Costa Rica became the latest country to legalize same-sex marriage early Tuesday when a ruling from its supreme court went into effect ending the country’s ban.Couples held ceremonies — mostly private due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but some that were broadcast — to celebrate their unions before judges and notaries after the ban was lifted at midnight.Daritza Araya and Alexandra Quirós married just after midnight in an outdoor service performed by a notary wearing a face mask who pronounced them “wife and wife.” Theirs was the first legal gay marriage in Costa Rica and it was streamed live on the internet.Costa Rica is the sixth country in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage, following most recently Ecuador, which allowed it last year. It is also permitted in some parts of Mexico.Gay equality activist Marco Castillo married his longtime partner Tuesday morning before a judge.”This is a step in social equality. The fact that Rodrigo and I are able to come marry each other in a court is progress,” Castillo said. “This drives us to continue other fights for those who have a different sexual orientation.”Castillo had fought for same-sex marriage for years in the courts. He was also recently sanctioned as a notary for conducting the marriage of two women, which was later annulled.President Carlos Alvarado sent a message on state television and social networks, saying, “Today we celebrate freedom, equality and democratic institutions,. The issue took center stage in Costa Rica’s 2018 presidential election after the Inter-American Court of Human Rights issued an opinion that countries like Costa Rica, which had signed the American Convention on Human Rights, had to move immediately to legalize gay marriage.  It helped propel President Carlos Alvarado to victory over an evangelical candidate, Fabricio Alvarado, who had campaigned against it. In August 2018, Costa Rica’s supreme court said the country’s ban was unconstitutional and gave the congress 18 months to correct it or it would happen automatically. The Legislative Assembly did not act, so at midnight the law banning same-sex marriage was nullified. A campaign celebrating the change called “I do” planned a series of events including hours of coverage on state television and messages from celebrities, including Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations rgh commissioner for human Rights.Gia Miranda, director of the “I do” campaign, said television coverage would also include segments on the movement’s history in Costa Rica.”It gives us so much joy,” Miranda said. “The only thing that could win with this is Costa Rica and in general love.” She said it would help decrease discrimination and make the country more prosperous and attractive to tourists. 
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Latam Airlines, South America’s biggest carrier, is seeking U.S. bankruptcy protection as it grapples with a sharp downturn in air travel sparked by the coronavirus pandemic. The Santiago,  be paid, the Santiago, Chile-based airline said. Travelers with existing tickets and vouchers can still use them.  
Chief Executive Roberto Alvo said Latam was profitable before the pandemic brought most of the world’s flights to a halt, but is now facing a “collapse in global demand.”
“We are looking ahead to a post-COVID-19 future and are focused on transforming our group to adapt to a new and evolving way of flying, with the health and safety of our passengers and employees being paramount,” he said in a statement announcing the bankruptcy filing.
 
Latam Airlines said that it and several of its affiliated companies launched the Chapter 11 reorganization effort in the United States in a bid to reduce its debt and find new financing sources.
Air travel has plunged to a fraction of the levels it was just months ago as the virus spread from China to countries around the globe, prompting growing alarm in the aviation industry. The International Air Transport Association last month predicted that airlines’ revenue from hauling passengers would drop $314 billion this year, meaning they could bring in less than half of what they did in 2019.  
Latam’s move comes little more than two weeks after another major Latin American airline, Avianca Holdings, filed for bankruptcy protection in New York. Australia’s second-largest carrier, Virgin Australia, sought bankruptcy in its home market last month.
Latam’s bankruptcy filing includes parent company Latam Airlines Group S.A. and its affiliated airlines in Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, as well as its businesses in the U.S.  
The company is not including its affiliates in Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay in the turnaround effort. It says it is talking with the Brazilian government about how to proceed with its operations there.  
Latam is South America’s largest carrier by passenger traffic. It operated more than 1,300 flights a day and transported 74 million passengers last year.  
The airline had more than 340 planes in its fleet and nearly 42,000 employees on its payroll, according to its more recent annual report. It reported a profit of $190 million in 2019.  
It said the reorganization effort has the support of two prominent shareholders — the Cueto family in Chile and Brazil’s Amaro family — as well as Qatar Airways, which owns 10% of the company.
Those three shareholders have agreed to provide up to $900 million in financing as Latam makes its way through the bankruptcy process. It currently has $1.3 billion on hand, it said.  
Latam reached a deal to sell a 20% stake to Delta Air Lines for $1.9 billion last year. Its announcement Tuesday made no mention of the Atlanta-based airline.
Delta CEO Ed Bastian expressed confidence in Latam’s management in an emailed statement responding to questions.
 
