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Mattha Busby and Caroline Bannock report:
As the UK faces a potential second wave of the coronavirus, care homes across the country have started to restrict visits to protect their elderly residents.
But the limits are causing heartache for relatives, some of whom have spoken of their grief at not being able to visit family members, even in the final days of their lives, with some only allowed one visitor for half an hour a fortnight.
In Norfolk, Anna Hemp and her family are mourning the loss of her grandfather Alan Sigsworth, 91, who died on Saturday from natural causes, with only one member of his family able to see him for a 30-minute period before his death, which a doctor had warned could happen within days:
Hi, Helen Sullivan joining you now.
I’ll be bringing you the latest for the next few hours. Get in touch on Twitter @helenrsullivan.
Cases are continuing to soar in Brazil. Figures on Monday show 4,345,160 cases in the country, a rise of more than 15,000 in 24 hours. The number of deaths was 132,006, a jump of 381.
A new national lockdown could be imposed in Wales within weeks unless people follow the updated rules on social gatherings, the country’s health minister has said.
Vaughan Gething also revealed that the Welsh government was investigating a range of measures for Wales including imposing curfews to try to control the spread of the virus.
My colleagues Steven Morris and Severin Carrell have the full story:
Updated
Jordan reimposes some restrictions following record rise in cases
Jordan will suspend schools for two weeks from Thursday and close places of worship, restaurants and public markets as part of renewed restrictions after a record rise in coronavirus cases in the last few days, Reuters reports.
The decision taken after a cabinet meeting came as the kingdom struggles to prevent the uncontrolled spread of the pandemic, government spokesman Amjad Adailah said, adding:
We are living through exceptional circumstances.
The health minister Saad Jaber said the government was seeking to avoid the kind of tight nationwide lockdown imposed in the spring that brought the virus under control with low daily case numbers among a population of 10 million.
In televised remarks, Jaber said:
These measures are harsh as they are, but we hope they will reduce infections and prevent a large outbreak that would lead to a total shutdown that would have catastrophic consequences.
But restrictions were lifted in June and 2 million students went back to schools and international flights resumed this month, and infections have jumped since Friday to a new peak of more than 200 a day.
The government reported 252 new cases on Sunday in its highest daily tally since the virus surfaced in early March. The country has now recorded 3,528 cases of infection and just 25 deaths.
The prime minister, Omar al Razzaz, said he hoped Jordan could avoid a total lockdown that the fragile, aid-dependent economy could ill-afford. The economy is now expected to shrink about 5% this year, which would be the biggest contraction since 1990.
Officials blame large social gatherings and weddings, which are now banned, for the fast transmission of the virus and have enforced 14-day prison term for violators of the ban. More than 4,000 shops have been closed for breaching health rules on wearing face masks.
Jaber said:
The irresponsible behavior of some by having condolences gatherings and weddings has affected everyone.
Updated
Panama has lifted a five-month-old coronavirus measure that restricted women from going out one day and men the next, the Associated Press reports.
The rules limiting when people can could go out for essentials proved controversial because it led to harassment and discrimination against transgender people.
The health minister, Luis Antonio Sucre, urged caution despite the lifting of the rule, which had been in place since March.
“Today we are beginning a new stage,” Sucre said, “in which men and women can go out when they wish. We have to be very careful, we have to remember that the pandemic is not over.”
Panama has had 101,745 reported cases and 2,166 deaths.
Similar measures were also tried in Peru as a way to reduce the number of people on the street and slow the spread of the virus.
Updated
French health authorities have reported 6,158 new Covid-19 infections over the past 24 hours, sharply down from Saturday’s record high since large-scale testing began of 10,561 and Sunday’s tally of 7,183.
The Monday figure always tends to dip as there are fewer tests conducted on Sundays.
The seven-day moving average of new infections, which smoothes out reporting irregularities, stood at 8,324, a record for a 28th day in a row, versus a low of 272 on 27 May, two weeks after the country ended its two-month-long lockdown.
The number of people in France who have died rose by 34 to 30,950. The cumulative number of cases now totals 387,252.
It comes as authorities in Bordeaux and Marseille announced strict new measures to limit public gatherings in an effort to rein in a rapid surge in Covid-19 cases that risks overwhelming the two cities’ hospitals.
The prime minister, Jean Castex, on Friday announced no new national restrictions and instead delegated the task to regional officials and health authorities. The country was not uniformly affected and they were better placed to act, he said.
Updated
The Chinese city of Ruili will test all people there after authorities reported two new coronavirus cases imported from neighbouring Myanmar, state media reported late on Monday.
Ruili is part of Dehong prefecture in China’s south-western province of Yunnan. The city asked residents to quarantine at home, according to state television CCTV.
Updated
That’s all from me, Caroline Davies. Thank you for your time.
The head of the Beirut Bar Association warned today that a coronavirus outbreak in crisis-hit Lebanon’s largest and most overcrowded prison amounted to a “humanitarian time bomb”.
Security authorities on Saturday announced 22 coronavirus cases at the Roumieh prison, just outside Beirut, including 13 detainees and nine guards. They said the prisoners had been transferred to an isolation unit inside the jail.
“The virus inside the Roumieh prison is tantamount to a humanitarian time bomb,” Beirut Bar Association head Melhem Khalaf told AFP.
The prison houses more than 4,000 prisoners, around three times its intended capacity, and has long been infamous for the poor conditions in some of its blocks.
Footage allegedly smuggled out of the prison and shared widely on social media shows several men lying on thin mattresses just feet apart from each other along a narrow corridor.
Summary
Here are some of the key developments from today.
- At least 14 refugees have tested positive for Covid-19, according to officials on Lesbos where efforts are underway to move thousands of people left homeless by devastating fires, in what had once been Europe’s biggest migrant camp in Moria, into a new facility.
- US president Donald Trump held a Nevada campaign rally at an indoor venue on Sunday despite public health professionals’ warnings against large indoor gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic. People in the crowd were seated close together and many did not wear masks.
- The World Health Organization reported a record single-day increase in global coronavirus cases on Sunday, as the tally surged by a further 307,930 infections in just 24 hours.
- Former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi left hospital on Monday 11 days after being admitted with coronavirus, describing it as “perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life.”
- The imposition of a second lockdown in Israel has left the country staggering, with fears that three weeks of shuttered businesses and restricting people to their homes could devastate livelihoods.
- Queues formed outside schools across Italy on Monday as 5.6 million pupils returned to classrooms for the first time in over six months. Schools in 12 Italian regions reopened in what prime minister Giuseppe Conte said was a “big test for the state”.
- The French prime minister, Jean Castex, has instructed the authorities in Marseille, Bordeaux and the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to detail extra measures to halt the spread of Covid-19 by the end of Monday.
- The World Health Organization expects Europe to see a rise in the daily number of Covid-19 deaths in October and November, the head of the body’s European branch has told AFP.
- Public Health England said that as of 9am on Monday, there had been a further 2,621 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK. Overall, 371,125 cases have been confirmed.PHE also said a further nine people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Monday. This brings the UK total to 41,637.
- Russia has reported 5,509 new coronavirus cases today, pushing its national tally to 1,068,320, the fourth largest in the world. Authorities said 57 people had died in the last 24 hours, bringing the official death toll to 18,635.
- An American woman has been accused of spreading coronavirus around a Bavarian town by allegedly drinking in pubs and bars despite being told to quarantine after showing coronavirus symptoms.
- Authorities in the Indonesian capital Jakarta reimposed a partial lockdown on Monday and vowed to strictly isolate anyone testing positive for Covid-19 as infections soared in the metropolis.
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Spain has logged another huge leap in Covid cases, reporting 27,4o4 new infections since last Friday and bringing its total to 593,730.
According to the latest figures from the health ministry, 116,464 cases have been diagnosed over the past two weeks and there have been 207 deaths over the past seven days.
Updated
People in England’s 10 worst-hit coronavirus hotspots were unable to get tests on Monday, leading to claims of a “shambles”.
Those trying to arrange a test in the areas with the highest infection rates were told that none were available at walk-in centres, drive-through facilities or for home delivery.
One official said there was capacity and swabs available at testing centres, but that a backlog in laboratories meant people were being told that no tests were available.
Read the full report here:
Spain records 27,404 new cases since Friday
Spain has logged another huge leap in Covid cases, reporting 27,4o4 new infections since last Friday and bringing its total to 593,730.
