Wooster

Coronavirus is roiling every part of child welfare system

Child welfare agencies across the U.S., often beleaguered in the best of times, are scrambling to confront new challenges that the coronavirus is posing for caseworkers, kids and parents. For caseworkers, the potential toll is physical and emotional. Child welfare workers in several states, including Michigan, Massachusetts, New York and Washington, have tested positive for COVID-19.

What's essential? In France: pastry, wine. In US: golf, guns

The coronavirus pandemic is defining for the globe what's “essential” and what things we really can't do without, even though we might not need them for survival. Whether it is in Asia, Europe, Africa or the United States, there's general agreement: Health care workers, law enforcement, utility workers, food production and communications are generally exempt from lockdowns. In some U.S. states, golf, guns and ganja have been ruled essential, raising eyebrows and — in the case of guns — a good deal of ire.

Ex-Sen. Tom Coburn, conservative political maverick, dies

Former U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma family doctor who earned a reputation as a conservative political maverick as he railed against federal earmarks and subsidies for the rich, has died. Coburn, who also delivered more than 4,000 babies while an obstetrician in Muskogee, where he treated patients for free while in the Senate, died early Saturday morning, his cousin Bob Coburn told The Associated Press in a text message. Tom Coburn was diagnosed with prostate cancer years earlier.

U.K. Deaths Surge 34%; Global Cases Exceed 618,000: Virus Update

(Bloomberg) -- The U.K. reported its deadliest 24 hours as Spain had record fatalities for a second straight day. Worldwide cases topped 618,000 as the coronavirus pandemic showed little sign of abating.U.S. President Donald Trump approved Michigan’s disaster declaration after complaining about its governor. Japan plans an “unprecedented” stimulus as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe warned of a long battle against the virus.Key Developments:Cases top 615,000; 28,000 dead, 135,000 recovered: Johns HopkinsSpain reports 832 deaths, exceeding Friday’s recordAbbott gets emergency approval for five-minute testTrump signs $2.2 trillion aid packageJapan plans supplementary budget, cash handoutsSubscribe to a daily update on the virus from Bloomberg’s Prognosis team here.Click VRUS on the terminal for news and data on the coronavirus and here for maps and charts. For analysis of the impact from Bloomberg Economics, click here. For BNEF’s view of the impact on energy, click here.U.K. Has Most Deaths in a Day (10:30 a.m. NY)The U.K. reported a 34% increase in deaths in one day, its biggest surge since the outbreak began.Fatalities jumped by 260, to 1,019, as of late Friday, the Department of Health and Social Care reported. There were 17,089 confirmed cases Saturday, up from 14,543 a day earlier. The government is expanding testing for hospital staff and building new facilities near London, Birmingham and Manchester.Denmark’s Premier Pledges to Reopen ASAP (10:44 a.m. NY)Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen on Facebook said she doesn’t think it will be several months before Denmark reopens, responding to speculation that limits could remain in place for several months. “We don’t want to keep Denmark under lockdown for one day more than necessary,” Fredericksen said in the posting.Portugal Deaths Rise (10:20 a.m. NY)Portugal’s cases rose 20% in one day and deaths climbed to 100 from 76, a fraction of the fatalities in neighboring European nations. Total cases rose to 5,170 on Saturday from 4,268 a day earlier, the Directorate-General of Health said. That compares with a daily increase of 20% reported on Friday and an 18% rise on Thursday.Deaths so far indicate a fatality rate of 1.9%, but 7.9% for those more than 70 years old, Health Minister Marta Temido said in Lisbon. The peak of infections may occur at the end of May, based on current data, she said. “This indicates that the containment measures that we’ve adopted, namely that people stay at home except to go to work, are being effective,” Temido said.Trump Clears State Funding (9:15 a.m. NY)President Donald Trump approved disaster declarations for Michigan and Massachusetts on Friday, the White House said in statements on Saturday. Trump has approved declarations for more than a dozen states, making them eligible for certain federal funding.Earlier, Trump complained that Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan’s Democratic governor, as well as her counterpart in Washington, don’t appreciate his administration’s efforts to combat the coronavirus epidemic, and said Vice President Mike Pence shouldn’t take their calls.Namibia Shuts Mines, Quarries (8:45 a.m. NY)Namibia, the world’s top producer of marine diamonds and the fifth-biggest of uranium. halted mining and quarrying operations to curb the outbreak, Minister of Mines and Energy Tom Alweendo said. The semi-arid southwest African nation will allow minimal operations and critical maintenance work. Namibia, with eight virus cases, imposed a partial lockdown of the capital, Windhoek.Study Cuts U.K. Death Estimate (7:47 a.m. NY)The number of coronavirus fatalities in Britain could be much lower than previously estimated thanks to social distancing, according to a new paper from statisticians at Imperial College London, the Times reported. That’s a sharp drop from previous analysis that suggested fatalities from the virus could be 260,000 if Britain maintained its previous policy of less restrictive interventions.Prime Minister Boris Johnson became the first world leader to reveal he has Covid-19 yesterday.Sweden Begins Random Testing (7:27 a.m.)Swedish health authorities have begun random testing in Stockholm to help contain the spread of the coronavirus, Sveriges Radio reported.About 1,000 people will undergo testing, the broadcaster reported, citing state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell. The testing will help determine the effectiveness of measures taken to contain the infection, Tegnell said.Switzerland is also going to start testing for antibodies next week to see if people have already had the virus, and once the test is more readily available, those tests will be done on a grander scale, the health ministry said on a webcast.Spain’s Deadliest Day (6:42 a.m. NY)Spain said 832 people died from coronavirus in the last 24 hours, its deadliest day since the outbreak began. That brings total fatalities to 5,690 after the country recorded 769 deaths on Friday.Health Minister Salvador Illa warned on Friday that the pandemic has yet to reach its peak in Spain.Germany to Stay Locked Down (6:37 a.m. NY)German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the country’s lockdown rules are unlikely to be relaxed because they are needed to protect the health-care system.Her chief of staff, Helge Braun, separately told newspaper Der Tagesspiegel it has been decided to keep the current measures largely in place until April 20.Loss of Smell Key Symptom (6:30 a.m. NY)The coronavirus is capable of attacking key cells in the nose, which may explain the unusual finding that some Covid-19 sufferers lose their ability to smell and taste, Harvard Medical School researchers found.Their study of human and mice genomic data found certain cells at the back of the nose harbor the distinctly shaped proteins that the coronavirus targets to invade the body. Infection of these cells could directly or indirectly lead to an altered sense of smell, they said in a paper published Saturday.Japan Stimulus to Exceed Financial Crisis (5:30 p.m. HK)Japan will extend economic stimulus on an “unprecedented scale” in response to the outbreak, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said.There will be cash handouts for citizens and the government will act to protect regional employment, he said in a televised press briefing on Saturday. The government actions will be on a larger scale than that of the financial crisis more than a decade ago, he said.Abe said a supplementary budget will be passed as soon as possible, as he cautioned that the battle against the virus will be a long one. Japan is preparing its virus-related policities with the worst-case scenario in mind, the prime minister said.Dutch Hospitals to Reach ICU Bed Capacity (5 p.m. HK)Dutch hospitals will probably reach full capacity of intensive care unit beds on Sunday due to the pandemic, local newspaper Trouw writes, citing numbers from a medical association. The government is currently in talks with Germany to see if it can transfer intenive-care patients. Doctors have also started calling elderly people at home to ask if they want to be treated in the hospital or at home if they get Covid-19, causing panic among older citizens, newspaper Telegraaf reported.Later, Philips delivered the first 100 of 1,000 ventilators to the Netherlands from the U.S. The devices will help to increase the number of ICU beds.Hubei Border Clash After Quarantine Lifted (3:45 p.m. HK)Dozens of people clashed on the Hubei border after the Chinese government lifted a two-month quarantine on the epicenter of the country’s coronavirus outbreak. The conflict began Friday morning on a bridge connecting Hubei and neighboring Jiangxi province as policemen from both sides argued over how to verify if people were allowed to enter Jiangxi, according to local media reports.The two counties issued a joint statement on Saturday, saying checkpoints between them would be removed and no special documentation would be needed to cross.Tokyo Sees Biggest Daily Increase in Cases (3:30 p.m. HK)New coronavirus infections in Tokyo rose by more than 60 on Saturday, the biggest daily increase yet, according to Kyodo News. The rise comes amid a critical weekend for the capital, where people have been asked -- though not forced -- to stay at home.Iran to Punish Those Who Ignore Social Distancing Rules (3 p.m. HK)Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said people who ignore social distancing rules aimed at stopping the spread of the coronavirus would be punished.“Anyone who doesn’t want to listen or chooses to resist will face harsher measures this time around,” Rouhani said in a television broadcast. “Punishments are in place to that end, but hopefully we will never get there.”This week authorities introduced stricter measures to combat the outbreak, including a ban on intercity travel and the closing of parks and other public spaces.The country’s oil, power facilities and fuel supply have been unaffected by the outbreak, the president added.Singapore Advises Public to Stay Indoors, Shop Online (1:05 p.m. HK)Singapore advised its public to stay at home in its latest effort to curb the spread of the coronavirus, a day after Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said the city state is facing a grave economic challenge posed by the pandemic.The public should only head to malls for essential items such as food, the government said in an advisory on its official WhatsApp channel, suggesting that people “buy food and groceries online.”Mexico’s AMLO Encourages Shopping in Public Markets (11:19 a.m. HK)Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said people should shop in public markets to support small businesses during the coronavirus outbreak.“Those at the top know how to defend themselves; they can resist,” he said in a video posted on Facebook. “Those at the bottom have a hard time in times of crisis”The president has been criticized for his response to the virus, though he appeared to be changing tone recently. The Health Ministry has advised people to maintain social distance from one another to inhibit the virus’s spread.China Signals Ramped-Up Stimulus (10:26 a.m. HK)China’s top leaders pledged to widen the fiscal deficit and sell sovereign debt, signaling that Beijing is preparing larger-scale stimulus to counter the economic fallout from the virus.China will increase its fiscal deficit as a share of gross domestic product, issue special sovereign debt and allow local governments to sell more infrastructure bonds as part of a package to stabilize the economy, according to a Politburo meeting on Wednesday, Xinhua reported late Friday.Singapore Defense Forum Called Off (10 a.m. HK)The Shangri-La Dialogue, a high-profile regional security forum held annually in Singapore, has been canceled due to the coronavirus outbreak.The forum, usually attended by ministerial-level delegates and top defense officials globally, was scheduled to be held from June 5-7. This is the first time the event is being canceled since its inception in 2002.Australian State Introduces Social Distance Fines (9:45 a.m. HK)In the Australian state of Victoria, police have been given power to issue on-the-spot fines of up to A$1,652 ($1,020) for individuals and A$9,913 for businesses who don’t follow rules on social distancing or limits on gatherings. Premier Dan Andrews said he wouldn’t hesitate to close beaches after police were forced to disperse hundreds of people sunbathing on Melbourne’s St. Kilda beach on Friday.Australia’s death toll from the coronavirus outbreak has risen to 14, according to government figures released Saturday. The number of confirmed infections stood at 3,635 as of Saturday afternoon, an increase of 469 from Friday afternoon.China Says All New Virus Cases on March 27 Imported (9:30 a.m. HK)China’s National Health Commission said all 54 new coronavirus cases reported on March 27 were imported, as an order to seal the borders to most foreigners takes effect Saturday.China had 81,394 confirmed cases as of March 27, with 649 of those imported, according to a statement on NHC’s website. The death toll rose by three to 3,295, with all new deaths reported in Hubei province. Discharged patients rose by 383 to 74,971.Abbott Launches Five-Minute Virus Test (7:31 a.m. HK)Abbott Laboratories is unveiling a coronavirus test that can tell if someone is infected in as little as five minutes, and is so small and portable it can be used in almost any health-care setting.The medical-device maker plans to supply 50,000 tests a day starting April 1, said John Frels, vice president of research and development at Abbott Diagnostics. The molecular test looks for fragments of the coronavirus genome, which can be detected in as little as five minutes when it’s present at high levels. A thorough search to definitively rule out an infection can take up to 13 minutes, he said.Read full story hereTrump Says U.S. Handles 100,000 Tests a Day (6:38 a.m. HK)President Donald Trump said the U.S. is conducting about 100,000 tests a day for the coronavirus after weeks of complaints from governors and health-care workers about a scarcity of tests.The president, in a White House news briefing, also questioned whether New York will need as many ventilators as Governor Andrew Cuomo is seeking, saying the state’s projections could be “extremely high.”Cuomo said Friday that New York may need as many as 40,000 of the medical devices to treat patients in critical condition in the state, which is the center of the U.S. outbreak.U.S. Becomes First Nation With 100,000 Cases (5:27 p.m. NY)The U.S. became the first country to surpass 100,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus on Friday, a day after it overtook China to become the largest outbreak in the world. America’s most prominent hot spots are New York and New Jersey, which together account for half the country’s total cases. California has more than 4,000, and smaller outbreaks in Illinois and Michigan continue to gain traction.L.A. Warns of New York-Level Surge in Five Days (5:06 p.m. NY)Los Angeles could see a coronavirus surge similar to New York City’s in five days if the spread continues at the rate it’s been going, Mayor Eric Garcetti said.“We will have doctors making excruciating decisions,” Garcetti said at a press briefing alongside Governor Gavin Newsom. They spoke in front of the U.S. Navy hospital ship Mercy, which docked in Los Angeles to lend extra medical space for non-coronavirus needs. It will be the largest hospital in the city, Garcetti said.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