“Airlines globally have been devastated by the COVID-19 pandemic, for which no business plan could have adequately prepared. We remain firmly committed to our partnership with LATAM and believe that it will successfully emerge a stronger airline and Delta partner for the long term,” Bastian said.
He did not say whether Delta might provide further financial support, and the company declined to comment further.
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As the white van approached Perfect Love Street, one by one chatting neighbors fell silent, covered their mouths and noses and scattered.
Men in full body suits carried an empty coffin into the small, blue house where Edgar Silva had spent two feverish days gasping for air before drawing his last breath on May 12.
“It wasn’t COVID,” Silva’s daughter, Eliete das Graças insisted to the funerary workers. She swore her 83-year-old father had died of Alzheimer’s disease, not that sickness ravaging the city’s hospitals.  But Silva, like the vast majority of those dying at home, was never tested for the new coronavirus.
The doctor who signed his death certificate never saw his body before determining the cause: “cardiorespiratory arrest.”
His death was not counted as one of Brazil’s victims of the pandemic.
Manaus is one of the hardest hit cities in Brazil, which officially has lost more than 23,000 lives to the coronavirus. But in the absence of evidence proving otherwise, relatives like das Graças are quick to deny the possibility that COVID-19 claimed their loved ones, meaning that the toll is likely a vast undercount.
As ambulances zip through Manaus with sirens blaring and backhoes dig rows of new graves, the muggy air in this city by the majestic Amazon River feels thicker than usual with such pervasive denial. Manaus has seen nearly triple the usual number of dead in April and May.
Doctors and psychologists say denial at the grassroots stems from a mixture of misinformation, lack of education, insufficient testing and conflicting messages from the country’s leaders.
Chief among skeptics is President Jair Bolsonaro, who has repeatedly called COVID-19 a “little flu,” and argued that concern over the virus is overblown.
Asked by a reporter about the surging number of deaths on April 20, Bolsonaro responded, “I’m not a gravedigger, OK?”  
He has resisted U.S. and European-style lockdowns to contain the virus’ spread, saying such measures aren’t worth the economic wreckage. He fired his first Health Minister for supporting quarantines, accepted the resignation of a second one after less than a month on the job, and said that the interim minister, an army general with no background in health or medicine, will remain in charge of the pandemic response “for a long time.” In a cabinet meeting last month, a visibly enraged Bolsonaro insulted governors and mayors enforcing stay-at-home measures.  
The president’s political followers are receptive to his dismissal of the virus, as determined as he is to proceed with life as usual.
On a recent Saturday in Manaus, locals flocked to the bustling riverside market to buy fresh fish, unaware of the need for social distancing, or uninterested. As swamped intensive-care units struggled to accommodate new patients airlifted from the Amazon, the faithful returned to some of the city’s evangelical churches. Coffins arriving by riverboat did nothing to dampen the enthusiasm of young people at clandestine dance parties. And in the streets, masks frequently covered chins and foreheads rather than mouths and noses.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms. But for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause severe illness such as pneumonia and lead to death.  
The new sickness made its way to Manaus in March, in the middle of the rainy season. At least that’s when health officials first became aware of it in the capital of Amazonas state, which is at once remote and international. One precarious road connects the city to the rest of Brazil, and other municipalities are hours away by boat. But tropical fauna and flora normally draw tourist cruises up the Amazon, and business people fly in from around the world, to visit its free trade zone. Just last October, Manaus sent a delegation to China looking for investors.
The city’s first virus fatality was reported on March 25 and deaths have surged since then. But due to a lack of testing, just 5% of the more than 4,300 burials performed in April and May were confirmed cases of COVID-19, according to city funeral statistics.
To accommodate its swelling number of coffins, the public Nossa Senhora Aparecida cemetery razed an area of tropical forest to dig dozens of trenches in the rust-colored soil for burials.
These mass graves sparked anger toward city officials among families of the deceased. Why did their loved ones’ bodies have to be buried in such a way, they asked, if there was no evidence the deaths were caused by COVID-19?
Das Graças was among those who had hoped that her father could have a proper sendoff. But it wasn’t to be. The white-suited men informed her that his coffin would be sealed, a precaution taken now regardless of cause of death. He would be sent to the public cemetery’s refrigerated container to await burial.
“A person can’t even die with dignity,” das Graças, 49, said through tears. “He’s going to spend the night in the freezer when we could be doing his wake at home!”
Home wakes are no longer permitted. But workers from SOS Funeral, which provides free coffins and funeral services to those who can’t afford them, have found homes packed with relatives touching the bodies of loved ones, hugging each other and wiping away tears with ungloved hands—a potentially contagious farewell.  
Overwhelmed emergency services have encountered similar reluctance to acknowledge viral risk. Ambulance doctor Sandokan Costa said patients often omit the mention of COVID-19 symptoms, putting him and his colleagues at greater risk. “What has most struck me is people’s belief that the pandemic isn’t real.”
Costa fell ill with the virus in late March but has worked non-stop since recovering and is astonished to see his fellow citizens on the streets acting as though nothing is going on. There is a stigma attached to the new disease, he said. “Coronavirus has become something pejorative.”
Health care officials attribute much of that to Bolsonaro’s handling of the pandemic.
Rather than take precautions, Bolsonaro has supported the use of chloroquine, the predecessor of an anti-malaria drug that U.S. President Donald Trump has advocated for treatment of coronavirus and is taking himself to ward it off. Bolsonaro ordered the Army’s Chemical and Pharmaceutical Laboratory to boost its chloroquine production despite a lack of clinical proof that it is effective. A large study recently published in the Lancet medical journal suggests that the malaria drugs not only do not help but are also tied to a greater risk of death in coronavirus patients.  
In Manaus, scientists stopped part of a study of chloroquine after heart rhythm problems developed in a quarter of people given the higher of two doses being tested.
Visiting the hard-hit Amazon capital was a priority for Bolsonaro’s second health minister, Nelson Teich, who donned a body suit to tour several hospitals. But he resigned days later after disagreeing with the president’s demand that the ministry recommend chloroquine be prescribed to patients with mild coronavirus symptoms.  
Amazonas Gov. Wilson Lima, a Bolsonaro ally, downplayed the virus at first. “There’s huge hysteria and panic,” Lima said March 16, three days after the first virus case in Manaus was confirmed in a woman who had traveled from Europe. That same day he declared a state of emergency, but his first measures were limited—cancellation of events organized by the state, suspension of classes and prison visits. For the rest, he recommended avoiding crowds and good hand washing.
It was only on March 23, when his state had 32 cases including local transmissions that he ordered the suspension of non-essential services. But the restrictions were never imposed on the city’s industrial zone.
A month later, hospitals in Manaus were overwhelmed with thousands of cases and hundreds of dead.
In late-April the governor announced plans to progressively reopen commerce, but backed down as the death toll continued to climb. This month, he told the Associated Press in an interview that the unusual surge in deaths can only be explained by the outbreak.  
“There’s no doubt that the majority (have died) because of COVID-19,” Gov. Lima said as he sat in a vast but empty meeting room in the state government headquarters in Manaus. “We don’t have any other explanation for this if not COVID.”
He admitted lack of testing makes it nearly impossible to have a clear idea how many people in the state are infected.  
But even with vast under-reporting, Amazonas state has the highest number of deaths by COVID-19 per capita in the country with more than 1,700 fatal victims.
Poor and crowded neighborhoods have been particularly affected. Unable to afford private consultations and fearing the chaos of the public health system, many only sought medical help when it was too late. Others preferred to die at home rather than alone at a hospital.
Lima’s administration has come under fire for spending half a million dollars (2.9 million Brazilian reais) to buy 28 ventilators at quadruple the market price from a wine importer and distributor. The breathing machines were deemed inadequate for use on coronavirus patients after inspections by the regional council of medicine and Manaus’ health surveillance office.
Lima denies any wrongdoing. Asked if he would have done anything differently to confront the virus, the governor shook his head.
“Even if I had stopped it (economy), if I had closed the city for 30 days, no one goes in and no one goes out. At some point I would have had to open and at some point the virus would have gotten here,” he said.  
The virus has, in the meantime, spread upriver from Manaus, creeping into remote towns and indigenous territories to infect indigenous tribes. The sparsely populated but vast rainforest region is completely unprepared to cope. Some towns can’t get oxygen tanks refilled or don’t have breathing machines, forcing nurses to manually pump air into lungs. When they do have machines, power cuts frequently shut them down.
Many patients are being airlifted to Manaus, the only place in the state of 4 million people with full intensive care units.
Although health experts warn that the pandemic is far from over in the Amazon region, or the rest of the country, national polls show adherence to lockdowns and quarantines falling, and a growing number of Brazilians are neglecting local leaders’ safety recommendations.
“Every day there are different messages coming from the federal government that clash with measures by the cities and states, and with what science says” said Manaus-based physician Adele Benzaken.
A public health researcher who until last year lead the HIV/AIDS department at the Health Ministry, Benzaken already has lost four colleagues in the pandemic.  
Meanwhile, misinformation and disinformation about the virus is swirling, some of it shared by the president himself. On May 11, Instagram labeled one of his posts as fake news after he falsely claimed a state had seen a drop in respiratory disease this year. Facebook also blocked one of his posts in March that showed him praising the healing powers of chloroquine to supporters.  
One false claim circulating on social media said the death rate in Manaus plummeted the day after the health minister’s visit. Another purported to show an empty coffin being unearthed at Manaus’ cemetery, implying the city was inflating its death toll. But the photo was taken in Sao Paulo three years ago.  
Still, the messages take root and spread like jungle foliage.
“My opinion is that they’re making this up and trying to make money from it” Israel Reis, 54, said outside Manaus’ fish market. He didn’t specify who “they” might be.  
Reis, who recently lost his job in an electronics maintenance company due to the pandemic, spoke without a mask and said he “of course” agrees with Bolsonaro the severity of the pandemic is exaggerated and death toll inflated.  
He recently advised his nephew against seeking help at the local health clinic for an earache. “Any dizziness and they’ll say it’s that thing,” he said, referring to the virus.
 
