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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
World
Helen Sullivan (now and earlier); Kevin Rawlinson , Damien Gayle, Gregory Robinson, Amy Walker (earlier)

Global trade forecast to fall by up to a third amid Covid-19 pandemic – as it happened

That White House press briefing is now over.

We’ll have a summary for you soon, in the meantime we are closing this blog and I’ve fired up a new one at the link below. Head over there for more rolling coverage of the coronavirus pandemic and the related political and economic developments:

Pence says when it comes to Easter and Passover celebrations this weekend, everyone should follow the usual guidelines. That will mean we can celebrate sooner, he says.

“We will be attending church in the living room of the vice president’s residence,” said Mike Pence. He’ll watch an Easter service from his home church in Indiana.

He encouraged all Americans to stay home. “Avoid gatherings of more than 10 people, avoid unnecessary travel,” he said.

Several churches around the country have flouted regulations and held services.

Pence is asked whether deaths are being “padded” – whether those who died after having underlying conditions made worse by coronavirus are listed as deaths from coronavirus, which “inflates” the number of deaths.

Dr. Deborah Birx says they’ve been hearing the opposite – that, she seems to imply – those who die because coronavirus made their underlying conditions worse (fatal) aren’t being listed as coronavirus-related deaths.

In other words, global death rates are worse than reported, not better.

Dr. Birx said that in some cases, there may be several reasons for death. “The number of Italians who succumbed had three or more comorbidities,” she said. The virus is considered the acute reason for death.

“Having an underlying condition and getting this virus is particularly damaging to those individuals” with underlying conditions, she says. “If you have asthma if you have renal disease... these put you at greater risk to have a worse outcome.”

Dr. Fauci says “you will always have conspiracy theories when you have challenging [public health crises] he says. They are just distractions.”

“Have somebody write a book about it later. Not now.”

Updated

Pence was asked whether certain states, like Colorado, are receiving preferential treatment when it comes to ventilators because of their relationships with Trump.

He did not address the question.

The reporter repeated it.

Dr. Deborah Birx responds to say different states had different numbers of ventilators. Every state with more cases than Colorado – which she says did not have many ventilators, comparatively – has received ventilators, she says.

Again, the question has not really been addressed.

Vice President Mike Pence is speaking now.

“We will have roughly four separate clinical trials under way studying hydroxychloroquine... It’s important to remember that the FDA has approved what is called ‘off-label use’.”

Dr. Fauci says there are a lot of different ways that malaria drug is being looked at in medical trials. “In addition to that there’s what was just mentioned now that any physician in consultation with their patient can prescribe that drug.” He does not comment on whether the drug is safe or effective.

Updated

Distancing is “the best tool,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said. “We know that this is something that is a strain on the American public,” he added, but it works to stop the spread of disease.

This press conference is happening as US cases pass the 400,000 mark. 14,529 people have died, according to the latest Johns Hopkins University figures, and a third of these deaths have been in New York.

For those of you who have not yet seen Wednesday’s New York Times front page:

Global cases have also passed the sombre milestone of 1.5 million, and deaths are close to 90,000 worldwide, with 87,984 confirmed, and many more suspected – some countries do not record deaths caused by certain complications or underling conditions aggravated by the virus as coronavirus-related deaths.

White House coronavirus task force member and the US’s foremost expert on infectious diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci is speaking now.

“What is the most striking thing that is so sobering to us is when we see deaths. We know now that the mitigation we are doing is having a positive effect. But you don’t see it until weeks later.”

“But don’t get complacent.”

The health disparities in the African American community puts them at risk much more so than the rest of the population, he says. This virus “preys” on those risks.

“To the young people to the older people in the community, protect yourself and please protect those who are susceptible.”

“We are not going to solve the problem of those health disparities this month or next month,” he says, but what we can do now is protect those people who are much more at risk. “We know that mitigation does work... keep your foot on the accelerator because that’s what’s going to get us through this.”

The White House’s coronavirus task force response coordinator Dr Deborah Birx is speaking now.

“Behind the scenes and working every day are the pediatricians fielding those calls from every concerned mother and grandmothers like myself.”

“To every pregnant woman don’t miss your appointments. If your OBGYN thinks you need to be there you should go.”

She :The number of people we’re losing every day is serious to every one of us and it could me so much worse but our front line care workers... this is how we can honour them by – as Dr Fauci says – put your foot on the gas and make sure to follow the guidelines.”

“This virus can infect everyone. This virus is very transmittable, but we need to protect those who need our protection the most.”

The White House press conference is live here:

You can get in touch with me on Twitter @helenrsullivan with any questions or comments.

Fact check: ventilators

My San Franciscan colleague Maanvi Singh has a fact check on that Trump claim regarding where things stand with ventilators.

It looks like we’re in great shape from the bed standpoint. It looks like we’re in great shape from the ventilators standpoint,” Trump said.

However, an article in the New England Journal of Medicine published on Wednesday 25 March categorically concluded that the US does not have enough ventilators to treat patients with Covid-19 in the coming months.

The authors, American public health experts, wrote: ‘There is a broad range of estimates of the number of ventilators we will need to care for US patients with Covid-19, from several hundred thousand to as many as a million. The estimates vary depending on the number, speed, and severity of infections, of course, but even the availability of testing affects the number of ventilators needed.... current estimates of the number of ventilators in the United States range from 60,000 to 160,000, depending on whether those that have only partial functionality are included. The national strategic reserve of ventilators is small and far from sufficient for the projected gap. No matter which estimate we use, there are not enough ventilators for patients with Covid-19 in the upcoming months.”

Trump has just been asked by a reporter: “When are we going to open up?” referring to the economy.

Trump says he doesn’t want to give a date. “I had a date. It was very aspirational – Easter.”

Trump said Easter might still be a good date after all, but for flattening the curve. He said the government is no longer receiving new requests for ventilators, and that he’d like to be able to lend ventilators to US allies – and non allies, he adds, because “we’re saving lives.”

Trump has now left the podium.

Pence says that the losses of life that are being seen today are in many cases people who contracted the virus before strict measures and other aspects of the response came into effect.

But in new cases there is great progress, says Pence. “We continue to evidence of stabilisation.”

“We may – may – be reaching the point where the coronavirus is levelling off,” says Pence.

Hello, Helen Sullivan with you now. I’ll be sticking with Trump’s press conference for the time being – after all, he has just said: “I’m not a doctor, I think you’ve figured that out.”

He also says “I don’t know why President Obama hasn’t supported Joe Biden. There’s something wrong there.... It does amaze me that President Obama hasn’t supported sleepy Joe.”

At least some things haven’t changed.

The World Health Organization “hasn’t accomplished what it was intended to deliver” Pompeo has said, doubling down the president’s criticisms.

Trump has repeatedly sought to shift blame for the crisis on the WHO, alleging that it responded too late. On the same day the WHO raised the global risk from the virus to its highest level, the US president called it a “hoax”.

The state department is working to repatriate Americans abroad, according to the secretary of state Mike Pompeo.

“We still have several thousand” US citizens abroad, in some cases in remote areas. Efforts to bring them home are ongoing, and “we will keep it up” Pompeo said.

Asked whether he thinks China has withheld information and whether the US will act on the president’s suspicion China has not been accurately reporting coronavirus data, Pompeo said, “This is not the time for retribution, but it is still the time for clarity and transparency.”

Pompeo avoided calling the coronavirus the “China virus” or “Wuhan virus” as he as in the past.

Updated

In Washington, the US president Donald Trump is giving his daily briefing. He has wished the UK’s prime minister Boris Johnson well.

We send our regards to Boris, his friends, his family. Hopefully he’s going to be ok.

On Tuesday, Trump detailed how he plans to help Johnson, by alerting his doctors in London to “some very good potential cures” that US companies are exploring.

UK police chiefs want the government to consider toughening coronavirus lockdown restrictions, the Guardian has learned, as they head into the Easter bank holiday weekend with concerns that a growing minority will flout the rules.

Vikram Dodd, Gregory Robinson and Jessica Murray write that more stringent restrictions to prevent people driving long distances are among options supported by at least five chief constables who want enforcement action to be bolstered by clearer and tougher government curbs. Other options include using legislation to enforce the order to limit exercise to once a day.

Two of Britain’s biggest Olympic sports have become the latest to announce plans to furlough staff because of the pandemic.

British Cycling is to avail of the government’s job retention scheme to cover 80% of the wages of 90 staff – approximately one third of its workforce – in April and May as it faces a drop in income of around £4m. UK Athletics also plans to furlough up to 12 of its head office staff as it also braces itself for a significant loss of revenue.

Virus fears prompt halt to Saudi military operations in Yemen

Concerns about a potential outbreak in Yemen, where no cases have been reported so far, are partly behind a decision to call a halt to the military action there that has left tens of thousands died and spread hunger and disease, a Saudi-led coalition spokesman Colonel Turki al-Malki has said.

The coalition fighting Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi movement has said it will call a nationwide ceasefire in support of UN efforts to end the five-year war.

The move aims to facilitate talks sponsored by the UN’s special envoy, Martin Griffiths, for a permanent ceasefire. It will go into effect at midday on Thursday for two weeks and is open to extension, al-Malki has said.

The president of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades, has announced that restrictive measures to combat Covid-19 will be extended through Orthodox Easter to the end of April.

In a televised address, the Greek Cypriot leader said to do otherwise “could be catastrophic” even if the measures, which include a night curfew, appeared to have yielded “a ray of light.”

We are not permitted any diversion or any possible relaxation of the measures that have been taken as any other action would lead to an unprecedented reversal with catastrophic consequences.

Easter is the biggest religious holiday for Eastern Orthodox faithful who will be celebrating on 19 April. But, acknowledging that the regulations would be “painful”, Anastasiades said:

What I want is that when we meet at the next festive table no one is missing.

The European Union’s most easterly member state, Cyprus, like Greece, has enforced strict restrictions against the spread of the potentially lethal disease, curbing freedom of movement since 16 March.

Authorities will also aggressively expand testing, Anastasiades added, saying an estimated 20,000 workers in the private and public sector, as well as the National Guard, would be tested for the virus. The government will roll out relief measures for employees and businesses until 12 June, he said.

Health authorities in the war-divided island’s Greek-south have identified 1,256 cases of the novel virus and reported nine Covid-19 related deaths. Three fatalities have been reported in the Turkish-held north, where 95 confirmed cases have also been announced.

Fears over the devastating impact coronavirus could have on South America’s indigenous communities have grown after a teenager from Brazil’s Yanomami people tested positive for the illness in the Amazon.

The 15-year-old is reportedly being treated in the intensive care unit of a hospital in Boa Vista, the capital of Roraima, the northern Brazilian state where much of the Yanomami reserve is located.

The teenager was admitted last Friday complaining of chest pains, breathing difficulties and a sore throat and tested positive for the illness on Tuesday.

It comes after indigenous groups across South America blockaded their villages and retreated into their traditional forest and mountain homes in an effort to escape the potentially cataclysmic threat of coronavirus.

Real Madrid have become the latest Spanish sports club to apply pay cuts to alleviate the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis.

The players and coaching staff of the football and basketball teams have joined executives in other departments in lowering their salaries by up to 20% in order to ensure that non-sporting employees are not affected and to help the club. The cuts were “voluntary”, a statement said – in contrast to those at Barcelona, Alavés and Atlético, which used the government’s ERTE scheme to unilaterally impose temporary reductions.

The US army corps of engineers says time is running out to build new facilities to help in efforts to combat the pandemic. Lt Gen Todd Semonite has said:

We’re beginning to run out of time. We’ll continue to support this, I’m not going to say ‘no’, but at some given point, this goes back to, ‘Are you going to be able to get a facility done?’

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has offered his full support to the World Health Organization (WHO) in a call with its director a day after his US counterpart’s criticism of the international organisation. An official has told the Reuters news agency:

[Macron] reaffirmed his trust, his support for the institution and refuses to see it locked into a war between China and the USA.

Reacting to the news, the leader of Luton’s council, Hazel Simmons, has said:

To lose so many residents in one care home is heartbreaking and our love, thoughts and prayers are with the friends and families of those who have died, as well as the staff at the home.

The council are supporting the staff at the home and will be offering support to the relatives of all those affected during this very difficult period.

This tragedy serves as another reminder of how important it is that we all follow the government guidance and stay at home to prevent the spread of this deadly disease.

It comes after the BBC reported that seven residents of an east London care home had died. Another 21 residents are displaying Covid-19 symptoms at the Hawthorn Green home in Stepney, which houses 48 people, according to the broadcaster.

Fifteen care home residents die

A single care home in the English county of Bedfordshire has lost 15 residents; five of whom had tested positive for Covid-19, officials say.

Public Health England (PHE) has confirmed the deaths and said it does not recommend testing new cases in care homes when some patients have already tested positive “as it will not change the public health management”.

A PHE spokeswoman was not immediately able to clarify when the deaths at the 69-bed Castletroy Residential Home in Luton had occurred.

Sultan Salimee, a consultant in health protection at PHE East, said experts were working closely with the home providing advice to stop the virus spreading.

Updated

The state of emergency in Peru has been extended for two more weeks to 26 April, the country’s president Martín Vizcarra has said.

He announced the extension, which includes a nationwide quarantine in the world’s second largest copper producer, as it reached 2,954 confirmed cases of the virus and 107 deaths. The first confirmed case in Peru was on 6 March.

We cannot let our guard down, we cannot reduce the effort we are making and the gains we are achieving just as we reach the most difficult stage.

Malta has recorded its first coronavirus victim, according to the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency. It quotes Malta’s deputy prime minister Chris Fearne as saying a 92-year old woman with underlying health issues has died.

Unfortunately, this will not be the first and last death. We can see what is happening across the world and Malta is no exception.

The woman had been living in an old people’s home in Gozo, according to Maltese media reports. The Mediterranean island has recorded 299 infected people since its first case on 7 March. Fearne said:

We have to protect the most vulnerable amongst us. The coming weekend is normally an occasion for families to meet at home to celebrate Easter but I ask you this year to forego these celebrations.

The Scottish parliament’s presiding officer, Ken Macintosh, has just informed MSPs that Nicola Sturgeon and Holyrood party leaders will take part in a virtual First Minister’s Questions at 12.30pm (BST) on Thursday.

Writing to members, Macintosh announced the “first leaders’ virtual question time, where party leaders will have the opportunity to question the first minister on the Scottish government’s ongoing response to the Covid-19 outbreak”.

It is expected to last for half an hour and will be carried live by the BBC.

Updated

The French government is prepared to provide “massive support” to Air France KLM to help the French-Dutch air carrier make it through the downturn, France’s finance minister Bruno Le Maire has told the France 2 television station.

Air France is losing billions of euros per month. Air France is not going to need a boost, but rather massive support from the state.

Air France will get this support from the state, we want to save at all costs this French industrial champion.

Le Maire added that other big companies, such as the aeronautical engineer Airbus, need help too.

Shipments of key protective medical gear bound for export from the United States will be seized, two federal agencies announce. The measures will be in place until Washington determines whether or not the equipment is needed in the US.

US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will hold exports of respirators, surgical masks and surgical gloves, according to a joint announcement made with the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA will then determine if the equipment should be returned for use in the United States, purchased by the US government or exported.

The US has been accused of hijacking shipments of medical supplies bound for other countries by offering higher prices to suppliers even as consignments were being prepared for dispatch.

France is to extend its national lockdown for a second time, meaning it will run beyond 15 April, the country’s presidential palace has said. It had earlier said the president of the republic, Emmanuel Macron, will address the nation regarding next Monday evening.