Analysis: Virus pulls federalism debate into 21st Century

A flu pandemic was ravaging the world, killing indiscriminately in almost every country, including more than 600,000 deaths in the United States. Woodrow Wilson did not address the nation on the subject of the pandemic of 1918-19 a single time. While his posture on the flu seems passive, even reckless, in a modern light, Wilson's approach to war demonstrated an entirely different view of federal power than President Donald Trump's approach to the current pandemic.

A Virus to Kill Populism, Or Make It Stronger

(Bloomberg) -- The last global crisis paved their way to power. The question is whether the latest one will loosen their grip on it.Fallout from the 2008 financial meltdown produced an electoral earthquake that upended postwar party politics, brought a new breed of populists to government and decisively shifted the balance among global powers toward China from the U.S. Novel Coronavirus may prove just as disruptive.It’s too soon to predict which governments will suffer politically from their handling of the virus, as the death toll continues to grow and a quarter of the world’s population remains in lockdown. Whether responses to Covid-19 unmask or entrench such leaders as U.S. President Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, or Italian opposition chief Matteo Salvini remains unclear.So, too, whether China will succeed or fail in transforming a disease that appears to have spread across the globe from Hubei province into a geopolitical opportunity, as it airlifts medical teams and supplies of masks and other equipment to burnish its image in countries such as Iran and Italy.But what’s already apparent is that for populist leaders who thrive on portraying their country as under siege, the coronavirus is proving a challenge. This time the enemy is an invisible one that doesn’t easily fit into a simple anti-elite, anti-migrant or anti-science narrative that has proven so politically fruitful before. Rather than fear others, people fear for themselves. Not only is the coronavirus creating a Darwinist test of which systems and societies are better able to cope, more citizens will put a premium on political decisions being underpinned by truth, said Ahn Cheol-soo, a former South Korean presidential candidate and trained physician. Ahn was speaking from self-isolation after treating the sick in the country’s outbreak epicenter of Daegu.“It will eventually help build a political landscape in which the public isn’t swayed by populism,” said Ahn, who has formed a political group to mount a challenge in April 15 parliamentary elections. “That will eventually make populists lose ground.”At the same time, some leaders have sought to tap into wider unease about a virus that has spread across a deeply interconnected globe at the speed of modern airliners. It’s forced even governments that favor globalization to shut down travel and disrupt supply chains. The course of the virus could yet be portrayed as vindicating nationalist arguments for a less connected world.After initially dismissing the severity of the pandemic, Trump has since tweeted that “THIS IS WHY WE NEED BORDERS!” He referred to the coronavirus as “Chinese” before backtracking.In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban initially focused popular ire on a group of Iranian students who were quarantined and later tested positive. As the virus took hold in the wider community, he then dropped the anti-immigrant theme that helped him win a third straight election in 2018.Salvini, leader of the League party whose roots are in the hardest-hit north of Italy, linked the spread of the disease with migrants who crossed the Mediterranean to Italy from north Africa. He didn’t provide any evidence.A League official said that regional governors in northern Italy in early February had asked for quarantine for everyone arriving from China but that the pandemic exploded because the Rome government did not act fast enough. The League believes more checks have to be made on people arriving from outside Italy, the official said.A former interior minister, Salvini has also portrayed Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte as doing too little too slowly to combat coronavirus, while at the same time accusing him of imposing the decisions of an elite without consulting parliament. Yet none of these arguments has gained traction to date, in a country struggling to cope with what’s quickly becoming the world’s largest outbreak of the disease.Italians are instead rallying behind their institutions in the emergency. Conte’s imposition of an ever-tighter lockdown has seen his government’s popularity reach a record high, backed by 71% of Italians in March, according to a Demos survey. But whether that popularity will survive a postmortem of Conte’s handling of the crisis also remains to be seen.A similar dynamic seems to be at play in Germany. Chancellor Angela Merkel and her beleaguered Christian Democratic Union party were severely damaged in elections by the wave of refugees who fled to the country from the Syrian war in 2015-16.They are now seeing their popularity rise on the back of their coronavirus response. A recent poll showed support for the Christian Democrats has jumped by five percentage points. The party joined traditionally fiscally cautious peers such as U.S. Republicans and Britain’s Conservatives in abandoning  ideological commitments to cutting budget deficits. Finance Minister Olaf Scholz called for a “bazooka” to be fired into the economy.“The economic crisis, rising immigration, these are things you can easily blame on one group or the political elite,” said Benjamin Moffitt, a senior lecturer in politics at the Australian Catholic University in Melbourne, whose latest book “Populism” was published this month. “But this is a biological crisis—to stop it, you can’t just drain the swamp or block refugees from coming.”Whereas Salvini has the luxury of opposition and risks at worst being side lined, the stakes are higher for Trump and Bolsonaro.The U.S. president has come under attack from state governors for not acting quickly enough to contain Covid-19, despite a $2 trillion aid package for the economy passed in the Senate. He claimed churches would be full again for Easter, a little over two weeks away. On Thursday, the U.S. surpassed Italy in cases, with more than 80,700, and is poised to overtake China.In Brazil, Bolsonaro’s insistence that life and business should go on as usual, despite the virus, has led to protests in the major cities with people hanging out of their windows to bang pots and pans. Already under pressure before the pandemic as scandal swirled around his family and a promised economic renaissance failed to materialize, Bolsonaro looks vulnerable.“This crisis has knocked the government out of his orbit,” said Creomar de Souza, chief executive of Dharma Political Risk and Strategy in Brazil. “The characteristics he has that were seen as positive, like combativeness and obstinacy, are now being seen as a liability.”Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrado, a populist from the left, has also downplayed the severity of the threat from the virus, telling people “to keep taking the family out to eat.”Although Mexico still has relatively few recorded cases, a telephone poll by the owner of newspaper Reforma found 44% of Mexicans now disapprove of his handling of the coronavirus threat, to 37% in favor. On Thursday, he appeared to  change his tone and called on companies to send their workers home.In the U.K., the urgency surrounding Covid-19 has even buried the debate over the terms of the country’s departure from the European Union—and with it Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s flirtation with populism.He deferred conspicuously to medical and epidemiological experts in his initial attempt at taking a measured approach to fighting the disease. During the Brexit campaign, experts were deliberately derided.Yet the idea that fighting coronavirus will lead to a restoration of a pre-financial crisis faith in fact is probably wishful thinking, according to Moffitt. That particularly goes for the U.S.“Expertise, in terms of this idea of neutral knowledge is dead in a lot of people’s minds,” he said. “You cannot spend a decade arguing that climate change is nonsense and that you don’t need vaccines, and then turn around and say actually, yes we need experts.” (Adds background on Italy’s League in 12th paragraph)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

