Coronavirus live news: Barcelona residents told to stay home after cases rise

The US has suffered another 926 deaths and recorded 72,045 new cases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), has said. That takes the respective totals to 137,864 and 3,555,877.

A top medical official has linked a recent spike in coronavirus cases in Canada to groups of young people gathering in bars, nightclubs and parties.

Deputy chief public health officer Howard Njoo said during a briefing:

When we examine recent trends in case reporting, there is some cause for concern. After a period of steady decline, daily case counts have started to rise.”

Njoo said the daily case count had risen to an average of 350 over the last week up from 300 a day earlier in July. More than 430 cases were reported on Thursday.

This coincides with increasing reports of individuals contracting COVID-19 at parties, nightclubs and bars as well as increasing rates of transmission among young Canadians.”

Canada has reported 109,266 total cases and 8,827 deaths, far fewer than in the United States.

Officials and experts this week said they saw signs of a new spike as the 10 provinces lifted social and economic restrictions imposed in March to fight the outbreak.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Friday that he will return a fourth of his salary to help Mexico deal with the coronavirus pandemic that has harmed its economy, encouraging public servants also to donate from their earnings.

Reuters reports Lopez Obrador’s salary is about 108,000 pesos ($4,806), the contribution amounts to some 27,000 pesos ($1,201), which Lopez Obrador said will go to health services.

He did not say if it would be a one-time or recurring deduction.

“There can’t be a rich government with a poor populace,” Lopez Obrador said in his regular morning news conference, urging others to follow his lead.

Trump’s handling of the crisis continues to draw widespread scrutiny. A Washington Post-ABC News poll found that 38% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the pandemic, down from 46% in May and 51% in March. Disapproval has simultaneously climbed to 60%, up from 53% in May and 45% in March.

Critics have accused the president of politicizing the pandemic, repeatedly undermining the advice of public health experts, and pressuring Republican governors to follow his lead as he focuses on the November election. Most recently the Trump administration has pushed the reopening of schools as soon as possible as part of its efforts to jump start the economy, despite safety concerns.

Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, which has more than 1.7 million members, told the Guardian she regards the effort as “reckless”, and could lead to an exodus of people out of the teaching profession.

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New York governor Andrew Cuomo tweeted this viral video to encourage people to wear a mask

Coronavirus infections in Brazil no longer appear to be rising exponentially but have reached a plateau, creating an opportunity to get the outbreak under control in the country, the World Health Organisation (WHO) emergencies programme head Mike Ryan said today.

Ryan told a news briefing that the “R” number, the number of people each infected person goes on to infect, now appeared to be between 0.5 and 1.5 across states in Brazil, and the number of new cases was plateauing at 40,000-45,000 per day.

The virus is not doubling itself in the community as it was before, so the rise is not exponential”.

Ryan added there was “absolutely no guarantee that it will go down by itself”.

Teams of military medics were deployed in Texas and California in the US to help hospitals deluged by coronavirus patients

In California, military doctors, nurses and other health care specialists have been deployed to eight hospitals facing staffing shortages amid a record-breaking case numbers, Reuters reports. California reported its largest two-day total of confirmed cases, nearly 20,000, along with 258 deaths over 48 hours. There are more than 8,000 people in hospitals who have either tested positive for the coronavirus or are suspected to have it.

In Houston, an 86-person Army medical team worked to take over a wing of United Memorial Medical Center.

Texas reported 10,000 new cases for the third consecutive day on Thursday and 129 additional deaths.

At least half of the 50 states have adopted requirements for wearing masks or other facial coverings.

Gregory Robinson here, If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter to share insight or send tips, I’m on @Gregoryjourno or send me an email at gregory.robinson@guardian.co.uk

Millions of workers in the US have lost health insurance and faced salary cuts and unions say firms are not doing enough to take care of employees during the pandemic. Michael Sainato reports for the Guardian:

The US economy is going to take longer to recover from the hit from the coronavirus pandemic than the market expects, and more stimulus is critical, BlackRock Inc Chief Executive Larry Fink said on Wednesday.

“There is a belief that we will have some form of anti-viral that reduces the severity but let’s be clear, if we had this type of infection rate in March the markets would have been down even further,” Fink said.

US stocks fell sharply during the first three months of the year with the S&P 500 dipping 20%.

Stocks have recovered since then and the index is down less than 1% for the year, even as coronavirus infections continue to shatter new records in the United States. “For one reason or another there is less fear about the disease with respect to its impact,” Fink said.

Fink said additional stimulus is critical for the recovery.

With protests growing, economically punishing restrictions reimposed and surging coronavirus cases in Israel, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s poll numbers are sinking.

After a late-night cabinet meeting, the government on Friday announced that stores, markets and various other public spaces would be closed on weekends. It said restaurants would be limited to takeaway services through the week, with a later statement specifying the measure would start from Tuesday.

Netanyahu’s office said the premier wanted to avoid another “general lockdown” – a move that would likely infuriate a public battered by the pandemic.

But it is clear that coronavirus stumbles by Netanyahu, a right-winger, have dented his support.

A poll this week by Channel 13 found that 61% of voters were “displeased” by his handling of the crisis. That marks a stark reversal for Netanyahu, whose response early in the outbreak won praise.

After his government curbed flights and imposed lockdown measures in March, Israel briefly reduced its daily tally of newly confirmed cases to the single digits in early May, but in recent weeks new cases have regularly topped 1,000 per day.

According to the Israel Democracy Institute think tank, 57.5% of the public supported Netanyahu’s coronavirus management at the beginning of April. As of July 12, that number had fallen to 29.5%.

Ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties, whose support has been essential to keeping Netanyahu in power, have voiced frustration over the looming threat of renewed synagogue closures.

Netanyahu met with ultra-Orthodox party leaders this week and said he wanted to ease their “distress,” while pledging to hold consultations before imposing any closures.