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Brazil is the first South American country to record more than 1,000 COVID-19 deaths. The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center said early Saturday Brazil has nearly 20,000 confirmed cases of the virus with 1,074 deaths.  Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has been reluctant to impose quarantine restrictions to slow the spread of the disease.  He has said he is concerned about the economic impact of the restrictions.   The president has made fun of the coronavirus, calling it the “little flu.”  Almost all of Brazil’s governors have introduced quarantine measures.  Bolsonaro visited a hospital Friday without wearing a face mask. He was seen wiping his nose and shaking the hand of an elderly person, the BBC reported.  Medical experts are especially concerned about the impact the virus could have on Brazil’s poor and crowded neighborhoods and the country’s indigenous population.  A 15-year-old member of the Yanonami ethnic group died this week, the BBC reported.  He was the first indigenous person to die from the virus.  Bolsonaro’s popularity is falling.  Protests against him have been staged in several cities.     
 
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Greek health officials have quarantined one of the country’s biggest Gypsy, or Roma, camps, scrambling to contain the spread of the coronavirus after multiple cases were detected there.  
     
The squalid settlement of 3,000 on the outskirts of the city of Larissa, 216 kilometers north of Athens, was locked down after at least 20 residents tested positive for the contagious virus late Thursday.   
     
Dozens more have since been recorded as authorities launched sweeping tests over the weekend, also keeping the military on standby to step in and enforce the quarantine in a bid to stop the virus from spreading to neighboring communities.   
     
“This incident has confirmed our greatest fear,” said Apostolos Kalogiannis, the mayor of Larissa, which, along with neighboring towns has until recently boasted a limited number of COVID-19 infections.  
     
All cases in the Roma settlement of Nea Smyrni have been linked to a 32-year-old man believed to have defied nationwide stay-home orders. He is also believed to have interacted with migrants at a nearby camp, forcing authorities to also quarantine that camp, 15 kilometers from Larissa, for two weeks.   
     
Health and security officials Friday scrambled to the Roma settlement to assess the situation, concerned the outbreak could imperil the government’s successful drive to bring the coronavirus to heel, after convincing the country’s population to heed draconian lockdown orders.   
   
The situation in this case “is different and difficult,” warned Sotiris Tsiodras, an infectious diseases expert and the head of the Greek medical response team. “The example of Larissa shows just how fragile the situation is,” he said, refusing to elaborate.  
   
As the COVID-19 pandemic rages across Europe, Roma, traditionally crammed in decrepit homes and settlements with poor sewage, are largely being viewed as ticking time bombs, generating 20 new cases for every infected person, seven times as fast as the average rate of virus’s infection, according to experts.   
Government officials contacted by VOA in Athens Friday said the administration was set to use “any and every necessary measure” to avoid further spread of the virus across Larissa, a largely agrarian area.   Members of a Roma community gather on the street after several cases of the coronavirus were detected, in Larissa, Greece, April 10, 2020.The latest outbreak provides a revealing glimpse of how vulnerable and neglected Roma communities remain across Greece and Europe generally.   
     
Up to 12 million Roma live in Europe, but their communities from the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia to Bulgaria, Romania, Kosovo, and Serbia, face decades of neglect.   
   
Stuck in slums and overcrowded neighborhoods, governments have long refused to formalize their settlements and provide basic services. Worse yet, critics add, authorities are now opting for aggressive tactics rather than aid and development plans to improve Roma communities.  
     
Abel Ravasz, the Slovakian government’s former emissary for the Roma communities, said the use of the military to enforce a lockdown order on affected communities would only further stigmatize the Roma.   
     
In the Bulgarian town of Sliven, police set up checkpoints around a Roma enclave earlier this week, restricting movements. Since then, police have moved to cordon off three other settlements, citing what they called traditional Roma defiance of rules and social distancing.   
     
“I would say that coercion is needed in certain situations because we are obliged to protect the rest of the population,” Interior Minister Mladen Marinov said.   
     
Nationalist European lawmakers, meanwhile, have called for sweeping shutdowns of Roma “ghettos,” labeling them breeding grounds for the coronavirus spread. The racial slurs have since then been picked up, posted and embellished by thousands of Greeks on social media accounts, sparking nationwide debate.   
     
To prevent further stigmatization, Greek officials, led by Tsiodras, lost no time in meeting with senior Roma leaders and community members at the Nea Smyrni settlement.   
     
We are all brothers in this country,” he told an open assembly of locals, after the talks on Friday. “But you have to follow the measures. You have to practice social distancing.”   
     
The crowd cheered but as the team left, groups of Roma were seen following the health chief and his team, asking why they had neglected them for so long. 
    
 Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, Greece has documented 92 deaths and nearly 2,000 cases, a stark contrast to the more than 17,000 fatalities in neighboring Italy.   
     
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One inmate has been found dead after a riot and a blaze swept through a Russian prison under a coronavirus lockdown in eastern Siberia, authorities said on April 11.Independent news outlets reported that about 300 inmates were injured in the incident at Prison No. 15 in Angarsk, Irkutsk region.Trouble erupted on April 9 with authorities blaming prisoners, while human rights activists said inmates self-harmed en masse to protest systematic mistreatment.Activists from the nongovernmental group For Human Rights say Russian special forces were deployed at the penal colony late on April 9 in an attempt to quell the riot.A Federal Penitentiary Service spokesman in Irkutsk region said the rioting started when a prisoner attacked a guard.On April 10, a fire broke out at the penal colony — engulfing an area of about 30,000 square meters — as riot police cordoned off roads leading to the prison, turning away independent observers. The fire was extinguished by the early morning on April 11.The rights ombudsman for the Irkutsk region, Viktor Ignatenko, was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying the body of one inmate was found after the debris was cleared. The reports did not specify the cause of death.The regional penal service said the situation at the prison early on April 11 was “under control.” It accused prisoners of starting the fire.Videos posted on social media show buildings on fire as prisoners assert that they are being “murdered.”Human rights activists have not been allowed into the prison. Relatives and monitors are unable to contact the prison due to quarantine restrictions imposed during the coronavirus epidemic.The Irkutsk Region Investigative Committee has opened a criminal case on the matter.There are about 1,300 prisoners at the facility.
 