One recent late afternoon, a group of paunchy middle-aged men seated in plastic chairs on the sidewalk debated measures to fight the virus. The street bar, just a few blocks from a police station in downtown Manaus, was operating in violation of state COVID-19 restrictions, yet officers in a passing squad car didn’t even slow down to reprimand them.  
Icy beer provided relief from the sweltering heat, and tropical insects had begun sounding their pre-dusk drone. The men, too, were getting worked up.  
“Put on your mask!” yelled one friend.
“I don’t need one!” screamed another, Henrique Noronha.
 
Noronha, 52, argued that only the elderly and those with health problems should stay home – as Bolsonaro affirms — and the fit should return to normal. Despite his age and full figure, Noronha didn’t believe he’s at risk.  
“This virus came to clean things up,” he said. “But I’ll be fine.”
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A second cruise line vessel repatriating nearly 180 Jamaican crew members is due to arrive on the island Tuesday, a day after more than 100 other citizens disembarked from a cruise ship under the government’s controlled re-entry program. The luxury liners had been idled since late March after the government closed seaports and airports to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The Jamaica Observer newspaper said a Norwegian Cruise Line ship returned 174 Jamaican crew members to their homeland Monday; the first of three ships expected to bring more than 500 citizens home this week.  Last week, more than 1,000 Jamaicans disembarked from a Royal Caribbean cruise liner that docked last Tuesday. Twelve Jamaicans on board tested positive for coronavirus. Jamaica is allowing citizens to return home as the country begins to gradually reopen while keeping restrictions in hot spots that are still seeing a rise in infections.  Jamaica has confirmed more than 500 COVID-19 cases and at least nine deaths. 
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Dozens of Mexican health workers in Mexico City are demanding that authorities provide them with Proper Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) needed for attending to coronavirus patients. The workers blocked roads in the capital city during a protest Wednesday, claiming Mexican officials are putting their health at risk by giving them poorly made equipment.  Nurse Susana Ballesteros said they are asked to re-use uniforms and N95 masks after several of their colleagues became infected and even died.  Ballesteros said they want equipment to be able to work. She said medical workers want authorities to listen to them.  It was not immediately clear if their protest moved them closer to achieving the results they are seeking. The nurses also complain about their workload, saying even with the extra work because of COVID patients, they are still required to train university graduates. Mexico has confirmed more than 70 thousand COVID cases and more than 7,300 deaths. The lion’s share of the infections and deaths are in densely populated Mexico City.  
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More than 200 workers at an export-focused textile plant in Guatemala have tested positive for the novel coronavirus and more results are pending in what could be one of the country’s largest outbreaks, officials said Monday. Zulma Calderon, the health prosecutor for Guatemala’s Human Rights prosecutor’s office, said they began receiving reports in early May that infected workers were continuing to work at the K.P. Textil plant in San Miguel Petapa and the company wasn’t taking protective measures. “We asked then that the Health (Ministry) examine all of the personnel,” she said. On Saturday, the Health Ministry said it believed the plant’s outbreak stemmed from one infected worker. On May 12, the local health agency advised of six positive cases among the plant’s at least 900 workers, but advised that plant management was not cooperating.  Francisco Reyes, the K.P. Textil, S.A. plant manager, denied that authorities told him workers had tested positive before he decided to close the plant May 12 for two weeks. “Now we’re reorganizing the cafeteria to comply with distancing,” he said. Guatemala reported Sunday more than 3,300 confirmed infections and 58 deaths.  Outbreaks at other export-oriented plants have been reported elsewhere in the region, especially Mexico where border assembly plants tried to continue operating during the pandemic. Calderon, the health prosecutor, said she had asked authorities to establish a health cordon around the plant to try to avoid further spread. But the spread has likely already occurred. Petapa Mayor Mynor Morales said the factory’s outbreak had deeply worried his city. The bustling working class bedroom community south of the capital is home to many export-oriented factories. After hearing of the positive results health workers tested people at some of the small food stores near the plant and got other positive results for the virus, he said. He was evaluating with his lawyers the possibility of presenting a complaint against the factory’s owners to establish whether there was negligence on their part.  
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The first of what is expected to be five Iranian oil tankers has docked at a Venezuelan refinery, defying U.S. sanctions on both countries. The ship arrived in Venezuela on Sunday and the country’s oil minister announced that it has moored at the El Palito refinery.     A second ship entered Venezuelan waters Monday and a third is sailing through the Caribbean. “I want to thank — from the most noble and sensible heart of the Venezuelan people — the Islamic Republic of Iran, President (Hassan) Rouhani, my friend and colleague, Supreme Leader Ayatollah (Ali) Khamenei … and all of Iran, from the heart, for its solidarity, for its support,” President Nicolas Maduro said.  Despite its oil wealth, Venezuela is experiencing severe fuel shortages. The collapse of its economy along with U.S. sanctions has nearly destroyed its refining capabilities. Iran has agreed to send more than one and a half million barrels of gasoline and parts to Venezuela. Neither the White House nor State Department had any comment Monday. But a top Trump official said last week the U.S. is considering how to respond. U.S. sanctions forbid Iran from selling oil and has also imposed sanctions on the Venezuelan economy, including its state-run oil company, as part of an effort to drive Maduro from power.  
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The lead vessel of a five-tanker flotilla carrying fuel supplied by Iran to gasoline-thirsty Venezuela was set to arrive at one of state-run PDVSA’s ports Sunday, escorted by the military, according to Refinitiv Eikon data and Venezuelan officials.Iran is providing Venezuela with 1.53 million barrels of gasoline and components in a move criticized by U.S. authorities as both nations are under sanctions, according to the governments, sources and calculations by TankerTrackers.com.The Trump administration said earlier this month it was considering measures it could take in response to the shipments, without providing specifics.The gasoline is desperately needed in Venezuela as its refining network has been operating this year around 10% of its 1.3 million-barrel-per-day capacity, forcing it to rely on imports amid U.S. sanctions that limit the sources and types of fuel it can receive.Tanker Fortune was scheduled to arrive at PDVSA’s El Palito port, a facility close to the country’s capital, according to a company source and the Eikon data showing its trajectory. A second vessel, the Forest, entered the Caribbean Sea on Saturday afternoon, and the three remaining vessels were crossing the Atlantic, the data showed.PDVSA did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the exact content of the cargoes or further plans to receive supply from Iran.Washington has steadily escalated sanctions on PDVSA as part of its effort to oust President Nicolas Maduro, a socialist who has overseen a six-year economic collapse. A senior Trump administration official Sunday said the fuel arriving would last for just a few weeks and would likely benefit only security forces and “people with connections.””Pretty soon most people will be wondering where it all went and why they couldn’t get any,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.The official declined to comment on what U.S. response was under consideration, if any. Last week, a Pentagon spokesman said he was unaware of any military move planned against the vessels. But Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Saturday warned of retaliation if Washington caused problems for the tankers.The two OPEC nations have previously helped each other in the face of U.S. sanctions. In 2010-2011, PDVSA sent fuel to Iran, which was under sanctions aimed at stifling its nuclear program.The U.S. Treasury Department earlier this month imposed sanctions on a Chinese firm for doing business with sanctioned Iranian company Mahan Air, which transported refining parts to Venezuela in over a dozen flights earlier this year. 
 
