British Prime Minster Boris Johnson remains in a central London hospital under observation, having been admitted there on the advice of doctors Sunday night. He was hospitalized on precautionary grounds for further tests as his symptoms had not improved. Johnson was diagnosed with the coronavirus eleven days ago. As Henry Ridgwell reports from London, the shock announcement overshadowed Queen Elizabeth’s rare televised address to the nation
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A Slovak court on Monday sentenced former soldier Miroslav Marcek to 23 years in prison for shooting and killing investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kusnirova in February 2018.
 
Marcek, 37, who was not present at the sentencing, had admitted guilt in the case, which led to nationwide protests and eventually brought down the Slovak government.
 
“It was cold-blooded and malicious. Victims did not have a chance to defend themselves,” presiding judge Ruzena Szabova of the Specialised Criminal Court said at the hearing in Pezinok, north of Bratislava. “His confession was a mitigating circumstance.”
 
Prosecutor Juraj Novocky, who asked for a 25-year sentence, appealed against the sentence.
 
Kuciak had covered corruption and the links of influential businessmen to political, judicial and police leaders.
 
Businessman Marian Kocner, who was a target of Kuciak’s reporting, is standing trial with two others in separate hearings on charges of procuring the murder. 
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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who last week tested positive for coronavirus, remained hospitalized Monday after being admitted for additional testing after having a persistent high fever. His office called the development “precautionary” and said he remained in charge of the government. Britain has emerged as one of the latest hot spots in the pandemic, reporting more than 600 deaths Sunday. Other parts of Europe showed some improvement after weeks of devastating impacts from the virus that have caused governments to put residents on lockdown to try to slow its spread. Italy, which has the most deaths, reported its smallest increase in two weeks, while Spain also reported its latest in a string of lower daily death and new infection counts. In the United States, the western states of Oregon and Washington said they will send thousands of badly needed ventilators across the country to New York, the hardest-hit area in the country.A ventilator is displayed during a news conference on March 24, 2020 at the New York City Emergency Management Warehouse, where 400 ventilators have arrived and will be distributed.About one-third of 9,600 people who have died from the coronavirus in the United States have been in New York City, where makeshift field hospitals and a U.S. Navy medical ship are trying to take some of the strain off the city’s health care system. Other parts of the country are emerging as concerns with mounting case numbers, including Pennsylvania, Colorado and the nation’s capital, Washington, DC, where about 1,000 cases have been confirmed. South Korea, one of the first hot spots in the outbreak, reported just 47 new cases Monday, but the country’s vice health minister cautioned the need for continued vigilance and for people to stay home to prevent an infection “explosion.” Kim Gang-lip said data from smartphones showed too many people were going out to restaurants and parks in recent weeks. Meanwhile, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is urging governments to take steps to protect women after a “horrifying” increase in domestic violence during the outbreak. 
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Two forest fires near the now defunct Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine have boosted the radiation level in the area. Ukrainian firefighters worked into Sunday night to put the fires under control. Emergency services said one of the fires that spread to an area of about five hectares was contained. The other fire was covering a much larger area, of about 20 hectares. Fire officials said radiation levels in the area near Chernobyl were considerably higher than normal.  The emergencies service, however, said radiation levels in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, about 100 kilometers south, were within normal range. The fires were within the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone established after the 1986 explosion at the plant, an area of 2600 square kilometers which was largely evacuated because of radioactive contamination. Since than about 200 people have remained in the area, disregarding orders to leave.  