According to the latest figures from the health ministry, 116,464 cases have been diagnosed over the past two weeks and there have been 207 deaths over the past seven days.
The Madrid area – the Spanish region hardest hit by the virus – accounts for roughly a third of all the cases and a third of the country’s 29,848 deaths.
The continuing spike in cases comes a week after Spain became the first western European country to log more than 500,000 cases. The country has carried out more than 7.6 million PCR tests since the pandemic began.
Updated
Coronavirus could potentially cost one million jobs in Britain this year, with most losses anticipated during the current third quarter, according to a study published on Monday.
Job losses could hit 450,000 between July and September, the Institute for Employment Studies forecast in a report, warning this could worsen to 690,000 positions under a worst-case scenario.
Another 200,000 cuts could follow in the fourth quarter, or three months to December, the research group predicted.
Recent official data showed that Britain has already shed around 240,000 jobs in the first six months of 2020.
The latest IES forecasts, based on official Insolvency Service data, could therefore bring the annual total to more than one million.
Public Health England confirms 2,621 new infections
An issue with Microsoft’s Azure cloud computing platform has sparked system problems for organisations in the UK, including Public Health England’s (PHE) coronavirus case dashboard.
The platform is used to track the number of new positive Covid-19 cases and reported deaths linked to the virus in England and is normally updated daily.
However, PHE tweeted on Monday afternoon that they had been unable to update the platform because of the problem, which Microsoft has confirmed and said it is investigating.
Due to an issue with Microsoft Azure we are unable to update the dashboard currently.
— Public Health England (@PHE_uk) September 14, 2020
We can confirm that:
2,621 new positive cases have been recorded on Monday 14 September, a total of 371,125.
9 new deaths have been reported, a total of 41,637 https://t.co/wswwEKHxqu
“Due to an issue with Microsoft Azure we are unable to update the dashboard currently,” the PHE tweet said, before confirming the day’s coronavirus figures through Twitter instead.
Microsoft said its engineers were investigating an issue “impacting storage and virtual machines” at its UK south data centre.
Updated
Officials in Canada’s largest city are calling for strip clubs to be shut down after a second Covid-19 outbreak linked to such an establishment in less than a month.
Over the weekend, Toronto’s public health unit identified seven cases linked to Club Paradise, a venue which had been attended by hundreds of patrons in recent weeks.
The outbreak came less than a month after as many as 550 people were feared to have been exposed to the virus at another club, the Brass Rail, after an employee tested positive for Covid-19.
Officials in Canada’s largest city are calling for strip clubs to be shut down after a second Covid-19 outbreak linked to such an establishment in less than a month.
Over the weekend, Toronto’s public health unit identified seven cases linked to Club Paradise, a venue which had been attended by hundreds of patrons in recent weeks.
The outbreak came less than a month after as many as 550 people were feared to have been exposed to the virus at another club, the Brass Rail, after an employee tested positive for Covid-19.
Read the full report here:
The world is doing far too little to prepare for future, possibly even more damaging pandemics, a global health monitor has warned.
In a fresh report, the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board (GPMB), an independent body created by the World Health Organization and the World Bank, decried that the pandemic had revealed how little the world had focused on preparing for such disasters, despite ample warnings that large disease outbreaks were inevitable, AFP reports.
“The Covid-19 pandemic is providing a harsh test of the world’s preparedness,” the report said, concluding that little progress had been made on any of the actions it had called for in its initial report last year, before Covid-19 struck.
“Failure to learn the lessons of Covid-19 or to act on them with the necessary resources and commitment will mean that the next pandemic, which is sure to come, will be even more damaging,” it warned.
Gro Harlem Brundtland, GPMB co-chair and a former WHO chief, stressed during the virtual launch of the report Monday that the board had warned a year ago that the world was ill-prepared for a pandemic.
“Tragically and catastrophically we have seen our worst fears realised,” she said.
“The impact of Covid-19 is even worse than we anticipated, but actions that we called for last year, have still not been taken.”
Updated
In the UK, head teachers have warned that the number of pupils who have to self-isolate could increase and more schools may have to close as winter approaches.
Downing Street says 99% of schools in England have reopened this month, with only a “very small” number remaining closed due to coronavirus outbreaks.
But Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), said disruption to pupils’ education could worsen in the months to come.
Heads are facing a “very difficult situation” because of Covid-19 transmission in the community, a “lack of sufficient capacity” in the testing system, and difficulties in getting timely advice from health teams, Barton said.
Official data on school attendance is due to be published on Tuesday, Downing Street said.
James Bowen, director of policy for school leaders’ union NAHT, said: “Unfortunately, since the start of September we have already seen cases of schools having to partially close as a result of advice from local health protection teams.
“The government must sort testing out quickly so that schools can remain open and pupils and staff know they are safe to attend.”
Updated
Public Health England said that as of 9am on Monday, there had been a further 2,621 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK. Overall, 371,125 cases have been confirmed.
PHE also said a further nine people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Monday. This brings the UK total to 41,637.
Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies show there have now been 57,400 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate.
Updated
In Canada, authorities and communities have continued to cope with outbreaks of Covid-19 among pupils at re-opened schools.
The Toronto Star reports meanwhile that Ontario is recording 313 cases of COVID-19, the most since June 7 when there were 415 cases reported; almost 30,000 tests were completed.
New rules that the French government had instructed authorities in Bordeaux to implement have been announced.
Bars and restaurants face new restrictions with no eating or drinking standing up, no music outside and public events must attract no more than 1,000 people, with gatherings of no more than 10 people in parks, gardens and beaches, no alcohol in public spaces, and no outside parties.
The French prime minister, Jean Castex, has instructed the authorities in Marseille, Bordeaux and the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to detail extra measures to halt the spread of Covid-19 by the end of Monday. Details of Marseille’s announcement are yet to come.
Bordeaux is to provide extra rush-hour bus and tram services to avoid overcrowding and firms are urged to allow staff to work from home where possible.
Masks must be work around schools at a radius of 50 metres and student parties are cancelled. Artistic, cultural and sports establishments – including gyms and swimming pools – are also to close.
The Bordeaux prefect Fabienne Buccio said: “In the private sphere, I seriously ask everyone to limit family and festive gatherings to a maximum of 10 people. I’m thinking particularly of marriages. I’m not saying don’t get married, but postpone the big parties.”
Updated
An American woman has been accused of spreading coronavirus around a Bavarian town by allegedly drinking in pubs and bars despite being told to quarantine after showing coronavirus symptoms.
The woman, who works at a hotel resort for US forces stationed in Germany and has not been identified, returned from a holiday in Greece at the end of August.
According to local authorities in the town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, she was tested on 8 September after displaying Covid-19 symptoms. They say she ignored instructions to quarantine until her results were available and went out that evening. The next morning she received a positive test.
At least 22 US citizens based at the hotel have become infected and the hotel itself, which hosted a conference last week on how to prevent the virus spreading in the US army, has been closed for two weeks.
Updated
The World Health Organization’s Covid-19 dashboard showed on Monday a new one-day record high had been reached at 307,930 confirmed cases of coronavirus.
The WHO’s complete figures for Sunday showed that 307,930 cases were confirmed to the UN health agency during the day, 19,870 higher than Saturday’s tally.
Daily confirmed cases have only topped 300,000 once before, when 306,857 were recorded on 6 September, AFP reports.
According to the WHO’s figures, there have been more than 28,870,000 confirmed cases of the respiratory disease, while more than 921,800 people have lost their lives, including 5,537 on Sunday.
“Lives and livelihoods have been lost, the global economy is in recession and social and political fault lines have been exposed,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said via video-link Monday at the organisation’s European regional committee.
“We are by no means out of the woods. The average daily number of cases in the region is now higher than it was during the first peak in March,” he said, citing the record 48,921 cases confirmed in Europe on Sunday.
A total of 132,464 cases were confirmed in the WHO’s Americas region on Sunday, followed by 101,119 in southeast Asia.
There were also 14,827 cases reported in the eastern Mediterranean, 5,958 in the western Pacific and 4,641 in Africa.
Updated
Officials in French regions worst hit by a rise in coronavirus infections are poised to announce further restrictions on public gatherings.
The French prime minister, Jean Castex, has instructed the authorities in Marseille, Bordeaux and the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to detail extra measures to halt the spread of Covid-19 by the end of Monday.
Before the weekend, Castex surprised the nation by failing to announce new national restrictions to deal with the worsening crisis; instead he delegated the task to regional officials, police and health bodies.
