Coronavirus live news: India to reimpose lockdown on 15m people in Chennai as new cases surge
North Macedonia’s main political parties have agreed to reschedule coronavirus-delayed elections for 15 July after weeks of wrangling over the new date as the country battles a second wave of infections.
The Balkan state has been weathering the pandemic in the hands of a limited caretaker cabinet whose mandate was supposed to expire in April when a snap poll was initially scheduled to take place.
Since that election was put on hold due to the virus, the country’s major parties have been locked in a battle over how to proceed.
The former ruling Social Democrats (SDSM) have been demanding a new vote to fill out the government as soon as possible while their right-wing rivals, VMRO-DPMNE, have been raising concerns about the health situation.
After reining in a small outbreak in late April, the country is now facing a steeper surge of Covid-19 infections, logging more than 4,000 cases and nearly 200 deaths among the population of less than two million.
“We will not be able to endure a bigger crisis than this with a caretaker government and without a parliament,” former prime minister and SDSM leader, Zoran Zaev, said after agreeing to the 15 July date proposed by his rivals.
Nepal will deport five foreign tourists and ban them from entering the Himalayan nation for two years after they joined protests against the government’s response to the coronavirus outbreak.
Police arrested three Chinese nationals and one each from the US, Australia and Norway during a street protest on Saturday in the capital Kathmandu.
The demonstrators demanded better quarantine facilities, and more testing and transparency in the purchasing of medical supplies to fight Covid-19.
The director general of Nepal’s Department of Immigration, Ramesh Kumar KC, said the Chinese and US tourists were each fined 10,000 Nepali rupees ($82.75). The Australian was fined double that because he was also taking pictures of the protests.
“All five will be banned for two years from entering Nepal and deported to their respective countries after international flights resume,” he told Reuters. Nepal has suspended all flights until 5 July as part of its coronavirus lockdown.
He said the Norwegian woman, who is married to a Nepali, will have to pay a 5,000-rupee fine but can remain in the country.
Another immigration official, Ram Chandra Tiwari, said the foreigners had been penalised for misusing their tourist visa and indulging in political activities such as the demonstration.
Nepal imposed a lockdown in March after detecting its second case of coronavirus infection. The numbers have since increased to 6,211 infections and 19 fatalities.
The government, which has been widely criticised for allegedly not doing enough to control the outbreak, says it is committed to increasing the number of tests and improving quarantine facilities.
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China has beaten the US in the battle for world opinion over the handling of coronavirus, according to new polling, with only three countries out of 53 believing the US has dealt with the pandemic better than its superpower rival.
The survey comes ahead of a major conference on the future of democracy this week, due to be addressed by the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state John Kerry and the Hong Kong democracy activist Joshua Wong. The conference is likely to be a rallying point for pro-democracy activists as China and the US enter an ever more explicit ideological contest.
The 53-country survey of 120,000 people by the German polling firm Dalia Research and the Alliance of Democracies Foundation, an organisation headed by the former Nato secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen, reveals deep dissatisfaction with US leadership.
The survey found electorates in Greece (89%), Taiwan (87%), Ireland (87%), South Korea, Australia and Denmark (all 86%) are happiest worldwide with the performance of their government in controlling the coronavirus. At the bottom end of the scale are Brazil, France, Italy, the US and the UK.
Only a third of people around the world said the US responded well to Covid-19, compared with more than 60% who said China’s response was good. In only three countries – Taiwan, the US and South Korea – do more people think the US has responded well to the pandemic than think China has responded well.
French headteachers are awaiting official guidance as to how they can open schools following Emmanuel Macron’s surprise decision that all pupils must go back to school.
During his national address on Sunday evening, the president announced it would be obligatory for youngsters to return to classes as of next Monday, 22 June.
Since the progressive end of France’s strict two-month lockdown began on 11 May, many schools have been partially open with alternate half-classes and attendance has been voluntary.
The decision had some schools that had already written off the final term of this academic year struggling to work out how to open full classes of sometimes 30+ pupils while maintaining coronavirus safety rules.
On Monday, Jean-Michel Blanquer, the education minister, said detailed guidance would be sent to all schools on Tuesday. He told Europe1 radio the rules would be eased.
“There will still be physical distancing but much less strict,” Blanquer said, adding that education officials would advise there should be a “lateral 1 metre” – meaning a distance of 1 metre each side of youngsters, but not necessarily in front and behind.
“We are changing from a distance of 4sq/m around each pupil to a much more flexible system. That will allow us to accept all the pupils,” Blanquer said. He added that protection measures, including masks, regular handwashing and the availability of sanitising gel remained in force.
Crêches, infants’ and primary schools opened shortly after the lockdown ended on 11 May. The lower two years of secondary schools went back the following week and most other schools, except lycées (15- to 18-year-olds), returned at the beginning of June – apart from in the Paris region where there were concerns that the virus was still circulating.
“Two weeks (of school) are very important. Each day counts. Children need to be going to school,” Blanquer added.
The new rules are expected to apply only to enclosed spaces including classrooms and corridors and not outside spaces including playgrounds.
Confirmed cases of Covid-19 are accelerating in Africa, doubling over the last three weeks. In west Africa, what was the continent’s worst affected region, confirmed cases are rising at a slower rate, doubling in just under a month.
Nigeria remains one the region’s most affected countries. Test availability is gradually increasing in part due to the PACT initiative launched by the Africa CDC, which aims to help administer 10m tests in the continent by November.
Yet just 93,000 tests have been administered in the country of 200 million people, while community transmission of the virus is widespread.
The Association of Resident Doctors, a major union representing about a third of doctors, are on strike today and have stopped providing all services including emergency care and coronavirus treatment.
The union is the latest to accuse the government of failing to provide adequate supplies of PPE and conduct tests across Nigerian medical centres. The union is also demanding increased pay to reflect the greater risks of treating patients during the pandemic.
Meanwhile, in Ghana, 200,000 university students, lecturers and non-teaching staff returned to campuses from today, after new measures announced by president Nana Akufo-Addo. Secondary and primary schools will open over the next two weeks he said in a televised address yesterday night.
There are 11,900 confirmed infections of Covid-19 in Ghana, including Ghana’s health minister who is now in hospital recovering. There have been over 4,000 recoveries, while 54 people have died, leaving Ghana with one of the lowest death rates in the world, Akufo-Addo said.
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