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I knew I was in trouble a few days ago when I looked in the mirror and saw a sheepdog looking back.Giselle, who has been keeping my shaggy hair in reasonable shape for years, is now in forced retirement until April 19. She is not alone.VOA Geneva reporter Lisa Schlein poses for a selfie at home, where she is sheltering in place during the Coronavirus lockdown. (Photo: Lisa Schlein / VOA)In an effort to contain the deadly coronavirus, the Swiss Federal Government has ordered all bars, restaurants, sports facilities and cultural spaces nationwide to shut down. Only essential businesses, such as grocery stores and pharmacies remain open.Clearly nobody thought to inform the authorities that beauticians were one of life’s essentials. So, activities for the country’s 8.57 million inhabitants are severely limited until at least April 19.That is when the government will take stock of COVID-19 and decide if the situation has improved enough for it to ease up on the extreme measures that have turned this picture-perfect Alpine country into a ghostly landscape.Last week, for the sake of my mental well-being, I decided to break free of days of home-bound self-isolation and take a walk among the coronavirus-free trees. Also, my food supply was running low, so I figured it was time to stock up.I wasn’t fully prepared for the “Brave New World” I encountered. The streets were largely deserted and desolate. Even the construction boom, which has been making life in this city a misery, has pretty much come to a halt.The parking lot in my usually bustling neighborhood shopping mall was half empty. All the high-end and bargain-basement stores were closed. Only two supermarkets remained open, with long queues of people, separated by two meters, patiently waiting for their turn to enter.By the time my turn came, a pack of “body snatchers” had swept the shelves clean of most packaged goods. Bread, in particular, took a big hit. There wasn’t a crumb in sight. And, yes—there was no toilet paper.My misery found a lot of company. People were kind. They would throw me a quick smile of compassionate understanding as we hastily passed each other in the aisles.The motorway A2 is seen amid an outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) near Wassen, Switzerland, April 10, 2020.Switzerland borders Italy, for weeks the country worst-hit by COVID-19. But a recent statistical analysis shows that Switzerland with more than 24,000 confirmed cases and more than 950 deaths, has the highest rate of COVID-19 infections in the world, based on the size of its population.Despite this sobering news and the lockdown in Italy, the Swiss border at Ticino remains open to allow some 68,000 Italians working in Switzerland and seen as vital to the economy to enter.Swiss authorities reacted quickly after the first case of coronavirus was confirmed on Feb. 25. Three days later, they took the unprecedented step of banning public gatherings of 1,000 or more, disappointing thousands of would-be merrymakers looking forward to the country’s biggest, most popular carnival in Basel.Other casualties included the world’s biggest art fair in Basel, major Swiss watch exhibitions, the zany Inventions Convention and the Geneva International Motor Show, which attracts half a million visitors every year.The ban has had an immediate adverse impact on the activities of the United Nations and other international organizations headquartered in Switzerland.FILE – A logo is pictured outside a building of the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland.On March 3, the U.N. Human Rights Council canceled 200 side events to reduce the number of participants attending. And, nine days later, the council suspended its session, a week before its ending date because of the spread of coronavirus.At the time, we did not fully realize that this was the end of all “normal” activities at the United Nations. The U.N., which used to be a beehive of activity, is basically shuttered. The staff is at home teleworking. Only a few essential personnel are left to roam in this cavernous building.These radical changes, of course, have affected the way I report. I’ve had little problem adjusting to working from home as I’ve been doing that for years—long before “teleworking” became a fixture in peoples’ everyday lexicon.However, the difference between working at home now and working at home in pre-coronavirus days is stark and not comforting.In the past, my self-isolating homework was interspersed with trips to the U.N. to attend press conferences, special events, socializing and gossiping with colleagues. It was easy to move around in the city or travel to out-of-the way places in search of a story.But that was then, and this is now. Like everyone else, I am learning how to maneuver in a virtual world.In-person press conferences have been replaced with virtual ones, presenting a number of drawbacks. For example, a few days ago, I plugged myself into a World Health Organization virtual press conference on the coronavirus pandemic.In his opening remarks, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said his greatest concern was the impact this deadly virus could have if it gained a foothold in countries with weaker health systems.I immediately focused on sub-Saharan Africa, where cases of COVID-19 are rising. I quickly pressed *9 to ask a question. Unfortunately, with 277 journalists on line, many of whom also were queued up to ask a question, I didn’t stand a chance– no matter how furiously and frequently I pounded *9 on my keyboard.Paul Molinaro, Chief Operations Support and Logistics at WHO, Director-General of World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and Maria Van Kerkhove, Technical Lead of the Health Emergencies Programme, attend a news conferenceOne of my biggest regrets as a reporter in this atmosphere of caution and fear is my reduced ability to tell the stories of desperation that deserve to be heard but are being forgotten.Catastrophic events with dire consequences for millions of civilians caught in conflict are playing out in silence. So are the tragedies of children dying from hunger and disease, of women being raped as a tactic of war, of refugees fleeing persecution and violence.I have figured out that my best hope of shedding a bit of light on these dark corners of misery is by linking them with the COVID-19 pandemic, a singular threat dominating every aspect of our lives.
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Fifty crew members aboard France’s sole aircraft carrier, the Charles de Gaulle, have tested positive for the new coronavirus and parts of the ship have been put in lockdown, the armed forces ministry said on Friday.
 
A ministry statement said that three sailors had been evacuated by air to a military hospital in Toulon, southern France, home port of the carrier.
 
A team equipped to carry out tests for coronavirus infection boarded the vessel on Wednesday just after the armed forces ministry had reported signs of COVID-19 symptoms among 40 crew members.
 
“The results of 66 tests showed 50 cases of COVID-19 aboard the Charles de Gaulle. There is no deterioration of the sailors’ medical condition at this stage,” the ministry said, adding that the evacuation of three of those sailors occurred Thursday.
 
The aircraft carrier, which is equipped with its own intensive care facilities, has 1,760 personnel on board.
 
The nuclear-powered carrier, which had most recently been taking part in exercises with northern European navies in the Baltic Sea, is continuing its journey to Toulon, where it is due to dock in the coming days.
 
“While awaiting the early return of the aircraft carrier in Toulon … extra measures aimed at protecting the crew and containing the spread of the virus have been put in place,” the ministry added, adding that all crew members must now wear face masks.
 