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The Trump administration may consider imposing a travel ban on Brazil as the South American country records a steep increase in coronavirus cases. In an interview with CBS’ “Face the Nation”, National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien said he expects a decision Sunday on whether to block travel from Brazil as was done with China and some European countries earlier this year.“We hope that will be temporary. But because of the situation in Brazil we’re going to take every step necessary to protect the American people,” he said.In recent months, Washington banned non-citizens who had been in China 14 days prior to their arrival from entering the United States. The same restrictions were later placed on those traveling from Europe.The United States remains the country with the highest number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the world – over 1,622,000.The number of cases in Brazil has increased in recent weeks. As of Sunday, Brazil had over 347,000 confirmed cases, making it the second-highest affected in the world after the United States, according to data from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. 
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The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus is expected to reach 100,000 in a few days.  To mark the solemn landmark, the front page of the print version of the Sunday New York Times is a simple list of names of dead victims of the disease and brief personal details about them scoured from media around the country.   Sunday’s headline is “U.S. Deaths Near 100,000, An incalculable Loss.” The U.S. death toll early Sunday was more than 97,000, according to Johns Hopkins University. The global total of COVID-19 infections has risen to more than 5.3 million, according to Johns Hopkins University, with more than 342,000 deaths. A medical worker in protective suit conducts tests for residents in Wuhan, the Chinese city hit hardest by the coronavirus disease, Hubei province, China, May 15, 2020.China, the country where the coronavirus outbreak began, reported no new infections Saturday, the first time since it started reporting cases in January.  The pandemic has countries struggling to keep people safe while simultaneously reopening their economies, and has disrupted collective celebrations by Muslims throughout the world observing the end of Ramadan, as well as the Memorial Day holiday weekend in the U.S., when millions traditionally head to beaches and national parks. The U.S. continues to be the epicenter of the contagion with 1.6 million cases, nearly one-third of all cases worldwide.   Gravediggers bury an alleged COVID-19 victim at the Vila Formosa Cemetery, in the outskirts of Sao Paulo, Brazil, May 22, 2020.Brazil comes in second with more than 347,000 infections, followed by Russia with almost 336,000 cases.  “In a sense South America has become the new epicenter of the disease,” said Michael Ryan, director of the WHO emergency program. “The most affected is clearly Brazil at this point,” he added. Brazil’s Health Secretary Wanderson de Oliveira announced Sunday that he would resign the following day. De Oliveira attempted to resign last month but stayed on at the request of then-health minister Luiz Mandetta, who was shortly thereafter fired by Brazil’s president. The country’s Health Ministry has been at odds with President Jair Bolsanaro, who has rejected recommendations by health experts in favor of protecting the economy. Brazil and Mexico reported record numbers of cases and fatalities almost every day this week, reinforcing criticism that their presidents failed to impose more stringent lockdowns measures. However, in Chile, Ecuador and Peru, which put in place early and aggressive containment measures, infections also continued to climb, overwhelming intensive care units in those countries. Beaches are beginning to open in a few places to domestic tourists in Europe. On Sunday, beaches at La Grande Motte in southern France opened with a two-day wait list, but parks in Paris remained closed. Municipal police officers wearing face masks talk to a woman, at the Promenade des Anglais, as they check that safety restrictions are being practiced, after France reopened its beaches to the public in Nice.Germans will be allowed to visit the Baltic Sea coast beginning Monday. A few dozen people gathered in St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican on Sunday to receive the traditional blessing for the first time in nearly three months.Pope Francis waves to people at St. Peter’s Square after the Regina Coeli prayer, which was held without public participation due to the COVID-19 outbreak, at the Vatican, May 24, 2020.The pope has been delivering a virtual message streamed on the internet from his library for the past few months, moving on to bless an empty square. European Union countries are planning to reopen their borders especially to migrant workers in the coming weeks, though it is unclear when they may allow intercontinental travel. 
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Brazil registered 965 new coronavirus deaths on Saturday, taking the total number of fatalities to 22,013, the Health Ministry said.The country now has 347,398 confirmed cases, according to the ministry, up 16,508 from Friday, when it surpassed Russia to become the world’s virus hot spot behind the United States.The actual number of cases and deaths is believed to be higher than the official figures disclosed by the government, as the testing capacity of Latin America’s largest country still lags.Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro has been fiercely criticized for his handling of the outbreak, which has led to the exit of two health ministers amid his insistence in opposing social distancing measures while advocating the use of unproven drugs for treatment.The former army captain has seen his opinion poll ratings drop as an unfolding political crisis adds to the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.
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Iran’s president has warned the United States not to interfere with a shipment of oil bound for Venezuela after the South American nation said it would provide an armed escort for the tankers.In a statement posted on his website, Hassan Rouhani said the United States had created unacceptable conditions'' in different parts of the world, but that Iran wouldby no means” be the one to initiate conflict.If our tankers in the Caribbean or anywhere in the world face any problems caused by the Americans, they will face problems as well,” he added.We hope the Americans will not make a mistake.”Rouhani made the remarks in a call with Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the ruling emir of Qatar, which has close relations with both Iran and the United States.FILE – A view of a vessel, the Clavel, sailing on international waters crossing the Gibraltar stretch, May 20, 2020. Five Iranian tankers likely carrying gasoline and similar products are now sailing to Venezuela from Iran.The five Iranian tankers now on the high seas are expected to start arriving in Venezuela in the coming days. They are carrying gasoline to alleviate severe fuel shortages in the country that have caused days-long lines at service stations, even in the capital, Caracas.Venezuela said Wednesday that planes and ships from the nation’s armed forces would escort the tankers in case of any U.S. aggression.U.S. President Donald Trump imposed heavy sanctions on Iran after he withdrew the U.S. from Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. The administration has ramped up sanctions on Venezuela to try to force President Nicolas Maduro from power.A force of U.S. vessels, including Navy destroyers and other combat ships, patrol the Caribbean on what U.S. officials call a drug interdiction mission. Venezuelan officials paint them as a threat, but U.S. officials have not announced any plans to intercept the Iranian tankers.
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Violet Manuel hastily abandoned her uncle’s funeral and grabbed two empty containers when she heard a boy running down the dirt road shouting, “Water, water, water!”The 72-year-old joined dozens of people seeking their daily ration in Zimbabwe’s densely populated town of Chitungwiza.“Social distancing here?” Manuel asked tartly. She sighed with relief after getting her allotment of 40 liters (10.5 gallons) but worried about the coronavirus.“I got the water, but chances are that I also got the disease,” she told The Associated Press. And yet her plans for the water did not include hand-washing but “more important” tasks such as cleaning dishes and flushing the toilet.Such choices underscore the challenges of preventing the spread of the coronavirus in slums, camps and other crowded settlements around the world where clean water is scarce and survival is a daily struggle.Some 3 billion people, from indigenous communities in Brazil to war-shattered villages in northern Yemen, have nowhere to wash their hands with soap and clean water at home, according to the charity group WaterAid. It fears that global funding is being rushed toward vaccines and treatments without “any real commitment to prevention.”Definitively linking COVID-19 cases to water access isn’t easy without deeper investigation, said Gregory Bulit with UNICEF’s water and sanitation team, “but what we know is, without water, the risk is increased.”In the Arab region alone, about 74 million people don’t have access to a basic hand-washing facility, the United Nations says.Nearly a decade of civil war has damaged much of Syria’s water infrastructure, and millions must resort to alternative measures. In the last rebel-held territory of Idlib, where the most recent military operations displaced nearly 1 million people, resources are badly strained.Yasser Aboud, a father of three in Idlib, said he has doubled the amount of water he buys to keep his family clean amid virus fears. He and his wife lost their jobs and must cut spending on clothes and food to afford it.In Yemen, five years of war left over 3 million people displaced with no secure source of water, and there are growing fears that primitive sources such as wells are contaminated.And in Manaus, Brazil, 300 families in one poor indigenous community have water only three days a week from a dirty well.“Water is like gold around here,” said Neinha Reis, a 27-year-old mother of two. To wash their hands, they depend on donations of hand sanitizer. Reis and most of the other residents have fallen ill with symptoms similar to those of COVID-19 in the past month.FILE – A woman wearing a face mask to protect against the coronavirus collects water on the side of a road to take home, in Caracas, Venezuela, April 22, 2020.Across Africa, where virus cases are closing in on 100,000, more than half of the continent’s 1.3 billion people must leave their homes to get water, according to the Afrobarometer research group.Where it is made available via trucks or wells, the long lines of people could become “potentially dangerous breeding grounds for the virus,” said Maxwell Samaila, program manager with the aid group Mercy Corps in Nigeria.In rural parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where most have to travel up to three hours for water, “you have 200 people touching the (well) handle one after the other,” said Bram Riems, an adviser on water, sanitation and hygiene with Action Against Hunger.At an open area surrounded by filthy apartment blocks in Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare, women in orange T-shirts ticked off names of people fetching water from a row of communal taps that Doctors Without Borders provided in poor suburbs. Many services in the country have collapsed, along with its economy.Kuda Sigobodhla, a hygiene promotion officer for the aid group, said training sessions had been organized before the outbreak arrived in Zimbabwe so that water distribution points did not become epicenters of contagion.“We had to do something,” Sigobodhla said.But while the empty buckets were neatly spaced 1 meter apart, their owners huddled in groups, chatting and occasionally exchanging cigarettes and high-fives while waiting their turn.One man shouted about social distancing but only a few seemed to listen. A hand-washing bucket was available, but most did not use it.To encourage hand-washing in some parts of Africa, aid groups are using measures such as placing mirrors and soap at makeshift taps.“We know people like to look at themselves when they wash their hands, so putting a mirror helps,” said Riems, of Action Against Hunger. His organization is piloting the project in Ethiopia, where only a third of the population has access to basic water services.Fear also could be a motivating factor, he said, citing a recent GeoPoll survey that found more than 70% of people in Africa are “very concerned” about the coronavirus. GeoPoll surveyed 5,000 people in 12 countries.Meanwhile, investment in water and hygiene has been precariously low.“Of 51 major announcements of financial support from donor agencies to developing countries, only six have included any mention of hygiene,” WaterAid has said of COVID-19?emergency funding from governments and aid groups in the past two months.Africa alone needs an annual investment of $22 billion, according to the Infrastructure Consortium for Africa, an initiative of the Group of 20 most-developed countries and international financial institutions. But the investment by African governments and external financiers currently hovers around $8 billion to $10 billion, it said.Some fear such woeful funding could now come with a huge human cost.“Funding for (water, sanitation and hygiene) has been going down,” Riems said. “Not enough people will have access to water, not enough people will be able to wash their hands and more people will get sick.”
 