A nurse who died of suspected Covid-19 has been remembered as a “spirited friend with a loving heart” who “loved his NHS job”.

Donald Suelto, who worked at Hammersmith hospital in west London, died after going into self-isolation with coronavirus symptoms, his friend and fellow NHS nurse Alejandro Fernandez has said.

Last month, Suelto had changed his Facebook profile picture to an image of him wearing a protective mask emblazoned with the words: “I can’t stay at home, I’m a healthcare worker.”

In a tribute to the nurse, originally from the Philippines, Fernandez said:

I still can’t believe it. You were never alone. As I said, you are a hero, everyone knows that. So proud of you.

He was an enthusiastic nurse, full of life, loved his NHS job and a spirited friend with a loving heart. Our prayers and thoughts go out to his family. Rest in Peace Donds.

Updated

In the UK, a Downing Street spokeswoman has said:

The prime minister continues to make steady progress. He remains in intensive care.

The number of people who have died in French hospitals has climbed by 8% in a day to at least 7,632, local authorities have said.

Summary

Key developments in the global coronavirus outbreak today include:

That’s it from me, Damien Gayle. I’m back tomorrow.

Updated

Kenya reports seven new confirmed coronavirus cases

The country’s ministry of health has provided all the information about the latest developments on Twitter.

Updated

Police forces in the UK have created online forms for the public to quickly report potential lockdown breaches, Jessica Murray reports.

Cambridgeshire police announced on Tuesday it had set up a form for people to report individuals breaching Covid-19 restrictions, prompting some critical comments online.

“I cannot express strongly enough how thoroughly revolting this is,” said one reply with over 100 likes. Another read: “They just don’t realise, the only thing they are doing is turning the law-abiding public against them.”

Others welcomed the move.

Police officers wear facial masks as they patrol in Wolverhampton, UK, on Tuesday
Police officers wear facial masks as they patrol in Wolverhampton, UK, on Tuesday Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

It one of many police forces around the country to have created an online form for reporting potential rule-breaking, with the Metropolitan police, and forces including Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, Avon and Somerset and Kent all offering a similar service.

Cambridgeshire police clarified their announcement. It said: “Like other forces, we’re urging people to use common sense. Please only [use] our online form if there is a significant issue or breach. This may be a large gathering or group of people repeatedly ignoring the restrictions.”

Updated

Europe-wide Covid-19 death toll passes 60,000

The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 60,000 people in Europe as of 4.15pm GMT (5.15pm BST) on Wednesday, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources.

That figure accounts for more than 70% of the deaths so far officially recorded worldwide. Italy remains the worst-hit country, with 17,669 deaths, followed by Spain with 14,555.

Updated

Celebrities and politicians with large social media followings are proving to be key distributors of disinformation relating to coronavirus, according to a study that suggests the fact checkers and mainstream news outlets are struggling to compete with the reach of influencers, writes Jim Waterson, the Guardian’s media correspondent.

The actor Woody Harrelson and the singer MIA have faced criticism after sharing baseless claims about the supposed connection of 5G to the pandemic, while comments by the likes of the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, have played down the scale of the crisis in the face of scientific evidence.

Research by Oxford’s Reuters Institute for the study of journalism found that while politicians, celebrities and other prominent public figures were responsible for producing or spreading 20% of false claims about coronavirus, their posts accounted for 69% of total social media engagement.

The issue has gained extra prominence as Britons began vandalising mobile phone masts in recent days amid baseless claims linking the virus to 5G.

Updated

Even before the impact of the coronavirus shutdown is taken into account, France was already in a technical recession, the Bank of France has said, according to AFP.

On Wednesday the bank issued data showing the French economy shrank 0.1% in the last quarter of 2019 and a new estimate that it further contracted by about 6% in the first three months of 2020. A recession is defined as two consecutive quarters of economic contraction.

According to the central bank, France’s first-quarter performance was already its worst since 1945.

For every two weeks the country is locked down by the virus, the Bank of France said it expects the economy to shrink by 1.5%. French economic activity plunged a whopping 32% in the last two weeks of March as the coronavirus crisis intensified, it added.

The bank governor, François Villeroy de Galhau, warned that April was expected to be “at least as bad” as late March.

“Economic growth will be strongly negative in 2020” before bouncing back in 2021, he told RTL radio.

Updated

Two million protective masks purchased by Finland from China have turned out to be unsuitable for use in hospitals, AFP reports.

Finland’s health minister, Aino-Kaisa Pekonen, had on Tuesday tweeted a picture of the first shipment of 2m surgical masks and 230,000 respirator masks being unloaded at Helsinki airport on a Finnair flight from Guangzhou in China, saying they would be “checked and tested” before use.

But by Wednesday, officials discovered the face masks did not meet the required standards of protection against coronavirus for use in medical environments.

“Of course this was a bit of a disappointment for us,” the health ministry permanent secretary, Kirsi Varhila, told a news conference.

Finland currently needs about half a million surgical masks, and 50,000 respirator masks per day, officials said on Wednesday, with some regions warning of shortages.

The prime minister, Sanna Marin, hit out at some local authorities on Twitter earlier in the day, accusing them of not having stockpiled three to six months’ worth of protective equipment as mandated by Finland’s pandemic preparedness plan.

Updated

In Quebec, a mantra amid the pandemic has emerged: “ça va bien aller,” French for “it’s going to be OK”.

Quebecers have embraced the rallying cry on social media and at home, writes Tracey Lindeman.

Across the Canadian province, handmade drawings of rainbows accompanied by the hopeful message have been taped in windows, draped over balconies, hung from fire and police stations, and drawn in chalk on pavements. A few days ago, Montreal’s iconic Jacques-Cartier Bridge was turned into a giant neon rainbow.

It comes as the province of 8 million people grapples with more than half of the country’s reported Covid-19 cases. At least 600,000 Quebecers have lost their jobs.

It’s unclear who started the “ça va bien aller” movement, but it gained momentum with Karine Laurin, a schoolteacher and mother of two in the Laurentian Mountains outside of Montreal. In mid-March, she taped rainbow illustrations her kids had coloured to her front window, then started a Facebook page asking others to do the same.

The group now has nearly 18,000 members, and the movement has spread across the province with even top officials invoking the mantra. The premier, François Legault, said in a news release: “All this is temporary. We’re in this together … We’ll overcome this, and it’s going to be OK.”

Updated

The government in the west African country of Benin has made wearing face masks mandatory in public in several key regions.

The authorities have ordered security forces to step up patrols and detain people without masks, but have not outlined penalties for those failing to comply.

On Wednesday many residents in the largest city, Cotonou, had donned surgical masks or homemade face coverings, AFP reports. Police were stopping pedestrians and confiscating vehicles of those who failed to comply with the order.

The government in Benin has subsidised the cost of masks at the equivalent of about 25p ($0.30) but that expenditure remains high for many on a daily basis.

Some residents complained they could not find masks despite pharmacies limiting sales to two per customer in order to conserve stocks. “They just told me that there aren’t any masks available,” said Edouard Gbeha, as he emerged from a store.

“They say that they are obligatory and we want to buy them but can’t find them.”

Benin has imposed a “cordon sanitaire” around major towns and cities. Travel in and out of these areas is banned, gatherings are restricted and bars have been closed.

The country has so far confirmed 26 infections and one death from coronavirus.

Updated

Bad news from Brazil.

The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, is sitting up in bed, after he was taken to an intensive care unit in a London hospital on Monday because of worsening coronavirus symptoms, his finance minister, Rishi Sunak, has said.

The prime minister is receiving “excellent care” and remains in intensive care, where his condition is “improving”. He has been “sitting up in bed” and “engaging positively” with the clinical team, the chancellor said in the British government’s daily coronavirus briefing.

You can read more updates from the press conference on our UK-focused blog.

Updated

The director general of the World Health Organization was on the defensive in a media briefing on Wednesday, after Donald Trump accused the UN health body of being biased towards China and threatened to slash US funding.

Some African leaders rallied around the WHO’s Ethiopian-born director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who declined to respond to questions about the US president’s specific criticisms and said: “Why would I care about being attacked when people are dying?

“I know that I am just an individual. Tedros is just a dot in the whole universe. I prefer to really focus on saving lives,” he said at the WHO’s daily media briefing.

The US contributed nearly $900m to the WHO’s budget for 2018-19, according to information on the agency’s website, an amount that represented one-fifth of the WHO’s total $4.4bn budget for those years.

Updated

EU promises €20bn Covid-19 aid to Africa, Asia and Pacific

The European Union has reshuffled its aid budget and promised €20bn (£17.5bn) to help countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific tackle coronavirus, as well as near neighbours in eastern Europe, Jennifer Rankin reports from Brussels.

Following a conference call of EU development ministers, the EU’s chief diplomat, Josep Borrell, told journalists he expected more than €20bn would be available to help countries around the world.

“Unless the virus is defeated everywhere, it will not be defeated anywhere,” he said.

The funds come from reorganising the EU’s existing aid budget. EU officials have insisted no country will get less than promised before the outbreak, while vital programmes on nutrition, sanitation, health and education will continue.

Earlier on Wednesday the EU announced €15.6bn in coronavirus aid, which includes €5.2bn in loans from the EU’s lending arm, the European Investment Bank.

Africa has been earmarked €3.25bn, while a further €3.07bn is for countries on or near the EU’s southern and eastern borders, including some Middle Eastern nations, as well as Belarus, Ukraine, the Caucasus, Turkey and the Balkans.

Borrell said Belarus had asked for help in tackling the virus and dealing with the impact on its economy, and could expect to get around €60m.

After the meeting it emerged EU member states had pledged €4bn, while the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development was ready to offer €1bn, taking the total funds to more than €20bn. But it was not immediately clear how much of that money was grants or loans.

Borrell said Africa was a priority for the EU, as the coronavirus could have “consequences of an entirely different scale than in other parts of the world”.

The World Health Organization warned this week that cases were “increasing exponentially in the African region”, while local experts have stressed that sub-Saharan Africa lacks intensive care facilities, which could bring devastating results.

Updated

European commission prepares 'roadmap' to end lockdown

The European commission has advised EU member states to extend restrictions on non-essential travel until 15 May but is preparing to issue a “roadmap” on a coordinated lifting of Europe’s lockdown, Daniel Boffey, the Guardian’s Brussels bureau chief, reports.

Announcing the proposed extension of the travel ban, Margaritis Schinas, the European commission’s vice-president, said:

While we can see encouraging first results, prolonging the travel restriction is necessary to continue reducing the risks of the disease spreading further. We should not yet let the door open whilst we are securing our house.

The commission guidance on travel was issued as a Brussels plan for lifting the lockdown was revealed in a document leaked to the Guardian.

Marked “absolutely confidential”, the paper, which is expected be endorsed by the European commission next week, says “it is time to develop a well-coordinated EU exit strategy” from the current measures. It says the easing should be done measure by measure on a month-by-month basis while admitting that it could lead to new infections.

“Any level of (gradual) relaxation of the confinement will unavoidably lead to a corresponding increase in new cases,” the paper says.

The criteria for lifting restrictions include a decrease in the spread of infection over a sustained period and confidence in the ability of the health services to cope.

“The exit strategy must be coordinated between the member states, to avoid negative spillover effects,” the document says. Measures that should accompany an easing of restrictions include an expansion of testing and an increase of availability of personal protective equipment.

The commission paper says: “The exit must be gradual: measures must be lifted in different steps and sufficient time should be left between the steps (eg one month), as their effect can only be measured over time. Wide measures must progressively be replaced by targeted ones. For example: most vulnerable groups (eg the elderly) must be protected for longer.”

To allow for social distancing the commission suggests that restaurants and bars should be only gradually opened, with restricted opening hours or limits on the number of people allowed in. Schools should start with small groups of students being permitted to return.

Updated

Italy records 542 new Covid-19 deaths

Deaths from coronavirus in Italy rose by 542 on Wednesday, 62 less than on Tuesday, while the number of people currently infected increased by 1,195, or 1.3%, according to figures from the civil protection authority, Angela Giuffrida reports.

There was a record day-to-day increase – 2,099 – in the number of people who have survived the virus, taking the total to 26,491.

Italy has registered 139,422 confirmed cases to date, including 17,669 deaths.

Updated

The Polish government has said it will pump another 100bn złoty into its economy to save jobs during the coronavirus lockdown, AFP reports.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said businesses would not have to repay between 60-75% of the aid, which is equivalent to about €22bn (£19bn), or roughly 4.5% of national output.

The new “financial shield” will complement an “anti-crisis shield” worth €47bn that Warsaw unveiled in March to help the normally vibrant economy weather the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Workers in protective suits disinfect public places in Krotoszyn, southern Poland, as a precaution against coronavirus.
Workers in protective suits disinfect public places in Krotoszyn, southern Poland, as a precaution against coronavirus. Photograph: Tomasz Wojtasik/EPA

Business and employers’ associations complained that the initial anti-crisis package fell short of their expectations and would not protect many from bankruptcy.

The total value of exceptional government spending “will exceed 300bn złotys, reaching 320 or 330bn,” Morawiecki said in Warsaw.

Meanwhile, the Polish central bank (NBP) on Wednesday cut its benchmark interest rate by 50 basis points to a record low 0.50%.

Updated

UK hospital deaths: record daily rise of 938 to 7,097

As of 5pm on 7 April, of those treated in hospital in the UK who tested positive for coronavirus, 7,097 have died, the Department for Health and Social Care said. That is a rise of 938, up from 6,159 the previous day – the highest day-on-day rise so far.

As of 9am on 8 April, 282,074 tests have concluded, with 14,682 tests on 7 April.

232,708 people have been tested, of which 60,733 tested positive.

The overall test figure excludes data from Northern Ireland, and test data from Charing Cross and Southampton has not been included because of a processing delay, the department added.

Updated

Human rights NGOs have called on the International Monetary Fund to include anti-corruption measures in coronavirus relief programmes to make sure the billions of dollars in funding it hands out reaches those most at need.

In a joint letter to the IMF board on Wednesday, Transparency International, Human Rights Watch and Global Witness called on the fund to “establish basic measures to ensure that the money received by countries is used in a transparent and accountable manner to reduce the risks of misuse and corruption”. The letter adds:

We deeply appreciate the scale and speed of the IMF’s response to this crisis through these programs, as well as its support of debt relief and other extraordinary measures. We also understand governments’ urgent need for immediate funding. Nevertheless, we are concerned that unleashing massive amounts of money without including basic transparency and anti-corruption measures risks undoing the significant progress the fund has made in tackling corruption in recent years. Therefore, we respectfully request urgent action from the fund in order to make sure that the much-needed money it is giving to its member countries is actually used to safeguard public health, save lives, and support livelihoods.

Updated

Residents in the Canadian province of Alberta are being warned to expect a grim future as the coronavirus pandemic — and collapse in oil prices—hit at the same time, Leyland Cecco reports.

Speaking in a televised address on Tuesday evening, the state premier, Jason Kenney, said medical experts in his government anticipated Alberta could see as many as 800,000 cases of Covid-19 by the end of summer on the current trajectory, with as many as 3,100 deaths, or as few as 400. An “elevated” scenario would result in 1 million infections and as many as 6,600 deaths.

“I know that these numbers can be overwhelming,” Kenney said. “But these models are not a done deal. I want Albertans to see them as a challenge.”

Currently, the province has 1,373 reported cases and 26 deaths.

Alberta premier Jason Kenney, pictured in December
The Alberta premier, Jason Kenney, pictured in December. On Wednesday he warned Albertans of grim economic prospects. Photograph: Blair Gable/Reuters

Kenney also warned a collapse in oil prices has left the province has left the province in a dangerous situation, projecting as much as a quarter of the workforce could be out of a job.