Analyzing the Patterns in Trump's Falsehoods About Coronavirus

Hours after the United States became the nation with the largest number of reported coronavirus cases on Thursday, President Donald Trump appeared on Fox News and expressed doubt about shortages of medical supplies, boasted about the country's testing capacity, and criticized his predecessor's response to an earlier outbreak of a different disease."I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators," he said, alluding to a request by Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York. The president made the statement despite government reports predicting shortages in a severe pandemic -- and he reversed course Friday morning, calling for urgent steps to produce more ventilators.Speaking on Fox on Thursday, Trump suggested wrongly that because of his early travel restrictions on China, "a lot of the people decided to go to Italy instead" -- though Italy had issued a more wide-ranging ban on travel from China and done so earlier than the United States. And at a White House briefing Friday, he wrongly said he was the "first one" to impose restrictions on China. North Korea, for one, imposed restrictions 10 days before the United States.He misleadingly claimed again Friday that "we've tested now more than anybody." In terms of raw numbers, the United States has tested more people for the coronavirus than Italy and South Korea but still lags behind in tests per capita.And he continued to falsely claim that the Obama administration "acted very, very late" during the H1N1 epidemic in 2009 and 2010.These falsehoods, like dozens of others from the president since January, demonstrate some core tenets of how Trump has tried to spin his response to the coronavirus epidemic to his advantage. Here's an overview.Playing down the severity of the pandemicWhen the first case of the virus was reported in the United States in January, Trump dismissed it as "one person coming in from China." He said the situation was "under control" and "it's going to be just fine" -- despite a top official from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention telling the public to "expect more cases."No matter how much the count of cases has grown, Trump has characterized it as low."We have very little problem in this country" with five cases, he said in late January.He maintained the same dismissive tone on March 5, as the number of cases had grown by a factor of 25. "Only 129 cases," he wrote on Twitter.A day later, he falsely claimed that this was "lower than just about" any other country. (A number of developed countries like Australia, Britain and Canada as well as populous India had fewer reported cases at that point.)By March 12, when the tally had again increased tenfold to over 1,200, the president argued that too was "very few cases" compared to other countries.He has also misleadingly suggested numerous times that the coronavirus is no worse than the flu, saying Friday, "You call it germ, you can call it a flu. You can call it a virus. You can call it many different names. I'm not sure anybody knows what it is."The mortality rate for the coronavirus, however, is 10 times that of the flu and no vaccine or cure exists yet for the coronavirus.In conflating the flu and the coronavirus, Trump repeatedly emphasized the annual number of deaths from the flu, and occasionally inflated his estimates. When he first made the comparison in February, he talked of flu deaths from "25,000 to 69,000." In March, he cited a figure "as high as 100,000" in 1990.The actual figure for the 1990 flu season was 33,000, and in the past decade, the flu has killed an estimated 12,000 to 61,000 people each flu season in the United States. That's so far higher than the death count for the virus in the United States, but below projections from the Centers for Disease and Prevention, which estimated that deaths from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, could range from 200,000 to 1.7 million. As of Friday evening, more than 1,200 deaths in the United States have been linked to the coronavirus.On the flip side, Trump inflated the mortality and infection rates of other deadly diseases as if to emphasize that the coronavirus pales in comparison. "The level of death with Ebola," according to Trump, "was a virtual 100%." (The average fatality rate is around 50%.) During the 1918 flu pandemic, "you had a 50-50 chance or very close of dying," he said Tuesday. (Estimates for the fatality rate for the 1918 flu are far below that.)This week, as cities and states began locking down, stock markets tumbled and jobless claims hit record levels, Trump again played down the impact of the pandemic and said, with no evidence and contrary to available research, that a recession would be deadlier than the coronavirus.Overstating potential treatments and policiesThe president has also dispensed a steady stream of optimism when discussing countermeasures against the virus.From later February to early March, Trump repeatedly promised that a vaccine would be available "relatively soon" despite being told by public health officials and pharmaceutical executives that the process would take 12 to 18 months. Later, he promoted treatments that were still unproven against the virus, and suggested that they were "approved" and available though they were not.Outside of medical interventions, Trump has exaggerated his own policies and the contributions of the private sector in fighting the outbreak. For example, he imprecisely described a website developed by a company affiliated with Google, wrongly said that insurers were covering the cost of treatment for COVID-19 when they only agreed to waive copayments for testing, and prematurely declared that automakers were making ventilators "right now."Often, he has touted his complete "shut down" or "closing" of the United States to visitors from affected countries (in some cases leading to confusion and chaos). But the restrictions he has imposed on travel from China, Iran and 26 countries in Europe do not amount to a ban or closure of the borders. Those restrictions do not apply to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, their immediate families, or flight crews.Not only were these restrictions total and absolute in Trump's telling, they were also imposed on China "against the advice of a lot of professionals, and we turned out to be right." His health and human services secretary, however, has previously said that the restrictions were imposed on the recommendations of career health officials. The New York Times has also reported that Trump was skeptical before deciding to back the restrictions at the urging of some aides.Blaming othersThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent test kits to states in February, some of which were flawed and produced inconclusive readings. Problems continued to grow as scientists and state officials warned about restrictions on who could be tested and the availability of tests overall. Facing criticism over testing and medical supplies, Trump instead shifted responsibility to a variety of others.It was the Obama administration that "made a decision on testing that turned out to be very detrimental to what we're doing," he said on March 4. This was a misleading reference to draft guidance issued in 2014 on regulating laboratory-developed tests, one that was never finalized or enforceable. A law enacted in 2004 created the process and requirements for receiving authorization to use unapproved testing products in health emergencies.The test distributed by the World Health Organization was never offered to the United States and was "a bad test," according to Trump. It's true that the United States typically designs and manufactures its own diagnostics, but there is no evidence that the WHO test was unreliable.As for the shortage of ventilators cited by Cuomo, Trump has misleadingly said that the governor declined to address the issue in 2015 when he "had the chance to buy, in 2015, 16,000 ventilators at a very low price and he turned it down."A 2015 report establishing New York's guidelines on ventilator allocation estimated that, in the event of a pandemic on the scale of the 1918 flu, the state would "likely have a shortfall of 15,783 ventilators during peak demand." But the report did not actually recommend increasing the stockpile and noted that purchasing more was not a cure-all solution as there would not be enough trained health care workers to operate them.Rewriting historySince the severity of the pandemic became apparent, the president has defended his earlier claims through false statements and revisionism.He has denied saying things he said. Pressed Tuesday about his pronouncements in March that testing was "perfect," Trump said he had been simply referring to the conversation he had in July with the president of Ukraine that ultimately led to the House impeaching him. In fact, he had said "the tests are all perfect" like the phone call.He has compared his government's response to the current coronavirus pandemic ("one of the best") favorably to the Obama administration's response to the H1N1 epidemic of 2009 to 2010 ("a full scale disaster"). In doing so, Trump has falsely claimed that former President Barack Obama did not declare the epidemic an emergency until thousands had died (a public health emergency was declared days before the first reported death in the United States) and falsely said the previous administration "didn't do testing" (they did).At times, Trump has marveled at the scale of the pandemic, arguing that "nobody would ever believe a thing like that's possible" and that it "snuck up on us."There have been a number of warnings about both a generic worldwide pandemic and the coronavirus specifically. A 2019 government report said that "the United States and the world will remain vulnerable to the next flu pandemic or large scale outbreak of a contagious disease." A simulation conducted last year by the Department of Health and Human Services modeled an outbreak of a rapidly spreading virus. And top government officials began sounding the alarms about the coronavirus in early January.Despite his history of false and misleading remarks, Trump has also asserted, "I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

Trump boosts virus aid, warns governors to be 'appreciative'

After days of desperate pleas from the nation’s governors, President Donald Trump took a round of steps to expand the federal government’s role in helping produce critically needed supplies to fight the coronavirus pandemic even as he warned the leaders of hard-hit states not to cross him. “I want them to be appreciative,” Trump said Friday after the White House announced that he would be using the powers granted to him under the Korean War-era Defense Production Act to try to compel auto giant General Motors to produce ventilators. “We have done a hell of a job," Trump said, as he sent an ominous message to state and local leaders who have been urging the federal government to do more to help them save lives.

'Officers are scared out there': Coronavirus hits US police

More than a fifth of Detroit's police force is quarantined; two officers have died from coronavirus and at least 39 have tested positive, including the chief of police. An increasing number of police departments around the country are watching their ranks get sick as the number of coronavirus cases explodes across the U.S. The growing tally raises questions about how laws can and should be enforced during the pandemic, and about how departments will hold up as the virus spreads among those whose work puts them at increased risk of infection. “I don’t think it’s too far to say that officers are scared out there,” said Sgt. Manny Ramirez, president of Fort Worth Police Officers Association.

No alcohol, no dog walks: Lockdown life in South Africa

South Africa government has introduced stringent measures to halt the spread of coronavirus.