Last week the captain of U.S. aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt was relieved of his command after the leak of a scathing letter he sent to superiors to call for stronger measures to curb a coronavirus outbreak on his vessel.  
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Finance ministers from the 19 eurozone countries Thursday agreed on a package worth more than half a trillion euros to help companies, workers and health care systems mitigate the economic consequences of the coronavirus outbreak.Mario Centeno, president of the Eurogroup of eurozone ministers, called the package of measures “totally unprecedented.””The package we approved today is of a size close to 4 percent of European GDP,” he said. “Plus, the automatic stabilizers that are quite powerful to protect European economies in case of crisis. This is totally unprecedented. We have never ever reacted so quickly to a crisis as this one.”The measures provide for hard-hit Italy and Spain to quickly gain access to the eurozone’s bailout fund for up to 240 billion euros, as long as the money is used for the needs of their health care systems.Centeno said at a video news conference that countries are expected to identify enough health costs to access the money.People line up to buy supplies from a supermarket as the lockdown to combat the spread of coronavirus in Madrid, Spain, continues on April 9, 2020.The credit line is available only for the duration of the COVID-19 outbreak and expires immediately after that.The Eurogroup package also includes up to 200 billion euros in credit guarantees through the European Investment Bank to help companies stay afloat and 100 billion euros to offset lost wages for workers confined at home and others who are on reduced schedule.However, the deal did not include shared borrowing guaranteed by all member countries to pay for the cost of the coronavirus crisis, a key demand from Italy, Spain, France and six other countries, but rejected by Germany, Austria and the Netherlands.The finance ministers of Eurogroup left that issue open and up to national leaders of member countries as part of further negotiations on a possible fund to support the economic recovery in the longer term.
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Teams of Mexico City government workers are fanning out across the metropolis delivering medical supplies, including thermometers, to people who notified the government they had symptoms associated with COVID-19.Officials said the outreach is aligned with the government’s recommendation that people with non-urgent symptoms isolate at home.The government said workers are also calling elderly people to see if they are all right and if they have a support network.Additionally, the government said it is making available food and monetary support for the neediest during the pandemic.So far, Mexico has confirmed more than 3,100 coronavirus case and 174 deaths.       
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Rio de Janeiro’s iconic Copacabana Palace hotel is closing Friday for the first time in nearly a century, Brazil’s latest economic casualty of the coronavirus pandemic.The hotel’s owner, Belmond, issued a statement, saying the temporary closure after 96 years in business, is due in part to efforts to curtail the spread of COVID-19.Copacabana Palace hotel is adjacent to Copacabana Beach, which remains closed because of the virus outbreak.Rio state’s governor has imposed restrictions on gatherings and business operations, but hotels were not ordered to close.Authorities in Rio also extended orders requiring non-essential businesses to close, and residents to stay at home, except for essential trips, through April 30.Rio de Janeiro’s state health department said as of Thursday, it registered 2,216 confirmed cases of the virus and 122 deaths.        
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One January lunchtime in a car parts company, a worker turned to a colleague and asked to borrow the salt.In that instant, they shared the coronavirus along with the saltshaker, scientists have since concluded.That their exchange was documented at all is the result of intense scrutiny, part of a rare success story in the global fight against the virus.The coworkers were early links in what was to be the first documented chain of multiple human-to-human transmissions outside Asia of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.They are based in Stockdorf, a German town of 4,000 near Munich in Bavaria, and they work at car parts supplier Webasto Group. The company was thrust under a global microscope after it disclosed that one of its employees, a Chinese woman, caught the virus and brought it to Webasto headquarters. There, it was passed to colleagues – including, scientists would learn, a person lunching in the canteen with whom the Chinese patient had no contact.The January 22 canteen scene was one of dozens of mundane incidents that scientists have logged in a medical manhunt to trace, test and isolate infected workers so that the regional government of Bavaria could stop the virus from spreading.That hunt has helped Germany win crucial time to build its COVID-19 defenses.Baker Tim Kortuem poses with lamb-shaped easter cakes with protective masks at his bakery Schuerener Backparadies as the spread of the coronavirus disease continues in Dortmund, Germany, April 9, 2020.The time Germany bought may have saved lives, scientists say. Its first outbreak of locally transmitted COVID-19 began earlier than Italy’s, but Germany has had many fewer deaths. Italy’s first detected local transmission was on February 21. By then Germany had kicked off a health ministry information campaign and a government strategy to tackle the virus which would hinge on widespread testing. In Germany so far, more than 2,600 people have died of COVID-19. In Italy, with a smaller population, the total exceeds 18,200.”We learned that we must meticulously trace chains of infection in order to interrupt them,” Clemens Wendtner, the doctor who treated the Munich patients, told Reuters.Wendtner teamed up with some of Germany’s top scientists to tackle what became known as the “Munich cluster,” and they advised the Bavarian government on how to respond. Bavaria led the way with the lockdowns, which went nationwide on March 22.Scientists including England’s Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty have credited Germany’s early, widespread testing with slowing the spread of the virus. “‘We all know Germany got ahead in terms of its ability to do testing for the virus and there’s a lot to learn from that,'” he said on TV earlier this week.Christian Drosten, the top virologist at Berlin’s Charite hospital, said Germany was helped by having a clear early cluster. “Because we had this Munich cohort right at the start … it became clear that with a big push we could inhibit this spreading further,” he said in a daily podcast for NDR radio on the coronavirus.Drosten, who declined to be interviewed for this story, was one of more than 40 scientists involved in scrutiny of the cluster. Their work was documented in preliminary form in a working paper at the end of last month. The paper, not yet peer-reviewed, was shared on the NDR site.Electronic diariesIt was on January 27, that Holger Engelmann, Webasto’s CEO, told the authorities that one of his employees had tested positive for the new coronavirus. The woman, who was based in Shanghai, had facilitated several days of workshops and attended meetings at Webasto’s HQ.Director Birgitta Falk, right, and conservator Luke Jonathan Koeppe remove the top of the Saint Corona shrine at the Cathedral Treasury in Aachen, Germany, April 9, 2020. There is no relationship between St. Corona and coronavirus.The woman’s parents, from Wuhan, had visited her before she traveled on January 19 to Stockdorf, the paper said. While in Germany, she felt unusual chest and back aches and was tired for her whole stay. But she put the symptoms down to jet lag.She became feverish on the return flight to China, tested positive after landing and was hospitalized. Her parents also later tested positive. She told her managers of the result and they emailed the CEO.In Germany, Engelmann said he immediately set up a crisis team that alerted the medical authorities and started trying to trace staff members who had been in contact with their Chinese colleague.The CEO himself was among them. “Just four or five days before I received the news, I had shaken hands with her,” he said.Now known as Germany’s “Case No. 0,” the Shanghai patient is a “long-standing, proven employee from project management” who Engelmann knows personally, he told Reuters. The company has not revealed her identity or that of others involved, saying anonymity has encouraged staff to cooperate in Germany’s effort to contain the virus.The task of finding who had contact with her was made easier by Webasto workers’ electronic calendars – for the most part, all the doctors needed was to look at staff appointments.”It was a stroke of luck,” said Wendtner, the doctor who treated the Munich patients. “We got all the information we needed from the staff to reconstruct the chains of infection.”For example, case No. 1 – the first person in Germany to be infected by the Chinese woman – sat next to her in a meeting in a small room on January 20, the scientists wrote.Where calendar data was incomplete, the scientists said, they were often able to use whole genome sequencing, which analyzes differences in the genetic code of the virus from different patients, to map its spread.By following all these links, they discovered that case No. 4 had been in