“The shutdown in much of our economy is having a devastating impact,” Kenney told to an online energy conference earlier in the day.

An unemployment rate of 25% would be double Alberta’s worst numbers — set in 1984 — and worse than anything experienced in the rest of the country.

Updated

German car production to restart

Mercedes-Benz maker Daimler said on Wednesday it planned to restart work at factories in Germany from 20 April, as a slew of car makers made plans to emerge from the coronavirus lockdown, AFP reports.

In a statement the company said:

In a few selected factories, we are implementing a coordinated restart of production ... From 20 April this will affect the car motor factories in Germany, Mercedes-Benz car factories in Sindelfingen and Bremen and the vans factories.

But Daimler also said it would further roll out shorter hours for its German workers until 30 April, impacting “the majority of production ... as well as administration”.

Volkswagen said it would begin increasing production from 14 April in “a few” factories building car components, which are currently operating at much-reduced capacity.

Most of the company’s sites are closed until at least 19 April, but the group wants “to safeguard the supply of components to plants in China” after the Easter weekend.

BMW said on Tuesday it would extend a production stop until 30 April, while Ford’s European factories are on hold until at least 4 May.

Updated

A retirement home in Canada that lost nearly half its residents to coronavirus is scrambling to protect the remaining healthy inhabitants who lived alongside infected neighbours for nearly two weeks, Leyland Cecco in Toronto reports.

Pinecrest nursing home, a privately run facility in the town of Bobcaygeon, Ontario, has emerged as one of the country’s deadliest Covid-19 hotspots.

Twenty-seven of the home’s 65 residents have succumbed to the disease, and the spouse of one resident, who often volunteered at the home, has also died.

But it was not until last week – after 16 deaths – that sick residents at the home were finally separated from healthy residents, according to CBC News.

A hearse leaves Pinecrest nursing home in Bobcaygeon, Ontario, in this picture taken last Tuesday
A hearse leaves Pinecrest nursing home in Bobcaygeon, Ontario, in this picture taken last Tuesday. Photograph: Fred Thornhill/AP

A respiratory outbreak at Pinecrest was first declared on 18 March. Three residents tested positive for Covid-19 shortly afterwards, and in the following weeks the virus tore through the home, overwhelming residents and infecting dozens of staff.

The layout of the facility complicated efforts to contain the outbreak. Pinecrest has a mix of private and semi-private rooms to house residents, as well as shared rooms that sleep four people. In some cases, however, only a curtain separated residents, even though staff told families that sick residents had been isolated, CBC reported.

Updated

Italy declares ports 'unsafe' to block migrant rescues

In an unprecedented move, the Italian government has declared its seaports “unsafe” due to the coronavirus pandemic, and will not authorise the landing of migrant rescue boats until the end of the emergency, writes Lorenzo Tondo in Palermo.

In a decree issued late on Tuesday, the government wrote that “for the entire duration of the health emergency, due to the outbreak of coronavirus, Italian ports cannot be classified as ‘safe places’ for the landing of people rescued from boats flying a foreign flag”.

The measure – the first of its kind in Italian history – appeared designed to prevent rescue boats from disembarking migrants in the upcoming weeks, as departures from Libya have increased in recent days with the arrival of good weather.

The decree, signed by the interior minister, Luciana Lamorgese, the health minister, Roberto Speranza, the foreign minister, Luigi Di Maio, and the infrastructure minister, Paola De Micheli, also suggests that rescued migrants might include people who have contracted Covid-19.

It adds that “rescued people must be guaranteed an absence of any threat to their lives”, and concludes that at this time the government cannot guarantee the security of migrants’ lives in Italy.

Updated

After the number of cases across the continent passed 10,000 last night, the World Health Organization’s Africa regional office has produced a graphic showing the national breakdown in case numbers.

The coronavirus death toll among black and Hispanic communities in New York City has been disproportionately high, the city’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, said on Wednesday, the Associated Press reports.

Preliminary data indicates that black people account for 28% of the city’s Covid-19 death toll, even though they are just 22% of the city’s population, while Hispanic people are 34% of the city’s virus death toll and 29% of its population.

De Blasio acknowledged Wednesday that official death tolls are lower than reality because people who have died at home without being tested for the virus are not included.

Updated

Global trade forecast to fall by up to a third - WTO

Global trade could fall by up to a third this year, the World Trade Organization has said, with its director general issuing a warning that the suffering caused by Covid-19 will be compounded by “unavoidable declines in trade and output.”

In a trade forecast published on Wednesday, the WTO forecast 13-32% falls in global trade, giving a wide range because the economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak was still uncertain. It said nearly all regions would suffer double-digit declines in trade volumes, with exports from Asia and north America worst affected.

The WTO said it expected a recovery next year, but that would be dependent on how long the pandemic lasted and the effectiveness of policy responses. WTO director-general, Roberto Azevêdo, said:

This crisis is first and foremost a health crisis which has forced governments to take unprecedented measures to protect people’s lives

The unavoidable declines in trade and output will have painful consequences for households and businesses, on top of the human suffering caused by the disease itself.

... These numbers are ugly – there is no getting around that. But a rapid, vigorous rebound is possible. Decisions taken now will determine the future shape of the recovery and global growth prospects. We need to lay the foundations for a strong, sustained and socially inclusive recovery. Trade will be an important ingredient here, along with fiscal and monetary policy.

Keeping markets open and predictable, as well as fostering a more generally favourable business environment, will be critical to spur the renewed investment we will need. And if countries work together, we will see a much faster recovery than if each country acts alone.

Updated

More than 250 epidemiologists and public health experts have called for a drastic increase in Covid-19 testing in Latin America and the Caribbean to tackle the spread of the coronavirus.

In an open letter, the scientists call on governments in the region and international organisations to urgently increase efforts to test and track infections. Pointing particularly to Bolivia, Mexico and Venezuela, they warn that evidence suggests the current extent of the outbreak is being badly underestimated.

“Social isolation measures will have little effect and will need to be extended if there are no complementary strategies to aggressively detect and track Covid-19 cases,” they warn.

The document, organised by Enrique Acosta, a research scientist at the Max Planck institute for demographic research’s population health lab, warns that Latin America is particularly vulnerable because of its precarious healthcare infrastructure, high prevalence of chronic conditions that are risk factors for Covid-19, and housing and economic conditions that preclude effective social distancing and confinement.

The letter states:

We recognize that massive test coverage for Covid-19 is costly. However, there are clear economic and social benefits: lower mortality rates, fewer consequences for physical and mental health, and less impoverishment of the population in the long term. This not to mention the substantial reduction of the risk of new Covid-19 outbreaks and the possibility of avoiding further social isolation measures. Taken together, we contend that, whatever the strategy adopted by LAC governments to contain or mitigate the progress of the pandemic, it must be accompanied by rigorous monitoring of the contagion levels of Covid-19 based on tests to detect the virus.

… An accurate diagnosis of the situation will allow governments to treat patients and save lives. It will also allow them to implement appropriate policies to manage the impact of the pandemic on the society and economy of the region.

Updated

Here is the European Research Council scientific council’s response to the resignation of Mauro Ferrari. Seems like they are not sad to see him go.

EU's top scientist resigns over Covid-19 response

The EU’s most senior scientist has resigned with a passionate denunciation of the bloc’s reaction to the coronavirus pandemic, claiming he has been blocked from funding treatments and vaccines, Daniel Boffey, the Guardian’s Brussels bureau chief, reports.

Mauro Ferrari, the president of the European Research Council, said he had been “deeply disappointed and disturbed” by the EU’s efforts in reaction to what he described as “a tragedy of possibly unprecedented proportions”.

“In time of emergencies people, and institutions, revert to their deepest nature and reveal their true character,” Ferrari wrote in a damning statement announcing his resignation.

Ferrari, a leading research scientist, who told the Guardian in January that his passion for funding breakthrough science had been fuelled by the death of his first wife from cancer, had served three months of his four-year term before handing in his letter of resignation to the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, on Tuesday.

In the letter, Ferrari writes:

I have been extremely disappointed by the European response to Covid-19, for what pertains to the complete absence of coordination of healthcare policies among member states, the recurrent opposition to cohesive financial support initiatives, the pervasive one-sided border closures, and the marginal scale of synergistic scientific initiatives.

I have lost faith in the system itself. And now the times require decisive, focused, and committed actions – a call to responsibility for all those that have an aspiration to make a difference against this devastating tragedy.

Updated

The European parliament has pledged to give free meals to homeless people and health workers during the coronavirus crisis, Jennifer Rankin in Brussels reports.

The European parliament president, David Sassoli, said the European parliament in Brussels would distribute more than 1,000 meals a day, following an agreement with the city authorities.

The meals will be distributed from the Helmut Kohl building, an administrative annexe that is not part of the main European parliament headquarters in the Belgian capital.

The European parliament building in Brussels
The European parliament building in Brussels Photograph: Olivier Hoslet/EPA

The agreement follows a similar arrangement in the parliament’s Strasbourg home, where local authorities will take charge of part of a building to carry out coronavirus tests.

Officials said they could not give details on when the meals and tests would start, as these were up to local authorities in charge of the programmes.

In a statement, Sassoli said

We want to be close to those who suffer, to those who work tirelessly in our hospitals, to the city and people of Brussels, as well as those of Strasbourg and Luxembourg, who welcome us and who need our help today. Europe’s strength is in its ability to act in solidarity.

Updated

The UK’s largest travel firm, Tui, has cancelled all its beach holidays for the next five weeks due to the coronavirus pandemic, writes Miles Brignall, Guardian money reporter.

The travel giant said on Wednesday that all package trips up to and including 14 May were being cancelled, while all its Marella Cruises sailings have been suspended until at least June. Tui said:

We are constantly monitoring the situation and will start taking people on holiday again as soon as we are able to do so. At this point in time, nobody can accurately predict when that will be, so for the time being we will keep a close eye on our programme and continue to amend and adapt timings in line with the latest global travel advice.

A TUI aircraft parked at Hanover airport, Germany. The travel firm has cancelled all its beach holidays for the next five weeks
A Tui aircraft parked at Hanover airport, Germany. The travel firm has cancelled all its beach holidays for the next five weeks. Photograph: Alexander Koerner/Getty Images

Currently bookings for the May half-term, one of the busiest weeks in the holiday calendar are set to go ahead, although that looks unlikely. Earlier this week the Foreign & Commonwealth Office extended its ban on all but essential travel outside the UK, and said this would run until further notice.

Tui has told affected passengers not to contact the firm, and it will get in touch. It is currently only offering those with cancelled trips the chance to rebook, rather than the full refunds as required by law. Rory Boland, from the consumer group Which?, said:

TUI is acting disgracefully by telling customers ‘don’t call us, we’ll call you’ and then failing to provide any information about their rights to a refund for cancelled holidays.

It should not be on consumers to prop up the UK’s biggest holiday company while they are left to suffer without their money. To help end this uncertainty, the government should confirm how it intends to support the travel industry through this outbreak.

Updated

In Spain, one family is speaking out after being wrongly told that their 84-year-old mother had died from Covid-19, writes Ashifa Kassam in Madrid.

The country has emerged as one of the hardest-hit by the virus, with more than 14,500 deaths, behind only Italy. Stories of confusion have accompanied the sharp rise in deaths, from cases of mistaken identity to days-long searches for the bodies of loved ones who have passed away.

For Mercedes Maroto, the saga began when her mother, Teodora, was admitted to a hospital in central Spain last month. Days later, after a full day had passed without any news, Maroto and her siblings began calling the hospital.

It took four attempts before they got a doctor on the line. He informed them that their mother had passed away, Maroto told Spanish newspaper El Mundo.

A woman rests in front a shop in Pamplona, northern Spain
A woman rests in front a shop in Pamplona, northern Spain. Photograph: Álvaro Barrientos/AP

The news left the family reeling, particularly Maroto’s father. “He kept repeating, between sobs: ‘Now what do I do without you?’”

After a sleepless night punctuated with questions – How did she die? Did she suffer? Was she alone? – Maroto’s phone rang at 7:30am. This time it was the funeral home. “Your mother is alive. She didn’t die, they moved her to another floor,” Maroto said she was told.

Now the tears were of joy. “I thought I was dreaming,” said Maroto. She rushed over to the hospital where a doctor helped her speak to her mother on the phone.

While she described it as the “worst experience of her life”, Maroto shied away from casting blame, pointing to the chaos that has taken hold at Spanish hospitals as they scramble to treat the sudden influx of thousands of thousands of Covid-19 patients.

Her mother is now home and slowly regaining her strength. The family has yet to tell her about what El Mundo called the family’s own Easter resurrection tale. “Right now, she doesn’t know anything,” said Maroto. “We’ll tell her when she’s fully healed.”

Updated

Pakistan has reported 208 new confirmed cases of coronavirus in the past 24 hours, bringing its total to 4,072, as the World Health Organization representative in the country warned it was facing an acute shortage of nurses.

The most affected province is Punjab, with 2,030 cases of coronavirus infection, followed by Sindh, with 986. So far 58 people are confirmed to have died from Covid-19 across the country, while 467 have recovered, according to Johns Hopkins University’s tally of official figures.

(As I write, the Pakistani English language newspaper Dawn was running with slightly higher numbers, perhaps reflecting its ability to source more up-to-date figures.)

A man wearing a face mask walks past a painted wall during lockdown in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Tuesday
A man wearing a face mask walks past a painted wall during lockdown in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Tuesday. Photograph: Xinhua/REX/Shutterstock

In a message to the nation broadcast earlier, Pakistan’s prime minister, Imran Khan, called on people to stay at home for the sake of their elders, and said the Covid-19 crisis would not end any time soon, according to the live blog running on Dawn.

Khan added that he was disappointed by violence used against doctors in Quetta after they staged a demonstration over a lack of personal protective equipment.

Updated

US records highest one-day death toll from coronavirus

The US suffered its highest daily death toll from coronavirus on Tuesday, with 1,858 people succumbing to the disease, according to the latest data from Johns Hopkins University, Ed Pilkington and Joanna Walters report from New York.

The new peak in deaths was propelled by New York City, which remains the most stricken part of the country and which recorded 806 fatalities on Tuesday. The city has now recorded more than 4,000 deaths from the novel virus.

Recent statistics have heartened city authorities, suggesting that new cases and the number of people being treated in hospital might be starting to plateau. But the rising death toll suggests that much suffering still lies ahead.

On Monday some 731 people were killed by Covid-19 across New York state, the previous highest daily jump.

Updated

Many know about the British-Iranian dual national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who is out of jail in Tehran but under a form of house arrest waiting to know if she is to be allowed to return to her husband and daughter in London, writes Patrick Wintour, the Guardian’s diplomatic editor.

Fewer know about another dual national Anoosheh Ashoori, who is still being held in Evin Prison and was not one of the political prisoners temporarily released by the Iranian government in the wake of a coronavirus outbreak in Iran.

He is 65 today and this is the desperate message he sent by phone from jail, pleading with the UK government to do more to secure his release. He was sentenced to 10 years jail for spying, and fears he will contract the virus in jail. The only birthday present he wants is to return to his wife and two children in London.

Updated

The British and American cybersecurity agencies have issued a joint warning about a rise in cybercrime related to Covid, as attackers take advantage of weaknesses in remote working setups to hack, phish and scam people in self-isolation, Alex Hern, the Guardian’s UK technology editor, reports.