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The U.N. secretary-general warned Sunday that the increase in social and economic pressures brought on by the coronavirus pandemic has led to a global increase in violence against women and girls.   Last week, Antonio Guterres called for a global cease-fire so that the international community could focus all of its attention on stopping the virus and helping those who have contracted it. “But violence is not confined to the battlefield,” he said in a statement Sunday evening. “For many women and girls, the threat looms largest where they should be safest – in their own homes. And so I make a new appeal today for peace at home — and in homes — around the world.” Many countries have reported a surge in domestic violence incidents and calls to abuse hotlines since the pandemic started spreading globally earlier this year. In France, domestic violence rates surged by a third in one week. In South Africa, authorities received nearly 90,000 reports of violence against women in the first week of its lockdown. Australia’s government says online searches for support on domestic violence have risen 75%, while in Turkey, activists are demanding greater protections after the killing of women rose sharply after a stay at home order was issued March 11. Badges showing an emergency phone number created to fight domestic violence are pictured, Sept. 3, 2019, at the hotel Matignon, the French prime minister’s official residence in Paris, at the outset of a multiparty debate on domestic violence.Entire countries have called for quarantines and lockdowns to slow the spread of the respiratory virus that has sickened more than 1.25 million people worldwide and killed nearly 70,000. These stay at home orders mean many women and girls are stuck in crowded homes with men who have lost their jobs or have no outlet for their frustrations, such as watching sports or meeting friends at a local bar, and are instead taking them on out on them. At the same time, authorities, such as police, are overwhelmed with their coronavirus response, and civil society groups are struggling to maintain staff and resources. In some cities, domestic violence shelters have been commandeered as health centers. “I urge all governments to make the prevention and redress of violence against women a key part of their national response plans for COVID-19,” Guterres said of the disease caused by the coronavirus. He said that includes declaring shelters as essential services, setting up emergency warning systems in pharmacies and grocery stores, declaring shelters essential services, and creating safe ways for women to seek support, without alerting their abusers. 
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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was diagnosed with the new coronavirus more than a week ago, was admitted to a hospital Sunday for tests.  Johnson’s office said he was hospitalized because he still has symptoms 10 days after testing positive for the virus. His admission to an undisclosed hospital in London wasn’t an emergency.Downing St. said it was a “precautionary step” and Johnson remains in charge of the government.Johnson, 55, has been quarantined in his Downing St. residence since being diagnosed with COVID-19 on March 26.Johnson has continued to chair daily meetings on Britain’s response to the outbreak, and has released several video messages during his 10 days in isolation.In a message on Friday, he said he was feeling better but still had a fever.The virus causes mild to moderate symptoms in most people, but for some, especially older adults and the infirm, it can cause pneumonia and lead to death.Johnson has received medical advice by phone during his illness, but going to a hospital means doctors can see him in person.Johnson’s fiancee Carrie Symonds, 32, revealed Saturday that she spent a week with coronavirus symptoms, though she wasn’t tested. Symonds, who is pregnant, said she was now “on the mend.”The government said Sunday that almost 48,000 people have been confirmed to have COVID-19 in the U.K., and 4,934 have died.Johnson replaced Theresa May as prime minister in July and won a resounding election victory in December on a promise to complete Britain’s exit from the European Union. But Brexit has been overshadowed by the coronavirus pandemic sweeping the globe.Johnson’s government was slower than those in some European countries to impose restrictions on daily life in response to the pandemic, but Britain has been effectively in lockdown since March 23.Several other members of Johnson’s government have also tested positive for the virus, including Health Secretary Matt Hancock and junior Health Minister Nadine Dorries. Both have recovered.News of Johnson’s admission to hospital came an hour after Queen Elizabeth II made a rare televised address to the nation, urging Britons to remain “united and resolute” in the fight against the virus.Drawing parallels to the struggle of World War II, the 93-year-old queen said that “while we may have more still to endure, better days will return: we will be with our friends again; we will be with our families again; we will meet again.”
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Queen Elizabeth II urged Britons to “rise to the challenge” of the coronavirus pandemic in a rare address to the nation Sunday night.“I am speaking to you at what I know is an increasingly challenging time,’’ she said, speaking from her residence in Windsor.The Queen thanked workers at the National Health Service as well as those continuing to work essential jobs.“Every hour of your hard work brings us closer to a return to normal times,” the Queen said, going on to add her thanks for every Briton who is staying at home.“I hope in the years to come everyone will be able to take pride in how they responded to this challenge,” she said.The Queen left London to stay in the Windsor castle as the COVID-19 pandemic affects Britain.Her son, Prince Charles, has been diagnosed with a mild case of the virus.Queen Elizabeth II records an annual Christmas message to Britain, but very rarely addresses the country in Sunday’s fashion. Other instances of such an address by the 93-year-old monarch include one before the funeral of Princess Diana in 1997 and after the Queen Mother’s death in 2002.
 