contact several times with the Shanghai patient. Then case No. 4 sat back-to-back with a colleague in the canteen.When that colleague turned to borrow the salt, the scientists deduced, the virus passed between them. The colleague became case No. 5.A passenger walks at the airport in Frankfurt, Germany, on April 9, 2020. About 95 percent of the flights were canceled because of the coronavirus.Webasto said on January 28 it was temporarily closing its Stockdorf site. Between January 27 and February 11, a total of 16 COVID-19 cases were identified in the Munich cluster. All but one were to develop symptoms.All those who tested positive were sent to hospital so they could be observed and doctors could learn from the disease.Bavaria closed down public life in mid-March. Germany has since closed schools, shops, restaurants, playgrounds and sports facilities, and many companies have shut to aid the cause.Hammer and danceThis is not to say Germany has defeated COVID-19.Its coronavirus death rate of 1.9 percent, based on data collated by Reuters, is the lowest among the countries most affected and compares with 12.6 percent in Italy. But experts say more deaths in Germany are inevitable.”The death rate will rise,” said Lothar Wieler, president of Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases.The difference between Germany and Italy is partly statistical: Germany’s rate seems so much lower because it has tested widely. Germany has carried out more than 1.3 million tests, according to the Robert Koch Institute. It is now carrying out up to 500,000 tests a week, Drosten said. Italy has conducted more than 807,000 tests since February 21, according to its Civil Protection Agency. With a few local exceptions, Italy only tests people taken to hospital with clear and severe symptoms.Germany’s government is using the weeks gained by the Munich experience to double the number of intensive care beds from about 28,000. The country already has Europe’s highest number of critical care beds per head of the population, according to a 2012 study.People keep distance due to the coronavirus at a market in Aachen, Germany, April 9, 2020.Even that may not be enough, however. An Interior Ministry paper sent to other government departments on March 22 included a worst-case scenario with more than 1 million deaths.Another scenario saw 12,000 deaths – with more testing after partial relaxation of restrictions. That scenario was dubbed “hammer and dance,” a term coined by blogger Tomas Pueyo. It refers to the ‘hammer’ of quick aggressive measures for some weeks, including heavy social distancing, followed by the ‘dance’ of calibrating such measures depending on the transmission rate.The German government paper argued that in the ‘hammer and dance’ scenario, the use of big data and location tracking is inevitable. Such monitoring is already proving controversial in Germany, where memories of the East German Stasi secret police and its informants are still fresh in the minds of many.A subsequent draft action plan compiled by the government proposes the rapid tracing of infection chains, mandatory mask-wearing in public and limits on gatherings to help enable a phased return to normal life after Germany’s lockdown. The government is backing the development of a smartphone app to help trace infections.Germany has said it will reevaluate the lockdown after the Easter holiday; for the car parts maker at the heart of its first outbreak, the immediate crisis is over. Webasto’s office has reopened.All 16 people who caught COVID-19 there have recovered. 
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Many people in Italy are calling for the government to begin easing restrictions now that the coronavirus spread is showing what some see as signs of slowing down. The daily death toll has been dropping steadily, as have admissions to intensive care units. But with about 500 people still dying each day, the country’s prime minister is resisting calls to relax strict safe-distance measures.The debate is growing on whether it is time to downgrade the emergency and start easing restrictions after a strict five-week lockdown.Falling daily death rates and fewer admissions to intensive care units are reason for hope.  On top of that, there is pressure to reopen industries and businesses in the face of what could be a massive economic meltdown.Medical staff tends to a patient in the ICU unit of San Filippo Neri Hospital’s Covid department, in Rome, Italy, April 9, 2020.In the face of it all, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte is urging caution and says any decision to downgrade the emergency must be taken gradually and together with scientists.He also warned of dire consequences yet to come for the whole of Europe if the EU does not come together and agree on a rescue package.Conte said the future of the European Union is at stake in a challenge he has compared to that of World War II.In a video interview with the German newspaper Bild Conte, the Italian prime minister said Europe must unite and deliver a solid response to head off a devastation of the European economy.He said the sooner financial instruments are created that will allow countries to deal with this crisis, the sooner everyone will emerge from this situation and enjoy economic and social and advantages.Divisions between southern European nations, led by Italy, and northern ones, mainly Germany and the Netherlands, have so far stalled plans for a massive package to help the hardest-hit economies recover from the effects of the pandemic.
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Governments from the 19 countries that use the euro overcame sharp differences to agree Thursday on measures that could provide more than a half-trillion euros ($550 billion) for companies, workers and health systems to cushion the economic impact of the virus outbreak.Mario Centeno, who heads the finance ministers’ group from euro countries, called the package of measures agreed upon “totally unprecedented … . Tonight Europe has shown it can deliver when the will is there.”The deal struck Thursday among the finance ministers did not, however, include more far-reaching cooperation in the form of shared borrowing guaranteed by all member countries.FILE – Italian Economy Minister Roberto Gualtieri attends a meeting in Rome, March 3, 2020.The officials left that issue open, pushing the question to their national leaders to sort out down the road as part of a further discussion about a fund to support the economic recovery in the longer term. Still, Italian Finance Minister Robert Gualtieri tweeted that shared borrowing through “eurobonds” had been “put on the table.”FILE – Dutch Finance Minister Wopke Hoekstra attends a news conference in Paris, France, March 1, 2019.Borrowing together to pay for the costs of the crisis was a key demand from Italy, Spain, France and six other countries. Italy and other indebted members are expected to see their debt load increase because of the recession caused by the virus outbreak. But shared debt was rejected by Germany, Austria and the Netherlands. Netherlands Finance Minister Wopke Hoekstra tweeted that “we are and will remain opposed to eurobonds.”The question now is whether the package will be seen as big enough to impress markets and enable eurozone governments to handle new accumulations of government debt from the recession. The concern is that increased borrowing could in the longer term trigger a new eurozone financial crisis like the one that threatened the currency union in 2010-2015. For now, bond-market borrowing costs of indebted countries such as Italy are being held in check by the European Central Bank, which has launched an 870 trillion-euro bond purchase program. But that program is so far limited in size or duration.The ministers agreed that hard-pressed governments such as Spain and Italy could quickly tap the eurozone’s bailout fund for up to 240 billion euros ($260 billion), with the condition that the money is spent on their health care systems and the credit line expires after the outbreak is over. A dispute over conditions had held up a decision at a conference Tuesday.The agreement also provides for up to 200 billion euros in credit guarantees through the European Investment Bank to keep companies afloat and 100 billion euros to make up lost wages for workers put on shorter hours.Centeno said that countries would work on a recovery fund for the longer term and as part of that would discuss “innovative financial instruments, consistent with EU treaties.” He said that some countries support shared borrowing and that others oppose it.The deal overcame bitter disagreement between Italy and the Netherlands over the conditions for loans from the bailout fund, the European Stability Mechanism. Italy had rejected the idea of using the fund because of the ESM’s requirement that the money come with conditions to reform. That recalled the tough conditions imposed on Greece, Ireland and other indebted eurozone countries that were bailed out during the eurozone debt crisis.The compromise struck in the final statement says that countries could borrow up to 2% of annual economic output at favorable rates to finance “direct or indirect” costs of the current health crisis. Centeno said during a post-decision video news conference that he expected countries to be able to identify enough health costs to access the money.The package comes on top of extensive spending measures at the national level by member governments. The European Union has also taken the unprecedented steps of setting aside its limits on debts and subsidies by national governments to their home companies. 
 