In the advisory, jointly issued by GCHQ’s National Cyber Security Centre and the US’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, internet users are warned to watch out for “emails containing malware which appear to have come from the the director general of the World Health Organization, and others which claim to offer thermometers and face masks to fight the pandemic”.

The agencies have also found cybercriminals “scanning for vulnerabilities in software and remote working tools”, aiming to exploit the absence of corporate IT protections to hack weak links in businesses.

Popular videoconferencing tool Zoom is one such tool, and interest in hacking techniques that could be used against it is “sky high”, according to one report in Vice. Successful attacks against the software, and other videoconferencing services, could be used to enable successful corporate espionage. “Industrial espionage is making millions now. Zoom, GTM, WebEx … all meetings where you needed an insider to get in before,” a source told Vice News.

Other Coronavirus-related scams are less high-tech. Security researchers at McAfee found one posting on a dark web forum where an individual claiming to have recovered from Coronavirus selling their blood to others. For just $1,000, the user offered a sample of their blood or saliva, which could be used harvested for antibodies – if they’re telling the truth.

Updated

The Afghan health minister has asked the Taliban to announce a ceasefire to help the fight against coronavirus, as Kabul goes under full lockdown and number of infections continues to surge, Akhtar Mohammad Makoii reports from Herat.

Officials in the country reported 21 new confirmed cases of coronavirus in last 24 hours, pushing the total number of infections to 444 since the country’s outbreak began.

However, due to a lack of some testing materials in Herat, no suspected patients tested for Covid-19 in Afghanistan’s worst-affected area in last 24 hours, a health ministry spokesman said, adding that materials were transferred to Herat this morning. As of yesterday the number of confirmed cases in the province was 257, including 41 health workers.

Health workers wait outside while the hospital where they work is disinfected, in Herat, the Afghan city worst affected by the coronavirus outbreak
Health workers wait outside while the hospital where they work is disinfected, in Herat, the Afghan city worst affected by the coronavirus outbreak. Photograph: Jalil Rezayee/EPA

The health minister warned that the virus would spread more if people did not comply with the recommended health measures.

“If we do not take this seriously, we will be harmed more than other countries” said Ferozuddin Feroz.

Asking the Taliban to declare a immediate ceasefire, Feroz, the minister of public health, told the paramilitary group that the coronavirus doesn’t know “friend or enemy, so let’s work together and fight against the virus”.

He was in Kandahar to inaugurate a Covid-19 special laboratory, where suspected cases of Covid-19 from Helmand, Uruzgan, and Zabul provinces would be tested.

Lockdown rules will be fully implemented in Kabul by use of force from Wednesday. Health workers and food suppliers, media workers, security officials and telecom services employees are exempt, the interior ministry said yesterday.

Afghanistan has recorded 15 deaths from Covid-19, while 29 patients have recovered.

Updated

Lebanon has long been a country that neither war nor crisis could defeat. But with a bankrupt economy, rampant poverty, a political class offering few solutions - and now coronavirus, the resilience of its people is being tested like never before.

Before the pandemic, Lebanon was in economic freefall, unable to pay its debts, or keep a lid on spiralling prices of food and medicine, and to stop a financial meltdown that threatens bank deposits.

Last November before the threat of Covid-19 materialised, the World Bank predicted that the portion of Lebanon’s population below the poverty line would rise from 30% to 50% in 2020. The lockdown imposed on 15 March has compounded an already dire situation and there are grave fears that the large numbers who have lost their incomes since – the majority of the country’s workforce – can no longer meet daily needs.

On Wednesday, the Lebanese government announced a relief plan to reach those already impoverished. But Human Rights Watch says the plan raises more questions than it answers.

“The lockdown to slow the spread of Covid-19 has compounded the poverty and economic hardship rampant in Lebanon before the virus arrived,” said Lena Simet, senior researcher on poverty and inequality at the organisation. “Many people who had an income have lost it, and if the government does not step in, more than half the population may not be able to afford food and basic necessities.”

Lebanon had recorded 548 coronavirus cases as of Tuesday night. However, there are fears that political groups are hiding large numbers of people with the virus, which they are treating away from the state health system. The country has arranged flights for expatriates to return, a rescue mission it has flagged as its biggest ever.

Updated

Several passengers on an Indonesian ferry jumped into the sea and swam ashore after authorities sought to block the vessel docking due to fears of suspected coronavirus cases, as tensions rise over the spread of the disease across the archipelago.

The ferry was blocked when trying to make port in Maumere in the eastern island of Flores, amid fears three crew members on board had contracted the virus, reports Reuters.

Passengers flung themselves into the sea in life vests and swam ashore.

The ferry was carrying 255 passengers, mostly migrant workers returning home from Malaysia, after the neighbouring country imposed a coronavirus lockdown. As of Wednesday, Indonesia had recorded 2,956 cases of the coronavirus and 240 deaths, with many of the cases in the capital, Jakarta, though there is a growing number in other provinces.

Updated

A scientist who adapted his veterinary lab to test for disease among humans rather than salmon is being celebrated for helping the Faroe Islands avoid coronavirus deaths, where a larger proportion of the population has been tested than anywhere in the world.

The north Atlantic archipelago currently has only one person in hospital with Covid-19 and it is one of five European countries, along with Latvia, Georgia, Malta and Liechtenstein to so far not have any deaths from the virus.

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the Netherlands rose by 969 to 20,549 as of Wednesday, health authorities said, with 147 new deaths.

Reuters reports the country’s total death toll from the disease is now 2,248, the Netherlands’ National Institute for Health (RIVM) said in a daily update.

Good afternoon. I’m Gregory Robinson, taking over the live blog for the next hour. If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter to share insight or send tips, I’m on @Gregoryjourno or send me an email at gregory.robinson@guardian.co.uk

Amid reports that life in Wuhan, the Chinese city where the coronavirus outbreak began in December, is returning to normal, a reader has written to give his experience of the easing of the lockdown.

Although many westerners left China at the beginning of the crisis, Mark Gaynor, who says he has lived in Wuhan for seven years, was in the city throughout the crisis. What has been widely reported as the end of Wuhan’s lockdown is somewhat different from his lived experience, he writes:

What you’ve seen happen today is the ‘exit door’ open to allow thousands of people who have been trapped in Wuhan for 76 days to finally go home.

Life for residents of Wuhan is still more restricted than UK’s so-called lockdown. Each district is controlled by its own local authority so it’s not entirely uniform but the basics are the same.

To leave the community residence you need a green health code via an app on your phone. This is tied to your Chinese ID card and logs who you are and where you are. Your temperature is also taken.

To use the limited public transport you also need to log in and out using the app. Foreigners don’t have an ID card so they can’t use it.

Anyone returning to work also needs a special certificate verifying that the business has been given permission to restart. Otherwise you’re expected to return to your home within two hours.

Restaurants, cafes, stores, anywhere that people might gather are still closed. I can get to the supermarket five minutes walk from my apartment block, that’s all.

One hour a day exercise? No way.

So nobody should be mistaken that life in Wuhan is back to normal. And people in the UK need to think about what lockdown really means.

A woman wearing a face mask adjusts her child’s mask as they arrive at Hankou Railway Station in Wuhan to take one of the first trains leaving the city
A woman wearing a face mask adjusts her child’s mask as they arrive at Hankou railway station in Wuhan to take one of the first trains leaving the city Photograph: Noel Celis/AFP via Getty Images

Updated

Iran has reported 121 new deaths from the novel coronavirus, bringing its overall number of fatalities to 3,993, AFP reports.

In the past 24 hours, 1,997 new cases of Covid-19 infection were detected in Iran, state news agency Irna quoted health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour as saying. That put the number of confirmed cases at 64,586, he added.

Iran, which announced its first Covid-19 cases on February 19, is by far the worst hit by the pandemic in the Middle East, according to official tolls. But there has been speculation abroad that the real number of deaths and infections in the country could be higher.

Jahanpour said that while 3,956 patients were in critical condition, those who recovered had reached 29,812.

In a bid to halt the spread of the pandemic, Iran ordered the closure of non-essential businesses and imposed inter-city travel bans, while refraining from a lockdown.

Updated

Health authorities in Ukraine have reported 206 new laboratory-confirmed cases of coronavirus, and seven new deaths.

The total number of confirmed cases of coronavirus since the outbreak began in the east European country now stands at 1,668, according to the latest data from the Ukrainian government.

Ukraine remains under strict lockdown measures, including bans on public gatherings of more than ten people, the closure of cafes, restaurants, gyms, museums and galleries, and tight restrictions on public transport.

The government has moved to reassure residents, saying on its information page: “The disease caused by the novel coronavirus, cannot be called ‘lethal’ as the lethality is 4-9%.”

On Tuesday, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Ukraine, Osnat Lubrani, warned that the civil conflict there was still a major concern, as fighting continued and civilian casualties mount amid the Covid-19 outbreak. In a statement she said:

The people of Ukraine, together with countless millions across the world, are confronted with a global crisis that is menacing all of humanity: the Covid-19 pandemic. Against this backdrop, the increase in civilian casualties in eastern Ukraine, which have reached their highest level since September 2019, is deeply concerning.

I urge all concerned to heed UN secretary general António Guterres’s call for a global ceasefire and put aside differences to focus on stopping the spread of the virus. This is a time for solidarity. Urgent, collective action is needed now to address the pandemic and to assist those most vulnerable.

Updated

Pope Francis has admitted to moments of selfishness while living in lockdown at the Vatican, and has saluted people on the frontline of the fight against the coronavirus, including doctors and shop workers, as “the saints who live next door”, writes Harriet Sherwood.

With characteristic frankness, the pope said he struggled with “self-preoccupation” in a largely solitary existence. “Of course I have my areas of selfishness. On Tuesdays, my confessor comes, and I take care of things there,” he said in an interview published in the Catholic weekly the Tablet. He added:

I’m thinking at this time of the saints who live next door. They are heroes – doctors, volunteers, religious sisters, priests, shop workers – all performing their duty so that society can continue functioning. How many doctors and nurses have died! How many religious sisters have died! All serving … If we become aware of this miracle of the next-door saints, if we can follow their tracks, the miracle will end well, for the good of all.

Updated

Health authorities in Nigeria reported 16 new cases in the country in a statement last night, with the majority in Lagos, the country’s economic centre.

According to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control there have now been 254 confirmed cases of Covid-19 detected in the country, of whom six have died and 44 have recovered.

A government minister in South Africa has been placed on special leave after she was seen violating the country’s coronavirus lockdown by visiting a friend’s house for lunch.

Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, the country’s communications and digital technologies minister, appeared in a picture posted on Instagram on Sunday with five other people at at the home of a former deputy minister earlier that day.

Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, right, South Africa’s communications and digital technologies minister, in a picture taken in February
Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, right, South Africa’s communications and digital technologies minister, in a picture taken in February. Photograph: Rodger Bosch/AFP via Getty Images

It came after the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, had ordered a three-week national lockdown to try to brake the virus, which has infected 1,749 people, killing 13 of them, according to an official tally.

“President Ramaphosa has placed the minister on special leave for two months,” Ramaphosa’s office said in a statement. The president has “accepted the minister’s apology for the violation but was unmoved by mitigating factors she tendered”, it said. Ramaphosa was quoted as saying:

The nation-wide lockdown calls for absolute compliance on the part of all South Africans. Members of the national executive carry a special responsibility in setting an example to South Africans, who are having to make great sacrifices.

None of us – not least a member of the national executive – should undermine our national effort to save lives in this very serious situation. I am satisfied that Minister Ndabeni-Abrahams appreciates the seriousness of what she has done and that no-one is above the law.

Updated

The German economy is expected to shrink by nearly 10% in the second quarter as a result of the economic impact of lockdown conditions to stem the spread of coronavirus, according to research institutes in the country.

“The corona pandemic will trigger a serious recession in Germany,” the six thinktanks, including Ifo, DIW and RWI, said in their annual spring report, according to AFP.

Gross domestic product is likely to have contracted by 1.9% in the first three months of 2020, and is set to shrink by a 9.8% year-on-year in the second quarter, with normal economic life still essentially frozen by widespread shutdowns.

The second-quarter plunge is twice as big as seen during the 2008-09 financial crisis and marks the steepest fall since the institutes’ records began in 1970, the report noted.

A deserted restaurant in Berlin on Monday. The German economy is forecast to shrink by nearly 10% in the second quarter of 2020
A deserted restaurant in Berlin on Monday. The German economy is forecast to shrink by nearly 10% in the second quarter of 2020. Photograph: David Heerde/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

Spain reports 757 new Covid-19 deaths

Spain has reported 757 deaths in the past 24 hours, a slight increase from the 743 deaths reported one day earlier, writes Ashifa Kassam in Madrid.

The virus has now claimed 14,555 lives in the country, while another 146,690 have tested positive, according to the health ministry.

This week has seen the daily death toll grow by 5% compared with around 9% one week earlier, the country’s health minister said on Wednesday. “We have reached the peak of the curve and we are in a slowdown phase,” Salvador Illa told parliament.

Spanish Civil Guard officers stop cars at a checkpoint near San Sebastian de los Reyes, on the outskirts of Madrid on Tuesday
Spanish civil guard officers stop cars at a checkpoint near San Sebastián de los Reyes, on the outskirts of Madrid on Tuesday Photograph: Bernat Armangué/AP

The latest figures come amid speculation that the actual number of Covid-19 deaths in Spain is much higher than official figures.

Recently released data from judicial authorities in Madrid, for example, suggest that 6,600 more people than usual died in the last two weeks of March, compared with the official tally of 3,500 Covid-19 deaths in the region.

When pressed, the health minister argued that Spain’s criteria ranks among the most stringent in Europe. “Everyone who tests positive and dies is counted as having died due to the coronavirus,” Illa told reporters.

His explanation suggests that those who have died in elderly care homes and private residences – the vast majority of whom were not tested for the virus – are not included in the data.

Spain’s justice ministry has responded by requesting judicial authorities to urgently send all records of burials and cremations that have taken place since emergency measures were imposed in mid-March, according to broadcaster Cadena Ser.

A homeless man rests on a street in Barcelona, Catalonia
A homeless man rests on a street in Barcelona, Catalonia, on Tuesday. Officials in the region have told people with mild symptoms to self-isolate instead of seeking testing. Photograph: Toni Albir/EPA

The confusion over the official figures comes as the Spanish government seeks to gauge the spread of the virus across the country. In the coming days, the health ministry said it would begin mass testing on more than 62,000 randomly chosen people.

After hard-hit regions such as Madrid and Catalonia instructed people with mild symptoms to self-isolate rather than seek testing, health officials in Spain have estimated that as many 90% of the country’s cases may have gone undetected.

Updated

More than 17,000 people in Australia have joined a movement to stage a rent and mortgage payment strike, as many people in the country face running out of money as they are forced to self-isolate.

With the global lockdown hammering vital sectors including hospitality and tourism, many workers face destitution from lost jobs or slashed hours, or from running out of limited sick pay entitlements if they are forced to take time off work.

A campaign to raise awareness of the strike, created by the local chapter of the Industrial Workers of the World union, is running on the Megaphone website - with 17,115 signatories so far.

It comes as calls for rent strikes are growing across the world, including in the US, where renters in California are calling for collective action, and in the UK, where groups of students at two universities, Bristol and SOAS, have already begun withholding rent.

In a statement on Megaphone, the Australian campaign organisers say:

As renters and mortgagors we need to pledge, en-masse, that we will collectively withhold all rental and mortgage payments while the COVID-19 pandemic requires vulnerable people to isolate without security of income and housing.

Renters must demand a rent amnesty from our landlords or real estate agents.

Mortgagors must demand a repayment amnesty from our banks and mortgage holders. This has already been done in Italy, and will make a rent amnesty possible.