This followed a decision by the president, Emmanuel Macron, to ignore advice from the government’s scientific advisory committee after new infections topped 10,000 in one 24-hour period on Friday, the highest since the pandemic broke out in France in early March.
The full report can be found here:
Updated
Officials in southern Germany are considering imposing hefty fines on a 26-year-old American woman linked to a cluster of coronavirus cases in the Alpine resort town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, including at a hotel that caters to US military personnel.
German media report that the woman, who lives locally and was not named, had visited several bars in the town last week despite having symptoms and being told to quarantine while waiting for her Covid-19 test result.
“Garmisch-Partenkirchen is a model case of stupidity and an example for how quickly one can become infected,” said Bavaria’s governor, Markus Soeder.
Such recklessness must have consequences, he added. That’s why it is reasonable for the health authorities to consider, after carefully examining the case, whether to impose appropriately high fines, AP reports.
The woman, who was not named for privacy reasons, has been blamed for an increase in cases that pushed Garmisch-Partenkirchen above the threshold of 50 new cases per 100,000 in a week at which authorities are required to impose further infection control measures.
In Garmisch-Partenkirchen, these include a 10pm curfew on bars and restaurants and a rule that no more than five people can gather in public.
The incident also affected the Edelweiss Lodge and Resort, which shut down completely for two weeks Monday after confirming that several staff members had tested positive for Covid-19.
The resort, which is reserved for members of the American military, their families and veterans, said it is working with US Army medical professionals and local medical officials to assess the situation and conduct contact tracing.
Anyone who has visited the resort since 3 September should monitor for any symptoms and seek medical care if symptoms develop, it added.
Germany’s disease control centre on Monday reported 927 new cases across the country in the past day.
Updated
Authorities in the Indonesian capital Jakarta reimposed a partial lockdown on Monday and vowed to strictly isolate anyone testing positive for Covid-19 as infections soared in the metropolis.
Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan said the city would resume large-scale social restrictions for two weeks starting today, calling it a necessary measure to prevent the health system from collapsing.
Non-essential businesses are only allowed to operate at 25% capacity, restaurants can only serve take-aways, and school, parks and tourist spots have been ordered to shut.
Anyone testing positive for Covid-19 – including asymptomatic patients – will have to undergo mandatory quarantine in government facilities, he said.
“If a person who was tested positive refused to be isolated in the designated facility, health workers and law enforcers will pick them up,” Baswedan told a news conference.
Jakarta first introduced restrictions in early April, but began relaxing them in June. Weeks later, however, the capital has seen a sharp increase in new Covid-19 cases.
Indonesia is the country hardest-hit in south-east Asia with 221,523 infections and 8,841 deaths, AFP reports.
As of Monday, Jakarta has reported more than 55,000 cases with nearly 1,500 deaths.
Indonesia’s president Joko Widodo has announced that 15 hotels will be used to quarantine Covid-19 patients with mild or no symptoms.
Updated
The French government will commit an additional €20m ($23.8m) to subsidies for bike repairs or tune-ups, extending a popular programme aimed at easing public transport crowds during the coronavirus outbreak.
The €50 subsidy will be available until the end of the year, environment minister Barbara Pompili and transport minister Jean-Baptiste Djebbari announced on Monday while visiting a Paris bike shop.
Officials in the capital and other French cities have turned hundreds of traffic lanes into protected “coronapiste” bike paths, encouraging the cycling boom seen since lockdown was lifted in May.
The national government will also increase rebates offered to low-income households for buying electric bikes by up to €200, Pompili said.
Overall, €80m will be spent on the subsidies as officials try to reduce dependence on public transport in a bid to cut Covid contagions.
“We’re living a bike moment,” Pompili said, adding that the government’s primary role was to ensure that all cyclists, from longtime commuters to novices, “can ride in complete security.”
Two hundred million euros will also be spent as part of France’s €100bn economic recovery plan to build secure parking spots at train stations and finance about 600 new bike paths over the next two years.
Updated
Pope Francis is being “constantly monitored” for signs of the coronavirus, a top Vatican official said on Monday, after the 83-year old pontiff met with a cardinal who later tested positive.
Philippine cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, 63, had a private audience with Francis on 29 August. He went on to test positive for Covid-19 on his return to Manila on 10 September.
“We are being prudent,” secretary of state Pietro Parolin told ANSA news agency.
“There is no particular alarm (in the Vatican)“, but the health of the head of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics was being “constantly monitored,” he added.
The pope talks to those who visit him at the Apostolic Palace without wearing a face mask. Last week he was spotted wearing one for the first time since the start of the pandemic, but he took it off to chat to the faithful.
Francis shunned, however, his usual practice of shaking hands and kissing babies, and used hand sanitiser that was handed to him by a personal assistant, AFP reports.
The pope was tested for Covid in March when a prelate living in the same residence as him was found to be positive.
Updated
Health authorities in Catalonia have reported four cases of coronavirus reinfection, including a doctor who is currently being treated in an intensive care unit, but who is expected to recover.The other three cases are said to be mild.
Last week, Spain became the first western European country to log more than 500,000 Covid cases. By last Friday, the total number of cases stood at 566,236 - 112,364 of them diagnosed over the previous two weeks.
Spain has so far recorded 29,747 coronavirus deaths.The proportion of hospital beds occupied by Covid patients stands at 7.5% nationally, although the figure in Madrid is almost three times that, at 18%.
Both the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, and Fernando Simón, Spain’s health emergencies chief, have expressed concerns over the situation in Madrid, which accounts for around a third of all cases and deaths. On Monday, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, the regional president of Madrid, announced an €80m plan to improve primary healthcare and hire more staff.
14 Lesbos refugees test positive
At least 14 refugees have tested positive for Covid-19, according to officials on Lesbos where efforts are underway to move thousands of people left homeless by devastating fires, in what had once been Europe’s biggest migrant camp in Moria, into a new facility.
Health authorities are conducting rapid Covid-19 tests on men, women and children prior to them entering the new facility. Those diagnosed with the virus are being taken to a separate area to quarantine.
Some 200,000 test kits were flown into the Aegean island last week. Prior to the fires coronavirus had been detected in at least 35 camp residents who, with the exception of two picked up on Sunday, have subsequently gone missing.
Speaking to Thema 104,6 radio this morning, Alternate Migration Minister Giorgos Koumoutsakos confirmed that tents able to accommodate 5,000 had been erected in the new site. Since fires destroyed Moria six days ago over 12,500 former occupants have been forced to sleep out in the open.
Koumoutsakos said:
A dramatic situation is gradually being normalised. Tents for 5,000 people have been prepared. All the administrative and medical structures are in place. Our big problem is the refusal of refugees themselves to return to this [new] reception centre. While we have opened a centre for 5,000 only eight to nine hundred have come back because for many the destruction of Moria is an occasion to push for their relocation to Europe.
Authorities overseeing relief efforts say young Afghans have launched a campaign to stop families from entering the facility described as temporary by Greek officials until a new camp is built, with the help of the EU, on Lesbos.
“Resettlement in the new structure is not optional, it’s compulsory,” the country’s migration minister Notis Mitarachi also said today confirming that the asylum service was back up and running. “It is examining applications so as to send the message to the few causing problems that they have to go through the foreseen asylum process, and only if a decision is positive will they be able to leave,”he told local radio.
Updated
More than a million pupils returned to schools across Portugal on Monday.
Portugal ordered schools, kindergartens and universities to close in mid-March when a lockdown was imposed to fight the spread of the virus. Classes were replaced with online lessons and daily TV broadcasts of various subjects.
The number of daily infections has increased in Portugal since the end of the lockdown and is now around the levels last seen in April.
Several European countries have started testing a technology platform that will allow national coronavirus tracing apps to “talk” to one another to better tackle the pandemic, the European commission said on Monday.
The commission has kicked off test runs between the servers that support the apps created by the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy and Latvia – whose apps share a similar design – and a new gateway to exchange data between them, Reuters reports.
“Many member states have implemented national contact tracing and warning applications. It is now time to make them interact with each other,” commissioner Thierry Breton said in a statement.
“Travel and personal exchange are the core of the European project and the single market. The gateway will facilitate this in these times of pandemic and will save lives.*
The gateway, built by a partnership between Germany’s SAP and Deutsche Telekom, would make it possible to log encounters between people while they are travelling abroad and issue push warnings should one of them be infected.