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The coronavirus pandemic accelerated across Latin America, Russia and the Indian subcontinent on Friday even as curves flattened and reopening was underway in much of Europe, Asia and the United States.
Many governments say they have to shift their focus to saving jobs that are vanishing as quickly as the virus can spread. In the United States and China, the world’s two largest economies, unemployment is soaring.  
The Federal Reserve chairman has estimated that up to one American in four could be jobless, while in China analysts estimate around a third of the urban workforce is unemployed.
But the virus is roaring through countries ill-equipped to handle the pandemic, which many scientists fear will seed the embers of a second global wave.
India saw its biggest single-day spike since the pandemic began, and Pakistan and Russia  recorded their highest death tolls. Most new Indian cases are in Bihar, where thousands returned home from jobs in the cities. For over a month, some walked among crowds for hundreds of miles.
Latin America’s two most populous nations — Mexico and Brazil — have reported record counts of new cases and deaths almost daily this week, fueling criticism of their presidents, who have slow-walked shutdowns in attempts to limit economic damage.  
Cases were rising and intensive-care units were also swamped in Peru, Chile and Ecuador — countries lauded for imposing early and aggressive business shutdowns and quarantines.  
Brazil reported more than 20,000 deaths and 300,000 confirmed cases Thursday night — the third worst-hit country in the world by official counts. Experts consider both numbers undercounts due to widespread lack of testing.
“It does not forgive, it does not choose race, or if you are rich or poor, black or white,” Bruno Almeida de Mello, a 24-year-old Uber driver, said at his 66-year-old grandmother’s burial in Rio de Janeiro. “It’s sad that in other countries people believe, but not here.”  
She had all the virus’s symptoms, but Vandelma Rosa’s death certificate reads “Suspected of COVID-19,” he said, because her hospital lacked tests. That means she didn’t figure in the death toll, which nevertheless on Thursday marked its biggest single-day increase: 1,181.
President Jair Bolsonaro has scoffed at the seriousness of the virus and actively campaigned against state governors’ attempts to limit movement and commerce.
Bolsonaro fired his first health minister for supporting governors. His second minister resigned after openly disagreeing with Bolsonaro about chloroquine, the predecessor of the anti-malarial often touted by U.S. President Donald Trump as a viable coronavirus treatment.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador downplayed the threat for weeks as he continued to travel the country after Mexico’s first confirmed case. He insisted that Mexico was different, that its strong family bonds and work ethic would pull it through.  
The country is now reporting more than 400 deaths a day, and new infections still haven’t peaked.
Armando Sepulveda, a mauseleum manager in the massive Mexico City suburb of Ecatepec, said his burial and cremation business has doubled in recent weeks.
“The crematoriums are saturated,” Sepulveda said. “All of the ovens don’t have that capacity.” Families scour the city looking for funeral services that can handle their dead, because the hospitals can’t keep the bodies, he said.
Meanwhile Mexico’s government has shifted its attention to reactivating the economy. Mining, construction and parts of the North American automotive supply chain were allowed to resume operations this week.  
Russian health officials registered 150 deaths in 24 hours, for a total of 3,249. Many outside Russia have suggested the country is manipulating its statistics to show a comparatively low death rate. The total confirmed number of cases exceeded 326,000 on Friday.
Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, who himself recovered from coronavirus, said earlier this week that only 27 regions out of 85 are ready to gradually lift their lockdowns. At least three cabinet ministers also contracted the disease, as well as the Kremlin spokesman.
China announced it would give local governments 2 trillion yuan ($280 billion) to help undo the damage from shutdowns imposed to curb the spread of the virus that first appeared in the city of Wuhan in late 2019 and has now infected at least 5.1 million people worldwide, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.
The Bank of Japan said it would provide $280 billion in zero-interest, unsecured loans to banks for financing small and medium-size businesses.
European countries also have seen heavy job losses, but robust government safety-net programs in places like Germany and France are subsidizing the wages of millions of workers and keeping them on the payroll. Tourism, a major income generator for Europe, has become a flashpoint as countries debate whether to quarantine new arrivals this summer for the virus’s two-week maximum incubation period.
Spain’s National Statistics Institute published its tourism report Friday showing columns of zeros for overnight stays, average length of stays and occupancy rates in April. Spain is Europe’s second most popular tourist destination, after France, and an economic recovery without visitors is all but unthinkable.  
Nearly 39 million Americans have lost their jobs since the crisis accelerated  two months ago. States from coast to coast are gradually reopening their economies and letting people return to work, but more than 2.4 million people filed for unemployment last week alone.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said over the weekend that U.S. unemployment could peak in May or June at 20% to 25%, a level last seen during the depths of the Great Depression almost 90 years ago. Unemployment in April stood at 14.7%, a figure also unmatched since the 1930s.
In an eerie echo of famous Depression-era images, U.S. cities are authorizing homeless tent encampments, including San Francisco, where about 80 tents are now neatly spaced out on a wide street near city hall as part of a “safe sleeping village” opened last week. The area between the city’s central library and its Asian Art Museum is fenced off to outsiders, monitored around the clock and provides meals, showers, clean water and trash pickup.
Nathan Rice, a 32-year-old who is camping there, said he’d much rather have a hotel room than a tent on a sidewalk.
“I hear it on the news, hear it from people here that they’re going to be getting us hotel rooms,” he said. “That’s what we want, you know, to be safe inside.”
Despite an often combative approach  to scientists who disagree with him, Trump’s approval ratings have remained steady, underscoring the way Americans seem to have made up their minds about him. A poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research says 41% approve of his job performance, while 58% disapprove. That’s consistent with opinions of him throughout his three years in office.
The World Bank announced a $500 million program for countries in East Africa battling COVID-19 and deadly flooding along with historic swarms of ravenous desert locusts. The added threat of the pandemic has further imperiled a region where millions lack regular access to food.
While many African countries have been praised for their response to the coronavirus, Tanzania is the most dramatic exception, run by a president who questions — or fires — his own health experts and says prayer has solved the crisis.  
The East African country’s number of confirmed virus cases hasn’t changed for three weeks, and the international community is openly worrying that Tanzania’s government is hiding the true scale of the pandemic. Just over 500 cases have been reported in a country of nearly 60 million people.
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A factory in Mexico City is now producing the all-important medical-grade N95 face masks for health care workers treating a growing number of COVID-19 patients.A government spokesperson said the facility, which opened Thursday, is projected to make up to 40,000 masks daily, an amount that is expected to meet the need for masks in the Mexican capital, which has been hard hit by the coronavirus.Mexico City government development director José Bernardo Rosas Fernandez said Mexico had trouble finding enough N-95 face masks as some hospitals became overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients.The new factory is being run jointly by the Mexico City government and a company specializing in air-filtration technology.Mexico has confirmed more than 56,500 COVID-19 cases and more than 6,000 deaths. 
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The United States has returned at least 1,000 unaccompanied migrant children to Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras since early March despite risks of violence and discrimination that have worsened because of the coronavirus pandemic, the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF said on Thursday.
 