We must all ensure that no member of our community is evicted, fined, or put into debt because they can’t pay rent or mortgage repayments while the COVID-19 outbreak is considered a pandemic.

Here’s a roundup of some of the most important developments over the last few hours:

  • The World Health Organization has said it is “deeply concerned” over the development of Covid-19 in Europe. Regional director Dr Hans Henri P Kluge said the continent accounted for about half of confirmed cases globally and warned governments against relaxing lockdown measures.
  • Mumbai is to extend its lockdown until at least 30 April. The city, which has a population of more than 20 million, has become the centre of the country’s coronavirus outbreak. Other parts of India are scheduled to lift restrictions on Tuesday.
  • Singapore has announced plans to boost food production amid concerns over shortages. As part of the plans, the city-state, which produces only 10% of its food needs, will turn carpark rooftops into urban farms.
  • Italy has closed its ports to migrant ships because of the pandemic. The decision, made by the government late last night, means charity migrant boats can no longer dock.
  • Concerns are mounting over the spread of the virus in Greek refugee camps. The government has said new asylum requests will not be examined during the crisis, leaving thousands trapped in camps. A total of 1,832 cases have been confirmed in the country.
  • The UK is “nowhere near lifting the lockdown”, according to the London mayor. Sadiq Khan made the comments as the prime minister, Boris Johnson, remained in intensive care with symptoms of the virus.

That’s it from me, Amy Walker, for today. I’ll be handing over to my colleague Damien Gayle.

Updated

Germany will take in up to 500 unaccompanied minors from Greek migrant camps over the coming weeks, foreign minister Heiko Maas said on Wednesday, in an effort to ease the pressure on the camps caused by the coronavirus outbreak.

“We said (to the Greek authorities and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees) that we want to take in between 350 and 500 children in the next few weeks,” Maas said in an interview with the RTL/ntv broadcaster, AFP reports.

The minister said he hoped other countries would follow suit. “We want to set an example here.”

The transfers could begin next week, the interior ministry said in a statement.

The children and adolescents, who arrived at the camps without their parents, “will at first be placed in quarantine for two weeks” before being housed in various regions, the ministry said.

Updated

This is Damien Gayle taking over this live blog for the next eight or so hours, with the latest updates in coronavirus news from around the world.

If you have any tips, comments or suggestions for coverage – particularly about regions or topics we’re lacking - please do send me an email to damien.gayle@theguardian.com, or a direct message via my Twitter profile, @damiengayle. If you’re sending us news from your area, if possible please do include a link so that I can source the information in any blog post I write.

I try my best to get to all messages, but it is not always possible, so if I miss yours then please accept my apologies in advance!

Updated

Ethiopia has declared a state of emergency in order to curb the spread of the coronavirus.

Prime minister Abiy Ahmed’s office said on Twitter: “The Ethiopian government has declared an emergency because of the worsening epidemic.”

There are 52 confirmed cases of the Covid-19 in Ethiopia, and two people have died, according to John Hopkins University.

WHO says Europe's Covid-19 outbreak is still "very concerning"

During an update on the development of the virus on the continent, regional director Dr Hans Henri P Kluge said the “progress” Europe had made so far was “extremely fragile. He added:

To think we are coming close to an end point would be a dangerous thing to do. The virus leaves no room for error or complacency.

Any shift in our response strategy, relaxing of lockdown status or physical distancing measures requires very careful consideration.

He warned that while the death toll was beginning to level off in hard-hit countries Italy and Spain, now was “not the time” to relax measures.

Seven of the top 10 countries that are most affected by the virus are located in Europe, where as of this morning, 687,236 people have tested positive and 52,824 people have died.

Updated

Russia reported a record increase in new coronavirus cases for a third straight day as the country’s tally of confirmed infections rose above 8,600.

Health officials reported 1,175 new cases in the country, a 15.7% increase to bring Russia’s total number of cases to 8,672.

It recorded 1,154 new cases on Tuesday and 954 on Monday. The majority of the cases are located in Moscow, where 12 million city residents have been told to stay at home until the end of April.

Veronika Skvortsova, a senior Russian health official, said yesterday that Russia should expect to reach its peak for infections in the next 10-14 days, with the plateau lasting until mid-June.

Updated

“Now is not the time to relax measures, it is the time to once again double and triple our collective efforts to drive towards suppression,” says Kluge.

He adds stresses that knowledge of the virus, and some positive signs from some countries does not yet represent victory.

“Infection occurs across all ages but proportionally less in children under the age of 15,” says Kluge.

“The burden of severe disease is greater in older people, particularly men and those with underlying health conditions.”

“Although the majority of cases remain mild, almost 40% result in hospitalisation and 5% require intensive care. Among those who have lost their lives, two-thirds are male and 95% are over the age of 60.

“Most of these individuals had one or a combination of underlying conditions. Cardiovascular disease in 66%, diabetes in 29% and renal disease in 21%.”

In both Spain and Italy, the “daily death toll is levelling off”, says Kluge.

He adds that 10 days after the implementation of broad public health and social measures, cases began to decline in Germany.

Mortality rates and the median age of confirmed cases in the country are lower than the average elsewhere. Kluge said:

This is linked to a range of factors including operation demography and widespread testing.

“Further good progress is being observed in Austria, the Netherlands and Switzerland.”

Cases of coronavirus in Europe account for about half of those globally, says WHO regional director Dr Hans Henri P Kluge.

Seven of the top 10 countries that are most affected by the virus are located in Europe.

New confirmed cases on the continent continue to increase, with the total number of confirmed cases standing at 687,236 as of this morning, including 52,824 deaths.

Updated

The World Health Organization has begun a situation update on the outbreak of Covid-19 in Europe.

Updated

If further evidence were needed, there are more signs this morning of coronavirus hitting the most vulnerable – in this case refugees.

Greece’s alternate minister for migration, Giorgos Koumoutsakos, says new asylum requests will not be examined until the asylum service and its officers – who must meet applicants in person – can operate again. The news will be a blow for the thousands trapped in camps often forced to wait years for asylum applications to be processed.

But speaking to Thema 104,6 radio on Wednesday, Koumoutsakos said migrants and refugees would “have the right to submit requests”.

And he sought to clear up confusion over the estimated 2,000 people who had slipped into Greece from Turkey after 1 March when Athens suspended asylum applications in response to Ankara announcing it was relaxing controls and opening the gates to Europe. “They will be judged on a personal basis, and quickly, and so very soon we will know who among them is in need of international protection and who is not and can be returned back [to their countries].”

Greek authorities were forced over the weekend to place a second migrant facility outside Athens in quarantine because of coronavirus fears.

The two camps – in Ritsona and Malakassa – will be sealed off for two weeks. Police reinforcements have been dispatched to enforce the lockdown, patrolling the periphery of both round the clock. The move came after testing revealed infections in the installations.

Those now diagnosed with the potentially deadly disease have been isolated in both sites, among 30 on the Greek mainland. The development has raised concerns for the 36,000 men, women and children living in vastly overcrowded camps on Aegean islands facing the Turkish coast where social distancing and other precautionary measures in the age of the novel virus are an impossible privilege.

By Tuesday evening, a total of 1,832 coronavirus cases had been confirmed in Greece with authorities announcing that 81 people had died.

Updated

Italy has closed its ports to migrant ships because of the coronavirus epidemic.

The government ruled on Tuesday evening that ports cannot be considered safe and will not let charity migrant boats dock.

The decision was taken after German non-profit organisation Sea-Eye headed towards Italy after picking up 150 people off Libya in one of its ships.

A photo from Sea-Eye which reportedly shows Libyan authorities approaching a small boat in distress off the Libyan coast during a rescue operation with the NGO vessel “Alan Kurdi”.
A photo from Sea-Eye which reportedly shows Libyan authorities approaching a small boat in distress off the Libyan coast during a rescue operation with the NGO vessel Alan Kurdi. Photograph: Cedric Fettouche/AFP via Getty Images

“For the entire duration of the national health emergency caused by the spread of the Covid-19 virus, Italian ports cannot guarantee the requisites needed to be classified and defined as a place of safety,” the decree said.

Although the national emergency is set to end on 31 July, the deadline could be extended.

Updated

While the UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, is in hospital with coronavirus symptoms, the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, is deputising.

Our political correspondent Peter Walker looks into what this actually means and what powers Raab will have in this explainer:

Updated

Irish police are to increase checkpoints and patrols this weekend to deter Easter travel, hardening what has until now been a soft application of lockdown in Ireland.

The minister for health, Simon Harris, on Tuesday night signed regulations giving gardaí new powers to restrict people’s movements and gatherings over the next five days. Penalties for violations include fines of up to €2,500 and up to six months in prison.

A person cannot leave home without a reasonable excuse, including legal, medical and family obligations, accessing essential services, and exercising within 2km of home. Gardai are expected to be especially vigilant at parks and beauty spots.

Restrictions on social and commercial life are due to expire on Sunday but authorities have signalled they will be extended.

Donald Trump has criticised the World Health Organization (WHO), and by implication Beijing, saying the global body is “China centric” and “biased” towards the rival superpower.

As Wuhan, the city at the centre of the outbreak, began to return to normal life, Trump said the WHO had “been wrong about a lot of things”, and threatened to put a hold on WHO funding. When asked if that was a good idea during a pandemic, Trump denied saying it, and then said they would “look at it”.

You can read the full report by Guardian Australia reporter Helen Davidson here:

Mumbai set to extend lockdown until at least 30 April

India’s financial hub Mumbai is set to extend lockdown measures until at least 30 April, officials have said.

A three week nationwide lockdown imposed by prime minister Narendra Modi is officially set to end next Tuesday.

But in Mumbai, authorities are racing to expand testing to slow down the spread of coronavirus cases.

The city, which has a population of more than 20 million, has become India’s virus epicentre.

On Wednesday, the latest health bulletin reported 782 positive cases and 50 deaths.

“In Mumbai cases are rising too fast. In just 24 hours 100 cases were reported on Tuesday,” said one of three senior officials who spoke to Reuters.

He added that an extension of current measures for at least another two weeks was necessary to stop Covid-19 from spreading in one of the world’s most populated cities.

Yesterday, our south Asia correspondent Hannah Ellis-Peterson and freelance journalist Shaikh Azizur Rahman wrote about the scramble to contain the virus in one of Mumbai’s slums.

Updated

A midnight light show lit up the sky in Wuhan as the former centre of the coronavirus outbreak celebrated its ‘reopening’.

On Wednesday, the Chinese city began lifting outbound travel restrictions after nearly 11 weeks of lockdown.

Skyscrapers and bridges across the Yangtze river radiated with images of health workers, troops, police officers and other key workers.

The UK is nowhere near ready to lift the lockdown measures it put in place to tackle the spread of Covid-19, London’s mayor Sadiq Khan has said.

Prime minister Boris Johnson, who is currently in intensive care after his coronavirus symptoms worsened, imposed the measures on 23 March, saying that they would be reviewed after three weeks.

With the date approaching, Khan told the BBC on Wednesday: “I think we are nowhere near lifting the lockdown.

“We think the peak, which is the worst part of the virus, is still probably a week and a half away.”

My colleague Sarah Marsh is currently running a separate liveblog with updates on the development of coronavirus in the UK:

Updated

Cases of the virus have risen to 8,672 in Russia, after they increased by more than 1,000 for the second day running.

The crisis response centre reported on Wednesday that the number of cases had gone up by 1,175, a record daily rise, while the number of people who have died has increased by five to 63.

Updated

French flagship military aircraft carrier, the Charles de Gaulle, is on its way back to port after staff on board showed symptoms in line with those of the coronavirus.

France’s armed forces ministry said on Wednesday that around 40 staff members were currently under strict medical observation.

French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle seen off the coast of Denmark in March.
French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle seen off the coast of Denmark in March. Photograph: Henning Bagger/EPA

Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey has pledged to donate $1bn (£800m) to fund coronavirus research.

Dorsey, who co-founded Twitter in 2006 and went on to found payments company Square, tweeted on Tuesday that he was donating $1bn of Square shares to a charitable fund, called Start Small, to “fund global Covid-19 relief”.

Dorsey, 43, said the donation was equivalent to about 28% of his wealth. Dorsey has a fortune of about $3.9bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Singapore announces plans to boost food production

Singapore has announced new plans to boost food production, including by turning car park rooftops into urban farms, as the Covid-19 pandemic disrupts global supply chains.

The city-state only produces around 10% of its food needs, but restrictions on population movement are wreaking havoc on farming and food supply chains – raising concern of shortages and price increases.

“The current COVID-19 situation underscores the importance of local food production, as part of Singapore’s strategies to ensure food security,” authorities said in a statement.

Vegetable seedlings at a rooftop hydroponics farm at an industrial estate in Singapore.
Vegetable seedlings at a rooftop hydroponics farm at an industrial estate in Singapore. Photograph: Edgar Su/Reuters

“Local food production mitigates our reliance on imports, and provides buffer in the event of food supply disruptions.”

Authorities have assured residents that Singapore has sufficient food supplies amid bouts of panic buying, but aim to ramp up local production over the coming months.

Under the plans, a $21m grant will be provided to support the production of eggs, leafy vegetables and fish, as well as identifying alternative farming spaces such as vacant industrial sites.

As part of the project, the Singapore food agency will next month launch a tender for rooftop farms on public housing car parks for urban farming.

Updated

Loans worth €6bn ($6.5bn) to bail out airline group Air France-KLM is a “realistic” figure, a French junior transport minister has said.

“You are talking about an amount which is not unrealistic, I can confirm that,” Jean-Baptiste Djebbari told French news channel LCI TV on Wednesday.

He added that the possible aid package was being discussed by the French finance ministry and the Dutch government.

Airlines across the globe grounded most of their fleets as global demand for flights plummeted amid travel bans to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

In the US, airlines will receive nearly $60bn in financial assistance as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act.

Updated

New cases of Covid-19 have risen in Germany for the second day after four days of drops, data from the Robert Koch Institute has shown.

The number of confirmed infections grew by 4,003 in the past 24 hours to 103,228 on Wednesday.

The federal government agency also reported that the death toll rose by 254 to 1,861.

A bicyclist riding down the deserted Friederichstrasse, one of Berlin’s prime shopping streets, during the coronavirus lockdown on Tuesday.
A bicyclist riding down the deserted Friederichstrasse, one of Berlin’s prime shopping streets, during the coronavirus lockdown on Tuesday. Photograph: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

It is not unusual for a dip to be followed by a rise in the number of cases in Germany after a weekend due to the way in which they report data.

Updated

The last-minute decision to carry out the May presidential election by post in Poland due to the coronavirus pandemic has raised concerns, EU values and transparency commissioner Vera Jourova has said.

“I followed this process very closely. I’m concerned about free and fair elections and the quality of voting, of the legality and constitutionality of such a vote,” she told the Polish daily newspaper Rzeczpospolita on Wednesday.

This week, the country’s parliament, where ruling nationalists, the Law and Justice party, have a majority in alliance with two other parties, backed a plan to conduct the election on 10 May by postal ballot to limit the risks of spreading the virus.

Critics accuse the party of prioritising its own political interests over public health.

This is Amy Walker, taking over the global liveblog from my colleague Helen Sullivan. You can get in touch or follow me on Twitter (@amyrwalker).

Updated

That’s it from me, Helen Sullivan for today. I leave you now in the company of my colleague Amy Walker.

It has been 100 days since the WHO was first alerted to the existence of a new virus. Not sure about you, but where I’m sitting (at home) it feels a lot longer.