Such a “roaming” function would be an add-on to the Bluetooth-based smartphone tracker apps, which now only work within national borders, with the goal of making it safer to revive travel and tourism.
Updated
Silvio Berlusconi leaves hospital in Milan
Former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi left hospital on Monday 11 days after being admitted with coronavirus, describing it as “perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life”.
Photograph: Andrea Fasani/EPA
The 83-year-old media tycoon, who tested positive for Covid-19 after returning from a holiday at his luxury villa in Sardinia, was admitted to the San Raffaele hospital in Milan on 3 September with a lung infection.
“The first three days were extremely difficult,” he told journalists as he left the hospital.
Two of his children – daughter Barbara, 36, and son Luigi, 31 – also contracted the virus, as did his companion Marta Fascina, AFP reports.
“It was tough. Thank heavens, thanks to the doctors, I got over what was perhaps the most difficult ordeal of my life. Once again, I seem to have got away with it!” he said, after walking slowly but without assistance to address the cameras.
Updated
Dozens of Mauritian cruise ship workers who were stranded off the coast of Brazil throughout the pandemic have finally started their journey home after desperate appeals to return.
A crew member representing the 101 workers, who have been at anchor on three ships off Santos in southern Brazil, said they had not been paid for over six months by the cruise line MSC, one of the companies leading the industry’s return to operations.
But over the weekend, crew workers on one of the liners posted photos on social media of their preparations to disembark and being their journey home. Workers had told the Guardian their physical and mental health were deteriorating.
You can read the full report by clicking the link below.
An Australian health official revealed on Monday that she has been under police guard because of death threats and growing public anger over pandemic border restrictions, the Associated Press reports.
Queensland state chief health officer Jeannette Young said she now travels with a police escort because of the threats.
“It has taken an enormous toll on me, but then this has taken an enormous toll on nearly every single person in our community,” Young told reporters.
“Every single person in our community in Queensland has had to give up an awful lot and we cant see a clear end to this so we’re going to all have to work this through together,” she added.
The Queensland state government has been under mounting criticism for making travellers spend two weeks in hotel quarantine when they cross the state border from other parts of Australia. The restrictions have led to a number of high-profile incidents, including one last week in which a woman was not allowed out of quarantine to attend her father’s funeral.
Updated
Manila cemeteries are to close for the “Day of the Dead” for the first time as the virus rages.
Cemeteries in the Philippine capital will be closed on All Saints’ Day, officials said on Monday, preventing millions in the Catholic-majority country from visiting their dead loved ones.
Filipinos usually pour into graveyards on 1 November, blending expressions of faith and grief with a party-like atmosphere and impromptu family reunions.
But as the number of virus infections continues to rise, mayors across Metro Manila have agreed to shutter the cemeteries for the annual rite to prevent further spread of the contagion.
The authority’s spokeswoman Celine Pialago told AFP it would be the first time cemeteries had been closed on All Saints’ Day.
People in the sprawling capital of 12 million are being encouraged to pay their respects to dead loved ones in the weeks before and after 1 November to avoid crowding.
Health under-secretary Rosario Vergeire said the department was considering recommending the closure of cemeteries across the country.
Despite six months of tough measures, including travel restrictions and mandatory face masks, the Philippines is struggling to contain the coronavirus outbreak.
As of Monday it had more than 265,000 confirmed cases, including more than 4,600 deaths.
Updated
Marrakesh in Morocco is facing an unprecedented crisis as the tourism industry is hit hard due to the pandemic.
The city’s famous Jamaa El Fna square, usually home to snake charmers, storytellers and crowds of tourists, is almost empty due to tough government restrictions, AFP reports.
“Before, you had to wait your turn to get a table,” said Bachir, a waiter, waving at the empty cafe terrace.
His neighbour Mohamed Bassir worries for the future.
“This is the first time I’ve seen the Jamaa El Fna so empty,” the orange juice seller said.
Morocco declared a state of health emergency in mid-March and shut its borders to stop coronavirus from spreading.
The North African nation of 35 million inhabitants has recorded over 1,500 Covid deaths and more than 86,600 confirmed cases.
In the labyrinth of alleys leading from the Jamaa El Fna, the narrow streets once packed with stalls selling everything from slippers to spices are largely shuttered.
“Most of the traders have closed their shops,” said Mohamed Challah, who sells flowing kaftan robes.
“The others are opening to kill time because there is nothing to do at home,” he said, adding that his store “no longer sells anything”.
After the initial pandemic restrictions were eased, traders and tourist operators hoped domestic tourism might mitigate their losses.
But then the surprise announcement of new restrictions, including the closure of Marrakesh and seven other cities, shattered hopes of a revival.
Last year, the city attracted three of the 13 million tourists who came to the country.
On social media, there are calls to “save” the city, with many using the hashtag “Marrakesh suffocates”.
Official figures predict the pandemic could push the country into its worst recession since 1996, with a contraction of more than five percent of its GDP.
The imposition of a second lockdown in Israel has left the country staggering, with fears that three weeks of shuttered businesses and restricting people to their homes could devastate livelihoods.
Anger is growing that the country’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, had reopened the country too soon and too fast after a previous spring lockdown. Now, the country is in a deep recession and faces restrictions that the finance ministry estimates will cost 6.5 billion shekels (£1.46 billion).
“It was Netanyahu who sent the young people to hang out and drink after the ‘success’ of the previous lockdown,” wrote Yehuda Sharoni in the Maariv newspaper on Monday. “But if we set aside the issue of placing blame, the vexing question is whether the business sector, which barely survived the first lockdown, will be able to recover this time from the decision on lockdown and to stand back on its feet—or whether this is a death blow.”
Writing in the same paper, Ben Caspit described the lockdown as a sledgehammer. “Its effect fades a short time afterwards and the situation reverts to its former state.”
With infections rising up to 4,000 per day, Netanyahu said on Sunday night that hospitals were “raising the red flag” and that a lockdown was essential. However, a key concern on Monday morning in Israel was whether that timeframe was open-ended.
Health Ministry Director-General Chezy Levy speculated that the easing of the nationwide lockdown would happen when the daily coronavirus infections drop to 1,000 a day but acknowledged that final criteria have yet to be set.
“We would like to get to 500 cases a day, but it is clear that at this time that won’t happen,” Levy told the Kan public broadcaster.
More than 3,100 people were diagnosed with the virus on Sunday.
Queues formed outside schools across Italy on Monday as 5.6 million pupils returned to classrooms for the first time in over six months.
Schools in 12 Italian regions reopened in what prime minister Giuseppe Conte said was a “big test for the state”.
Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
“There will be difficulties and hardship, especially at the beginning,” Conte said on Sunday. “I thank the teachers and school principals, and the families who have made many sacrifices.”
Schools were closed on 6 March, a week before Italy went into lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Chaos marked the lead-up to the reopening, with many schools forced to postpone the start of the academic year because single-person desks had not arrived in time. Some schools will also open with reduced hours due to a shortage of staff. About 13,000 teaching and non-teaching staff will not yet return after testing positive for Covid-19 antibodies as part of a blanket screening carried out last week.
Children went back to school in the northern Alto Adige region in early September while schools in the remaining seven regions are expected to reopen on 24 September.
Teachers have to wear face masks at all times, as do pupils over the age of six. Desks have to be 1 metre apart. Staff and children have their temperature taken on arrival, while hand-gel dispensers will be placed around school buildings. Those who have been in close contact with a student or teacher who tests positive for Covid-19 will be immediately quarantined.
Lucia Azzolina, the education minister, said on Monday that 94m face masks have been sent to schools.
“This year will be complex and we know that,” she said on Rai television. “But we have worked hard and constructed a prevention strategy that will function if everyone does their bit with responsibility.”
Updated
The Busan International Film Festival, Asia’s biggest gathering of its kind, will be reduced to a fraction of its usual scale with several sections moved online because of the pandemic, organisers said on Monday.
The event normally sees a host of stars and industry figures from across Asia and further afield, including some from Hollywood, descend on the South Korean port city for 10 days of critical consideration and financial deal-making.
“We agonised over whether we should go ahead with hosting the event,” festival chairman Lee Yong-kwan told reporters.
He hinted that it could still be cancelled altogether if Korea’s traditional Chuseok harvest festival triggers a new surge in infections.
Originally set for early October, organisers said it will be pushed back to 21-30 October and gave details of the cutbacks in a statement.