Epidemic infects Europe with 'germ of division'

The European Union has faced and survived a series of existential threats over the years but the coronavirus epidemic has exposed old wounds that could yet prove fatal. A debt crisis in Mediterranean countries, a series of refugee influxes and the ongoing saga on Brexit all rattled the European project but did not sink it. "The germ is back," former European Commission president and one of the modern union's chief architects, Jacques Delors, told AFP on Saturday.

Locked up: No masks, sanitizer as virus spreads behind bars

The chow hall line at New York’s Rikers Island jail had halted. For three hours, the men stood and waited, without food, until a correctional officer quietly delivered the news: A civilian chef was among those who tested positive for the coronavirus. Health experts say prisons and jails are considered a potential epicenter for America’s coronavirus pandemic.

AP FACT CHECK: Trump a rosy outlier on science of the virus

It's been that way since before the virus spread widely in the United States, when he supposed that the warmer weather of April might have it soon gone, a prospect the public health authorities said was not affirmed by the research. Now he's been talking about a country revved up again by Easter, April 12, while his officials gingerly play down that possibility from the same White House platform.

Living outside lockdown: Barbers, beauty shops still open

With South Carolina's first coronavirus hot spot just a short jaunt up the highway, Johellen Lee hadn't been out for anything but groceries for nearly a month. Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said in a Facebook question-and-answer session that “Mississippi’s never going to be China,” referring to the authoritarian country's near total shutdown of COVID-19 hot spots.

Virus prevention measures turn violent in parts of Africa

Police fired tear gas at a crowd of Kenyan ferry commuters as the country’s first day of a coronavirus curfew slid into chaos. Virus prevention measures have taken a violent turn in parts of Africa as countries impose lockdowns and curfews or seal off major cities. Cases across Africa were set to climb above 4,000 on Saturday.

Iran coronavirus death toll tops 2,500: ministry

Iran announced Saturday that 139 more people had died from the novel coronavirus, raising the official death toll to 2,517 in one of the world's worst-affected countries. Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour told a news conference that 3,076 more cases had been confirmed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of infections to 35,408. Iran has imposed strict new containment measures, after weeks of public appeals largely failed to deter hundreds of thousands taking to the roads to visit family for the Persian New Year holidays.

A walk through town: Families, coronavirus and togetherness

In a quiet suburb just north of Richmond, Virginia, a mother and her three children spend a weekday afternoon planting a small garden of spinach, red cabbage and lettuce. Stuck at home, thrust together, parents and children are navigating the most unsettling of circumstances and finding new ways to connect. This is one community's story, gathered this week from walks and observations of families keeping to themselves yet still, somehow, managing to remain part of a larger whole.

China sends medical aid to Pakistan to combat virus outbreak

China sent a plane loaded with medical personnel and supplies Saturday to help Pakistan fight the spread of the coronavirus in one of the world's most populous nations. Iran is battling the worst outbreak in the region and state TV said Saturday another 139 people had died from the virus. China has sought to portray itself as a global leader in the fight against the outbreak, which began a few months ago in its Wuhan province.

Moscow Mayor’s Tough Virus Stance May Hasten Russia Lockdown

(Bloomberg) -- As Russia steps up its fight against the coronavirus pandemic, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin has emerged as the leading voice for ever harsher measures that may become the model for locking down the country.Sobyanin has ordered restaurants, bars, parks and most stores in Europe’s largest capital city to close temporarily from Saturday and urged Muscovites to stay home. Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin embraced his approach on Friday, saying measures adopted by Moscow “should extend to all regions” of Russia as the number of declared coronavirus cases passed 1,000.“We need tough restrictions,” to ensure Russians stay at home during a planned shutdown of most workplaces next week, Mishustin said at a televised meeting with Sobyanin and other top officials charged with containing the outbreak. “We managed to win time thanks to preventative measures.”President Vladimir Putin gave Russians a week of paid leave in his first televised speech on the Covid-19 threat on Wednesday, while also promising benefits to help companies and individuals through the crisis.On Friday, however, the Kremlin walked back the decision amid reports that some Russians planned to travel to the country’s vacation spots or visit relatives, taking advantage of reduced domestic air fares offered by the state airline Aeroflot. Mishustin ordered all Russia’s parks and resorts to shut down.Police EnforcementSobyanin sent a message via email to residents of the Russian capital on Saturday morning with a list of instructions -- without any mention of police enforcement -- similar to those applicable in European cities under lockdown. These include limiting going out from home to essential shopping at stores, short walks with family members or journeys to and from work.Russia on Saturday reported 228 new cases of coronavirus overnight, bringing the total to 1,264, with four deaths attributed to the virus.Authorities in Moscow are seriously considering shutting down the city, said four people familiar with discussions on the subject. A Moscow government representative declined to comment.Center StageThe president has allowed Sobyanin, a former Kremlin chief of staff who’s led the city of 12.7 million since 2010, to take center stage in advocating intensifying restrictions to head off the greatest public health challenge of Putin’s 20-year rule.“They’re playing good cop and bad cop,” said Alexei Mukhin, head of the Moscow-based Center for Political Information. “Putin is doling out goodies while Sobyanin is in charge of taking unpopular measures.”Until recently, officials have ruled out a lockdown adopted by governments in the worst-afflicted European countries of Italy and Spain as well as in France and the U.K.. Putin’s top public health official, Anna Popova, on Monday called the measure unnecessary.But while Russia’s patient numbers are well below the levels in those countries, Putin made his address to the nation a day after Sobyanin warned him that the official figures understated the true scale of the outbreak and that Moscow had nearly twice as many cases in reality.Nikolai Malyshev, a leading infectious diseases specialist in the Health Ministry, warned on state TV this week that Russia is readying itself for an “explosive development like a nuclear reaction” with the coronavirus epidemic. In the near future, “large numbers of people will fall ill and need medical treatment,” he said.Despite Moscow’s gradual tightening of restrictions, the city so far has remained free of the home confinement imposed in other capitals including Paris, London, Rome and Madrid. The subway is open, even if traffic last week was down by half, and until Saturday there were plenty of cars on the roads.The World Health Organization’s representative in Russia, Melita Vujnovic, said Thursday that if Muscovites and others across the country exercise self-discipline and stay home, then officials may avoid imposing strict quarantine.“If it becomes necessary, I am sure they will take this measure,” she said.(Updates with Moscovites told to stay home in sixth paragraph, new cases in seventh.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