My colleague Michael Safi takes you through the first three-and-a-bit months of the coronavirus crisis in the story below. It’s well worth a read. What a way to start the new decade.

Campaigners have welcomed the relaxation of immigration restrictions by governments across Europe and the Americas to allow doctors, nurses and other key workers from refugee and migrant communities to join efforts against coronavirus.

And they urged countries still preventing medically trained asylum seekers from working – including Britain – to follow suit

Updated

Fears of power vacuum as PM stays in ICU

Flowers from the Pakistan embassy are delivered to 10 Downing Street in central London, on 7April, 2020.
Flowers from the Pakistan embassy are delivered to 10 Downing Street in central London, on 7April, 2020. Photograph: Tolga Akmen/AFP via Getty Images

Boris Johnson has spent a second night in intensive care in a “stable” condition with coronavirus symptoms as questions about who was running the country continued to rage. The prime minister was said to be breathing without assistance and was conscious at St Thomas’ hospital in London.

Dominic Raab, who is the prime minister’s “designated survivor”, led the daily government briefing yesterday and said the PM would “pull through”. But it remains unclear how long Johnson will be in hospital and Raab said he would need cabinet agreement to reach any major decision such as lifting the lockdown. No 10 said last night that there would be no review of the curbs next week as promised by Johnson when he introduced them three weeks ago.

It was a testing day for Raab as Britain recorded its biggest daily death toll so far and an American university forecast that the UK would be the worst-hit country in Europe. Chief medical officer Chris Whitty also admitted the UK must learn from Germany, where the death rate has been far lower.

Updated

How did coronavirus start and where did it come from? Was it really Wuhan’s animal market?

In the public mind, the origin story of coronavirus seems well fixed: in late 2019, someone at the now-world-famous Huanan seafood market in Wuhan was infected with a virus from an animal.

The rest is part of an awful history still in the making, with Covid-19 spreading from that first cluster in the capital of China’s Hubei province to a pandemic that has killed about 80,000 people so far.

But there is uncertainty about several aspects of the Covid-19 origin story that scientists are trying hard to unravel, including which species passed it to a human. They’re trying hard because knowing how a pandemic starts is a key to stopping the next one.

Updated

Here is a wrap of the most important developments over the last few hours.

Donald Trump has criticised the World Health Organization (WHO), and by implication Beijing, saying the global body is “China-centric” and “biased” towards the rival superpower.

As Wuhan, the city at the centre of the outbreak, began to return to normal life, Trump said the WHO had “been wrong about a lot of things”, and threatened to put a hold on WHO funding. When asked if that was a good idea during a pandemic, Trump denied saying it, and then said they would “look at it”.

The US has nearly 400,000 cases, and 13,000 deaths, compared with close to 83,000 cases in China and 3,337 deaths. Globally, there are more than 1.4m cases and just over 82,000 deaths.

Meanwhile, the British prime minister, Boris Johnson has spent a second night in intensive care amid concerns about the seriousness of his condition, and the power vacuum he leaves behind. His “designated survivor”, Dominic Raab, still requires cabinet approval for major decisions.

There are fears the UK will become the worst hit country in Europe, with more than 40% of the continent’s deaths, according to forecasts.

Updated

UK papers on Wednesday, 8 April 2020

Here’s a look at this morning’s front pages in the UK, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson spends his second night in intensive care with coronavirus.

Methadone to be handed out without prescription during Covid-19 crisis

Pharmacists are to be allowed to hand out a range of super-strength medicines, including the heroin substitute methadone, without prescription during the Covid-19 crisis, under emergency measures that official drug policy advisers have warned could trigger a spike in drug misuse.

100 Days that Changed the World

A turbulent decade had reached its final day. It was New Year’s Eve 2019 and much of the world was preparing to celebrate.

The obituaries of the 2010s had dwelt on eruptions and waves that would shape the era ahead: Brexit, the Syrian civil war, refugee crises, social media proliferation, and nationalism roaring back to life. They were written too soon.

It was not until these last hours, before the toasts and countdowns had commenced, that the decade’s most consequential development of all broke the surface.

At 1.38pm on 31 December, a Chinese government website announced the detection of a “pneumonia of unknown cause” in the area surrounding the South China seafood wholesale market in Wuhan, an industrial city of 11 million people. Outside China, its discovery was barely noticed.

Over the next 100 days, the virus would freeze international travel, extinguish economic activity and confine half of humanity to their homes, infecting more than a million people and counting, including the British prime minister, the heir to the British throne, an Iranian vice-president, and Idris Elba. By the middle of April, more than 75,000 would be dead.

Ardern optimistic as New Zealand records lowest number of Covid-19 cases for two weeks

New Zealand has recorded its lowest number of new coronavirus cases in a fortnight, one day after testing a record number of people.

There were 50 new confirmed or probable cases of Covid-19 in New Zealand on Wednesday, with 4,098 tests for the virus processed on Tuesday.

The number of new cases dropped from 54 on Tuesday and 67 on Monday. New Zealand’s government announced a strict national lockdown a fortnight ago that requires everyone except essential workers to stay home at all times, unless they are accessing vital services or walking for exercise.

Jacinda Ardern, the prime minister, said while the country “might see bumps along the way,” she was encouraged that the country might be “turning a corner” in quashing the spread of the virus.

“I have cautious optimism, but now is the time to stay the course,” she told reporters at parliament in Wellington on Wednesday.

You can get in touch with me directly on Twitter @helenrsullivan. While I’m not able to respond to every message right away, I do try to read them all. Thank you to everyone who has sent news and other helpful bits of information so far today.

Summary

  • British prime minister Boris Johnson remains in intensive care. The foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, who is running the government while Boris Johnson receives treatment in hospital for coronavirus, says he is confident the prime minister will recover. Johnson is spending a second night in intensive care.
  • Leading disease data analysts have projected that the UK will become the worst-affected country in Europe, accounting for more than 40% of total deaths across the continent.
  • London’s NHS Nightingale opens with 4,000 beds. The first patients were admitted on Tuesday evening to the new NHS Nightingale hospital. Some of the 4,000 beds in the health facility have already been taken up by Covid-19 patients.
  • Official global death toll passes 82,000. According to researchers at Johns Hopkins University, there have been 82,133 deaths so far. There are currently at least 1,430,453 confirmed cases worldwide. Due to suspected under-reporting, these figures are likely to be lower than the true statistics.
  • After 11 weeks of lockdown, the first train departed Wednesday morning from a re-opened Wuhan, the origin point for the coronavirus pandemic, as residents once again were allowed to travel in and out of the sprawling central Chinese city, AP reports.
  • US president Donald Trump has threatened to withdraw funding from the World Health Organization, which he says is “China-centric”. At Monday evening’s press briefing, after saying he would withdraw funding, he walked that back and said he was “looking into it”.
  • Schools and workplaces will be closed in Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital, as greater restrictions are imposed to slow the spread of coronavirus in the city, where a sudden rise in burials has raised concerns over undetected cases.
  • Former Chinese property executive who criticised Xi is under investigation. Ren Zhiqiang went missing last month after criticising President Xi Jinping over his handling of the coronovirus outbreak. He is under investigation for “serious disciplinary violation”, the Beijing municipal anti-corruption watchdog said in a statement late on Tuesday.
  • US folk and country singer John Prine has died aged 73 due to complications from Covid-19. Prine was hospitalised on 26 March, and was in intensive care for 13 days before dying on Tuesday, at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Tennessee.
  • Africa, the world’s second-largest continent, now has at least 10,000 cases – and experts believe the true scale of the outbreak is much greater. More than 1,700 of the cases are in South Africa, which has been rolling out an aggressive testing campaign.
  • Turkey has world’s fastest rising infection rate. The number is increasing by more than 3,000 a day, reaching 30,217 since the first case was confirmed four weeks ago. Reported fatalities remain much lower than other badly hit countries, at 649.
  • The death toll in Italy continues to rise. The country reported 604 more deaths, though it marked the lowest day-to-day increase in new infections since introducing quarantine measures. New cases rose 0.9% to 880.
  • The US is still obstructing medical supply shipment. Justin Trudeau says Canada still has more work to do to persuade Washington to ensure supplies flow freely, after it emerged Donald Trump had blocked a shipment of masks to Ontario.
  • The WHO held off recommending face mask use. Experts say that, despite evidence suggesting widespread use of masks could help reduce the virus’ spread, they are insufficient on their own, despite many places making them mandatory.

Hundreds of people held under mandatory quarantine in Kenya after returning from abroad are up in arms after the government extended their confinement for another 14 days.

An employee of the Kenyan Ministry of Health fumigates a Government designated quarantine facility in Nairobi on 1 April 2020.
An employee of the Kenyan Ministry of Health fumigates a Government designated quarantine facility in Nairobi on 1 April 2020. Photograph: AFP via Getty Images

Around 2,000 people were placed in forced quarantine as they arrived in the country from 22 March until international flights were banned three days later, a chaotic process criticised by some passengers as likely to have helped spread the virus.

Mixed with those who had been in contact with patients who tested positive, the quarantined Kenyans and foreigners make up some 80% of the country’s coronavirus patients.

Kenya has recorded 172 cases and six deaths.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has stepped up measures to stem rapidly growing coronavirus cases in Turkey but his refusal to impose a full lockdown to keep the economy afloat is drawing criticism, AFP reports.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference in Istanbul, Turkey on 6 April 2020.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference in Istanbul, Turkey on 6 April 2020. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

With gatherings banned, restrictions on intercity trips, and the obligation to wear masks almost anywhere, Erdogan has imposed a series of tough measures but thus far resisted calls for a complete confinement.

Parliament began on Tuesday debating a government-sponsored bill to release up to a third of detainees in the country’s overcrowded prisons as a safety measure against the coronavirus outbreak.

With 34,109 cases and 725 deaths, according to official figures published on Tuesday, Turkey is the ninth country in the world most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

What’s alarming is the fast spread of the disease in Turkey, which reported its first official case on March 11. The number of cases is doubling in every few days: From 7,400 on March 28, it reached 15,000 on April 1 and exceeded 30,000 on Monday, according to official figures.

Podcast: How are African countries coping with Covid-19?

Sarah Boseley speaks to Prof Trudie Lang about the outbreak on the continent and explores how a history of responding to Ebola and other public health emergencies could help.

On 21 February, the Lombardy province of Lodi was at the centre of Italy’s coronavirus outbreak when the first locally transmitted case was confirmed in the town of Codogno. The town was immediately put under lockdown, with 10 others across the province, which lies south of Milan, following suit the next day.

Today, as calls to emergency lines return to pre-outbreak levels, Lodi is offering a glimmer of hope for how the rest of Italy might overcome the pandemic and make its way out of the lockdown.

In recent weeks, the province, which has a population of about 230,000, has seen a sustained decline in the rate of new infections, with total cases by Monday reaching 2,278, a rise of 23 since Sunday.

“The first few days were very brutal, characterised by a significant number of patients with breathing difficulties,” said Stefano Paglia, the chief of the emergency unit at Codogno and Lodi city hospital.

“Now the situation is normalising, we still deal with some Covid-19 patients, but the situation has gone from one of maximum emergency to returning to more ordinary levels of management.”

Authoritarian Turkmenistan gathered thousands of citizens for mass exercise events to mark World Health Day, state media said, ignoring the global trend for social distancing to fight the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Central Asian country, along with North Korea, is one of a handful of territories which claim they have no cases of the virus which is sweeping across the globe.

A state television broadcast late on Tuesday showed hundreds of people wearing identical coloured tracksuits cycling in close formation on a cold, damp day in the capital Ashgabat.

State media said 7,000 citizens participated in cycling events across the gas-rich ex-Soviet country to celebrate the date, which has been marked internationally since 1950.

Turkmenistan has yet to register a case of coronavirus, despite sharing a border with Iran, one of the first countries to be hit hard by the pandemic after China.

The country’s government is notoriously secretive and national statistics, whether health-related or economic, are regularly doubted by field experts.

Asian stocks stepped back on Wednesday after two sessions of sharp gains as investors tempered their optimism about the coronavirus.

A pedestrian walks past a quotation board displaying share prices of the Tokyo Stock Exchange in Tokyo on 7 April 2020.
A pedestrian walks past a quotation board displaying share prices of the Tokyo Stock Exchange in Tokyo on 7 April 2020. Photograph: Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP via Getty Images

Not helping sentiment were wild swings in the oil market, where prices rebounded in Asia after sliding on Tuesday to leave traders feeling dizzy, Reuters reports.

US crude futures jumped 5.5% to $24.93 a barrel, having shed 9.4% the session before, while Brent crude added 75 cents to $32.62.

The erratic action spilled over into equities with MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan losing 0.7%.

Japan’s Nikkei went the other way and added 0.4%, while Shanghai blue chips lost 0.6%.

E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 wobbled either side of flat, while Eurostoxx 50 futures dropped 1.1%.

The S&P 500 had ended Tuesday down 0.16%, having been up as much as 3.5% at one stage. The Nasdaq dropped 0.33% and the Dow 0.12%.

Updated

UK will have Europe's worst coronavirus death toll, says study

A disturbing report for our friends in the UK from the Guardian’s health editor Sarah Boseley.

World-leading disease data analysts have projected that the UK will become the country worst hit by the coronavirus pandemic in Europe, accounting for more than 40% of total deaths across the continent.

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) in Seattle predicts 66,000 UK deaths from Covid-19 by August, with a peak of nearly 3,000 a day, based on a steep climb in daily deaths early in the outbreak.

Projected daily deaths in UK

The IHME modelling forecasts that by 4 August the UK will see a total of 66,314 deaths – an average taken from a large estimate range of between 14,572 and 219,211 deaths, indicating the uncertainties around it.

The newly released data is disputed by scientists whose modelling of the likely shape of the UK epidemic is relied on by the government. Prof Neil Ferguson, of Imperial College London, said the IHME figures on “healthcare demand” – including hospital bed use and deaths – were twice as high as they should be.

The IHME, which is responsible for the ongoing Global Burden of Disease study, estimated the peak is expected in 10 days’ time, on 17 April. At that point the country will need more than 102,000 hospital beds, the IHME says. There are nearly 18,000 available, meaning a shortfall of 85,000.

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Schools and workplaces will be closed in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta

Our Southeast Asia correspondent, Rebecca Ratcliffe, has this report from Indonesia, which has been criticised for failing to act quickly in response to the coronavirus threat and for downplaying the threat of the virus in the country. She writes:

Schools and workplaces will be closed in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, as greater restrictions are imposed to slow the spread of coronavirus in the city, where a sudden rise in burials has raised concerns over undetected cases.

People wearing face masks, amid the Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak, commute at Tanah Abang train station in Jakarta.
People wearing face masks, amid the Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak, commute at Tanah Abang train station in Jakarta. Photograph: Adek Berry/AFP via Getty Images

President Joko Widodo has previously resisted lockdown measures imposed in many other south-east Asian nations, but there are fears infections are not being spotted by authorities.

So far, officials have confirmed 2,738 cases of coronavirus, and 221 deaths, most of which have occurred in Jakarta. But the country of 264 million is reportedly able to process only 240 of the most accurate tests a day and is instead relying on rapid tests that are less effective.

The first case was not confirmed in Indonesia until 2 March, prompting fears that the virus may have been left to spread, especially in the country’s densely populated capital.

The full story is here:

Updated

South Korean President Moon Jae-in said on Wednesday the government will make an additional 36 trillion won ($29.5 billion) worth of cheap loans available for exporters hit by the coronavirus.