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Amid their anxiety and mourning for friends and family in their virus-stricken homeland, the diplomats at Italy’s embassy in Washington are working earnestly to secure help from afar.“We are all concerned by the situation in Italy. Our thoughts are constantly with relatives and friends, some of whom live in the hardest-hit areas of the country,” said Ambassador Armando Varricchio, who answered questions by email in accordance with the new social distancing norms.Italy was the first European country to see a large spike in cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, and remains among the most severely affected, with more than 143,000 cases confirmed and more than 18,000 deaths as of Thursday afternoon, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Coronavirus Resource Center.Armando Varricchio, Italy’s ambassador to the United States, is photographed while taking part in a virtual discussion organized by the Meridian Center, April 2, 2020. (Italian Embassy photo)Varricchio, whose staff is working long hours to address the needs and concerns of Italian citizens in the United States, told VOA his country was deeply grateful for $100 million worth of aid recently announced by President Donald Trump. He described the assistance as “a testament to a deeply rooted friendship that unites us.”Trump announced the aid, which he said would consist of “surgical and medical and hospital things,” at a White House event on March 30, adding that the people of Italy “are having a very hard time.”The U.S. business community has also stepped up with donations totaling more than 25 million euros, the ambassador said, “and we have also seen great support coming from nonprofit organizations.”Beyond that, Varricchio and his colleagues have teamed up with an organization comprising North America-based Italian scholars and scientists to raise money on GoFundMe for a research institute in Rome that focuses on infectious diseases, as well as hospitals in Milan and Naples.Despite the urgency of the situation, Varricchio is already looking ahead to what can be done to help his country emerge from the crisis.“What will be most needed in the long run,” Varricchio said, “is rebuilding our society, our economy and achieving robust growth.” He identified transatlantic trade, along with ties in economic activities and in finance, as “crucial.”
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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has moved out of intensive care as he continues to recover from COVID-19, a spokesman said on Thursday.”The Prime Minister has been moved this evening from intensive care back to the ward, where he will receive close monitoring during the early phase of his recovery,” the spokesman said.”He is in extremely good spirits.”Johnson, 55, was admitted to St Thomas’ Hospital on Sunday evening with a persistent high temperature and cough, and was rushed to intensive care on Monday where he has since spent three nights receiving treatment.  
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Two planeloads of Eastern European farmhands arrived Thursday in Berlin and Duesseldorf amid strict precautions to protect the country from the new coronavirus, as an ambitious German program to import thousands of seasonal agricultural workers got underway.Seasonal workers had been caught up in the country’s ban on travel after the outbreak of the coronavirus. That left a massive deficit in personnel available to pick asparagus, which has already sprouted, and plant other crops in German fields, where some 300,000 such workers were employed last year.Most came from Eastern European countries such as Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, and Hungary, where wages are much lower than in Germany, which is Europe’s largest economy.Under the new program, workers need to fly to the country in controlled groups — to prevent the possible infection of others en route — and are subject to medical checks upon arrival. They then must live and work separately from other farmhands for two weeks, and wear protective gear.Announcing the program, Agriculture Minister Julia Kloecker said it was a “pragmatic and goal-oriented solution” that would allow up to 40,000 seasonal workers into the country in April, and another 40,000 in May. She said the hope was to find an additional 20,000 over the two months among Germany’s own unemployed, students or resident asylum seekers.”This is important and good news for our farmers,” she said. “Because the harvest doesn’t wait and you can’t delay sowing the fields.”Ahead of time, interested workers have to register online and have their information checked by federal police. Farmers needing help register online with Eurowings, the airline contracted to bring the workers in, saying when they’re needed and where.So far, 9,900 people had registered for April and another 4,300 for May.Flights are then organized to bring in groups, and the first group of workers, 530 people from Romania, arrived on Thursday in Duesseldorf and Berlin, Eurowings said. Further flights were already planned to Duesseldorf, Karlsruhe, Leipzig, Nuremberg and Frankfurt.
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With humans away, the whales will play.In another sign that wild animals are roaming more freely while locked-down people are sheltering indoors from the coronavirus, a maritime patrol has filmed remarkable images of whales powering through Mediterranean waters off the coast of southern France.The graceful pair of fin whales was filmed Tuesday in waters off the Calanques national park, a protected reserve of outstanding natural beauty next to the usually bustling but now locked-down Mediterranean port city of Marseille.Didier Reault, who heads the park board, told France Info radio on Thursday that it is “very, very rare” for fin whales to be spotted and filmed at such close quarters in the reserve’s waters. He said the whales usually stay further out in deeper Mediterranean waters.Fin whales are among the largest of the species, weighing as much as 70 tons and growing past 20 meters (65 feet) in length.Wild animals venturing into places vacated by humans have also been spotted elsewhere around the world, as hundreds of millions of people are locked down and limited in their movements to try to slow the coronavirus pandemic.For most people, the coronavirus causes mild to moderate symptoms such as fever and cough. But for some, especially older adults and the infirm, it can cause pneumonia and death.Other places where animals have taken advantage of the peace of less human activity include Llandudno, a town in North Wales. There, mountain goats have been filmed roaming in frisky clumps through the streets and chomping on plants in people’s front yards.
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Mexico’s labor minister said the country has lost 346,748 jobs since mid-March because of its efforts to prevent and control the coronavirus outbreak.Labor Secretary Luisa Maria Alcalde said Wednesday that the greatest losses occurred in the tourism-dependent coastal enclave of Quintana Roo, which lost nearly 64,000 jobs.Popular resorts such as Cancun and Playa del Carmen have also taken an economic hit from the coronavirus pandemic.Alcade is urging businesses to stand up for their workers, but she stopped short of saying they should provide some financial relief.President Andrés Manuel López Obrador recently warned companies they would face public scorn if they refuse to provide a financial stopgap for laid-off workers.Meantime, he is promising to create 2 million jobs between May and December as part of an emergency plan response to the health care crisis.Reuters news agency said Mexico has recorded more than 3,100 coronavirus cases and 174 deaths. 
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After a brutal 10-year financial crisis, Greece was on course to a promising rebound. Businesses and exports were slowly but consistently growing, and tourism was booming. With the coronavirus, however, the biggest money-making industry for Europe’s poorest economy, is in peril.This was supposed to be a record year, with this tiny, sun-kissed nation and its idyllic islands expecting three times as many travelers as its population of 11 million.Now, not even a single tourist with a hat and camera can be seen.Lyssandros Tsilidis, the president of the Federation of Hellenic Associations of Travel and Tourist Agencies, described a devastated tourism industry.From inexpensive hostels to five-star resorts, he said, no one has been spared. All trips have been canceled. All flights have been grounded. It’s impossible to predict how and when it could all start up again, he said.For a country for which tourism accounts for 25 percent of gross domestic product and  where 1 in 5 jobs is linked to the trade, COVID-19 is exacting huge financial losses.The Greek economy is the European Union’s second-most reliant on tourism, after Cyprus, which makes it much more vulnerable and adds more hardship to a nation still reeling from a brutal 10-year recession.To offset some of the pain, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ government has stepped in, affording billions of euros to businesses while subsidizing employees’ salaries to prevent massive layoffs.On the popular island of Rhodes, though, where more than 2 million mainly British, German and American tourists flock each summer, resort owners are now considering staying shut beyond the mandatory lockdown that ends