“While we have faced challenges before, this one is different,” the Queen said, noting that the COVID-19 pandemic has affected nearly all nations around the globe.The United Kingdom has recorded more than 48,000 cases of COVID-19 and nearly 5,000 resulting deaths. Prime Minister Boris Johnson tested positive for the virus last week and is isolating at home.
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Soccer players in Spain on Sunday criticized the Spanish league’s decision to ask clubs to put the footballers on government furloughs during the coronavirus crisis.The league on Friday said the furloughs were needed because there was no agreement on the size of the salary cuts players must take to reduce the financial impact of the pandemic.”It is strange that the Liga supports [the furloughs],” Spain’s players’ association said in a statement.It said the league should have created a financial cushion for this period considering it always boasted about its “economic control measures” and the “well-balanced economy” of the Spanish clubs. The association said it also should be taken into account that the league has been temporarily suspended and not yet canceled.The league and the players’ association have been in talks to try to find ways to mitigate losses that could reach nearly 1 billion euros ($1.08 billion) if the season cannot be restarted because of the pandemic.The players said they agree with a salary reduction to help the clubs during the crisis, but not to the extent the league wants, which could amount to nearly half of the total losses if the competition is not resumed.Players said they want to keep negotiating directly with the clubs instead of being forced into furloughs.”The clubs and the players have been reaching agreements regarding the salaries,” the players’ association said. “What footballers are not going to do is relinquish labor rights.”Barcelona and Atlético Madrid are among the Spanish clubs requesting furloughs, but both directly negotiated the amount of the salary reduction with players — 70% in both cases. Both clubs and their players are contributing to guarantee the wages of non-playing employees being furloughed.The government furloughs help reduce the clubs’ labor costs while also guaranteeing players their jobs once the crisis is over.Spain has more than 130,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19, with nearly 12,500 deaths. The nation is expected to remain in a lockdown until April 26.There is no timetable for the return of the Spanish league.Players maintained their position to only resume competing when health authorities deem it safe for everyone’s heath, a view also shared by the Spanish league.The league has suggested it will recommend teams start mini-camp while the lockdown is still in place, if it’s possible to do so within the restrictions imposed by authorities.
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Emergency authorities in Ukraine say there are no signs of any fire still burning in the uninhabited exclusion zone around the decommissioned Chernobyl nuclear plant after firefighters mobilized to put out a blaze.The country’s State Emergency Service said early on Sunday that background radiation levels were “within normal limits.”More than 130 firefighters, three aircraft, and 21 vehicles were deployed on April 4 to battle the fire, which was said to have burned around 20 hectares (50 acres) in the long-vacated area near where an explosion at a Soviet nuclear plant in 1986 sent a plume of radioactive fallout high into the air and across swaths of Europe.Fire and safety crews were said to be inspecting the area overnight on April 4-5 to eliminate any threat from sites where there was still smoldering.The blaze required seven airdrops of water, officials said.The Ukrainian State Emergency Service said that “as of April 5, 7:00 a.m., there was no open fire, only some isolated cells smoldering.”It said firefighters hadn’t seen any flames since around 8:00 p.m. on April 4.Officials had earlier shared images taken from an aircraft of white smoke blanketing the area, where it said firefighting was complicated by “an increased radiation background in individual areas of combustion.”There was no threat to settlements, the State Emergency Service said.A number of regions of Ukraine this week have reported brushfires amid unseasonably dry conditions.Fires are a routine threat in the forested region around the exclusion zone where an explosion 33 years ago ripped a roof off the fourth reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant near the now-abandoned town of Pripyat.The 1986 explosion sent a cloud of radioactive material high into the air above then-Soviet Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia, as well as across Europe as Soviet officials denied there had been any accidents.Dozens of people in Ukraine died in the immediate aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster, and thousands more have since died from its effects, mainly exposure to radiation.A second massive protective shelter over the contaminated reactor was completed in 2016 in hopes of preventing further radiation leaks and setting the stage for the eventual dismantling of the structure.
 