Speaking at a policy meeting with economic chiefs, Moon also said fresh measures worth 17.7 trillion won will be rolled out to boost consumption and support domestic demand.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in presides over the fourth emergency economic meeting on coping with the coronavirus crisis at the presidential office in Seoul, South Korea, 8 April 2020.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in presides over the fourth emergency economic meeting on coping with the coronavirus crisis at the presidential office in Seoul, South Korea, 8 April 2020. Photograph: YONHAP/EPA

The latest now on Ren Zhiqiang, the influential critic of the Chinese Communist party who suggested president Xi Jinping was a “clown” over his handling of the coronavirus outbreak. Ren is being investigated for “serious violations of discipline and the law”, Chinese anti-corruption authorities have said.

The retired property executive, who remains a well-connected and vocal member of the ruling party, went missing last month after writing a critical essay about the outbreak. In mid-March, Ren’s friends told Reuters they had not been able to contact him, and they were “extremely anxious”.

Late on Tuesday, party officials said Ren was accused of violations that are widely used as a euphemism for corruption and graft. The short statement posted online said Ren was undergoing disciplinary review and supervision by the Beijing discipline inspection commission, the top anti-graft commission in the country.

Updated

Wisconsin went ahead with an in-person primary election on Tuesday after Republicans and the US and state supreme courts blocked efforts to postpone it. Trump declined to criticise the move and claimed, without evidence, that mail-in voting is rife with fraud.

“Mail ballots are a very dangerous thing for this country because they’re cheaters,” he said. “They go and collect them, they’re fraudulent in many cases, you gotta vote … The mail ballots are corrupt in my opinion.”

When it was pointed out that Trump himself used a mail ballot to vote in last month’s Florida primary, he retorted: “Because I’m allowed to. That’s called out of state. You know why I voted? Because I happen to be in the White House and I won’t be able to go to Florida and vote.”

Research has found that voter fraud is virtually nonexistent. In the five states that have moved to an entirely vote-by-mail systems, there has been no evidence of widespread fraud. Sean Eldridge, the founder of the grassroots community organisation Stand Up America, said: “Trump’s baseless attacks on vote-by-mail are a pathetic attempt to suppress the vote in the middle of a national crisis. He is demanding that voters choose between protecting their health and participating in our democracy.”

Updated

A university in Japan has held a graduation ceremony for students using avatar robots remotely controlled by graduating students from their homes. The avatar robots, dubbed ‘Newme,’ by developer ANA Holdings, were dressed in graduation caps and gowns for the ceremony, complete with tablets projecting the graduates’ faces. Business Breakthrough (BBT) University in Tokyo said it hoped the approach could be used as a model for other schools wishing to avoid large gatherings amid the pandemic. Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe has declared a state of emergency for the capital Tokyo and six other prefectures, for a period of about one month.

Podcast: Boris Johnson’s personal coronavirus battle

The PM’s admission to an intensive care ward in London has shocked the nation and left a gap at the heart of power during the UK’s biggest crisis in a generation.

When Boris Johnson began his period of isolation in Downing Street he released a video saying his symptoms were mild and he was getting on with the job of leading the government’s response to the coronavirus crisis.

Late on Sunday, he was admitted to hospital and the following night taken into intensive care. It was an announcement that shocked a nation already reeling from the speed of recent events.

Guardian columnist Jonathan Freedland joins Anushka Asthana to discuss how the prime minister’s illness leaves a gap at the top of government amid a major crisis. Health editor Sarah Boseley describes how the disease progresses.

Trump threatens to hold WHO funding, then backtracks, amid search for scapegoat

Donald Trump hunted for a new scapegoat on Tuesday in an increasingly frantic attempt to shift blame for thousands of American deaths from the coronavirus, accusing the World Health Organization (WHO) of having “called it wrong” and being “China-centric”.

The US president contradicted himself within minutes, first vowing to put “a very powerful hold” on his government’s funding of the WHO, then insisting such a freeze was only under consideration.

Trump’s early inaction has come under renewed scrutiny in the past day after a New York Times report that Peter Navarro, Trump’s trade adviser, warned in a memo in late January that the virus could put millions of Americans at risk and cost trillions of dollars. Susan Rice, a former national security adviser, told the Washington Post that Trump’s missteps “cost tens of thousands of American lives”.

The president has repeatedly denied responsibility and sought to blame China, the Obama administration and the media. On Tuesday, with the US death toll exceeding 12,000, he unleashed a tirade at the WHO, even though it raised the alarm in January, after which he made statements downplaying it and comparing it to the common flu.

“They’ve been wrong about a lot of things,” Trump said at the daily White House coronavirus task force briefing. “And they had a lot of information early and they didn’t want to – they seemed to be very China centric” – implying that the WHO had toed the line of Beijing’s early efforts to minimise the scale of the outbreak.

Moving away from that sad news now to Hong Kong, where authorities accidentally hospitalised a virus-free man instead of his sick son.

At a press conference on Tuesday afternoon, the Centre for Health Protection said it was investigating the mix-up. CHP controller, Dr Wong Ka-Hing, said a Nepali man and his family were close contacts of confirmed cases, and were sent to a government quarantine centre. The son tested positive for the Covid-19 disease, but authorities took his father to hospital instead.

“We have sent an apology to the family and we will investigate how it happened,” said Wong. “It may be too early to tell the exact reason behind [it] but I do not think this particular incident will affect the other people who are staying in the quarantine centre because the family itself stayed in a unit.”

It comes as Hong Kong authorities ramp up their testing and restrictions, in response to a growing number of cases fuelled by large numbers of people returning to Hong Kong in recent weeks.

People wearing masks walk on the street in Hong Kong, 7 April 2020.
People wearing masks walk on the street in Hong Kong, 7 April 2020. Photograph: Kevin On Man Lee/Penta Press/REX/Shutterstock

From today, all inbound travellers will be tested for Covid-19 on arrival at a nearby testing facility.

Beauty and massage parlours have been ordered to close for 14 days from this Friday, and an earlier ban on more than four people gathering has been extended until 23 April. Nightclubs, bars, cinemas and gyms were already shut down.

Hong Kong has confirmed at least 935 cases, the vast majority in the past few weeks.

John Prine has been called the Mark Twain of songwriters by USA Today and Rolling Stone.

In a 2017 profile of Prine, called “Inside the Life of John Prine, the Mark Twain of American Songwriting”, Rolling Stone wrote:

Prine became a fixture of the Seventies folk scene, smoking and drinking beer while spinning yarns between songs. ‘He was incredibly endearing and witty,’ says Bonnie Raitt, who would cover one of Prine’s most famous songs, ‘Angel From Montgomery,’ in 1974. ‘The combination of being that tender and that wise and that astute mixed with his homespun sense of humor – it was probably the closest thing for those of us that didn’t get the blessing of seeing Mark Twain in person.’

Here is Prine singing Angel from Montgomery:

Updated

John Prine: this extraordinarily gifted songwriter was the envy of all

As John Prine often pointed out, he missed the height of the 1960s. Drafted into the US army, but fortunate enough to escape a tour of duty in Vietnam, he spent the Summer of Love stationed in Germany. Prine arrived back in the US at the end of 1967, just as rock music began to leave psychedelic experiments behind and head earthbound again, which suited him just fine.

He was born in 1946 and learned to write songs during the early 60s folk revival by imitating the Carter Family. Eighteen months after he returned to civilian life in Chicago, he saw Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash performing together on the latter’s TV show. “I thought the music I was playing and writing, it’d fit straight in-between the two of ’em,” he recalled in 2019. “I thought, ‘That’s exactly where I want to be.’”

Almost uniquely among the glut of early 70s singer-songwriters, Prine – who has died aged 73 – seemed untouched by the countercultural events of the preceding years: he seemed to tap into an earlier musical tradition, “an authentic, rather catchy extension of Nashville and Appalachia”, as critic Robert Christgau noted of Prine’s eponymous 1971 debut album.

He was not given to writing starry-eyed paeans to the denizens of the Woodstock festival. His albums never sounded as if they had emerged from the stoned, eucalyptus-scented idyll of Laurel Canyon. There was something tough and austere about them, perhaps because of Prine’s voice – a rough, artless, nasal rasp that Dylan suggested sounded as if Prine had swallowed a jew’s harp. It got more gravelly as the years progressed and he recovered first from neck, then from lung cancer.

Rosanne Cash, Johnny Cash’s daughter has tweeted about John Prine’s death:

Other prominent singers and celebrities have also taken to Twitter to pay tribute to Prine:

US folk and country singer John Prine dies

Singer-songwriter John Prine performs during the 2019 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival on 15 June, 2019 in Manchester, Tennessee.
Singer-songwriter John Prine performs during the 2019 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival on 15 June, 2019 in Manchester, Tennessee. Photograph: Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images

John Prine, the US folk and country singer beloved of Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson and more, has died aged 73 due to complications from Covid-19.

Prine was hospitalised on 26 March, and was in intensive care for 13 days before dying on Tuesday, at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Tennessee. Prine’s family confirmed his death to several US media outlets including The New York Times, Rolling Stone and Variety.

Prine was born and raised on the outskirts of Chicago, and, on either side of a spell in the US army working as a mechanic in Germany, had a day job as a mail carrier while playing guitar and writing songs as a hobby. At a Chicago open mic night, he was heard complaining about the lack of talent on stage and was challenged to do better by one of the performers; his rapturously received three-song set earned him a $1,000-a-weekend residency and allowed him to quit the postal service.

His career was given a boost by Kristofferson, who saw him play in Chicago. When Prine was visiting New York, Kristofferson invited him to play a gig for a room of record-label staff – Prine was signed to Atlantic Records the next morning. “Luck has a good deal to do with it, luck and timing,” he said of his swift success. “But when the luck and timing comes along, you’ve got to have the goods.”

He released his debut album in 1971, and put out 19 studio albums in all. While wider mainstream success eluded him for years, he earned a sizeable following, including some of the 20th century’s greatest songwriters. Bob Dylan said in 2009: “Prine’s stuff is pure Proustian existentialism. Midwestern mind trips to the nth degree. And he writes beautiful songs.” Bonnie Raitt has celebrated his songwriting as “deceptively insightful. It’s at once playing on words and imagery, but expressing something deeper in such a succinct way, in such an exceptional way.”

Prine won two Grammy awards from 11 nominations, and was also given a lifetime achievement award at the 2020 ceremony.

Updated

Stepping away from that news for a moment while we wait for further confirmation to Equatorial Guinea, where two Brazilian pastors face expulsion, after the pair held unauthorised masses in contravention of Covid-19 restrictions, the justice ministry told AFP Tuesday.

The pair “must be expelled from national territory as soon as circumstances allow with no possibility of returning,” the president’s office had decreed Sunday, banning their congregations from further gatherings.

The pair had ministered at masses on April 3 and 4 and in so doing “were, through their actions, insensitive to the fate of citizens,” the presidency said, adding both their ministries would be shut down.

Equatorial Guinea has joined several other nations in central Africa in adopting strict measures designed to limit the spread of the virus including closing national borders and limiting movement across provincial boundaries as well as access to the capital Malabo.

Prime Minister Francisco Pascual Obama Asue announced in mid-March that authorities were closing all schools and entertainment venues to prevent the virus spreading as it began to take a foothold on the continent.

The New York Times is reporting that singer John Prine has died of complications caused by coronavirus. He was 73 years old.

On 30 March, Prine’s family announced that he had coronavirus and had been hospitalised.

Prine won the Grammy award for best contemporary folk album in 1992 and 2006, and a lifetime achievement award this year. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2019.

We will have more information soon.

Updated

In parts of Mexico, doctors, nurses and other health workers are being harassed to the point that federal authorities have pleaded for Mexicans to show solidarity, AP reports.

While tributes to courageous medical personnel putting themselves in the virus’ path circle the globe, Mexico and some other places have seen disturbing aggression born of fear.

Recently, a hospital in Guadalajara Mexico’s second-largest city were told to wear civilian clothes to and from work rather than their scrubs or uniforms because some public buses refused to allow them to board. Other medical personnel have reported attacks and this week someone threw flammable liquid on the doors of a new hospital under construction in the northern border state of Nuevo Leon.

Two nurses wearing protective masks pose inside the new immediate response mobile hospital in Pachuca, Mexico, 19 March, 2020.
Two nurses wearing protective masks pose inside the new immediate response mobile hospital in Pachuca, Mexico, 19 March, 2020. Photograph: Henry Romero/Reuters

“There have been cases, you could say isolated, but all outrageous,” Mexican undersecretary of health Hugo López-Gatell said Monday night. “Fear produces irrational reactions, reactions that make no sense, have no foundation and have no justification when they have to do with respecting the dignity and the physical integrity of people.”

It also comes as the Mexican government has embarked in a massive recruiting drive to bolster the thin ranks of its public health system before the virus hits with its full force.

Mexico has 2,439 confirmed cases of the virus, according to Johns Hopkins University figures, and 125 people have died.

Human impact on wildlife to blame for spread of viruses, says study

Hunting, farming and the global move of people to cities has led to massive declines in biodiversity and increased the risk of dangerous viruses like Covid-19 spilling over from animals to humans, a major study has concluded.

In a paper that suggests the underlying cause of the present pandemic is likely to be increased human contact with wildlife, scientists from Australia and the US traced which animals were most likely to share pathogens with humans.

Taking 142 viruses known to have been transmitted from animals to humans over many years, they matched them to the IUCN’s red list of threatened species.

Domesticated animals like cattle, sheep, dogs and goats shared the highest number of viruses with humans, with eight times more animal-borne viruses than wild mammal species.

Wild animals that have adapted well to human-dominated environments also share more viruses with people. Rodents, bats and primates – which often live among people, and close to houses and farms – together were implicated as hosts for nearly 75% of all viruses. Bats alone have been linked to diseases like Sars, Nipah, Marburg and Ebola.

The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, found that the spillover risk was highest from threatened and endangered wild animals whose populations had declined largely due to hunting, the wildlife trade and loss of habitat.

‘If it comes, it will be a disaster’: life in one of the only countries without coronavirus

Vanuatu – a nation of just under 300,000 people, whose 80 islands are strung across the ocean, 1,800km east of Australia – remains one of the few countries in the world without any confirmed cases of the coronavirus.

But even here, in this remote archipelago, which feels as far as possible from the lockdowns of Wuhan and dire scenes in Italy and New York, the shadow of the coronavirus hangs across the nation.

Vanuatu has introduced strict measures to try and protect the country from coronavirus, including requiring all businesses to set up hand-washing stations and shutting down at 7:30 each night.
Vanuatu has introduced strict measures to try and protect the country from coronavirus, including requiring all businesses to set up hand-washing stations and shutting down at 7:30 each night. Photograph: Nicky Kuautonga/The Guardian

Yasmine Bjornum writes about the measures that have been taken to protect the country, whose low incomes and weak health system would make an outbreak utterly devastating.

The country closed its border in March. Many restaurants and hotels have voluntarily closed down while others are trying to operate within the government’s restrictions, closing at 7.30pm before a curfew kicks in, which forbids anyone from being outside their homes between 9pm and 4am.

Along the main street of the capital of Port Vila, handwashing stations have been set up outside shops, banks and restaurants. Under the state of emergency rules, all businesses have been required to set up handwashing facilities at their own cost to promote hygienic practices.

A map of Vanuatu
A map of Vanuatu

“We know how the virus spreads and when we look at our culture and how we live, it’s in favour of this virus. If it comes, it would be a disaster,” said Russel Tamata, the lead spokesman for the government’s Covid-19 advisory team.

“The slightest mistake will impact us very badly.”

Republican congressional candidate touts AR-15s to fight ‘looting hordes from Atlanta’

Why do Americans need AR-15 rifles during a global pandemic? To shoot “looting hordes from Atlanta”.

