Coronavirus News
Coronavirus Coronavirus: What’s happening around the world on Tuesday
In Vietnam, travel into and out of the city of Danang was shut down early Tuesday, while in Europe, Britain and Germany recommended their citizens avoid the islands and beaches of Spain due to an increase in coronavirus cases. Here’s what’s happening with the pandemic in Canada and around the world on Tuesday.U.S. President Donald Trump…
Coronavirus
In Vietnam, travel into and out of the city of Danang was shut down early Tuesday, while in Europe, Britain and Germany recommended their citizens avoid the islands and beaches of Spain due to an increase in coronavirus cases. Here’s what’s happening with the pandemic in Canada and around the world on Tuesday.
The latest:
- Vietnam suspends flights to and from Danang due to outbreak.
- International Monetary Fund approves $4.3 billion US emergency loan to South Africa.
- UN releases $100 million US from emergency fund for 10 countries’ pandemic relief.
- Head of Chinese CDC is injected with experimental vaccine.
- Virus-linked hunger tied to 10,000 more child deaths each month.
- Fauci says Marlins’ virus outbreak could endanger MLB season.
As countries throughout the world begin to report COVID-19 spikes, recently opened borders are once again being closed.
In Vietnam, travel into and out of the resort city of Danang was shut down early Tuesday, while in Europe, Britain and Germany recommended their citizens avoid the islands and beaches of Spain due to an increase in cases.
At the same time, the U.K. government’s recommendation means that all travellers arriving in Britain from that country will have to undergo a 14-day quarantine. That move fanned uncertainty within Europe’s tourism industry over how to plan ahead amid authorities’ responses to new coronavirus outbreaks.
“Let’s be absolutely clear about what’s happening in Europe, amongst some of our European friends. I’m afraid you are starting to see in some places the signs of a second wave of the pandemic,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said early Tuesday. He noted that there could be further changes to travel advice down the line affecting all of Europe.
In the United States, President Donald Trump reverted back to pushing unproven claims that an anti-malaria drug is an effective treatment and challenging the credibility of the nation’s leading infectious disease expert.
Numerous studies have shown that the drug, hydroxychloroquine, is not an effective treatment for COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. And the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently withdrew an order that allowed the drug’s use as an emergency treatment for COVID-19.
Yet overnight, after returning from a trip to North Carolina where he promoted efforts to develop a coronavirus vaccine, Trump retweeted a series of tweets advocating for hydroxychloroquine.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, a leading member of the White House coronavirus task force, pushed back Tuesday during an appearance on ABC’s Good Morning America.
“I go along with the FDA,” said Fauci. “The overwhelming prevailing clinical trials that have looked at the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine have indicated that it is not effective in coronavirus disease.”
WATCH | Hydroxychloroquine trials halted, researchers focus on other treatments:
The WHO has suspended trials of hydroxychloroquine, the once touted COVID-19 treatment, because it doesn’t work and researchers are turning their focus to other promising treatments and the ongoing race for a vaccine. 1:56
During the same interview, Fauci noted that the Miami Marlins’ recent coronavirus outbreak could endanger the Major League Baseball season altogether.
More than a dozen of the team’s players and staff members have now tested positive for COVID-19. The Marlins were due to play Baltimore on Monday and Tuesday, though both games were postponed. The Yankees’ series opener Monday at Philadelphia was also postponed, where New York would have been in the same clubhouse the Marlins used last weekend.
“This could put it in danger,” said Fauci. “I don’t believe they need to stop, but we just need to follow this and see what happens with other teams on a day-by-day basis.”
Elsewhere in sports, the NBA and NHL plan to resume their seasons in bubble environments, with basketball at Lake Buena Vista, Fla., and hockey at Edmonton and Toronto. The NFL has opted not to create a bubble environment as training camps open for the coming season.