Mexico has also returned at least 447 migrant children to Guatemala and Honduras over the same period, UNICEF said. It warned that children returned by the United States and Mexico faced added protection risks because of the perception they are infected with the coronavirus.
 
“COVID-19 is making a bad situation even worse. Discrimination and attacks are now added to existing threats like gang violence that drove these children to leave in the first place,” UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said.
 
“This means many returned children are now doubly at risk and in even greater peril than when they left their communities,” her statement said.
 
U.S. immigration authorities dealing with border security and enforcement and Mexico’s National Institute of Migration did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
 
UNICEF said it was making efforts regionwide to shore up overstretched national protection systems for children.
 
A Reuters tally shows the coronavirus has infected more than 5 million people globally and caused almost 327,000 deaths.
 
UNICEF said it had reports of communities in Guatemala and Honduras barring entry to returned migrants, including children, and threatening violence.
 
Reuters reported Guatemala’s indigenous Maya towns are threatening to burn homes of some returned migrants or lynch them after more than 100 deportees from the United States tested positive for the coronavirus.
 
The United States launched coronavirus-related rules in March allowing authorities to rapidly deport migrants encountered at the border. Data shows some 900 unaccompanied children were deported in March and April under those rules.
 
U.S. immigration authorities said in April they would test some immigrants in detention for COVID-19 before deporting them.
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Venezuela’s defense minister said Wednesday that planes and ships from the nation’s armed forces will escort Iranian tankers arriving with fuel to the gasoline-starved country in case of any U.S. aggression.  
Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López said Venezuela’s navy and air force will welcome the five Iranian tankers, seeing them through the nation’s maritime territory and into port. He compared the fuel tankers to humanitarian aid that China and Russia have sent to help Venezuela combat the new coronavirus pandemic.  
A force of U.S. vessels, including Navy destroyers and other combat ships, patrol the Caribbean on what U.S. officials call a drug interdiction mission. Venezuelan officials paint them as a threat, but U.S. officials have not announced any plans to intercept the Iranian tankers, or threatened to try that. Both countries have been hit with U.S. economic sanctions.
Venezuela’s ambassador to the United Nations, Samuel Moncada, also lashed out at the U.S., saying any attempt to stop the tankers would be illegal.  
“Forbidding those boats from reaching their destination would thus constitute a crime against humanity,” Moncada said at a U.N. Security Council meeting to discuss recent turmoil in Venezuela.
The five Iranian tankers now on the high seas are expected to start arriving to Venezuela in the coming days. They are carrying gasoline to help alleviate days-long lines at service stations even in Caracas, which had normally been immune to shortages as the capital and seat of political power.
Earlier Wednesday, Iran’s ambassador to Venezuela defended broadening trade relations between the two nations, which includes the five tankers, as their right to trade freely. International conventions protect the expanding ties between the two U.S.-sanctioned nations, Ambassador Hojjatollah Soltani said.
“This relationship between Iran and Venezuela doesn’t threaten anybody. It’s not a danger to anyone,” Soltani said in a meeting with reporters at the Iranian Embassy in Caracas.  
In addition to sending the tankers, Iran has flown in shipments of a chemical needed to restart an aging Venezuelan oil refinery with the goal of producing gasoline.  
While Venezuela sits atop the world’s largest oil reserves, its oil production has plummeted in the last two decades, which critics blame on corruption and mismanagement under socialist rule. Recent U.S. sanctions designed to force President Nicolás Maduro from power have also hurt Venezuela’s production.  
Trump’s National Security Council tweeted Monday that few financial lifelines remain for Maduro. The U.S. is among nearly 60 nations that recognize opposition leader Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s legitimate leader.  
“Our maximum pressure campaign, which includes financial & economic sanctions, will continue until Maduro’s tyrannical hold ends,” the council said. “The humanitarian & economic crisis endured by Venezuelans is the fault of 1 person – Maduro.”
For Iran’s government, the business ties with Venezuela represent a way to bring money into its cash-starved coffers and apply its own pressure on Washington.
Soltani denied claims that Iranian planes returned from Venezuela loaded with gold to pay for Iran’s support. He accused U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo of spreading “fake news” to undermine the trade, which the ambassador called a “win-win” for both Venezuela and Iran.  
“They can sanction whoever they want,” Soltani said. “Iran will always advance.”  
Adm. Craig Faller, the top U.S. military official in Latin America, said Monday that he was “concerned” by the news reports that Iran was shipping gasoline to Venezuela. He said it fits a larger pattern of Iran trying to gain “positional advantage in our neighborhood in a way that would counter U.S. interests.”
“I’ve seen those same news reports that the tankers are in route,” Faller said in a webcast event. “We see the long hand of that Iranian malfeasance at work each and every day.” 
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Authorities in Argentina are hailing the production of an inexpensive coronavirus test that scientists say provides results in under two hours.The new test, NEOKIT-COVID-19, which cost around $8, is a collaboration between public and private partners.Santiago Werbajh, an epidemiologist at the Pablo Cassara Foundation, which contributed to the test’s creation, says the kit is unique in that it can be used on an outpatient basis for massive testing.The test works by mixing the patient’s sample with a liquid solution that turns violet if the person is negative for the coronavirus and blue if they test positive.Reuters news agency says Argentina’s government plans to make the first 10,000 tests available for nationwide use over the next 10 days.A government spokesperson said some foreign embassies have already been contacted about looking at the new coronavirus rapid test kit.So far, Argentina has confirmed more than 9,200 COVID-19 cases and 203 deaths. 
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Even as Mexico saw its largest one-day death toll, Mexico City announced Wednesday it will begin a gradual reopening June 1.The nationwide death toll rose by 424 on Wednesday to 6,090, well above last week’s record of 353 deaths reported in one day. Total confirmed infections nationwide grew to 56,594, though the real number is probably several times higher because Mexico performs so little testing.With about 9 million residents, the capital is one of the world’s largest cities. Authorities predicted the pandemic is nearing its peak in Mexico City, but hospitals in the capital are already about three-quarters full. As of Tuesday night, Mexico City reported more than 15,000 confirmed coronavirus infections and nearly 1,500 deaths.Despite it all, Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum said Mexico City will begin a gradual reopening June 1, when some sectors of the economy would be allowed to resume operations.While Sheinbaum called on residents to continue taking social distancing measures through June 15, impatience with being shut up at home, household financial demands and a lack of any enforcement already drew more and more people back into the streets in recent weeks.More customers clustered at the city’s famous street food stands and traffic has picked up. The city never shut down its subway system, which millions depend on for transportation.Sheinbaum’s reopening plan included some of the industries that the federal government already approved to return to work like construction, but also adds bicycle sales and beer production.The mayor said bike shops are being exempted because she wants to promote bicycle use as a way to help improve the health of city residents. As elsewhere around the world, Mexico’s COVID-19 dead have included a high percentage of people suffering from ailments such as diabetes and obesity.Some businesses never shut down in the city but did implement social distancing measures. At an office goods store in a central neighborhood Wednesday, a dozen people lined up in the parking lot outside. A security guard with a mask and bottle of hand sanitizer let customers enter one at a time only when an employee was available to escort them and after a squirt of gel on their hands.Sheinbaum has acknowledged that the real number of deaths in Mexico City is surely higher but said an independent panel will have to review suspected cases and make a determination. City death records reported by an anti-corruption watchdog group suggested the death toll could be three times as high in the capital.The city’s graduated reopening will be based on its hospital occupancy, which currently stands at 76 percent.”The trend continues increasing, but we hope this trend will decrease in the coming weeks,” Sheinbaum said.The rest of the city’s economic activity won’t be allowed to resume until hospital occupancy drops below 59 percent. Even then, restaurants, hotels and churches will be limited to 30 percent of their capacity.Sports are to resume without fans. But in professional soccer, Mexico’s most popular sport that has been shut down since March 15, club owners are still debating whether to restart their season or just call it off.Fanny Alejandra Manriquez Ezquivel, a city employee who has continued working and not quarantined at home, said Wednesday that she thinks it’s time for the city to return to some semblance of normality.”Sooner or later we’re all going to get infected, and you’ve got to return to normalcy,” Manriquez said. “They’re the ones who know and have the certainty of how to manage the city.” 