later this month, through the summer.The super moon rises in the sky in front of the Apollo’s temple about 80 kilometers southwest of Athens on Tuesday, April 7, 2020.Manolis Markopoulos, the head of the island’s hotel owners, said resorts may have no other option than to shut down entirely for the season. He said cancelations are running at nearly 100 percent for May, and operating costs are too high to maintain in a crisis that has no clear end date.Early and rigorous actions taken by the Greek government have helped contain the spread of the coronavirus here.However, for travel to resume and tourism to kick off again, all countries must be free of the coronavirus, Tsilidis said.Quarantines and travel just don’t mix, he said. What British national, or German or American is going to travel halfway around the globe for a week’s vacation in Greece, knowing he’ll be quarantined for at least 14 days? he asked.To head off a complete collapse of the country’s multibillion-dollar industry, officials said they will target domestic tourism more than ever — encouraging Greeks to rediscover their country once the virus is brought under control and travel regulations ease.Tsilidis said, though, it may take as much as 18 months for foreign travelers to set foot here again in organized forms of travel.Normality, he said, can only resume when people feel it is safe to travel again. That, he said, can only come from health experts and the World Health Organization when they announce a cure or vaccine for the coronavirus. 
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Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno is calling for an investigation into the handling of the bodies of coronavirus victims, especially in Guayaquil, the epicenter of the country’s outbreak.Moreno is seeking the probe amid an avalanche of complaints from relatives of victims, who accuse local authorities of mishandling the bodies of their loved ones.The sight of bodies in the street has fueled the anguish of some residents.  The virus is claiming victims so quickly that the backlog has led to bodies being stored in homes of relatives or in refrigerated shipping containers.Ecuador has 242 confirmed deaths and just as many more are suspected of dying from the coronavirus.Moreno said in a tweet that each person deserves a proper burial and that no one will be buried without being identified.Meanwhile, Health Minister Juan Carlos Zevallos said he fired one official who asked for money in exchange for handing over the remains of a victim in a Guayaquil public hospital.So far, there are more than 4,400 cases of the coronavirus in Ecuador, one of the hightest totals in Latin America.
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Brazil’s health minister said on Wednesday that the country’s attempts to purchase thousands of ventilators from China to fight a growing coronavirus epidemic had fallen through and the government is now looking to Brazilian companies to build the devices.“Practically all our purchases of equipment in China are not being confirmed,” Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta said at a news conference.An attempt to buy 15,000 ventilators in China did not go through and Brazil was making a new bid, he said, but the outcome is uncertain in the intense competition for medical supplies in the global pandemic.In one positive sign for Brazil’s supply crunch, a private company managed to buy 40 metric tons of protective masks from China, with the shipment arriving by cargo plane in Brasilia on Wednesday.Young women boxes with donations of food distributed by an NGO to people suffering during the COVID-19 outbreak at the Cidade de Deus (City of God) favela in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on April 7, 2020.The purchase of 6 million masks worth 160 million reais ($30 million) was undertaken by pharmaceutical and hospital equipment company Nutriex, based in Goiania, 220 kilometers east of Brasilia. The firm plans to donate part of the order.Health authorities began to sound the alarm this week over supply shortages as hospitals faced growing numbers of patients with COVID-19.Confirmed cases of coronavirus in the country soared to 15,927 on Wednesday, with the death toll rising by 133 in just 24 hours to 800, the ministry said.Rio de Janeiro reported the first six deaths in four of the city’s hillside slums, called favelas, alarming authorities who fear rapid contagion in crowded communities that have limited access to medical care and often lack running water for hygiene.Two of the deaths occurred in Rocinha, one the largest slums in South America where more than 100,000 people live.Mandetta reported the first case of coronavirus among the Yanomami people on the country’s largest reservation and said the government plans to build a field hospital for indigenous tribes that are vulnerable to contagion.“We are extremely concerned about the indigenous communities,” Mandetta said.Anthropologists and health experts warn that the epidemic can have a devastating impact on Brazil’s 850,000 indigenous people whose lifestyle in tribal villages rules out social distancing.President Jair Bolsonaro said in an address to the nation that the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine was saving lives of coronavirus patients and should be used in the initial stages of COVID-19. Due to the absence of scientific evidence on its effectiveness and safety, Brazil’s health authorities limit its use to seriously ill patients who are in hospital.Mandetta said Brazil has hired local unlisted medical equipment maker Magnamed to make 6,000 ventilators in 90 days.Pulp and paper companies Suzano SA and Klabin SA, planemaker Embraer SA, information technology provider Positivo Tecnologia SA and automaker Fiat Chrysler have also offered to help build ventilators, he said. 
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A year after a fire that shocked the world and destroyed the roof of Paris’ ancient cathedral of Notre Dame, France is marking the first anniversary amid the coronavirus pandemic. Workers who were removing lead contamination ahead of reconstruction were sent home as part of efforts to contain the spread of the virus.It has been a year since the iconic towers of Notre Dame were engulfed in flames and smoke, its ceiling collapsing and leaving the ancient building weakened.It has also been a year since French President Emmanuel Macron promised to rebuild the Paris landmark quickly.  In an address last year, Macron said French people are made of builders and that Notre Dame would be rebuilt even more beautifully, within five years. He assured the French it could be done.A year later, Parisians, tourists and Christian pilgrims are still mourning the loss of one of France’s best-loved monuments, which attracted 12 million visitors in 2018.Cedric Burgun is priest and a vice dean at the Paris Catholic Institute. He remembers the dramatic scene a year ago.FILE – The steeple and spire of the landmark Notre-Dame Cathedral collapses as the cathedral is engulfed in flames in central Paris on April 15, 2019.He said the memories of the fire are still vivid when walking around Notre Dame. He sees many people next to the building to see it or pray outside to remember that shocking event for French people.The scaffolding is still visible from outside the building. It was present on the building prior to the April 15th fire due to restoration work – the heat of the blaze welded it together.There are an estimated 551 tons of metal are still on top of the cathedral.The issue has become an important hazmat concern after last spring’s huge fire which released thousands of kilograms of toxic lead dust into the atmosphere.Decontamination efforts took months to make sure the neighborhood around Notre-Dame was safe and workers have to wear protective equipment to operate on the site.Lately, the site has been silent. The removal of the melted scaffolding on the cathedral’s roof – originally scheduled to begin March 23 – cannot take place under the country’s coronavirus measures.Father Benoist de Sinety, oversees the constructions efforts for the Paris diocese.He explains to VOA that the work is ongoing to conceive the cathedral’s future and what will happen around the building during the reconstruction to welcome visitors, pilgrims.No sooner had firefighters extinguished the flames when pledges of donations for restoration poured in. French authorities say that by November, donors had pledged more than $1 billion.FILE – A hole is seen in the dome inside Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, France, April 16, 2019.The Fondation Notre-Dame already spent nearly $23 million on efforts to secure the building. Christophe Rousselot is the president of the institution.He explains to VOA these are large amounts of money but they are a necessity to ensure the building does not collapse.According to him there is no way currently to build a frame and put a roof on top of it without being absolutely sure of that the building is solidThere is a debate on the types of materials that will be used to rebuild the 900-year-old structure.Christophe Rousselot said it is more than likely that a spire will be built but its shape remains unclear. In his view, architects will not go crazy. New materials will be used for a modern cathedral, he said, in a sense that it will stand better against potential fires, which is good news, he thinks.To mark the first anniversary, the clergy planned a small religious ceremony with only seven people inside the damaged cathedral.The Archbishop of Paris was to display the relic of Christ’s crown of thorns for veneration during a Good Friday broadcast.However, the bells were to remain silent on Easter Monday. 