Photograph: BIFF/AFP/Getty Images
The opening and closing ceremonies have been cancelled. as have receptions and parties, AFP reports.
A total of 192 films from 68 countries will still be shown, but each movie will only be screened once, compared with two or three times last year. All judging for the festival’s awards will take place online, as will its film and project markets, and discussion forum.
Updated
Hi. Caroline Davies here taking over the blog for the next few hours. You can get in touch on caroline.davies@theguardian.com
Updated
Experts have described as dangerous and premature the Philippines’ decision to cut the social distancing minimum to 30cm (12in) on public transport next month, as the country recorded another daily record in newly confirmed Covid-19 deaths.
Karen Lema reports for Reuters that experts and medical professionals have warned that reducing the gaps between passengers incrementally to a third of the 1-metre minimum could backfire and prolong a first wave of infections that the Philippines has been battling since March.
The new rules took effect today, when the country reported 259 new confirmed deaths, a record for the second time in three days. Total fatalities increased to 4,630, while infections have doubled in the past 35 days to 265,888, south-east Asia’s highest.
“This will be risky, reckless and counter-intuitive and will delay the flattening of the curve,” Anthony Leachon, ex-president of the Philippine College of Physicians, told news channel ANC.
“Even if you wear a face shield and mask, reducing the distance between, it will be dangerous,” he said, adding that 1 or 2 metres was the minimum international standard.
The transport ministry’s new rules will cut the distance forst to 75cm, then 50cm on 28 September and finally 30cm on 12 October. To reduce transmission risk conversation and phone calls are prohibited.
The health ministry urged the public to be “extra vigilant” in tight travel conditions and to choose other transport modes if possible.
Manila’s transport systems are notoriously crowded, with commutes typically involving long queues and several changes.
“It is likely that we will see an increase in cases and our recovery will slow if we do this now,” said epidemiologist Antonio Dans.
Dans is a member of a health professionals alliance that last month pleaded for a tightening of Manila’s lockdown - a “timeout” to stop hospitals being overrun. It urged a rethink of the 30cm rule.
The plan aims to help an economy that the government sees contracting 5.5% this year, the worst shrinkage in 35 years.
“Reopening the economy will never happen unless the viral transmission is controlled,” added Leachon, a former advisor to the government’s Covid-19 task force.
And that’s it from me, Martin Belam, this morning. I’m handing over now to my colleague Caroline Davies.
Updated
Reuters reports that Sweden has taken Britain off its red-list of countries that it advises citizens not to travel to, despite a pick-up in new coronavirus cases and restrictions on public gatherings in the UK.
Swedes can now travel freely to most European destinations, though Finland, Ireland, the Baltic countries and Malta remain on the country’s red-list.
Updated
Irish pubs may be set to reopen next week, but they’ve already been open in the UK for a while. Gatherings in pubs in England are going to be legally limited from today with the introduction of the new ‘rule of six’, which restricts people from meeting with more than five others.
But there’s some worrying news about pubs this morning. Wetherspoons has announced 66 staff have tested positive for Covid. Julia Kollewe reports:
The firm’s announcement came after concerns were raised last month that the chain was failing to prevent overcrowding in its pubs, which are popular with young people due to their comparatively low prices for alcohol and food.
The company said it had 32m customer visits to its 861 pubs open in the 10 weeks since 4 July. During this period, 66 of its 41,564 staff tested positive for coronavirus.
It said 811 pubs had reported no positive tests. Most of the reported cases have been mild or asymptomatic and 28 of the 66 employees have returned to work, after self-isolating in accordance with medical guidelines.
You can read it here: Wetherspoons says 66 staff have tested positive for Covid
Updated
Rebecca Ratcliffe reports for us on a new development in the Philippines, where a gardening craze has led to endangered species being dug up from mountains and forests. Authorities say demand is being fuelled by the coronavirus pandemic, with people wanting to improve their home decor while the country still faces partial restrictions limiting non-essential movement and social gatherings, and with people also needing to replace their sources of income. She writes:
Officials have vowed to crack down on poachers, promising to step up patrols of forests and warning that people could face hefty fines, and jail sentences of up to 12 years if they collect wild plants that are classified as critically endangered.
The Philippines’ rich and diverse habitats, which are thought to contain at least 70% of the world’s flora and fauna species, face threats ranging from mining and logging to development.
Over recent months, entrepreneurs and workers who lost their incomes during the pandemic have begun selling plants to make ends meet. Demand for house plants is especially high in Manila, one of the world’s most densely populated cities.
You can read her full report here: Coronavirus pandemic fuelling plant poaching in Philippines
Here’s a quick look at the latest stats and the places around the globe where new cases are rising and falling.
Russia has reported 5,509 new coronavirus cases today, pushing its national tally to 1,068,320, the fourth largest in the world. Authorities said 57 people had died in the last 24 hours, bringing the official death toll to 18,635.
Indonesia, meanwhile, has reported 3,141 new infections and 118 more deaths. The country has seen 8,723 deaths and 218,382 cases in total.
Pubs and bars have long been seen as a focal point of Irish culture, but the country has kept them shut for much longer than many other countries.
Padraic Halpin has been speaking to Irish pub landlords for Reuters, and reports on the plight of those that rely on the hospitality industry.
Pub owner Paul Moynihan told Halpin that he had been eagerly awaiting the promised 20 July reopening of non-food pubs, and spent €10,000 ($11,855) on a beer garden at his establishment in the village of Donard hoping that some late summer trade would help compensate the sudden March closure.
But the government moved the date three times and those pubs are now only due to open their doors on Monday 21 September - even though infection rates are now 10 times more than late July.
“It’s ironic: they kept us closed to make sure the numbers didn’t rise and they rose hugely with us closed,” said Moynihan, surrounded by empty stools at his bar in the small County Wicklow locality, 50km (31 miles) from Dublin.
“I don’t know what the logic was, it didn’t work anyway.”
With the antithesis to Sweden’s hands off approach, Ireland’s strict controls on labour-intensive sectors did keep coronavirus cases among the lowest in Europe. But a recent spike has seen the 14-day rate of cumulative cases per 100,000 people jump to almost 40 from three to four in late July.
Unemployment, including those considered temporarily laid off, stands at 15.4%, while the government is subsidising the wages of a further 15% of the workforce. Ireland’s hospitality, retail, administrative and transport sectors account for half of the 220,000 people still temporarily laid off.
In Donard, home to farm workers and Dublin commuters but without a cafe, restaurant or public transport link, Moynihan is just glad he may finally see his regulars again.
“There are people in rural Ireland who won’t see anybody really without the pub. It feels like there’s light at the end of the tunnel.”
Also in Italy, children in Codogno have gone back to school for the first time since 21 February. The northern town gained notoriety as the first place in Europe to record local transmission of the coronavirus.
The Associated Press report that nursery school children must have their temperatures taken at drop-off but are not required to wear masks. In elementary school and middle school, parents are asked to monitor temperatures at home and masks are required, though they may be lowered during lessons. In schools where distance cannot be maintained, older students will have to keep masks on all day.
Many of the children heading back lost grandparents during the outbreak, said Cecilia Cugini, the principal of Codogno’s nursery, elementary and middle schools.
“It is an emblematic moment for us,” Cugini said. “It is important to create an atmosphere so the students can experience the emotions of finding themselves back in school, with classmates and teachers, without being distracted by other things.”
Mayor Francesco Passerini said the town of 17,000 has had virtually no new cases for months now, but authorities are not being complacent. He said they have spared no effort in working with school administrators to provide maximum protection to the city’s 3,500 students. “We hope it goes well, so that all we lived can be relegated to memory,” Passerini said.
Former Italian PM Berlusconi to leave hospital after Covid treatment
A quick snap from Reuters that former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi will leave the Milan hospital where he was being treated after contracting the coronavirus two weeks ago.
Officials in his Forza Italia party said in a message sent to journalists that “The president will be discharged today at around midday.”
The 83 year-old was admitted to Milan’s San Raffaele hospital on 4 September, suffering from mild pneumonia symptoms in both lungs after contracting COVID while on holiday in Sardinia.
Last night Michigan’s lieutenant governor blasted President Donald Trump over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic in the US.
Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II said: “Donald Trump is a liar who has killed people, straight up. We cannot afford another four years of this man at the helm. There are literally millions of lives at stake.”