The Coronavirus Disaster You’re Not Paying Attention To

BARCELONA—It was a perfect Barcelona day. The wet air was filled with spring smells. The city’s pollution rate had declined by 89 percent. Crime had dropped more than 70 percent. Police cars, lights flashing, sat idle on the empty street. The ambulances, around 10 of them, were parked in front of my local health center. One rode past, its lights on but with the siren silent.A perfect day, except the COVID-19 death toll had just exceeded that of China, a country of 1.4 billion.After Putin’s Big Fail, Russia Braces for COVID-19 OnslaughtSpain is reeling from the coronavirus epidemic. By Friday, the daily death toll reached 769 over 24 hours. As of this writing, Spain has suffered 4,858 fatalities overall with 64,059 confirmed cases—including 9,444 health workers. Some 36,293 people are hospitalized.  Only 9,357 patients have recovered. All this in a county with a population one-seventh the size of the United States.The mood in this context of looming mortality is surreal. The virus is invisible, death omnipresent and the silent streets speak to an almost ghostly existence.The only reasonably good news was that Thursday saw only a 14 percent increase in cases compared with 18 percent a day earlier and 20 percent on Wednesday. Across the country, the army has been deployed to deep-clean hospitals and other facilities—including some 900 nursing homes where at least 1,517 deaths have been recorded. Members of the Military Emergencies Unit found corpses, including “some totally abandoned elderly people—even some who were dead in their beds,” Defense Minister Margarita Robles told the Ana Rosa TV program. Nearly two weeks into a general quarantine that the government says will last at least until April 12, and it is hard to remember a time when people rubbed shoulders, drinking and dancing in the ciudad condal. Now, the time of revelry feels like a distant era. To be sure there are the nightly 8 p.m. cheers for health workers on the front lines of the crisis. And on a Friday night clutches of young people put out disco lights and dance on their balconies. The spectacle lasts for maybe 10 minutes before they go back inside and shutter their doors. How did it all go so wrong so quickly?While China was busy fighting the virus, warnings about the critical importance of being prepared for what was coming went largely unheeded. “Perhaps stopping the entry of the virus was impossible, because it involved confining a country without [visible] cases,” wrote a Spanish researcher, a consultant physician in internal medicine and infectious diseases, in an opinion piece in the Spanish daily El Periodico. “But we could have bought equipment and designed protocols that would not put our health workers in the battle that they are currently fighting piecemeal and without adequate weapons.” Even when the disease had arrived at Spain’s doorstep there was a feeling of business as usual. In a country where the elderly often pick up their grandchildren, schools didn’t close until just before a national emergency was declared. Airports didn’t bother to screen passengers for signs of fever. The week before, on March 8, a huge march celebrating International Women’s Day was allowed to take place, despite the obvious danger. An unprecedented number of Spain’s politicians began to fall ill. Every ideological faction was hit, and right at the top.Spain’s Minister of Equality Irene Montero, who attended the rally, tested positive, as did Isabel Díaz Ayuso, president of the Community of Madrid. Meanwhile Santiago Abascal, leader of the ultra right-wing Vox Party, along with Javier Ortega Smith, the party’s secretary general, fell ill with the disease. So did Quim Torra, a leader in Catalonia’s independence movement. Even Maria Begoña Gómez, the wife of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, was stricken. Throughout the country, but particularly in the Spanish capital of Madrid, the dead began to pile up. On Wednesday, reports surfaced that a new residence for the elderly in the posh district of Chamartin had been decimated by the virus. Some 25 people at the facility had perished, and 50 were infected. Management called the military for help as the silent plague raged around them.The virus has spread quickly to the countryside as well. In addition to Madrid, the Basque Country and Catalonia, the disease has reached Castilla y León, Castilla-La Mancha, and Valencia. Major hospitals as far as Murcia and Andalucia reportedly are inundated by coronavirus patients. To be sure, both Spanish authorities and citizens generally are doing whatever they can to combat the onslaught of disease and death. In Madrid the military has been hard at work trying to create extra capacity for the overflow of patients from hospitals struggling to keep up with an exhausting caseload. On Wednesday, more than 300 coronavirus patients were transferred to Pavilion 5 at the Madrid exhibition center, where scores of beds with oxygen tanks had been installed. A small laboratory was built to analyze patient data, and radiology equipment was brought in largely for chest X-rays. The hope is that an intensive care unit consisting of some 96 beds will be ready by Saturday. “Our role is to unclog all the hospitals in the region,” said Eduardo López Puertas, the director general of Ifema, which manages the complex. Meanwhile, citizens played their part. Unlike in Los Angeles, where there are reports that businesses refused to close after a general quarantine was declared, Spaniards throughout the country cooperated as best they could. Faced with a shortage of medical supplies, people brought out their sewing machines and stitched together makeshift masks, which were donated to the elderly. Soup kitchens for the poor and the vulnerable began to emerge. In the United States, supermarkets were scenes of much-publicized chaos and disrespect for social distancing, but in Barcelona and elsewhere, people gently lined up two meters apart, giving the elderly and the vulnerable preference. In Barcelona and other cities, some even took the time to make sure the city’s pigeons had enough feed to survive the plague. In the absence of humanity, rats braved some streets as never before. A wild boar was even reported rummaging for food in the city center. When the elderly, living alone and vulnerable, decided to go outside, normal people at newspaper kiosks and on street corners told them to stay in doors. Better loneliness than death, they urged. And while the police fined some for being outdoors, their response with the vulnerable was generally more an expression of concern than anything else. Still the number of intensive care beds, only some 5,000 spread throughout the country, did not nearly match the number who needed them. At the Severo Ochoa Hospital in Leganes, on the outskirts of Madrid, there were more than 260 patients in an emergency room with a capacity of 90. Medical professionals throughout the country had to begin to prioritize who would receive precious oxygen and artificial respiration machines. Patients lay on floors or sat in plastic chairs.Whatever could go wrong went wrong. On Thursday it was learned that fast coronavirus tests that government officials had purchased from a Chinese supplier were essentially garbage. The tests manufactured by a Chinese company were supposed to have a sensitivity level of 80 percent when in fact the level of sensitivity was 30 percent. The tests are to be returned.The lack of molecular testing kits means that the overall number of dead may be underreported in some parts of the country by as much as 70 percent, according to research conducted by the Institute of Health Juan Carlos III that was published in Spain’s El Pais newspaper. The institute cited abnormally high overall death rates in hard hit parts of the country, even taking into account coronavirus mortalities.On Wednesday, associations of physicians, pharmacists, nurses, dentists and veterinarians representing some 721,000 medical professionals issued a joint statement in which they warned of a health care system on the verge of total collapse. “Health-care professionals find ourselves in a situation of total insecurity and helplessness,” due to the lack of basic supplies, the statement said. Already, as of Wednesday, some 14 percent of the infected were medical professionals.A large hospital can use as many as 5,000 surgical masks per day. Now, at some facilities, hospital workers were jerry-rigging their own equipment including protective pants made from plastic garbage bags. On social media some doctors were touting the use of adapted one-piece diving masks as a protective measure. Workers caring for the elderly clamored for protective equipment, but to no avail. Yet as absolutely frightening as this situation is, virtually no one I know would trade enduring coronavirus in Spain with having to face it in New York, Los Angeles or Seattle, where quarantines and school closures weren’t enacted until the very last minute. It is unbelievable to think that there are places that could be worse than Spain right now. But the overwhelming fear for those of us who care about America—and there are many here—is that the United States will endure an even greater catastrophe than we have seen.The new reality is that the virus creeps silently among us, eroding and in many cases destroying whatever sense of safety we had even a month ago. Cooped up in their apartments, people hear the sirens of passing ambulances riding along empty streets. They peek from the windows when the health workers stop to pick up another victim. The disease has become a neighbor.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

AP PHOTOS: Italy's front-line medical heroes, in portraits

The doctors and nurses on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic in Italy are almost unrecognizable behind their masks, scrubs, gloves and hairnets — the flimsy battle armor donned at the start of each shift as the only barrier to contagion. Associated Press photographers fanned out on Friday to photograph them during rare breaks from hospital intensive care units in the Lombardy region cities of Bergamo and Brescia, and in Rome. Friday was a bad day: Italy registered the most deaths since the country's outbreak had exploded five weeks earlier, adding 969 more victims to raise the world’s highest COVID-19 toll to 9,134.

Australia prepares to fly cruise passengers to Germany

Australian authorities pressed ahead Saturday with plans to fly 800 cruise ship passengers to Germany this weekend after a downward revision in the number of people on board who needed to be tested for the coronavirus. Plans had been put in place to fly the European passengers to Germany from the Western Australia state capital, Perth, near where their ship, the Artania, is docked at the port of Fremantle. The plans were thrown into doubt by an apparent spike in the number of people on the ship who were suspected of being infected with the new coronavirus — from nine confirmed cases on Friday to more than 70 possible ones early Saturday.

One Battle Boris Johnson Is Clearly Winning

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- As recently as a few weeks ago, it seemed as though U.K. politics could not possibly talk about anything besides Brexit, even after the country’s formal departure from the EU. Business as usual was expected to return at some unspecified point in the future.As elsewhere, the coronavirus has turned British politics on its head. Unlike Brexit, which continues to divide opinion fairly evenly, the coronavirus crisis has prompted an outbreak of recently unfamiliar unity. Number Cruncher polling (excusive to Bloomberg) finds personal ratings for Boris Johnson -- himself now diagnosed with coronavirus -- that have not been seen for a British Prime Minister since the early days of Tony Blair’s premiership in 1997.Fully 72% of eligible voters are satisfied with Johnson’s performance as Prime Minister, with 25% dissatisfied. Ninety-one per cent of those currently supporting the Conservatives count themselves as satisfied, along with about half of Labour voters and those voting for other parties and a large majority of undecided voters. Johnson’s government gets similar approval ratings, both overall (73% to 24%) and on its handling of the Coronavirus outbreak (72% to 25%).The 1,010 interviews were conducted Tuesday through Thursday, following Johnson’s televised address on Monday, but completed before Johnson himself revealed that he had tested positive for the virus. There is some evidence in our data to suggest that these figures were higher in the immediate aftermath of the pre-recorded broadcast, which was watched by around half of the adult population.The strongest numbers of all are for the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak (77% satisfaction). Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, whose successor will be named on April 4, remains in negative territory (with 54% dissatisfied).While wartime metaphors are now commonplace, this pandemic is not, of course, a war in literal sense -- people are being killed by a disease, not each other. But it does share many of the same characteristics and a similar “rally around the flag” sense. The most obvious of these is the unity against a common enemy, with a lot of agreement across parties and across the public. There is also clear sense of “national effort,” and some extremely large government spending on its way.That’s not to say that there have been no controversies — there have been debates over strategy and the policy response — though these can easily be drowned out by the enormity of the wider situation.This is not unique to the U.K. Polling elsewhere has shown that the crisis has helped incumbents in other countries too. Emmanuel Macron in France, Italy’s Giuseppe Conte and Canada’s Justin Trudeau have also seen their ratings improve. Even in the strongly polarized U.S., Donald Trump’s approval ratings have seen gains.But what is specific to the U.K. is the perfect storm providing the tailwind to the Conservatives. The post-election bounce for Johnson and his party was still very much in evidence when the coronavirus became the dominant story, and was likely boosted by Brexit on Jan. 31st. Labour has been less visible than it might normally be, and when it is visible it’s via its unpopular leader, who remains in place more than three months after his election defeat.Coupled with the rally-round-the-flag effect, it is not hard to see why records are being broken. Of likely voters, 54% would choose Conservatives, up nine points from the December election (excluding Northern Ireland). No Conservative government has ever had such a strong poll rating, according to records compiled by author Mark Pack beginning in 1943.Labour has dropped five points to 28%, giving the Tories their biggest lead while in office since Margaret Thatcher’s peak during the Falklands war in 1982. The Liberal Democrats — who this week postponed their leadership election until 2021 — also fall five points to 7%.Of course, no U.K. election is imminent, with even the local elections scheduled for May having been postponed until next year. What’s more, being hugely popular in a war or war-like situation can still end in electoral defeat, as it did for Winston Churchill and George H.W. Bush. And that’s before we consider likely economic damage of the coronavirus, which is in the very early stages of being felt.But these numbers are significant for another reason. The immediate task for Johnson and other leaders is to convince their citizens to comply with personal restrictions that would be unthinkable in normal times. Irrespective of the wider politics, having the public united behind him can only help. For now, the U.K. feels strangely united.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Matt Singh runs Number Cruncher Politics, a nonpartisan polling and elections site that predicted the 2015 U.K. election polling failure.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