That’s the campaign message from a former Republican congressman from Georgia, Paul Broun, who is now running for congress again.

Broun lives in Gainesville, Georgia, a city that is 87% white, and that is about an hour outside of Atlanta, the state capital, which is majority-black.

In a new campaign video, Broun promises to give away an AR-15 rifle “to one lucky person who signs up for email updates” from his campaign website.

More businesses in the UK are laying off staff as they start to run out of cash and struggle to get access to emergency coronavirus financial support from the government, a leading employers’ organisations has said.

The British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said its weekly survey of how firms were coping with the Covid-19 crisis found an increase in the number planning to furlough workers as a result of the economic lockdown.

The employers’ organisation said only 1% of firms responding to its survey had secured a loan under the government’s Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) while 7% had received one of the grants offered by the Treasury for small businesses.

The survey found little change in the dire cashflow problems facing many companies, with 57% of firms having three months’ cash in reserve or less, and 6% reporting they had already run out of money.

Walt Disney Co might require theme park visitors to have their temperatures checked when they reopen after coronavirus restrictions on public gatherings are lifted, Executive Chairman Bob Iger said in an interview published on Tuesday.

Disney’s Magic Kingdom theme park sits empty after it closed in an effort to combat the spread of coronavirus in Orlando, Florida 26 March 2020.
Disney’s Magic Kingdom theme park sits empty after it closed in an effort to combat the spread of coronavirus in Orlando, Florida 26 March 2020. Photograph: Gregg Newton/Reuters

Disney operates Walt Disney World in Florida and Disneyland in California as well as theme parks in China, Hong Kong, Japan and France. All are currently closed to help fight the spread of the novel coronavirus. The company has not said when they will re-open, Reuters reports.

Walt Disney World, the most-visited theme park in the world, attracted 58.4 million visitors in 2018, according to the Themed Entertainment Association.

Iger said Disney is studying China’s efforts to let people return to everyday activities.

Mainland China reported on Wednesday 62 new confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, up from 32 a day earlier, the National Health Commission said, as the number of infections from people arriving from abroad surged.

Mainland China’s imported cases stood at 1,042 as of Tuesday, up 59 from day earlier, according to the health authority.

That brings the total number of confirmed cases to 81,802 so far.

First train departs Wuhan after 11 weeks of lockdown

After 11 weeks of lockdown, the first train departed Wednesday morning from a re-opened Wuhan, the origin point for the coronavirus pandemic, as residents once again were allowed to travel in and out of the sprawling central Chinese city, AP reports.

A policeman stands beside a high-speed train, which is the first train to leave Hankou Railway Station in Wuhan.
A policeman stands beside a high-speed train, which is the first train to leave Hankou Railway Station in Wuhan. Photograph: Aly Song/Reuters

Wuhan’s unprecedented lockdown served as a model for countries battling the coronavirus around the world. With restrictions now lifted, Hubei’s provincial capital embarks on another experiment: resuming business and ordinary life while seeking to keep the number of new cases down.

As of just after midnight Wednesday, the city’s 11 million residents are now permitted to leave without special authorization as long as a mandatory smartphone application powered by a mix of data-tracking and government surveillance shows they are healthy and have not been in recent contact with anyone confirmed to have the virus.

The occasion was marked with a light show on either side of the broad Yangtze river, with skyscrapers and bridges radiating animated images of health workers aiding patients, along with one displaying the words heroic city,” a title bestowed on Wuhan by president and Communist Party leader Xi Jinping. Along the embankments and bridges, citizens waved flags, chanted Wuhan, lets go! and sang a capella renditions of Chinas national anthem.

North Korea, one of only a handful of countries not to have reported confirmed cases of Covid-19, has said that it continues testing and has more than 500 people in quarantine, the World Health Organization (WHO) told Reuters on Tuesday.

A health worker takes the temperature of a woman at an entrance of the Pyongchon District People’s Hospital in Pyongyang, North Korea on 1 April, 2020.
A health worker takes the temperature of a woman at an entrance of the Pyongchon District People’s Hospital in Pyongyang, North Korea on 1 April, 2020. Photograph: Kim Won Jin/AFP via Getty Images

The WHO, which said it had been receiving “weekly updates” from the health ministry, said that the reclusive country had the capacity to test coronaviruses in its national reference laboratory in the capital Pyongyang.

“As of 2 April, 709 people - 11 foreigners and 698 nationals - have been tested for Covid-19. There is no report of a Covid-19 case. There are 509 people in quarantine, two foreigners and 507 nationals,” Dr. Edwin Salvador, the WHO Representative to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), said in an email reply.

“Since 31 December, 24,842 people have been released from quarantine, which includes 380 foreigners,” he said. The WHO has been informed that North Korea received primers and probes for use with PCR diagnostic tests from its ally China in January, he added. The WHO has sent supplies of protective equipment.

Some foreign experts have expressed doubts that North Korea, which shares borders with China and South Korea, both hard-hit by epidemics, has not detected any infections.

North Korea has stepped up border checks and imposed quarantine measures. The head of US forces in South Korea said in mid-March that North Korea had its military forces on lockdown for about 30 days and had recently resumed training.

The disruption to the world’s economies caused by the Covid-19 pandemic is expected to wipe out 6.7% of working hours globally in the second quarter of this year – the equivalent of 195 million jobs worldwide, according to the UN’s labour body.

More than four fifths of workers globally live in countries affected by full or partial lockdown measures, the International Labour Organization (ILO) said in a report on Tuesday.

The agency welcomed fiscal and monetary measures applied so far but urged countries to take steps to keep people connected to jobs they are no longer able to do, so fewer will end up unemployed.

Here’s a summary of US news from the past few hours from my colleague Maanvi Singh in San Francisco.

  • Donald Trump threatened to stop funding the World Health Organization and once again touted an unproven anti-malarial drug as a quick fix for coronavirus. The president also alleged widespread voter fraud and insisted that he was getting along swimmingly state governors, who have increasingly found themselves at odds with him as they respond to the crisis.
  • Dr. Anthony Fauci said the crisis has shined “a bright light” on the racial disparities in the US. Data from some states and cities suggest that the pandemic is disproportionately killing Black Americans.
  • Memos revealed that Trump was warned in January of the severity of the coronavirus crisis. The president insisted he never saw the warnings from his economic adviser Peter Navarro.
  • Acting navy secretary Thomas Modly resigned over insulting comments he made about Captain Brett Crozier, the commander of the USS Theodore Roosevelt who raised concerns about the spread of coronavirus on the ship.
  • Trump removed a Pentagon official tapped to oversee the coronavirus relief effort from his post. Acting Pentagon inspector general Glenn Fine was supposed to oversee implementation of the $2 trillion coronavirus bill, but an agency spokesperson confirmed he is no longer in the role.
  • New York11reported the largest single-day increase in its coronavirus death toll yet. The state has recorded 5,489 deaths linked to the virus, up from 4,758 a day earlier, governor Andrew Cuomo announced at his daily briefing today.
  • The White House announced an overhaul of its communications team. Press secretary Stephanie Grisham is returning to the first lady’s staff after never having held a single White House briefing in more than nine months. She will be replaced by Kayleigh McEnany, who currently serves as a spokesperson for Trump’s reelection campaign.
  • Congress is seeking to allocate additional funds to the small business loan program established by the stimulus package. Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin said he would ask Congress to add $250 billion to the program, which was originally given $350 billion under the stimulus package passed last month.

Seal the deal: amorous mammals forced to contend with cruise ships

Cruise ships are drowning out the roars of seals that are important for bagging a mate, researchers have found in the latest study to reveal the consequences of human activity on wildlife.

Ships are known to produce low-frequency sounds which can overlap with calls made by marine creatures. But now researchers studying harbour seals say such noise could be taking its toll.

“As it gets noisier, it becomes harder for harbour seals to be heard,” said Dr Michelle Fournet, a co-author of the research at Cornell University, noting the animals’ roars serve a number of purposes – including advertising to females and establishing underwater territories.

New York state suffers largest single-day increase in coronavirus deaths

New York suffered the highest single-day increase in its death toll from coronavirus, governor Andrew Cuomo reported on Tuesday, even as those in the state were still under orders to stay at home.

The governor noted the three-day average of hospitalizations was down, indicating the state is “reaching a plateau in the total number of hospitalizations”.

But the New York death toll continues to steeply rise. The state has recorded 5,489 deaths, up from 4,758 a day earlier. Those 731 deaths on Monday represent the highest single-day increase in the death toll since the crisis started.

At least 3,544 people have died in New York City from Covid-19 as of Tuesday afternoon, the city reported, a figure that eclipsed those killed in the 9/11 terrorist attack, which claimed the lives of 2,753 people in the city.

New York has the highest number of cases of any US state, with 138,863 cases of coronavirus already confirmed. New York City has seen the largest number of cases and deaths within the state, with 74,601 cases.

Former Chinese property executive who criticised Xi is under investigation

Former Chinese property executive Ren Zhiqiang, who went missing last month after criticising President Xi Jinping over his handling of the coronovirus outbreak, is under investigation for “serious disciplinary violation”, the Beijing municipal anti-corruption watchdog said in a statement late on Tuesday.

Chinese real estate mogul Ren Zhiqiang.
Chinese real estate mogul Ren Zhiqiang. Photograph: AP

Ren, a former top executive at state-controlled property developer Huayuan Real Estate Group and a member of the ruling Communist Party, had gone missing after calling Xi a “clown” in an essay following a speech by China’s leader, Reuters reported, citing his friends.

The phrase “serious disciplinary violations” is often used by Chinese authorities in reference to graft investigations.

An Australian cruise company is working to disembark a stricken Antarctic cruise ship on which around 60% of the passengers and crew have been infected with coronavirus.

The Greg Mortimer has been anchored 20km off the coast of Uruguay since 27 March, but authorities in the South American country had until now refused to allow passengers to disembark.

‘Stranded at sea’: cruise ships around the world are adrift as ports turn them awayRead more

On Tuesday, the ship’s operator, Aurora Expeditions said that of 132 passengers and 85 crew, 128 people had tested positive for Covid-19. Most on board are understood to be Australian, although there are also citizens of New Zealand, the US and the UK.

“We found a ship where almost everyone has been infected,” said Karina Rando, one of 21 Uruguayan doctors dispatched to the ship. “We’ve done our utmost to prevent our own infection. Most of the passengers are well.”

Many of those who tested positive are still asymptomatic, but could still be at risk, said Rando.

Italy declares own ports ‘unsafe’ to stop migrants disembarking

The Italian government has declared its seaports “unsafe” due to the coronavirus pandemic, and will not authorise the landing of migrant rescue boats until the end of the emergency.

In a decree issued late on Tuesday, the government writes that “for the entire duration of the health emergency, due to the outbreak of coronavirus, Italian ports cannot be classified as ‘safe places’ for the landing of people rescued from boats flying a foreign flag.’’

‘Migrants never disappeared’: the lone rescue ship braving a pandemicRead more

The measure – the first of its kind in Italian history – appeared designed to prevent rescue boats from disembarking migrants in the upcoming weeks, as departures from Libya have increased in the last days with the arrival of good weather.

Here is Trump earlier saying the US would put a hold on funding for the World Health Organization. Later in that White House press briefing he backtracked and say that the hold wasn’t certain, but that the government was looking into it.

We’ll be bringing you a summary of Monday evening’s White House press briefing shortly. In the meantime:

London's NHS Nightingale opens with 4,000 beds

Taking a short break from that White House briefing now to focus on London, where the first patients were admitted on Tuesday evening to the new NHS Nightingale hospital. The hospital was created in just nine days to help cope with the pandemic.

Some of the 4,000 beds in the health facility have already been taken up by Covid-19 patients.

Beds are set up by members of the military and private contractors inside the ExCel centre in London, which has been transformed into a field hospital to be known as the NHS Nightingale Hospital, to help with the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic.
Beds are set up by members of the military and private contractors inside the ExCel centre in London, which has been transformed into a field hospital to be known as the NHS Nightingale Hospital, to help with the novel coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau/AFP via Getty Images

A spokeswoman declined to say how many people were being treated at the custom-built field hospital at the ExCeL Centre in the capital’s Docklands.

Opened by Prince Charles on Fridayand named after nursing pioneer Florence Nightingale, it will need an army of up to 16,000 staff in clinical and ancillary roles to keep it running.

With more than 80 wards containing 42 beds each, the facility will be used to treat Covid-19 patients who have been transferred from other intensive care units across London.

Updated

Speaking at the White House press briefing Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, is asked about death rates globally. “I think in this country we have taken a very liberal approach to mortality reporting... There are other countries where if you had an existing condition... some countries are recording that as a heart issue or a kidney issue and not a Covid-19 death.”

Updated

You can the White House press briefing live here:

Summary

Hello and welcome to today’s live coronavirus pandemic coverage.

The world has passed another sombre milestone, with more than 1.4 million cases as we mark 100 days since the World Health Organization was first alerted to the virus in China.

Donald Trump meanwhile has threatened to withhold funding from the organization, which he has called “China-centric”.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson remains in intensive care, but has stabilised, according to foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, who is meanwhile running the country. We will be keeping a very close eye on any news of Johnson’s health.

Below are the most important recent development. I’ll be bringing you breaking news and other updates right here for the next few hours. A reminder that the best way to get in touch with me directly if you have questions, comments or news tips is on Twitter @helenrsullivan.

  • The British prime minister remains in intensive care. The foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, who is running the government while Boris Johnson receives treatment in hospital for coronavirus, says he is confident the prime minister will recover.
  • Official global death toll passes 80,000. According to researchers at Johns Hopkins University, there are also at least 1,414,738 confirmed cases worldwide. Due to suspected under-reporting, these figures are likely to be lower than the true statistics.
  • US president Donald Trump has threatened to withdraw funding from the World Health Organization, which he says is “China-centric” and “called every aspect [of the coronavirus crisis] wrong”. At Monday evening’s press briefing, after saying he would withdraw funding, he walked that back and said he was “looking into it”.
  • Africa, the world’s second-largest continent, now has at least 10,000 cases – and experts believe the true scale of the outbreak is much greater. More than 1,700 of the cases are in South Africa, which has been rolling out an aggressive testing campaign.
  • The chief executive of Square and Twitter, Jack Dorsey has pledged $1bn of his equity in the payments processor towards fighting the outbreak.
  • EU’s top scientist reportedly resigns over bloc’s virus response. The Financial Times reported that Professor Mauro Ferrari has resigned as the president of the European Research Council (ERC), saying he has been “extremely disappointed by the European response to Covid-19”.
  • Turkey has world’s fastest rising infection rate. The number is increasing by more than 3,000 a day, reaching 30,217 since the first case was confirmed four weeks ago. Reported fatalities remain much lower than other badly hit countries, at 649.
  • The death toll in Italy continues to rise. The country reported 604 more deaths, though it marked the lowest day-to-day increase in new infections since introducing quarantine measures. New cases rose 0.9% to 880.
  • The US is still obstructing medical supply shipment. Justin Trudeau says Canada still has more work to do to persuade Washington to ensure supplies flow freely, after it emerged Donald Trump had blocked a shipment of masks to Ontario.
  • The equivalent to 195m jobs are forecast to be lost in working hours as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak, according to the International Labour Organisation, which forecasts the global downturn to be far more damaging than the 2009 crash.
  • The WHO held off recommending face mask use. Experts say that, despite evidence suggesting widespread use of masks could help reduce the virus’ spread, they are insufficient on their own, despite many places making them mandatory.

Updated

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