He was speaking at a virtual event for progressive voters called “Fighting for Justice in Michigan”. Michigan will be one of the key battlegrounds in November’s US election. The state has had at least 123,075 cases and 6,912 deaths from coronavirus, and is currently averaging around 800 new cases a week.
Yesterday Donald Trump held his first indoor rally since June. The Nevada event defied Covid rules as the president appeared in front of a mostly mask-less crowd which breached both the state’s 50-person limit and the Trump administration’s coronavirus guidelines.
The Spanish government is considering extending the nationwide ERTE furlough scheme that guarantees workers part of their income into 2021, Labour Minister Yolanda Diaz said this morning, according to Reuters reports.
“The date is open, but likely 31 December would not be the most adequate, and we have to extend a little beyond,” Diaz said in an interview on the Spanish state TV station.
She added the extension might be longer for different industries. She said for instance the tourism industry would benefit from the scheme so long as they need it.
Good morning from London, this is Martin Belam, taking over from Matthew Weaver.
Reuters report that French interior minister Gerald Darmanin has this morning criticised Olympique Marseille’s (OM) fans for celebrating en masse on the streets of the city after Marseille beat Paris Saint Germain (PSG), given the risks from the COVID-19 virus in France.
“One can only condemn the images that we are seeing,” Darmanin told LCI television, when shown TV footage of hordes of supporters partying in Marseille’s Vieux Port after the win. They were in close proximity to one another, with many not wearing masks.
Last week, French Prime Minister Jean Castex singled out Marseille and Bordeaux as among the mainland French cities hardest hit by the resurgence of the Covid virus in France.
Marseille’s hospitals have also been put back on a crisis footing as the virus has started to spread again in France, which has the world’s seventh-highest COVID-19 death toll.
WHO Europe: 'it's going to get tougher'
The World Health Organization expects Europe to see a rise in the daily number of Covid-19 deaths in October and November, the head of the body’s European branch has told AFP.
“It’s going to get tougher. In October, November, we are going to see more mortality,” the WHO Europe director, Hans Kluge, said, as the continent experiences a surge of cases though the number of deaths has remained relatively stable.
The resurgence is, however, expected to lead to an increase in daily deaths, the WHO said.
“It’s a moment where countries don’t want to hear this bad news, and I understand,” Kluge said stressing that he wanted to send the “positive message” that the pandemic “is going to finish, at one moment or another”.
The WHO Europe’s 55 member states are holding an online meeting on Monday and Tuesday to discuss their response to coronavirus and agree on their overall five-year strategy.
However Kluge, based in Copenhagen, cautioned against those who believe that the development of a vaccine will bring an end to the pandemic. He said:
I hear the whole time: ‘the vaccine is going to be the end of the pandemic’. Of course not!
We don’t even know if the vaccine is going to help all population groups. We are getting some signs now that it will help for one group and not for the other
And then if we have to order different vaccines, what a logistical nightmare!
The end of the pandemic is the moment that we as a community are going to learn how to live with this pandemic. And it depends on us and that’s a very positive message.
The number of cases in Europe has risen sharply in recent weeks, especially in Spain and France. On Friday alone, more than 51,000 new cases were reported in the 55 countries of the WHO Europe, which is more than the highest peak in April, according to the organisation.
Meanwhile, the number of daily deaths has remained at around the same level since early June, with around 400-500 deaths per day linked to Covid-19, WHO data showed.
Updated
Two more people in Thailand have tested positive for the virus.
The Thai government said two people on repatriation flights had tested positive, bringing its cumulative total to 3,475.
Last week Thailand announced that an Uzbek professional footballer had tested positive. Earlier this month a prison inmate became Thailand’s first locally transmitted coronavirus case after the country marked 100 days without one.
#COVID19 situation in #Thailand as of 14 Sep 2020
— PR Thai Government (@prdthailand) September 14, 2020
Thailand reported 2 new confirmed cases from people on repatriation flights
😷New Confirmed Cases: 2
🦠Cumulative number of cases: 3,475 (+2)
🩺Receiving medical treatments: 105
👍🏻Recoveries: 3,312 (+0)
📣Fatalities: 58 (+0) pic.twitter.com/CsFCv2O4a8
Australia has reported its lowest one-day rise in infections in nearly three months as authorities began to ease restrictions aimed at slowing its spread, Reuters reports.
Thirty-nine people were found to be infected with the virus in the past 24 hours, the lowest one-day increase in new cases since 26 June, when 37 infections were detected.
With dwindling numbers of new infections, the epicentre of Australia’s latest outbreak, Victoria state, has begun easing restrictions, allowing people to leave their homes for longer periods for exercise and shortening a curfew at night.
Still, frustrations are high, with hundreds of people taking part in protests on the weekend against the weeks-long coronavirus lockdown. Authorities urged patience.
Brett Sutton, Victoria’s chief health officer, likened the cautious easing of restrictions to “baby steps”.
“We can’t have short-term memories on this,” Sutton told reporters in Melbourne, referring to the virus.
In Queensland state, which has effectively eradicated the virus, authorities are under pressure as they decline to open its borders to other areas that are also free of infections.
With families separated, even for funerals, the state’s chief health officer is under police guard after getting death threats.
Australia’s most populous state, New South Wales, was the only other to report any new cases with four in the past 24 hours. All but one of the cases was in quarantine after returning from overseas, though officials warned against complacency.
Australia has recorded a total of 27,000 novel coronavirus infections and 817 deaths.
That’s it from me, Helen Sullivan for today. I’ll be here same time tomorrow – and in the meantime a series of talented colleagues will be helming the blog.
Here is today’s global report:
A collective failure by political leaders to heed warnings and prepare for an infectious disease pandemic has transformed “a world at risk” to a “world in disorder”, according to a report on international epidemic preparedness, Reuters reports.
“Financial and political investments in preparedness have been insufficient, and we are all paying the price,” said the report by The Global Preparedness Monitoring Board (GPMB).
“It is not as if the world has lacked the opportunity to take these steps,” it added. “There have been numerous calls for action ... over the last decade, yet none has generated the changes needed.”
The GPMB, co-convened by the World Bank and the World Health Organization, is chaired by former WHO director-general Gro Harlem Brundtland, who now also chairs an independent watchdog that monitors the WHO.
The board’s 2019 report, released a few months before the novel coronavirus emerged in China, said there was a real threat of “a rapidly spreading pandemic due to a lethal respiratory pathogen” and warned such an event could kill millions and wreak havoc on the global economy.
This year’s report - entitled “A World in Disorder” - said world leaders had never before “been so clearly forewarned of the dangers of a devastating pandemic”, and yet they had failed to take adequate action.
The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed “a collective failure to take pandemic prevention, preparedness and response seriously and prioritise it accordingly”, it said.
“Pathogens thrive in disruption and disorder. Covid-19 has proven the point.”
It is, perhaps, the perfect musical for a nation under the UK’s “rule of six” law. The hit show Six, in which Henry VIII’s wives return from the dead to give a boisterous “histo-remix” pop concert, is set to become the first musical to reopen in the West End since lockdown and will have a simultaneous run in Salford:
Summary
Here are the key developments from the last few hours:
- US president Donald Trump held a Nevada campaign rally at an indoor venue on Sunday despite public health professionals’ warnings against large indoor gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic. People in the crowd were seated close together and many did not wear masks.
- The World Health Organization reported a record single-day increase in global coronavirus cases on Sunday, as the tally surged by a further 307,930 infections in just 24 hours.
- Israel’s government will impose a new three-week nationwide lockdown that will start on Friday, after the rate of infection during the past two weeks became the highest recorded since the outbreak began.
- South Africa’s finance minister, Tito Mboweni, warned on Sunday the economy could shrink by more than the 7% forecast for 2020, stressing that public finances are “overstretched”.
- Australia’s second most populous state of Victoria on Monday reported seven deaths from the new coronavirus in the last 24 hours and 35 new cases, its lowest daily rise in infections since late June.
- New Zealand will remain at its current Covid-19 alert level for at least another week. The country is under low-level restrictions due to continued community transmission of the coronavirus in Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city. Physical distancing is required, and masks are legally mandated on public transport.
- Saudi Arabia will partially lift its suspension of international flights as of 15 September to allow “exceptional categories” of citizens and residents to travel.
- About 4,000 health workers demonstrated in Brussels on Sunday, calling for more spending on the healthcare system.