One Battle Boris Johnson Is Clearly Winning

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- As recently as a few weeks ago, it seemed as though U.K. politics could not possibly talk about anything besides Brexit, even after the country’s formal departure from the EU. Business as usual was expected to return at some unspecified point in the future.As elsewhere, the coronavirus has turned British politics on its head. Unlike Brexit, which continues to divide opinion fairly evenly, the coronavirus crisis has prompted an outbreak of recently unfamiliar unity. Number Cruncher polling (excusive to Bloomberg) finds personal ratings for Boris Johnson -- himself now diagnosed with coronavirus -- that have not been seen for a British Prime Minister since the early days of Tony Blair’s premiership in 1997.Fully 72% of eligible voters are satisfied with Johnson’s performance as Prime Minister, with 25% dissatisfied. Ninety-one per cent of those currently supporting the Conservatives count themselves as satisfied, along with about half of Labour voters and those voting for other parties and a large majority of undecided voters. Johnson’s government gets similar approval ratings, both overall (73% to 24%) and on its handling of the Coronavirus outbreak (72% to 25%).The 1,010 interviews were conducted Tuesday through Thursday, following Johnson’s televised address on Monday, but completed before Johnson himself revealed that he had tested positive for the virus. There is some evidence in our data to suggest that these figures were higher in the immediate aftermath of the pre-recorded broadcast, which was watched by around half of the adult population.The strongest numbers of all are for the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak (77% satisfaction). Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, whose successor will be named on April 4, remains in negative territory (with 54% dissatisfied).While wartime metaphors are now commonplace, this pandemic is not, of course, a war in literal sense -- people are being killed by a disease, not each other. But it does share many of the same characteristics and a similar “rally around the flag” sense. The most obvious of these is the unity against a common enemy, with a lot of agreement across parties and across the public. There is also clear sense of “national effort,” and some extremely large government spending on its way.That’s not to say that there have been no controversies — there have been debates over strategy and the policy response — though these can easily be drowned out by the enormity of the wider situation.This is not unique to the U.K. Polling elsewhere has shown that the crisis has helped incumbents in other countries too. Emmanuel Macron in France, Italy’s Giuseppe Conte and Canada’s Justin Trudeau have also seen their ratings improve. Even in the strongly polarized U.S., Donald Trump’s approval ratings have seen gains.But what is specific to the U.K. is the perfect storm providing the tailwind to the Conservatives. The post-election bounce for Johnson and his party was still very much in evidence when the coronavirus became the dominant story, and was likely boosted by Brexit on Jan. 31st. Labour has been less visible than it might normally be, and when it is visible it’s via its unpopular leader, who remains in place more than three months after his election defeat.Coupled with the rally-round-the-flag effect, it is not hard to see why records are being broken. Of likely voters, 54% would choose Conservatives, up nine points from the December election (excluding Northern Ireland). No Conservative government has ever had such a strong poll rating, according to records compiled by author Mark Pack beginning in 1943.Labour has dropped five points to 28%, giving the Tories their biggest lead while in office since Margaret Thatcher’s peak during the Falklands war in 1982. The Liberal Democrats — who this week postponed their leadership election until 2021 — also fall five points to 7%.Of course, no U.K. election is imminent, with even the local elections scheduled for May having been postponed until next year. What’s more, being hugely popular in a war or war-like situation can still end in electoral defeat, as it did for Winston Churchill and George H.W. Bush. And that’s before we consider likely economic damage of the coronavirus, which is in the very early stages of being felt.But these numbers are significant for another reason. The immediate task for Johnson and other leaders is to convince their citizens to comply with personal restrictions that would be unthinkable in normal times. Irrespective of the wider politics, having the public united behind him can only help. For now, the U.K. feels strangely united.This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg LP and its owners.Matt Singh runs Number Cruncher Politics, a nonpartisan polling and elections site that predicted the 2015 U.K. election polling failure.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

With virus, cherished Mideast traditions come to abrupt halt

Under the sign “Take out only” and a tall bottle of antiseptic by his side, Mazin Hashim, 54, rearranged the coals heating a water pipe outside his famed cafe in Baghdad. No more evenings spent mostly by men in traditional coffee shops across the region. In a region where life is often organized around large families, communal meals and tribal rules, social distancing can be difficult.

Virus infections top 600,000 globally with long fight ahead

The number of confirmed coronavirus infections worldwide topped 600,000 on Saturday as new cases stacked up quickly in Europe and the United States and officials dug in for a long fight against the pandemic. The latest landmark came only two days after the world passed half a million infections, according to a tally by John Hopkins University, showing that much work remains to be done to slow the spread of the virus. While the U.S. now leads the world in reported infections — with more than 104,000 cases — five countries exceed its roughly 1,700 deaths: Italy, Spain, China, Iran and France.

Students provide sanitizers to daily workers to fight virus

They toil on the fringes, without any job security or set hours or decent wages. Then, said organizer Ari Wijayanto, they fanned out to distribute 400 bottles of hand sanitizers and 30 bottles of hand soaps to pedicab drivers. As of Thursday, the government said there were 893 confirmed cases in Indonesia, including 16 in Yogyakarta.

Joseph Lowery, civil rights leader and MLK aide, dies at 98

The Rev. Joseph E. Lowery fought to end segregation, lived to see the election of the country’s first black president and echoed the call for “justice to roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream” in America. For more than four decades after the death of his friend and civil rights icon, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the fiery Alabama preacher was on the front line of the battle for equality, with an unforgettable delivery that rivaled King’s — and was often more unpredictable. Lowery had a knack for cutting to the core of the country’s conscience with commentary steeped in scripture, refusing to back down whether the audience was a Jim Crow racist or a U.S. president.

Civil rights leader, MLK aide Joseph Lowery dies at 98

The Rev. Joseph E. Lowery, a veteran civil rights leader who helped the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and fought against racial discrimination, died Friday, a family statement said. A charismatic and fiery preacher, Lowery led the SCLC for two decades — restoring the organization’s financial stability and pressuring businesses not to trade with South Africa’s apartheid-era regime — before retiring in 1997. Lowery, considered the dean of civil rights veterans, lived to celebrate a November 2008 milestone that few of his movement colleagues thought they would ever witness — the election of an African American president.

Virus coordinator Birx is Trump's data-whisperer

For many in the public health and political worlds, Dr. Deborah Birx is the sober scientist advising an unpredictable president. Others worry that Birx, who stepped away from her job as the U.S. global AIDS coordinator to help lead the White House coronavirus response, may be offering Trump cover to follow some of his worst instincts as he considers whether to have people packing the pews by Easter Sunday. In coming days, immunologist Birx will be front and center in that debate along with the U.S. government's foremost infection disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, as well as Vice President Mike Pence.

UN chief says misinformation about COVID-19 is new enemy

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Friday the world is not only fighting the “common enemy” of the coronavirus “but our enemy is also the growing surge of misinformation” about COVID-19 disease. Guterres said the U.N. is launching a COVID-19 Communications for Solidarity Initiative to rapidly inform people about the facts and science, “and promote and inspire acts of humanity around the world.” The U.N. chief also urged all nations “to stand up against the increase in hate crimes targeting individuals and groups perceived to be associated with the coronavirus.”

Dour Moscow mayor сomes to fore as 'PM for coronavirus'

At a televised meeting with Vladimir Putin, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin flatly told the President that official figures on COVID-19 cases were far from the reality. After that reality check, the official narrative changed swiftly: Putin, who had called the situation "under control", on Wednesday gave a grim-faced address to the nation. "Putin signed up to Sobyanin's position," opposition politician Vladimir Ryzhkov said on the popular Echo of Moscow radio station.

As world hunkers down, Trump moves full-speed against US foes

The coronavirus pandemic is shaking up the world, but not US foreign policy. As billions hunker down to halt the spread of the virus, President Donald Trump has only ramped up sanctions and other pressure against frequent targets such as Iran and Venezuela. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has led calls for an "immediate global ceasefire" to refocus on fighting COVID-19 and on Friday appealed for the "waiving of sanctions that can undermine countries' capacity to respond to the pandemic."

AP Sources: Alleged Maduro co-conspirator is in DEA custody

A retired Venezuelan army general indicted alongside Nicolás Maduro has surrendered in Colombia and is being taken by Drug Enforcement Administration agents to New York for arraignment, four people familiar with the situation said Friday. Cliver Alcalá has been an outspoken critic of Maduro for years.

UN health agency settles in for long fight with virus

The World Health Organization’s emergencies chief said Friday that widespread testing for the new coronavirus is crucial and countries should not be faulted for reporting higher numbers of cases. The comments from Dr. Michael Ryan suggested a change in mindset at WHO and the U.N. health agency's increased resignation that the virus first identified in China late last year will be around for a while.

