in Barcelona over the jailing of separatist leaders from Spain’s Catalonia region, police say.
On Sunday a Mexican city was deluged in hail and ice, leaving cars buried beneath 5 feet of the frozen substance and leading the state governor to exclaim he had never seen anything like it.