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Iran’s ambassador to Venezuela said Wednesday that the two nations, both under increasing U.S. pressure, were exercising their right to trade freely in a deal that includes shipping the South American nation five tankers of gasoline to relieve deep shortages.Ambassador Hojjatollah Soltani said international conventions protected the expanding relationship between the two U.S.-sanctioned nations.”This relationship between Iran and Venezuela doesn’t threaten anybody. It’s not a danger to anyone,” Soltani said in a meeting with reporters at the Iranian Embassy in Caracas.The five Iranian tankers now on the high seas are expected to start arriving to Venezuela in the coming days. They’re carrying gasoline to help alleviate days-long lines at service stations even in Caracas, which had normally been immune to shortages as the capital and seat of political power.While Venezuela sits atop the world’s largest oil reserves, its oil production has plummeted in the last two decades, which critics blame on corruption and mismanagement under socialist rule. Recent U.S. sanctions designed to force Maduro from power have also impacted Venezuela’s production.Trump’s National Security Council tweeted Monday that few financial lifelines remain for Maduro. The U.S. is among nearly 60 nations that recognize opposition leader Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s legitimate leader.”Our maximum pressure campaign, which includes financial & economic sanctions, will continue until Maduro’s tyrannical hold ends,” the National Security Council said. “The humanitarian & economic crisis endured by Venezuelans is the fault of 1 person – Maduro.”In addition to sending the fuel-laden tankers, Iran has flown in shipments of a chemical needed to restart an aging gasoline refinery. For Iran, the business ties represent a way to bring money into its cash-starved nation and apply its own pressure on Washington.Soltani denied claims that Iranian planes returned from Venezuela loaded with gold to pay for Iran’s support. He accused U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo of spreading “fake news” to undermine the deal, which the ambassador called a “win-win” for Venezuela and Iran.”They can sanction whoever they want,” Soltani said. “Iran will always advance.”
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Brazil’s daily death toll from the new coronavirus jumped to a record 1,179 on Tuesday as U.S. President Donald Trump said he is considering imposing a ban on travel from Brazil. The highest daily toll before Tuesday had been 881 deaths on May 12. The pandemic has killed at least 17,971 people in Brazil, according to the Health Ministry. Brazil overtook Britain on Monday to become the country with the third-highest number of confirmed infections, behind Russia and the United States. Brazil’s confirmed cases also jumped by a record 17,408 on Tuesday, for a total of 271,628 people who have tested positive for the virus. President Jair Bolsonaro, an ideological ally of Trump, has been widely criticized for his handling of the outbreak, such as opposition to restrictions on movement he sees as too damaging to the economy. Bolsonaro said Interim Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello would issue new guidelines on Wednesday expanding the recommended use of the anti-malarial drug chloroquine to treat the coronavirus. Health Minister Nelson Teich quit on Friday under pressure to sign the guidelines, making him the second trained doctor to leave the post in a month.Brazil’s newly-named Brazil Health Minister Nelson Teich speaks during his swearing-in ceremony at Planalto palace in Brasilia, Brazil, Friday, April 17, 2020.In an interview posted to the website Blog do Magno, Bolsonaro said Pazuello, an active duty army general who had been Teich’s deputy, would sign the new chloroquine guidelines and keep the top job for now. Bolsonaro added that his mother is 93 years old, and he keeps a box of chloroquine on hand should she need it. Trump, who announced on Monday he was taking chloroquine preventively, told reporters on Tuesday: “I don’t want people coming over here and infecting our people. I don’t want people over there sick either. We’re helping Brazil with ventilators … Brazil is having some trouble, no question about it.”  
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Coronavirus cases are spiking from India to South Africa and Mexico in a clear indication the pandemic is far from over, while Russia and Brazil now sit behind only the United States in the number of reported infections.  
The surges come as much of Asia, Europe and scores of U.S. states have been easing lockdowns to restart their economies as new infections wane. U.S. autoworkers, French teachers and Thai mall workers are among hundreds of thousands of employees back at work with new safety precautions.Russia reported a steady rise in new infections Tuesday, and new hot spots have emerged across the nation of about 147 million. Russia registered nearly 9,300 new cases in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to almost 300,000 infections, about half of them in Moscow. Authorities say over 2,800 people with COVID-19 have died in Russia, a figure some say is surely higher.
Some experts argue Russian authorities have been listing chronic illnesses as the cause of death for many who tested positive for the virus. Officials angrily deny manipulating statistics, saying Russia’s low death toll reflects early preventive measures and broad screening. Nearly 7.4 million tests have been conducted.
In Russia’s second-largest city of St. Petersburg, a virus hot spot, all burials now must be with closed coffins as a precaution, irrespective of the cause of death. Previously the measure applied only to COVID-19 deaths.  
Russia’s caseload is second only to that of the U.S., which has seen 1.5 million infections and over 90,000 deaths. The country’s prime minister, Mikhail Mishustin, resumed work Tuesday after a bout of coronavirus.  
Cases are still rising across Africa, where all 54 nations have seen confirmed infections for a total of over 88,000 cases and 2,800 deaths, according to the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  
South Africa has the highest number of cases at over 16,400 and nearly 290 deaths. Infections have increased dramatically in Cape Town and the surrounding Western Cape province, which now accounts for 61% of South Africa’s total.  
Latin America has seen more than 480,000 confirmed coronavirus cases and about 31,000 dead. The highest number of cases is in Brazil, which became the world’s third worst-hit county Monday with more than 250,000 infections despite limited testing. Hospital officials reported that more than 85% of intensive care beds are occupied in the states of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo.
Some countries have seen encouraging signs reverse: Iran reported a steady drop in new infections through April, only to see them rise again in May.
But there is new hope after an experimental vaccine against the coronavirus yielded encouraging results, though in a small and extremely early test. Stocks rallied Monday on the news.
In a surprise announcement, President Donald Trump said he has been taking the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine to protect against the virus even though scientists say there is no evidence of its effectiveness against the disease and his own administration has warned it should be administered only in a hospital or research setting because of potentially fatal side effects.
In Russia, President Vladimir Putin has declared that a partial economic shutdown imposed in late March helped slow the outbreak and prevented the nation’s health care system from being overwhelmed. A week ago, he ended the nationwide lockdown.  
He has given Russia’s 85 regions a free hand to determine how they will ease their own lockdowns, but some have been struggling. The mostly Muslim southern province of Dagestan has reported a spike in infections that left its hospitals overflowing.
In India, coronavirus cases surged past 100,000, and infections are rising in the home states of migrant workers who fled cities and towns during a nationwide lockdown when they lost their jobs.
India is now seeing more than 4,000 new cases daily. States including West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha and Gujarat, the major contributors of India’s migrant labor, are showing major spikes in infections as the country’s lockdown rules have eased. More than 3,100 with COVID-19 have died, according to India’s Health Ministry.
And in densely populated Bangladesh, where authorities reported a record number of new positive tests at over 1,600, thousands of cars were on the streets of the capital, Dhaka, despite a lockdown. Authorities have relaxed some rules and allowed shops to open ahead of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr.
In Latin America, intensive care units in the Chilean capital of Santiago have been beyond 90% capacity for days, and officials warned that intensive care staff members are reaching their limits.
“They can’t keep going forever, no matter how many beds or ventilators there are,” said Claudio Castillo, a professor of public policy and health at the University of Santiago.  
Infections are also increasing in poor areas of Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, where authorities relaxed strict lockdown measures last week, allowing some businesses to open and children to walk outside on weekends.  
Colombia struggled with an outbreak in Leticia, a city on the border with Brazil, where hospitals were overwhelmed and patients were being sent to commandeered hotels. Colombia has recorded about 16,300 confirmed cases and close to 600 dead.In Europe and in the United States, which has seen 36 million Americans file for unemployment, economic concerns dominated the political landscape.  
Unemployment claims in Britain jumped 69% in April, the government reported Tuesday. European car sales collapsed by an unprecedented 76% last month.
An experimental vaccine by Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Moderna Inc. triggered hoped-for immune responses in eight healthy, middle-aged volunteers. They were found to have antibodies similar to those seen in people who have recovered from COVID-19.  
Much bigger studies on the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness are planned. Worldwide, about a dozen vaccine candidates are in or near the first stages of testing.  
More than 4.8 million people worldwide have been infected and over 318,000 deaths have been recorded, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University that experts believe is too low for several reasons.
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Governments in the Americas are failing to protect vital health care workers, according to a report by Amnesty International released Tuesday.The report focuses on the rights of health care professionals in both North and South America, and it is based upon 21 in-depth interviews, an Amnesty International press released stated.“ … saying thank you is not enough. Governments must take action to ensure their basic rights and safety are never put at such horrendous risk again,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas director at Amnesty International. 
 