U.S. Infections Top 100,000; L.A. Warns of Surge: Virus Update

(Bloomberg) -- The U.S. became the first country to reach 100,000 coronavirus cases. Italy had its deadliest day with almost 1,000 fatalities. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his health secretary tested positive.President Donald Trump ordered General Motors to start making ventilators by invoking a Cold War-era law. Toyota’s idled U.S. manufacturing facilities will make much-needed face shields and masks.New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said new infections will be “astronomical.” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti warned his city may see a New York-like surge in less than a week.Key Developments:Cases top 585,000; 26,800 dead, 130,000 recovered: Johns HopkinsU.S. cases top 100,000, more than Italy, ChinaU.S. ramps up virus testing, but demand still outpaces supplyWorkers critical to world’s food supply falling illU.K. orders unprecedented shutdown of housing marketTokyo braces for critical weekendFrom Spain to Germany, farmers warn of fresh food shortagesSubscribe to a daily update on the virus from Bloomberg’s Prognosis team here.Click VRUS on the terminal for news and data on the coronavirus and here for maps and charts. For analysis of the impact from Bloomberg Economics, click here. To see the impact on oil and commodities demand, click here.U.S. Becomes First Nation With 100,000 Cases (5:27 p.m. NY)The U.S. became the first country to surpass 100,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus on Friday, a day after it overtook China to become the largest outbreak in the world. America’s most prominent hot spots are New York and New Jersey, which together account for half the country’s total cases. California has more than 4,000.L.A. Warns of New York-Level Surge in Five Days (5:06 p.m. NY)Los Angeles could see a coronavirus surge similar to New York City’s in five days if the spread continues at the rate it’s been going, Mayor Eric Garcetti said.“We will have doctors making excruciating decisions,” Garcetti said at a press briefing alongside Governor Gavin Newsom. They spoke in front of the U.S. Navy hospital ship Mercy, which docked in Los Angeles to lend extra medical space for non-coronavirus needs. It will be the largest hospital in the city, Garcetti said.Rhode Island Stops Cars With N.Y. Plates (5 p.m. NY)Rhode Island police, aided by the National Guard, on Saturday will conduct house-to-house searches to find people who traveled from New York to demand they begin 14 days of self-quarantine. State police are already stopping cars with New York license plates.“Right now we have a pin-pointed risk,” Governor Gina Raimondo said. “And that risk is called New York City.”Raimondo, a Democrat, said she consulted lawyers and while she couldn’t close the border, she felt confident she could enforce a quarantine. Many New Yorkers have summer houses in the state, especially in tony Newport, and the governor said authorities would be checking there.Trump Signs $2 Trillion Stimulus Bill (4:47 p.m. NY)President Donald Trump signed the largest stimulus package in U.S. history, a $2 trillion aid bill intended to rescue the economy. The plan will provide a massive injection of loans, tax breaks and direct payments to large corporations, small businesses and individuals whose revenue and income have plummeted under social distancing restrictions.Read full story hereFour Die on Holland America Cruise Ship (4:30 p.m. NY)Carnival Corp.’s Holland America line said four passengers died on its Zaandam ship, which has had an outbreak of flu-like symptoms on board, including at least two confirmed cases of Covid-19. The cruise line said the passengers were “older” but didn’t say how they died.The Zaandam, currently near Panama, was still at sea when cruise companies halted new voyages earlier this month.Trump Orders GM to Make Ventilators (4 p.m. NY)President Donald Trump ordered General Motors Co. to immediately begin making ventilators, invoking a Cold War-era defense act amid productive talks with the automaker.“Our negotiations with GM regarding its ability to supply ventilators have been productive, but our fight against the virus is too urgent to allow the give-and-take of the contracting process to continue to run its normal course. GM was wasting time,” Trump said in a statement. “Today’s action will help ensure the quick production of ventilators that will save American lives.”GM and ventilator maker Ventec Life Systems Inc. had much of what they needed in place to ramp up production of the breathing machines. They were just waiting on the Trump administration to place orders and cut checks.Belgium May Keep Limits Until May 2 (3 p.m. NY)Belgium extended restrictions on citizens and businesses, which took effect March 14, by two weeks until April 19, and Prime Minister Sophie Wilmes signaled a further extension to May 3, saying it’s too early to declare the epidemic under control. Belgians must stay at home except for essential activities such as grocery shopping. Gatherings by more than two people are banned and stores selling non-essential goods remain closed.N.Y. Seeks Aid for Four New Hospitals (2:45 p.m. NY)New York is seeking federal assistance for four new emergency hospitals, Governor Andrew Cuomo said, as the number of state deaths spiked 35% in a day to more than 500.The new sites would join four centers the U.S. is setting up in the city, he said. The state wants more beds for Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester counties. Cuomo spoke from the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center on Manhattan’s west side, which is being converted into a 1,000-bed emergency hospital that will open Monday.Cuomo said current demand for medical equipment is adequately covered and that the state is stockpiling additional supplies for a potential peak of infections three weeks from now. “We don’t need them yet,” he said. “We need them for the apex.”The governor said he would keep the state’s schools closed for an additional two weeks, at which time the situation will be reassessed.Luxembourg Plans to Test for Herd Immunity (1:30 p.m. NY)Luxembourg is in an intensive planing phase to be among the first nations to research so-called herd immunity based on new blood tests the country is expecting to get, Health Minister Paulette Lenert said Friday.The new tests wouldn’t check for Covid-19 infections but whether people have developed immunity against the new virus. Luxembourg, due to its small population of just over 600,000 people, is in a fortunate position to do this, the minister said. Scientists would be able to test samples that would be representative of the entire population, the minister said.Italy’s Daily Toll Nears 1,000 (12:35 pm. NY)Italy had its highest daily death toll even as the number of new cases declined on Friday. Fatalities shot up to 969, the most in a 24-hour period since the start of the outbreak.New infections totaled 5,959, compared with 6,153 the previous day, civil protection authorities said at their daily news conference in Rome. Italy now has 86,498 total cases, roughly the same number as the U.S. and more than China, where the disease’s first outbreak occurred.U.S. Buys More Ventilators (12:30 p.m. NY)President Donald Trump said the federal government bought “many ventilators” from several companies he didn’t identify. Trump in a tweet said the names will be announced later.State and local officials have been pleading with the federal government for more ventilators as cases of the coronavirus mount.France Extends Restrictions (12:20 p.m. NY)French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said public confinement is being extended to April 15. The restrictions could be further extended if needed, he said in a press conference after a cabinet meeting on Friday. A scientific committee consulted by the government recommends at least six weeks of confinement, he said.Portugal’s Cases Rise 20% (12:14 p.m. NY)Portugal’s cases rose 20% to 4,268 from 3,544 a day earlier, the government’s Directorate-General of Health said. That compares with a daily increase of 18% reported Thursday and a 27% rise on Wednesday. The total number of deaths increased to 76 on Friday from 60 reported through Thursday morning.Director-General of Health Graça Freitas said the data suggest the peak won’t be a moment in time but rather a plateau, and may not occur before May.Libya, Syria Face Catastrophe: WHO (11:35 a.m. NY)Libya reported its first case this week, meaning 21 of 22 Eastern Mediterranean nations have infections. The World Health Organization said Libya’s capacity to respond is extremely limited in some areas and non-existent in others, with a large movement of people from neighboring countries.The outbreak also threatens to cause a catastrophe in Syria, the WHO said. Half of the nation’s hospitals are not functioning after nine years of war and thousands of health workers having fled the country. Millions of displaced people live in overcrowded camps in the country’s northwest, but after two days of tests using 300 WHO kits, no cases so far have been detected, the agency said.Toyota Shifts Factories to Face Shields (11:07 a.m. NY)Toyota Motor Corp.’s idled manufacturing facilities in the U.S. will make much-needed face shields and masks, and the Japanese automaker is closing in on deals with medical-device makers to help them boost production.The carmaker said Friday it will start mass production of face shields early next week to supply hospitals near its plants in Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan and Texas. Toyota also said it is finalizing pacts with at least two companies to make breathing ventilators and respirator hoods, and it’s looking for partners to make protective masks. The company on Thursday extended its shutdown of North American factories for two weeks.U.K. Virus Deaths Jump 30% (10:29 a.m. NY)The number of people in the U.K. who have died from coronavirus increased by 31% to 759 as of Thursday, the Department of Health said. That’s higher than the five-day average of 20%.Some 14,579 have tested positive for the disease as of Friday, an increase of about 25%, above the five-day average of 20%.Two Fed Bankers Confident of Rebound (10:29 a.m. NY)Atlanta Fed President Raphael Bostic and Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan expressed confidence the U.S. economy will rebound when restrictions on activity are lifted.“This is a public health crisis” and different from a typical recession, Bostic said on Bloomberg Television Friday. Kaplan offered a similar view a few minutes earlier. “We were strong before we went into this, and we believe that we’ve got a great chance to come out of this very strong,” he said.Kaplan said unemployment would peak “in the low to mid teens” before recovering to around 7%-to-8% by year-end.Coronavirus Response Leaves U.K. Vulnerable: Lancet (9:29 a.m. NY)A delayed response by the U.K. government to the coronavirus pandemic has left the health system “wholly unprepared” for an expected surge of critically ill patients, according to the editor of the medical journal The Lancet.In a letter posted on the journal’s website, Richard Horton described chaos and panic across the National Health Service, basing his comments on messages he received from workers. The government last month should have expanded testing capacity, ensured the distribution of protective equipment and stepped up training, he said.U.K. Prime Minister, Health Secretary Have Virus (9:17 a.m. NY)British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will self-isolate in Downing Street for seven days after a test found he had the coronavirus, spokesman James Slack told reporters on Friday. Health Secretary Matt Hancock has also contracted the illness, in a double blow to the U.K. government’s response to the crisis.Both men have reported mild symptoms. Meals will be left at Johnson’s door while he continues to work by video-conference, Slack said. Hancock is self-isolating and working from home.These are the latest high-profile individuals to contract the virus in Britain after Prince Charles, the heir to the throne, tested positive.U.K. Sees No Change to Brexit Timetable (8:29 a.m. NY)“In terms of the timetable there’s no change from our point of view,” the U.K. prime minister’s spokesman James Slack told reporters in a conference call. Slack was asked if there would be an extension to the Brexit transition period beyond December.NYC Mayor Says Trump Needs to Face Reality on Ventilators (8:20 a.m. NY)New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said cases of the new coronavirus are going to become “astronomical,” putting unprecedented strain on the hospital system. Trump said in an interview on Fox News that he didn’t think New York state needed the 30,000 ventilators that Governor Andrew Cuomo has asked for to treat Covid-19 patents with respiratory conditions.“When the president says the state of New York doesn’t need 30,000 ventilators, with all due respect to him, he’s not looking at the facts of this astronomical growth of this crisis,” de Blasio said. “If they don’t have a ventilator, a lot of people are just not going to make it.”Rolls-Royce Pauses U.K. Civil-Engine Output (8:07 a.m. NY)Rolls-Royce Holdings Plc will wind down jetliner-engine production in the U.K. as it spends a week implementing cleanup and safety measures to cope with the coronavirus outbreak. The company, which makes turbines for wide-body planes, will “significantly reduce” all but essential activities within its U.K. civil aerospace facilities from midnight, it said in a statement Friday.Rolls-Royce is taking a break from manufacturing after customer Airbus SE also paused production to check on measures to protect employees from Covid-19. Boeing Co. has gone a step further, winding down planemaking in the Seattle area for two weeks after a worker died of virus-related complications.China Ramps Up Stimulus Measures (8 a.m. NY)China will “appropriately” raise its fiscal deficit as a share of gross domestic product, issue special sovereign debt and allow local governments to sell more infrastructure bonds as part of a stimulus package to stabilize the economy, according to a politburo meeting on Wednesday, central China television reported late on Friday.Italy Virus Curve Seen Flattening Slightly (7:49 a.m. NY)The curve of new coronavirus cases in Italy appears to have started flattening slightly since March 20, Silvio Brusaferro, head of the country’s National Health Institute, said at a press conference on Friday. The mortality rate in the country is proportional to patients’ age, Brusaferro said.The National Health Institute said the country wasn’t at the peak of the contagion yet, but the head of the Superior Health Council Franco Locatelli said there were clear signs that the containment measures “are efficient, so people must respect them.”Italy reported its biggest rise in coronavirus infections in the last five days on Thursday, as the disease spread further in the northern Lombardy region, even after weeks of rigid lockdown rules.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

