Coronavirus live news: 600 die in Nigeria outbreak; Madrid denies not treating care home residents
A supreme court judge in Brazil has ordered Jair Bolsonaro’s administration to resume publishing complete Covid-19 statistics after moves to suppress such information prompted accusations of authoritarian skulduggery designed to cover up the crisis, write Tom Phillips and Caio Barreto Bristo in Rio De Janeiro.
The Brazilian government sparked outrage on Saturday by purging the health ministry website of historical data relating to the pandemic and announcing it would stop publishing the cumulative death toll or number of infections.
Officials claimed the changes would help “refine” official coronavirus data. But critics attacked what they called an illiberal ruse to conceal the severity of the pandemic’s impact in Brazil, where more than 37,000 lives have been lost.
Some drew parallels with the suppression of information in authoritarian countries such as North Korea and Venezuela while others recalled how Brazil’s own military regime had covered up a meningitis epidemic in the 1970s, with devastating consequences.
On Monday night, supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes reportedly gave Bolsonaro’s administration a 48-hour deadline to begin releasing the full figures again each day, after a legal challenge from two opposition parties.
The European Union’s health commissioner, Stella Kyriakides, says the health emergency provoked by the pandemic has made one thing very clear: Europe needs a stronger public health system, writes Helena Smith, the Guardian’s Athens correspondent.
Speaking via teleconference at this year’s Delphi Economic Forum, the EU health chief said it was vital the continent emerged “wiser” from the crisis.
“The pandemic is not over. Public health is our basic priority, we can’t relax measures and risk what we have achieved so far,” said Kyriakides, a Greek Cypriot.
“Europe needs a better public health system. European citizens expect us to take a more active role in this issue.”
The European Commission says it will increase expenditure on health dramatically announcing that the €413 million allocated to the sector in the bloc’s current seven-year budget will be boosted more than 20-fold, to €9.4 billion, in the next.
The massive rise, which covers a coronavirus recovery fund, is aimed specifically at assisting member states tackle future health emergencies. Funding for doctors who will fly between participant countries at times of crisis is also included.
Kyriakides said Brussels’ priority now was to find a vaccine against coronavirus that would be accessible to all. The EU had already collected 9.8 billion euro for that purpose while the European investment bank had earmarked 75 million euro for research. “The vaccine is our basic priority,” said the health commissioner adding that from day one she had been in contact with pharmaceutical companies working on finding an effective treatment.
Although the novel virus had highlighted the bloc’s weaknesses it had also helped bring its better characteristics to the surface including solidarity, support and collectivity, the health commissioner told the annual forum which pre-coronavirus has taken place since 2015 in Delphi, home of the ancient oracle.
The chief prosecutor of Paris said on Tuesday it had launched an investigation into the French state’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak, with possible charges including “involuntary homicide” and “endangering life”, AFP reports.
Remy Heitz said the investigation, which comes after complaints were filed by civil groups and members of the public, was not aimed at determining “political or administrative responsibility”. But he said it would decide whether national decision-makers had committed “possible criminal offences”.
President Emmanuel Macron, as head of state, has immunity from prosecution and is not a target of the inquiry, nor are government ministers who can be held accountable only by the Republican court of justice, an administrative tribunal, which has itself received 80 complaints, Heitz said.
The complaints relate to the alleged failure to put in place anti-virus protections at the workplace, to provide face masks to reduce infection, and to roll out testing to diagnose carriers of a virus that has claimed more than 29,000 lives in France.
The Paris prosecutor’s office has jurisdiction over issues of national public health, and over crimes allegedly committed within the borders of the city, where most of the state authorities targeted by Heitz’s inquiry are based.
They include Jerome Salomon, head of the Sante Publique France health agency, who has gained prominence with his nightly summaries of the virus’s toll at the height of the outbreak.
His agency will also be a focus of the inquiry, as is the health ministry and the national prison administration.
Care homes, many of which are privately operated, are not part of the investigation.
Heitz said the investigation arose from complaints lodged by associations, labour unions and individuals.
Possible charges of involuntary homicide, involuntary injury, endangering life, failure to combat a threat and non-assistance to persons in danger are being examined by a branch of the prosecutor’s office dedicated to alleged threats to public health.
“If there is criminal wrongdoing, it will probably have been – it’s a hypothesis – unintentional,” Heitz said.
Many shops and restaurants are still deserted as India begins emerging from lockdown this week.
Radha Dhongre, an economist, described going out for a coffee with her daughter on Monday in Khan Market in New Delhi, the Indian capital, the day the lockdown was eased as an experiment. Her trip was motivated by curiosity and a desire to see if it was feasible.
“I’m glad we went but we aren’t doing it again for some time. It was too much for the nerves. We felt quite drained by the tension,” said Dhongre.