Updated
China on Monday reported 10 new coronavirus cases in the mainland for 13 September, the same as a day earlier, the health authority said.
All of the new infections were imported, the National Health Commission said in a statement. There were no new deaths.
China reported 39 new asymptomatic patients, compared with 70 a day earlier.
As of Sunday, mainland China had a total of 85,194 confirmed infections of the coronavirus, it said. The Covid-19 death toll remained unchanged at 4,634.
Updated
Spending $5 (£3.90) per person annually on global health security over the next five years could prevent a future “catastrophic” pandemic, according to a former head of the World Health Organization (WHO).
It would cost the world billions of dollars, but that amount would be a huge saving on the $11tn response to Covid-19, said Gro Harlem Brundtland, who, with other prominent international experts, sounded the alarm over the threat of a fast-spreading deadly pandemic last September.
The costs are based on estimates by McKinsey & Company, which found the average annual costs to prepare for pandemic over the next five years would be equivalent to $4.70 per capita.
Brundtland, co-chair of the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board (GPMB) and a former prime minister of Norway, said there had been a collective failure to take prevention and response seriously and to prioritise it. “We are all paying the price,” she said:
In open defiance of state regulations and his own administrations pandemic health guidelines, President Donald Trump on Sunday hosted his first indoor rally since June, telling a packed, nearly mask-less Nevada crowd that the nation was making the last turn in defeating the virus.
Eager to project a sense of normalcy in imagery, Trump soaked up the raucous cheers inside the warehouse venue. Relatively few in the crowd wore masks, with one clear exception: those in the stands directly behind Trump, whose images would end up on TV, were mandated to wear face coverings.
Not since a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, that was blamed for a surge of coronavirus infections has he gathered supporters indoors. There was no early mention from the president that the pandemic had killed nearly 200,000 Americans and was still claiming 1,000 lives a day.
“We are not shutting the country again. A shutdown would destroy the lives and dreams of millions Americans,” said Trump:
Here is the full story on New Zealand, from Charlotte Graham-McLay in Wellington:
New Zealand will remain at its current level of Covid-19 restrictions for another week, the prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, said on Monday as she urged the public to stay the course on the county’s “cautious” approach to quashing the virus.
“New Zealand has followed a plan that has worked,” she said, referring to her government’s strict, early lockdown of the country in March as New Zealand’s coronavirus cases started to rise. “This has both saved lives, but also meant our economy has been able to be more open in a more sustained way than nearly any other country in the world.”
Restrictions on Auckland – which include a 10-person limit on social gatherings – would remain in place for a further week, until 21 September, Ardern said on Monday. She had earlier met with her cabinet about the Covid-19 protocols.
Milder rules for the rest of the country – where no community transmission has been recorded – will also remain in place until 21 September, when they will be jettisoned if case numbers remain contained, Ardern said. At present, social gatherings outside Auckland are limited to 100 people.
Throughout the country, she added, physical distancing would no longer be required on planes or public transport, effective immediately; previously, all travellers had been required to leave empty seats between them. Masks are legally mandated for all passengers.
The number of Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins seen around Hong Kong has jumped as the pause in high-speed ferry traffic due to the coronavirus allows the threatened species to make something of a comeback, scientists said.
Marine scientist Lindsay Porter of the University of St. Andrews said the mammals - also known as Chinese white dolphins and pink dolphins - were moving back into parts of the Pearl River Delta that they typically avoided due to the ferries that connect Hong Kong and Macau.
Dolphin numbers in the area had jumped by up to 30% since March when the ferry traffic was suspended, allowing scientists a rare opportunity to study how underwater noise affected their behaviour, she said.
Scientists think there are about 2,000 dolphins in the entire Pearl River estuary. A Hong Kong government survey from 2019 found only about 52 dolphins entered the waters around the Asian financial hub, but Porter believes the real number may be slightly higher.
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 927 to 260,355, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed on Monday.
The reported death toll rose by one to 9,350, the tally showed.
Trump holds Nevada rally indoors despite coronavirus warnings
US President Donald Trump held a Nevada campaign rally at an indoor venue on Sunday despite public health professionals’ warnings against large indoor gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic, Reuters reports.
People in the crowd were seated close together and many did not wear masks.
Biden has criticized Trump for holding campaign events that put people at risk of contracting the coronavirus, which has killed more than 194,000 people in the United States.
Trump played down the virus in its early stages and has alternately embraced and disregarded advice from public health experts, who encourage mask-wearing and maintaining social distance to prevent its spread.
President Trump slams Joe Biden: "This man is totally unfit to be president." pic.twitter.com/YWM5CQjHPG
— The Hill (@thehill) September 14, 2020
The president’s campaign portrayed the rally at a large warehouse in Henderson as an opportunity for supporters to exercise their rights to peaceful assembly under the US Constitution’s First Amendment.
“If you can join tens of thousands of people protesting in the streets, gamble in a casino, or burn down small businesses in riots, you can gather peacefully under the First Amendment to hear from the president of the United States,” spokesman Tim Murtaugh said in a statement.
Participants were to have temperatures taken before entry and be given a mask they would be encouraged to wear, the campaign said.
Updated
Asian shares firmed on Monday on renewed hopes for a coronavirus vaccine after AstraZeneca resumed its phase-3 trial though sentiment was still cautious ahead of a big week of central bank meetings in UK, Japan and the United States, Reuters reports.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.7%, poised for its second straight session of gains.
Australian shares climbed 0.6% while Japan’s Nikkei added 0.7%. Chinese shares started firm with the blue-chip index rising 0.6%.
U.S. stock futures, the S&P 500 e-minis, jumped more than 1% after a mixed session on Wall Street last week.
Friday marked six months since the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic on 11 March.
Since then, major global economies have slipped into recession and millions have lost their jobs, prompting central banks around the world to launch unprecedented stimulus.
In the UK, close to half a million redundancies are likely to be announced in the autumn, although the number could end up exceeding 700,000, according to a study that lays bare the scale of the Covid-19 jobs crisis facing the UK.
These job cuts are on top of 240,000 redundancies officially recorded by the government up until June. That means the total redundancy figure for 2020 could top one million.
In a bleak warning, the Institute for Employment Studies (IES), which published the analysis, said the number of jobs likely to be lost “will almost certainly exceed anything we have experienced in at least a generation” – far exceeding the peak reached in the last downturn just over a decade ago and the highest since at least 1995.
With the autumn budget weeks away, it is calling for urgent measures to support those affected, stimulate employment growth and provide targeted help to viable firms:
Podcast: How an Austrian ski resort became the centre of Europe’s Covid-19 outbreak
When Nigel Mallender headed to Ischgl in March, he was looking forward to a fun-packed break with friends. Just four days later, he and thousands of other tourists were desperately trying to leave after authorities became aware of coronavirus cases. Mallender and the Guardian’s Philip Oltermann discuss the fallout from that week:
In Australia, the state of Queensland’s chief health officer, Dr Jeannette Young, says death threats and extreme trolling have taken an “enormous toll”, with a permanent police escort now assigned to the officer.
The state’s leadership, including Young, have come under intense scrutiny in recent days over Queensland’s hardline approach to border control in response to the coronavirus, which has prevented multiple family members from attending loved one’s funerals.
The Queensland AMA president, Chris Perry, told the Today show on Monday that Young had been receiving death threats. He said she now required police guards at her home and officers “who go with her everywhere” for her safety.
Singapore is battling new clusters of coronavirus infections in migrant dormitories that had won the all-clear from authorities, highlighting the difficulty of stamping out the disease, even in a closely monitored population, Reuters reports.
As the wealthy city-state tumbled into recession, officials facing intense pressure to revive the economy are opting for limited isolation measures rather than the wide clampdowns earlier, but most low-wage workers are still penned in.
“There is little choice,” said Leong Hoe Nam, an infectious diseases expert at the city’s Mount Elizabeth Hospital. “We need to be realistic. We need the economy to go on.”
The dormitories, home to more than 300,000 workers in industries such as construction and shipbuilding, with several allocated to a room, contribute nearly 95% of Singapore’s tally of more than 57,000 infections.
When authorities uncovered the virus raging through the dormitories they sealed off their occupants, launched vigorous testing and ordered a nationwide lockdown.
Still, an average of 45 daily new infections has shown up there since authorities declared last month that all residents had recovered or been shown by testing to be virus-free. Outside, the daily average is just two local cases.