Mississippi Governor Creating ‘Mass Confusion and Panic’ Amid Pandemic

As the threat of the coronavirus spreads across the country, governors have been moving forward with aggressive actions designed to leave little room for confusion or error when it comes to best health practices. And then there’s Tate Reeves of Mississippi. The first term Republican has made clear that he appreciates the severity of the pandemic, but in the past week he’s left local officials in his state grasping for answers over what, exactly, his response to it is. The confusion stems from an executive order that Reeves put in place earlier this week that led some local leaders to believe that he was hampering their abilities to direct more aggressive public health measures to contain the coronavirus. Reeves later said the order was meant to be a “floor statewide” for local authorities to follow. In its wake, some mayors have made their frustrations clear. "The governor's actions are creating mass confusion and panic across the state," Tupelo Mayor Jason Shelton, a Democrat, said in an interview with The Daily Beast. Reeves' stewardship of his state through the coronavirus crisis provides an illustration of what happens when executive leadership doesn’t want to be too heavy a government hand. To a certain degree, his actions have mirrored President Donald Trump. But unlike the president, who has no direct control over the decisions states and municipalities make, the results of Reeve’s approach are out there for everyone to see. And what is being witnessed is a state of confusion, even as Mississippi’s health department reports 579 COVID-19 cases and eight deaths. During a press conference Tuesday, Reeves emphasized the state was not at the end of the pandemic and "may still be at the beginning stages of this fight." He then detailed an executive order that instructed residents to avoid gatherings deemed non-essential of 10 or more people. Employers were instructed to "let every possible employee" work from home.But when the executive order was published, key language sparked dismay from local leaders who worried the governor’s move would supersede the actions they had already taken in hopes of minimizing the virus in their own communities. For Moss Point Mayor Mario King, who considers himself an independent, the back and forth has been embarrassing. On Monday, he was unhappy with the governor’s lack of leadership only to feel by Friday that no action from the governor would have been better than what ended up happening. These Republicans Think Trump’s Easter Deadline Doesn’t ‘Make Sense’King now says he’s just embarrassed when it comes to the governor of his state, and believes the governor’s action directly interfered with his own local stay at home order. There's no logic behind the governor’s thought process, he said.  "My thing is Tate, c'mon, you are the governor of Mississippi,” King said. “Just admit that you made a mistake and let us do our jobs because you're interfering with that right now." Back in Tupelo, Shelton initially said it appeared the governor’s more broad approach superseded local decisions in "no uncertain terms.” "I don't know if it's intentionally vague or accidentally vague or what, but it's not serving the best interest of the citizens in the state of Mississippi," Shelton said. By Friday afternoon, the confusion pushed the mayor to essentially have a new mindset over the more aggressive measures he believes his community needs during the pandemic. “Act without regard to the governor's executive orders and just do what we think is best for Tupelo,” Shelton said. In Oxford, Mayor Robyn Tannehill said their first interpretation—which left her "very frustrated"—was that the governor’s order superseded what they had done locally and would allow "a lot of businesses to open back up."But after talking with Reeves, the Democrat came away with the understanding that the stricter resolutions in her community could stay in place “just as they were.” "Initially it caused a great deal of confusion," she said. "And it's continuing to cause confusion in our community with businesses that had closed that now are saying, 'wait, now I can be open.'” The governor’s office has tried to play clean up over the order’s language with a spokesperson saying Thursday that they were trying to create “statewide parameters that local leaders on the front lines can build on.” “The Governor will be issuing a supplement (Thursday) to clarify that no local precautionary measures are overruled by this executive order,” a spokesperson for the governor said in an email. Reeves made a similar pledge during a press conference that same day, though he chided some critics in the process. "If you'll recall, some of the same folks that are upset today were upset a week ago because we had not issued statewide guidance on some things," Reeves said Thursday. Reeves earlier declared a state of emergency and ordered public schools closed until April 17. He has also said the state wouldn't make "rash decisions simply because some other states decide to do things." He has emphasized social distancing and urged residents of his state to practice "very sanitary means," and ensure “that you are being smart." On Twitter he’s urged residents to “stay home if you can.” During a livestream Monday, where he answered submitted questions, Reeves stood in line with the approach Trump has taken during his presidential press briefings.  The governor said he wouldn't make decisions with the "potential of really causing more harm than they have of actually producing good." "If you feel that a statewide lockdown should be occurring, then you should put yourself on individual lockdown," Reeves said at the time. "If that's what you believe is best for you and your family, then that's fine. That is not the guidance that we are getting from our experts." At one point, an online questioner challenged Reeves that China did a lockdown and "it was good for them." "Why can't Mississippi?" the question read. "Mississippi's never going to be China," Reeves said. "Mississippi's never going to be North Korea." Reeves’ resistance to dramatic public health measures stands in contrast to those governors who are on the frontlines of the coronavirus fight. The Republican governor of Ohio issued a stay at home order on Sunday and according to The New York Times a slew of states both led by Democrats and Republicans have made similar moves. In neighboring Louisiana, a stay at home order also came out Sunday. Health experts remain anxious about the differences between different states approaches as the pandemic plays out, fearful that a virus won’t respect state lines.  "It certainly would help if it's realized that infections don't stop at the state border,"said Dr. Arnold S. Monto, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan. "If there are contrary policies in different states, it certainly is not helpful." Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

NOT REAL NEWS: Debunking yet more false coronavirus content

None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. CLAIM: Nancy Pelosi snuck $25 million worth of pay raises for Congress into the federal relief bill intended to help Americans amid the coronavirus pandemic. THE FACTS: A proposal in the economic rescue package sets aside $25 million for the House of Representatives but “none of those funds will go to member salaries,” Evan Hollander, the communications director for the House Appropriations Committee, told The Associated Press.

Iran confronts deadly alcohol crisis in midst of dealing with coronavirus

Iran, already struggling to fight the growing spread of novel coronavirus, is now coming to grips with an alcohol poisoning problem that has killed hundreds of people this year. In the wake of the deaths, officials initially blamed misinformation on social media for convincing victims that drinking alcohol could protect them against coronavirus. "The first few days we all thought patients had drunken alcohol to protect themselves of corona, as some of them claimed so," Gholam Hosein Mohebbi, head of the public relation of Imam Hospital of Ahwaz, told ABC News.

Haiti, Venezuela among countries in $2 billion U.N. humanitarian response plan

Haiti and Venezuela are among 51 countries the United Nations is seeking to help through a $2 billion global humanitarian plan launched this week to respond to the coronavirus.

Eiffel Tower says "Merci" to health workers fighting virus

Health workers racing to save lives as France contends with one of the world's worst coronavirus outbreaks have received a huge show of gratitude with the help of the Eiffel Tower. The display of solidarity that started at 8 p.m. (1900 GMT) coincided with the moment when citizens in lockdown across France have been cheering and applauding from their windows and balconies in support of doctors and nurses. Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said the light show will take place every evening on the 324-meter-tall tower.

States impose new restrictions on travelers from New York

States are pulling back the welcome mat for travelers from the New York area, which is the epicenter of the country’s coronavirus outbreak, but some say at least one state’s measures are unconstitutional. Governors in Texas, Florida, Maryland and South Carolina this week ordered people arriving from the New York area —including New Jersey and Connecticut — and other virus hot spots to self-quarantine for at least 14 days upon arrival. Connecticut officials have also pleaded with New Yorkers and others from out of state to avoid visiting unless absolutely necessary.

These 13 government officials and world leaders have reportedly tested positive for COVID-19

The novel coronavirus has made its way up the ranks of several world governments, with officials in the US, Australia, Iran, and UK testing positive.

Coronavirus: 150 Tunisians self-isolate in factory to make masks

They are churning out 50,000 a day, plus other gear to keep doctors protected from coronavirus.

Fears grow over coronavirus outbreak devastating refugees, civilians trapped by war

The novel coronavirus has swept through developed countries like China, Italy, South Korea, Spain and the United States, killing thousands and disrupting their economies, but the world has yet to see mass outbreaks among the most vulnerable populations. Humanitarian experts and the United Nations are warning that day will come soon, posing a deadly threat to millions of people and demanding an urgent response from the international community -- but one that so far hasn't come together. "This pandemic can only be won when countries and means and resources are put and pooled together to contain and to fight the spread of the of the virus," Robert Mardini, director-general designate of the International Committee of the Red Cross, told ABC News.

Federal prisons struggle to combat growing COVID-19 fears

When a federal correction officer geared up for duty recently at a Florida prison complex, he added an N95 mask amid coronavirus fears. At other federal prisons, though, he would have been told to wear one. Together, these accounts detail a scattershot policy on COVID-19 safety at the federal Bureau of Prisons amid the growing pandemic.