It’s a view being echoed over large parts of India as the country emerges from its two-and-a-half month lockdown. Banks, shopping malls, cafes, and restaurants were still mostly deserted, with only a handful of customers. Many Indians prefer the security of the lockdown to the perils of venturing out.
Spain: facemasks to remain compulsory in public places
Facemasks will remain compulsory in all public spaces even after Spain’s Covid-19 state of emergency ends on 22 June, the government has announced, as it urged Spaniards to “to live alongside the virus”.
The announcement came as the Socialist-led coalition laid out its plans for the return to what it terms “the new normality” but insisted that there was no room for complacency amid Spain’s staggered lockdown exit.
“The message is one of prudence and caution,” the finance minister and government spokeswoman, María Jesús Montero, said on Tuesday.
“Until there is a vaccine or a treatment, the virus remains a threat. We can’t think that the danger has gone.”
The health minister, Salvador Illa, said people would “have to learn to live alongside the virus”, adding that masks remain compulsory in situations where people cannot keep a 1.5m-distance from each other.
Masks will need to continue to be worn on public streets, in the open air and in enclosed public spaces as well as on public transport. Anyone not wearing a mask without a valid reason will be subject to a €100 fine.
According to the royal decree approved by the cabinet on Tuesday morning, Spain’s 17 regional governments will need to keep providing figures on deaths, diagnoses and hospitalisations so that the pandemic can be monitored.
Regional governments will have to have contingency plans and enough healthworkers to deal with any further outbreaks, and also ensure that anyone suspected of having the virus is given a PCR or other test as soon as possible.
Carehomes – which have been very hard hit in Spain, as elsewhere – must also prepare themselves and draw up contingency plans for residents and staff.
The government said workplaces, restaurants and shops would need to adopt hygiene and prevention measures such as organising shifts to avoid large groups of people gathering in one place.
Mexico is still weeks away from its peak of coronavirus infections and deaths, the deputy health minister, Hugo Lopez-Gatell, has warned.
Speaking at a regular news conference, he said:
We still haven’t reached maximum point. For several more weeks, we will keep announcing there are more cases today than yesterday.
Earlier, Lopez-Gatell announced 2,999 new infections and 354 new deaths. Coronavirus has claimed the lives of more 14,000 people in Mexico, making it the seventh worst-hit country in the world.
The is Matthew Weaver taking over the blog to allow Damien to take a break.
Food insecurity is deepening in North Korea after it closed the border with China and took other steps against Covid-19, a UN rights expert said Tuesday.
The country, which has yet to confirm a single case of the novel coronavirus, has introduced a range of other measures to try and prevent an outbreak, including strict quarantine measures, restricted travel between cities, and the total closure of its borders.
Tomas Ojea Quintana, the United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the country, called for urgent action from Pyongyang and the international community to relieve the suffering. On food insecurity, the rapporteur said:
Under the pervasive discrimination in the public distribution system, ordinary citizens, including farmers, do not receive rations. Lack of food had a devastating impact in DPRK in the 1990s, and prospects of a further deepening of food shortages and widespread food insecurity is alarming. The Government must take swift action on this matter by prioritising allocations of financial resources and allowing the humanitarian aid to be delivered on the ground without restrictions
Before the coronavirus crisis, more than 40% of people in North Korea were already considered food insecure, with many suffering malnutrition.
The decision five months ago to close the border with China, and putting thousands into isolation, are exacerbating the situation, said Quintana – an independent expert who does not speak on behalf of the UN but who reports his findings to it.
North Korea’s trade with China in March and April this year dropped by more than 90 percent, leaving many living in the border areas with no income, he said.
The expert pointed to reports that soldiers were also reportedly suffering from food shortages, and voiced concern over the situation in prisons, particularly in secret prison camps. Pointing to accounts of prisoners frequently dying due to exhaustive work, lack of food, overcrowding and contagious diseases, he urged Pyongyang to consider releasing vulnerable prisoners.
Quintana also warned of the impact of the punishing international sanctions imposed on North Korea.
In a context where the Covid-19 is bringing drastic economic hardship worldwide, any sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council that impact on the livelihood of people and hinder the Government’s capacity to respond to Covid-19 should be sincerely reconsidered.
The international community, in particular some permanent members of the Security Council, should no longer rest on the paradox of sanctioning inputs needed to increase food production, while then offering food relief. Any gains from lifting of sanctions should be channeled towards the most vulnerable, including by strengthening the right to food and to health.
Domestic flights have resumed in Indonesia – as the country announced its biggest daily rise in coronavirus cases.
The transport minister, Budi Karya Sumadi, said new regulations for air travel, allowing planes to operate at only 70% capacity, among other strict rules, followed talks between airlines, the Covid-19 task force, and the health ministry.