Updated
Charlotte Graham-McLay reports for the Guardian:
Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s prime minister, is explaining the decision to leave current Covid-19 restrictions in place for at least another week. In June, the country returned to almost-normal life – at least domestically – after the coronavirus appeared to have been eliminated.
But in Auckland, a resurgence of the virus has prompted the reintroduction of some restrictions.
“Within the Auckland cluster is a potential trouble spot,” Ardern told reporters on Monday, after speaking to her cabinet about the decision to retain restrictions. A new sub-cluster that had emerged in the past fortnight had led to 15 new cases, and it raised the possibility that “more people had been exposed,” she said.
Cases in the community continued to emerge every day, Ardern added.
“New Zealand has followed a plan that has worked,” she said, referring to the strict and early lockdown she imposed in March, which has been widely credited with the country’s earlier elimination of the virus. “Since the start we have been cautious.”
New Zealand to remain on current alert level for at least another week
Charlotte Graham-McLay reports for the Guardian:
New Zealand will remain at its current Covid-19 alert level for at least another week, the prime minister Jacinda Ardern has just said at a news conference.
The country is currently under low-level restrictions due to continued community transmission of the coronavirus in Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city. Physical distancing is required, and masks are legally mandated on public transport.
Social gatherings in Auckland are limited to 10 people, and the rest of the country is limited to 100. The gathering limits for Auckland will be reviewed on 21 September, said Ardern, who is speaking to reporters in the city of Dunedin.
Restrictions on the rest of New Zealand will be reviewed on 21 September too – if the virus remains contained, the country outside of Auckland would move to the lowest restriction level.
Ardern said physical distancing restrictions on planes and public transport – which required empty seats to be left between passengers – would be removed today, with masks still required.
There are 96 active cases of Covid-19 inNew Zealand. There have been 23 deaths since March, and 1,447 cases total.
Nothing short of force majeure will prevent Yoshihide Suga from becoming Japan’s prime minister when the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP) elects a leader to replace Shinzo Abe this week.
As chief cabinet secretary for almost eight years, Suga has acted as the administration’s de facto second-in-command, batting away tricky questions at twice-daily press briefings, advising Abe on policy and reining in Japan’s recalcitrant bureaucracy.
Suga has emerged as the clear favourite to replace Abe, who is resigning on health grounds, since securing the support of key LDP factions. After what observers predict will be a comfortable victory over his rivals, the party’s policy chief, Fumio Kishida, and Shigeru Ishiba, a former defence minister, Suga is practically assured of being approved as prime minister in the lower house of parliament on Wednesday.
Suga’s status as a relative outsider could serve him well as he attempts to steer Japan out of a prolonged recession worsened by the coronavirus pandemic, according to Tobias Harris, a Japan expert at Teneo Intelligence in Washington and the author of a new book on Abe:
French Polynesia has recorded another 67 Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours, raising its total to 1,020.
Of those cases, 958 have been detected since August, when the government and the French High Commission re-opened borders and abolished quarantine restrictions for tourists.
On 9 August, there were just 69 infections. Since that date - five weeks ago - the number of confirmed cases has increased exponentially, up nearly 1500%.
The infections in French Polynesia have only caused two fatalities, a couple in their 80s in the capital Papeete. The majority of infections are on the island of Tahiti, but others are in Mo’orea and Hao.
A small rally in Papeete over the weekend protested a new mask-wearing mandate, introduced to try to slow the current outbreak.
Masks are compulsory in enclosed public places and on public transport while school students older than 11 must also wear them.
Still in the UK, tens of thousands of pubs, bars, nightclubs and gig venues will not survive increased coronavirus-prevention measures, such as local lockdowns and evening curfews, unless they receive fresh state support, the UK government has been warned.
One in four of the 115,000 licensed premises in Britain still had not reopened by the end of August after restrictions were imposed to contain Covid-19, according to data from the analysis firm CGA and AlixPartners.
With concern growing about rising infection rates, a ban on gatherings of more than six people comes into effect across England on Monday, while Scotland and Wales have their own amended restrictions:
Police chiefs have urged the public in England to take personal responsibility and observe the new “rule of six” regulations following a weekend rife with illegal gatherings.
Overall crime dropped dramatically during the coronavirus lockdown, when police were handed powers to enforce regulations designed to limit the spread of the disease. But Martin Hewitt, the chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, said demand for the police was now close to that before the outbreak of the pandemic and urged the public to do their part by limiting gatherings indoors and outdoors to six people:
Victoria, Australia sees lowest case rise in nearly 3 months
Australia’s second most populous state of Victoria on Monday reported seven deaths from the new coronavirus in the last 24 hours and 35 new cases, its lowest daily rise in infections since late June.
#COVID19VicData for 14 September, 2020.
— VicGovDHHS (@VicGovDHHS) September 13, 2020
Yesterday there were 35 new cases reported and 7 lives lost. Our thoughts go out to all those affected.
More information will be available later today. pic.twitter.com/jApb1qnkTW
The state has eased some restrictions in its largest city Melbourne from Monday by shortening the overnight curfew by an hour and doubling the amount of time people are able to spend outside to two hours per day.
Victoria has continued a steady downward trend in daily cases in recent days with the rise in infections falling to double digits thanks to the hard lockdown from a peak of more than 700 cases in a single day in early August.
The southeastern state, which is at the centre of the coronavirus outbreak in Australia, reported 41 cases and seven deaths a day earlier.
Israel to reimpose strict national lockdown
Israel will enter a three-week nationwide lockdown starting on Friday to contain the spread of the coronavirus after a second-wave surge of new cases, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday.
Reuters reports that during the lockdown, which comes during the Jewish high-holiday season, Israelis will have to stay within 500 metres of their houses, but can travel to workplaces that will be allowed to operate on a limited basis. The measures make Israel the the first country to reimpose such severe restrictions on a national scale.
Schools and shopping malls will be closed but supermarkets and pharmacies will remain open. The public sector will operate with fewer staff, but non-governmental offices and businesses will not have to close, as long as they do not accept customers.
“I know those measures will exact a heavy price on us all,” Netanyahu said in a televised address. “This is not the kind of holiday we are used to. And we certainly won’t be able to celebrate with our extended families.”
Netanyahu, who has faced increasing criticism over his handling of the coronavirus crisis, said he instructed his finance minister to come up with a new economic package to assist businesses hurt by the lockdown.
• This post was amended on 14 September 2020. Israel is not the first country to reimpose a national lockdown, but is the first to reimpose it on such strict terms. This has been clarified.
Updated
Of that record one-day case increase, the largest individual country infection totals were from India, the United States and Brazil, according to the WHO.
India reported 94,372 new cases, followed by the United States with 45,523 new infections and Brazil with 43,718.
Both the US and India each reported over 1,000 new deaths and Brazil reported 874 lives lost in the past 24 hours.
The previous WHO record for new cases was 306,857 on 6 September.
On 17 April, the agency reported a record 12,430 deaths.
Summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.
My name is Helen Sullivan and I’ll be bringing you the latest global Covid-19 news for the next few hours.
As always, it would be great to hear from you. You can find me on Twitter @helenrsullivan email: helen.sullivan@theguardian.com.
The World Health Organization reported a record single-day increase in global coronavirus cases on Sunday.
In the 24 hours to Sunday, 307,930 new infections were confirmed globally. The previous WHO record for new cases was 306,857 on 6 September. The agency reported a record 12,430 deaths on 17 April.
Global officially recorded deaths from Covid-19 rose by 5,537 in the same period to a total of 917,417.
Here are the key developments from the last few hours:
- The World Health Organization reported a record single-day increase in global coronavirus cases on Sunday, as the tally surged by a further 307,930 infections in just 24 hours.
- Israel’s government will impose a new three-week nationwide lockdown that will start on Friday, after the rate of infection during the past two weeks became the highest recorded since the outbreak began.
- South Africa’s finance minister, Tito Mboweni, warned Sunday the economy could shrink by more than the 7% forecast for 2020, stressing that public finances are “overstretched”.
- Spain plans to extend until the end of the year a measure preventing employers from using the coronavirus pandemic as an excuse to fire staff.
- Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen unit will begin mid-stage trials of its Covid-19 vaccine in Spain on Monday.
- Saudi Arabia will partially lift its suspension of international flights as of 15 September to allow “exceptional categories” of citizens and residents to travel.
- Around 4,000 health workers demonstrated in Brussels on Sunday, calling for more spending on the healthcare system.
Updated