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Outside wartime nothing like it as ever been seen before in modern Western history. The lockdowns by democratic states with their draconian constraints on civil liberties and private enterprise fly in the face of an historical progression that’s seen the size and roles of governments shrunk and individual liberty boosted.As governments mobilize resources and coerce people in a life-and-death struggle to contain the coronavirus and mitigate its impact, the state has been unbound. People have been confined indoors, police powers have been expanded, data-surveillance increased and businesses shuttered.  All with little debate.The size and scope of the state’s role in the economy prompted by the coronavirus dwarfs anything mounted to handle the 2008 financial crash. Britain, France and other European countries have offered so far loans and subsidies worth around 15% of their GDPs. America’s stimulus package is at around 10% of GDP. The U.S. fiscal stimulus package was dubbed by Larry Kudlow, President Donald Trump’s economic adviser, “the single largest Main Street assistance program in the history of the United States.”Municipal police officers check documents as they patrol in a street of Sceaux, south of Paris, France, during nationwide confinement measures to counter the Covid-19, April 8, 2020.In France, President Emmanuel Macron’s government not only passed legislation giving it the legal right to control the movement of people, it also seized the power to manage prices and requisition goods. In the United States, President Trump has used the Defense Production Act to prevent the export of surgical masks and gloves.State power is now at its most intrusive since the Second World War. For die-hard advocates of free markets and limited government the abrupt change in direction is horrifying. For others it is less so, even something to be embraced, a harbinger of the future, a turning point that will end up re-reordering their countries.For those on the progressive left, the reemergence of state power is a vindication of long-held beliefs that market-based models for social organization fail the majority of people. They hope the crisis will provide the opportunity to refashion along less market-oriented and more socialist lines. In the United States, supporters of Bernie Sanders say the crisis has exposed for all to see America’s threadbare social-safety net and the need for a government-run single-payer health care system.Last week, Britain’s former Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said that the government’s massive and unprecedented underwriting of the British economy and labor market vindicated his pre-coronavirus election manifesto, the most left-wing program ever presented by the modern Labour Party.On Europe’s far right, too, there is self-preening as well as hope that the eventual political outcome from the coronavirus will be along lines more to their liking. A future of strong nation states and powerful central governments far less hedged in by Brussels is what they hope the coronavirus will lead to.Europe’s nationalist populists have long demanded more border controls and have advocated for a break with the Schengen system of passport-free travel. They hope the imposition of temporary border controls, in the face of the disapproval of Brussels, will lead to the break-up of Schengen permanently. Luca Zaia, governor of Italy’s hard-hit Veneto region and a member of Matteo Salvini’s populist Lega party, told reporters last month that “Schengen no longer exists” and forecast, “it will be remembered only in the history books.”Some are not waiting for history to reward them. FILE – Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban replies to an oppositional MP during a question and answer session of the Parliament in Budapest, Hungary, March 30, 2020.Hungary’s firebrand populist Viktor Orbán, a proponent of what he dubs ‘illiberal democracy,’ has seized the moment to accrue more power. Since his reelection in 2010 civil libertarians have denounced him for initiating a concerted erosion of democratic checks and balances, including the curbing of judicial independence, the politicization of the civil service and state interference in media and civil society. Last week, the country’s parliament, which is controlled by his right-wing nationalist party, gave Orbán the power to rule by decree indefinitely, shrugging off opposition demands for at least an end-date to his one-man-rule in the heart of the European Union. “The Hungarian situation offers us a glimpse of how world politics may function during and after the coronavirus crisis unless we give it careful thought,” frets Umut Korkut, a politics professor at Scotland’s Glasgow Caledonian University. Tom Palmer, a vice president at the Atlas Network, a non-profit which advocates for free-market economic policies and limited government, agrees. The Hungarian example — as well as the unbinding of the state elsewhere in the West — prompts his alarm. “There is a rising tide of authoritarian statism coming,” he says.Coffins arriving from the Bergamo area are being unloaded from a military truck that transported them in the cemetery of Cinisello Balsamo, near Milan in Northern Italy, March 27, 2020.But some governments appear just to be trying to manage public fear with no aim to prolong intrusive power. Others are exploiting it. In many cases established democracies are giving people enough confidence to accept restrictions in exchange for health security. Positive examples include South Korea and Israel, where the introduction of tough measures reflect a strong public consensus for action. In Britain, an opinion poll this week showed that two-thirds of the public back police enforcement of lockdown measures. Italy’s Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte, got overwhelming public approval for his nationwide shut-down.But the unbinding of the state does raise serious questions about government overreach and individual rights.Other analysts and commentators remain more sanguine, pointing out that while many Western governments have taken emergency powers during this viral outbreak, no other democracy has given a leader full control as in Hungary. Faced with the prospect of tens of thousands – even hundreds of thousands – of deaths, Western governments have had little option but to expand their authority. People want governments to do whatever is needed to save lives. Once the acute phase of the pandemic is over, everything can revert to how it before, they say. The crisis may even allow for an improvement of democracy — a renewal involving reform of hidebound bureaucracy and a reduction in red tape as well as a greater nimbleness and responsiveness by government. The fight against the Coronavirus has exposed bureaucratic inertia in the West, a leaden-footedness and a failure to act quickly enough. Critics say bureaucracies have become arthritic, adjusting too slowly to the burgeoning crisis and have been reluctant to embrace innovation and flexibility. FILE – A laboratory technician prepares COVID-19 patient samples for semi-automatic testing at Northwell Health Labs, March 11, 2020, in Lake Success, New York.With the exception of Germany, many Western states have bungled virus testing and been sluggish to embrace the greatest strength of advanced democracies — their industries and manufacturers. As in Britain, so in the United States, commercial and university laboratories were blocked for weeks from developing their own tests for the virus. The government-designed testing kits rolled out at first were faulty.Belatedly, Western governments have started to try to be more responsive and to be smarter in the securing the resources needed to fight the insidious virus, cutting back on red tape, opportunistically embracing innovation, trying to reinvent themselves while tossing aside economic orthodoxy, all for the collective good. That all might leave a lasting legacy.But it remains unclear whether the unbound state will relinquish its expanded authority once the crisis is over. “Some will reassure themselves that it is just temporary and that it will leave almost no mark, as with Spanish flu a century ago,” the Economist magazine editorialized last month. “However, the scale of the response makes covid-19 more like a war or the Depression. And here the record suggests that crises lead to a permanently bigger state with many more powers and responsibilities and the taxes to pay for them,” the editors noted. Governments are never good at handing back powers they have seized. Outside of the democratic states of the West, the picture is gloomier. Dictators and strongman are using the crisis to tighten their grip on power. Many are fearful of political and social revolt triggered by scarcity, fear and an uncontrolled spread of the virus. A member of the non-profit Cambodian Children’s Fund sprays disinfectant to help curb the spread of the new coronavirus in the slum neighborhood of Stung Meanchey in southern Phnom Penh, Cambodia, March 24, 2020.In Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev has cited the threat of the coronavirus to crack down even harder on opposition to his rule. So, too, in Cambodia, where Hun Sen has been arresting dissidents on grounds they’re spreading false information about the virus and he’s scapegoating Muslims for its emergence and introducing the contagion into the country. “In Thailand, Cambodia, Venezuela, Bangladesh, and Turkey, governments are detaining journalists, opposition activists, healthcare workers, and anyone else who dares to criticize the official response to the coronavirus,” says Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “For authoritarian-minded leaders, the coronavirus crisis is offering a convenient pretext to silence critics and consolidate power. Censorship in China and elsewhere has fed the pandemic, helping to turn a potentially containable threat into a global calamity. The health crisis will inevitably subside, but autocratic governments’ dangerous expansion of power may be one of the pandemic’s most enduring legacies,” he fears.FILE – Lebanese policemen remove protesters’ tents in Martyrs Square in Beirut, March 28, 2020.The coronavirus has given governments in the Middle East some breathing space from protest movements that have been burgeoning this year. Public demonstrations have been banned on social distancing grounds. But the Virus and food scarcity risks upending regimes.  