Coronavirus What’s happening with coronavirus in Canada
As of 10:00 a.m. ET on Tuesday, Canada had 114,597 confirmed and presumptive coronavirus cases. Provinces and territories listed 99,860 of the cases as recovered or resolved. A CBC News tally based on provincial reports, regional health information and CBC’s reporting indicates that 8,936 Canadians have died.
- Calgary doctor says ‘dramatic’ 40% drop in preterm births during lockdown is global trend
- Infamous ‘Windsor Hum’ finally dies down as U.S. Steel idles
- COVID-19 risks for kids are low, must be balanced against cost of being out of school, doctors say
WATCH | Epidemiologist on evolving risks as we learn to live with coronavirus:
Dr. Christopher Labos says the revelation that 11 players and coaches with the Miami Marlins have tested positive for COVID-19 shows the challenge of holding safe sporting events. 6:18
Coronavirus What’s happening in the rest of the world
The United Nation’s humanitarian aid co-ordinator has unlocked another $100 million US from its emergency fund to help 10 under-resourced countries in Africa, the Middle East and the Americas meet pressing needs made worse by the pandemic.
The injection from the Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs brings the total to $225 million US released to help 20 countries this year, a record allocation from its Central Emergency Response Fund. Yemen, which the agency says is facing the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, is to receive $35 million, the most of any country.
Other top beneficiaries include Afghanistan, Colombia, Mozambique, Nigeria and Pakistan.
Meanwhile, virus-linked hunger is leading to the deaths of 10,000 more children a month over the first year of the pandemic, according to an urgent call to action from the UN shared with The Associated Press ahead of its publication in the Lancet medical journal.
Further, more than 550,000 additional children each month are being struck by what is called wasting, according to the UN — malnutrition that manifests in spindly limbs and distended bellies. Over a year, that’s up 6.7 million from last year’s total of 47 million. Wasting and stunting can permanently damage children physically and mentally, transforming individual tragedies into a generational catastrophe.
The International Monetary Fund has approved a $4.3 billion emergency loan to South Africa as it reels under the coronavirus pandemic with the world’s fifth-largest virus caseload, and confirmed cases approaching half a million.
The fact that Africa’s most developed country for the first time approached the IMF for a loan is the latest sign of its pain. Unemployment is above 30 per cent and rising, and major state-owned enterprises were already in poor shape.
The Madrid regional government in Spain is making the wearing of face masks mandatory in all public areas, limiting how many people can gather in one place and targeting young people in a drive to stamp out new outbreaks of the coronavirus.
Regional government head Isabel Diaz Ayuso said an information campaign will focus on young people, who are largely blamed for spreading the coronavirus through their social lives. She said young people “have it in their hands to reverse the trend.”
Madrid, along with Catalonia, is one of Spain’s worst-hit regions. It has recorded more than 74,000 cases, with almost 1,900 new infections in the past two weeks.
Vietnam has locked down its third-largest city for two weeks after 15 cases of coronavirus were found in a hospital.
Public transport into and out of the central city of Danang was cancelled. Over the weekend, thousands of mostly Vietnamese tourists had to end their summer holidays in the popular beach destination.
Authorities estimated several thousand people would be stranded by the transportation shutdown and asked hotels to shelter them.
The government on Sunday had ordered physical distancing and the closure of nonessential businesses in the city of 1.1 million people.
The head of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, Gao Fu, says he has been injected with an experimental coronavirus vaccine in an attempt to persuade the public to follow suit when one is approved.
China has positioned itself to be a strong contender in the race for a vaccine. Eight of the nearly two-dozen potential vaccines in various stages of human testing worldwide are from China, the most of any country.
The Associated Press reported earlier this month that a state-owned Chinese company injected employees with experimental shots in March, even before the government-approved testing in people — a move that raised ethical concerns among some experts.
The capital Beijing also reported its first case of domestic transmission in more than two weeks, while the northeastern province of Liaoning added another six cases in its local outbreak. Another four cases were found among Chinese travellers arriving from outside the country, bringing the daily total over the past 24 hours to 68.
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