“Transportation management in the era of the new normal hinges on health aspects,” Sumadi told an online news conference, according to Reuters. “We hope that people stay productive, but safe.”
Flights have been restricted in Indonesia in response to the pandemic, but in recent weeks migrant workers returning home and those travelling for work in exempt sectors, such as health and security, have been allowed to fly.
The Indonesian capital began easing social restrictions last week, even though coronavirus cases continue to rise across the world’s fourth most populous nation.
Indonesia has recorded 33,076 positive coronavirus infections and 1,923 deaths from Covid-19. On Tuesday, it announced 1,043 new cases, the highest daily increase so far.
The Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has seized on a comment from a World Health Organization official that transmission of coronavirus by people with no symptoms could be “rare” as proof his country should be reopening for business, writes Tom Phillips, the Guardian’s Latin America correspondent.
Brazil has the second highest number of infections after the US and is set to overtake the UK this week as the country with the second highest number of deaths.
But during a cabinet session on Tuesday morning, Bolsonaro, who has downplayed the risks of coronavirus and opposed efforts to impose shutdowns, said he hoped the statement from WHO official Maria van Kerkhove would “cut short this policy of stay at home and absolute isolation and even lockdown”.
Bolsonaro insisted this was necessary “so the ills [caused by such measures] are not worse … than the treatment for the pandemic”.
The Brazilian leader criticised how many people in Brazil had followed the WHO “almost blindly” and said it was time for South America’s largest economy to get back to business.
“What we most want is to get back to normal and for the country to retake the path of prosperity,” Bolsonaro said.
Bolsonaro distorted the WHO’s official’s controversial comment that symptomatic carriers appeared less likely to pass on the illness.
During the televised meeting at his official residence, Bolsonaro falsely suggested the WHO had issued a categorical statement making clear “that asymptomatic did not transmit” the virus.
Bolsonaro said he hoped coronavirus “panic” might now start to fade because of the WHO’s supposed claim over the “non-transmission, or near zero-transmission” of carriers without symptoms.
For weeks, the booze-soaked, coronavirus-themed parties had raged over the road from Ticyana Azambuja’s home in Rio de Janeiro, until finally she snapped.
She picked up a hammer, marched across the street and used it to smash the rear windshield and union jack-patterned wing mirror of a reveller’s car.
“I just wanted them to come out and listen to me. I’d pay to fix the car, but they needed to understand how ridiculous it was to be throwing those parties day and night … right in the middle of a pandemic,” the 35-year-old said.
Azambuja’s moment of fury was understandable, if illegal: an anaesthetist, she has spent the last three months battling to save lives on the frontline of Brazil’s fight against Covid-19 – even catching the disease herself.
On 30 May, the day she lost her cool, she had been trying to rest after a gruelling 24-hour shift at one of the three hospitals where she works.
The organisers of the bacchanalia showed no compassion.
There could soon be half a million cases of coronavirus in Delhi, the city’s authorities have warned, saying they expect transmission to increase almost 20-fold in the coming weeks.
Even as India eases its coronavirus lockdown, which has dealt a devastating economic blow, the virus is still spreading fast across the world’s second-most populous nation, with nearly 270,000 reported infections – the fifth-highest caseload in the world.
It has reported almost 10,000 new infections in the past 24 hours with crowded megacities like Mumbai and Delhi, the capital, the worst hit.
Manish Sisodia, Delhi’s deputy chief minister, said after a crisis meeting that authorities expected infections to soar to 550,000 by the end of July, up from almost 30,000 at present.
“There will be 44,000 cases by June 15, 100,000 by June 30, 225,000 by July 15, and we’ll need to prepare necessary infrastructure accordingly,” Sisodia was quoted as saying by the French news agency AFP.
He said the city of around 20 million people, where hospitals are already stretched and anecdotal evidence suggests crematoriums are struggling, needed 80,000 hospital beds.
Delhi’s health minister last week said that it had around 9,000 beds available for coronavirus patients.
Slovakia is to reopen its borders to 16 more European countries from 10 June and will no longer require people to wear face masks outside, the prime minister, Igor Matovic, has said.
From Wednesday, there will be no restrictions on visitors from Germany, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Slovenia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Norway, Denmark and Iceland.
Slovakia last week reopened its borders with neighbours Czech Republic, Austria and Hungary.
Matovic also said that compulsory quarantine upon arrival from abroad will be dropped for countries on its safe list, and people will not have to activate “smart quarantine” on their mobile devices, Reuters reports.
Slovakia had imposed relatively strict restrictions including border closures before it reported any coronavirus cases, and has moved cautiously in reopening. “We are switching from bans to personal responsibility,” Matovic said at a televised news conference.
The country of 5.5 million people has recorded 1,531 cases of the Covid-19 illness, with 28 deaths.
Read the original article at The Guardian