In Beirut, protesters flouted a curfew last week chanting, “We want to eat, we want to live.” In Tripoli, the country’s second-largest city, protesters shouted: “Dying from the coronavirus is better than starving to death.”A precipitous fall in oil prices risks destabilizing even strong central powers. With revenues plunging, Saudi Arabia’s ruling family is also at risk, say analysts. Few, though, believe another a coronavirus-sparked repeat of an Arab spring would give rise to the emergence of democracy in the region — more likely just a swap out of authoritarians.Speaking to the French nation last month, France’s Emmanuel Macron promised his people,  “The day after we emerge victorious, will not be like the day before.” His words were meant to reassure the French that the virus would give rise to helpful reform. But they could prove prophetic in quite the opposite way for many countries.   
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Puerto Rico’s governor on Wednesday asked federal officials to ban all flights from U.S. cities with a high number of coronavirus cases to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the U.S. territory.
The petition by Gov. Wanda Vázquez to the Federal Aviation Administration came after officials accused some visitors of taking medicine to lower their fevers to avoid being placed in quarantine by National Guard troops screening people at the island’s main international airport.  
At least two passengers from New York who lowered their fever with medication are now hospitalized in the island with COVID-19, said National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Paul Dahlen.
“They themselves admitted it,” he said, adding that the two people called health authorities when their condition worsened and that one of them was placed on a ventilator.
Vázquez asked to ban flights from New York, Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Illinois.
Joel Pizá, interim executive director of Puerto Rico’s Ports Authority, said in a statement that those flights would be rescheduled when there’s a drop in cases in those states.
It’s unclear how many flights would be affected if the FAA agrees to the temporary ban. A Ports Authority spokesman did not immediately return a message for comment.
The FAA previously authorized a petition from the U.S. territory to allow the National Guard to screen passengers at Puerto Rico’s main international airport and agreed to reroute all commercial flights to that airport.
The National Guard has screened more than 52,000 people with the help of high-speed infrared cameras that set off an alarm if they detect a high temperature. More than 160 passengers were ordered to remain isolated for two weeks, although the government has no way of ensuring that they follow those instructions.
Puerto Ricans have been increasingly complaining about a high number of COVID-19 cases among tourists arriving from the U.S. who don’t adhere to the required two-week quarantine. One man was heavily criticized on Twitter after he posted that he was at the supermarket just days after arriving in Puerto Rico from New York.
Puerto Rico has reported at least 24 deaths and more than 600 confirmed cases, with only 6,000 people tested in a U.S. territory of 3.2 million. The territory’s government imposed a curfew on March 15 that has shuttered all non-essential businesses and ordered people to stay in their home unless they have to buy food, medication or go to the bank. Hundreds have been cited for violating the curfew.
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A California appeals court ordered the dismissal of a criminal case Tuesday against a Mexican megachurch leader on charges of child rape and human trafficking on procedural grounds.Naason Joaquin Garcia, the self-proclaimed apostle of La Luz del Mundo, has been in custody since June following his arrest on accusations involving three girls and one woman between 2015 and 2018 in Los Angeles County. Additional allegations of the possession of child pornography in 2019 were later added. He has denied wrongdoing.  While being held without bail in Los Angeles, Garcia has remained the spiritual leader of La Luz del Mundo, which is Spanish for “The Light of the World.” The Guadalajara, Mexico-based evangelical Christian church was founded by his grandfather and claims 5 million followers worldwide.It was not clear when he would be released.  The attorney general’s office said it was reviewing the court’s ruling and did not answer additional questions.  Garcia’s attorney, Alan Jackson, said he and his client are “thrilled” by the decision.  “In their zeal to secure a conviction at any cost, the Attorney General has sought to strip Mr. Garcia of his freedom without due process by locking him up without bail on the basis of unsubstantiated accusations by unnamed accusers and by denying him his day in court,” Jackson said in a statement.La Luz del Mundo officials in a statement urged their followers to remain respectful and pray for authorities.  “(W)e are not to point fingers or accuse anyone, we must practice the Christian values that identify us, such as patience, prudence, respect and love of God,” they said.The appeals court ruling states that the Los Angeles County Superior Court must dismiss the 29 counts of felony charges that range from human trafficking and production of child pornography to forcible rape of a minor.The appeals court ruled that because Garcia’s preliminary hearing was not held in a timely manner and he did not waive his right to one, the complaint filed against him must be dismissed.  In June, Garcia was arraigned on 26 counts and waived his right to a speedy preliminary hearing — a common move. The following month, he was arraigned on an amended complaint that included three additional charges of possession of child pornography. That time, he did not waive the time limits for a preliminary hearing.  His hearing was postponed several times — in some instances, because prosecutors had not turned over evidence to the defense — as he remained held without bail, prompting his attorneys to file an appeal.  The appeals court ruled that a preliminary hearing on an amended complaint for an in-custody defendant must be held within 10 days of the second arraignment — unless the defendant waives the 10-day time period or there is “good cause” for the delay.  The appeal only mentioned the dismissal of Garcia’s case and not those of his co-defendants, Susana Medina Oaxaca and Alondra Ocampo. A fourth defendant, Azalea Rangel Melendez, remains at large.  It was not immediately clear if the co-defendants’ cases would also be tossed.  In February, a Southern California woman filed a federal lawsuit against the church and Garcia. In it, she said Garcia, 50, and his father sexually abused her for 18 years starting when she was 12, manipulating Bible passages to convince her the mistreatment actually was a gift from God.The lawsuit will continue despite the dismissal, the woman’s lawyers said Tuesday in a statement.  The dismissal is the latest in a series of blunders on this high-profile case for the attorney general’s office.  Attorney General Xavier Becerra himself pleaded with additional victims to come forward — a move defense attorneys said could taint a jury pool.”It would be hard to believe that, based on the information that we’re collecting, that it’s only these four individuals,” Becerra said in June, repeatedly calling Garcia “sick” and “demented.”Prosecutors Amanda Plisner and Diana Callaghan also said multiple times in court that they expected to file additional charges based on more victims as the case continued to be investigated. But ultimately they only added three counts of possession of child pornography to the original complaint.Plisner and Callaghan were additionally sanctioned by a Superior Court judge in September, who said they had violated a court order in failing to give defense lawyers evidence. The judge later rescinded the sanctions and overturned $10,000 in fines she had levied. 
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It is usually the most crowded week of the year in the Eternal City, but for the first time in recorded history, Rome  — including the Vatican — are deserted on Holy Week as travel and fear of contagion keep thousands of pilgrims away. For VOA, Sabina Castelfranco reports. 
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