Titled “The Cost of Curing: Health workers’ rights in the Americas during COVID-19 and beyond,” the report discusses topics such as compensation, access to personal protective equipment and reprisals for whistleblowers.  
 
“The right to access information and the right to speak up freely [are] both rights recognized under international human rights law and crucial elements of protecting the right to health,” the report states. 
 
Several American countries have repressed the freedom of expression relating to the coronavirus outbreak.Venezuela, for example, has jailed journalists for speaking out against the nation’s practice of underreporting.Similarly, El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele vetoed legislation designed to increase the safety of health care workers, and he accused human rights organizations of working “to make sure more people die.”In the United States, those interviewed expressed fear of losing their jobs if they spoke out, and they also mentioned a lack of adequate access to equipment.According to the study, more than half of those who have tested positive for COVID-19 reside in the Americas but suffer disproportionate access to medical care.  
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AT&T said Tuesday it will immediately abandon Venezuela’s pay TV market as U.S. sanctions prohibit its DIRECTV platform from broadcasting channels that it is required to carry by the socialist administration of Nicolas Maduro.  
The Dallas-based company said its decision to close its unit is effective immediately.  
“Because it is impossible for AT&T’s DIRECTV unit to comply with the legal requirements of both countries, AT&T was forced to close its pay TV operations in Venezuela, a decision that was made by the company’s U.S. leadership team without any involvement or prior knowledge of the DIRECTV Venezuela team,” the company said in a statement.  
AT&T is the largest player in Venezuela’s pay TV market and was one of the last major American companies still operating in the crisis-wracked country.  
But it has come under pressure of late for abiding by Maduro regulators’ orders to remove some 10 channels such as CNN en Espanol that have broadcast anti-government protests and critical coverage of the country amid the past year’s turmoil.
DIRECTV is also a major platform for the broadcast of state-run TV outlets criticized by the opposition as propaganda. It’s also required to carry Globovision, a private network owned by a businessman close to Maduro who is wanted on U.S. money laundering charges.  
While AT&T hasn’t made money from its Venezuelan operations for years, the company was reluctant to close down its operations in Venezuela because of its 44% market share and its commitment to a satellite broadcast center from which DIRECTV beams about a third of its programming to several parts of South America. 
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