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“It’s only been 30 days since our first case,” battle-fatigued New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Saturday about the COVID-19 outbreak that has invaded his state.  “It feels like an entire lifetime.”New York is the U.S. state hardest hit by the coronavirus, where it has claimed more than 3,500 lives.  Public health experts say the situation is about to get worse, not only for New York, but for the rest of the United States as well.While Cuomo said the state is about seven days away from its apex of the health crisis, U.S. President Donald Trump warned Saturday that the U.S. would soon face its hardest two weeks with the virus.“There’s going to be a lot of death,” Trump said.U.S. hospitals have been fighting the coronavirus battle with a woefully inadequate arsenal.  Hospitals have been pleading for ventilators for their patients and the protective gear that doctors and other medical workers wear to prevent passing the disease back and forth between themselves and their patients.New York received a shipment of 1,000 ventilators Saturday from China.  “This is a big deal and it’s going to make a significant difference for us,” Cuomo said.Cuomo also said 85,000 volunteers are helping New York combat the virus and that he will sign an executive order allowing medical students slated to graduate this spring to graduate early and start practicing.A medic of the Elmhurst Hospital Center medical team reacts after stepping outside of the emergency room on April 4, 2020, in the Queens borough of New York.Some states have been at odds with the White House because the Trump administration has not mounted a unified approach to combatting the virus, leaving each state to craft its own strategy to find medical equipment and drugs to fight the deadly virus.The Washington Post reported the White House got its first official notification of the outbreak in China on January 3, but it took the administration 70 days to treat the outbreak as the deadly pandemic it has become.The global tally of confirmed cases has climbed to more than 1.2 million and almost 65,000 deaths.Spain, with more than 126,000 cases and almost 12,000 deaths, plans to extend its nationwide lockdown by 15 more days, until April 26. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Saturday he would ask parliament to extend lockdown measures for the second time after first extending them to April 11.Italy, the second-hardest-hit European country after Spain, has had more than 11,000 of its medical workers infected by COVID-19, according to its National Institutes of Health and an association of physicians. The groups said about 73 physicians have died from the virus. Infections among medical personnel amount to nearly 10 percent of all infections in Italy.Carabinieri military police patrol Saint Peter’s square at the Vatican April 5, 2020, before Pope Francis leads Palm Sunday Mass without public participation due to the spread of coronavirus disease.Britain’s Ministry of Justice said Saturday that thousands of prisoners would be released within weeks as part of its broader campaign to contain the spread of the virus. Britain reported 708 deaths overnight, boosting the country’s death toll to more than 4,300. The ministry said the inmates would be electronically monitored to ensure they remain at home and could be returned to prison “at the first sign of concern.”France’s military has begun moving patients to hospitals across the country in an effort to contain the coronavirus’s spread in the hard-hit area in and around Paris. Military planes, helicopters and trains are transporting patients to less-affected areas in western France. More than 7,500 deaths and 90,000 infections have been reported in France.China observed a national moment of mourning for three minutes Saturday morning, as flags flew at half-staff and air sirens sounded to remember COVID-19 victims and the “martyrs” or front-line medical workers who died in the Asian nation’s fight to save the sick.The coronavirus first emerged late last year in China’s Hubei province, killing more than 3,300 people.       
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A Sudanese refugee went on a knife rampage in a town in southeastern France on Saturday, killing two people in what was being treated as a terrorist attack.The attack in broad daylight, which President Emmanuel Macron called “an odious act,” took place with the country on lockdown in a bid to stem the spread of the deadly coronavirus.Counterterrorism prosecutors launched an investigation into “murder linked to a terrorist enterprise” after the rampage in a string of shops in Romans-sur-Isere, a riverside town of 35,000.The assailant, identified only as Abdallah A.-O., a refugee in his 30s from Sudan who lives in the town, was arrested without a fight by police.”He was found on his knees on the pavement, praying in Arabic,” the prosecutor’s office said.According to witnesses cited by local radio station France Bleu Drome Ardeche, he shouted “Allah Akbar!” (God is greatest) as he stabbed his victims.”Anyone who had the misfortune to find themselves in his way were attacked,” town Mayor Marie-Helene Thoraval told AFP.David Olivier Reverdy, from the National Police Alliance union, said the assailant had called on police to kill him when they came to arrest him.’Jumped over the counter’The suspect first went into a tobacco shop, where he attacked the owner and his wife, Thoraval said.He then went into a butcher’s shop, where he seized another knife before heading to the town center and attacking people in the street outside a bakery.”He took a knife, jumped over the counter, and stabbed a customer, then ran away,” the butcher’s shop owner, Ludovic Breyton, told AFP. “My wife tried to help the victim but in vain.”Interior Minister Cristophe Castaner, who visited the scene, said two people were killed and five others injured.”This morning, a man embarked on a terrorist journey,” he said.The initial investigation has “brought to light a determined, murderous course likely to seriously disturb public order through intimidation or terror,” according to the national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office (PNAT).It said that during a search of the suspect’s home, “handwritten documents with religious connotations were found in which the author complains in particular that he lives in a country of nonbelievers.”The suspect, who obtained refugee status in 2017, was not known to police or intelligence services in France or Europe, PNAT said.Macron denounced the attack in a statement on Twitter.”All the light will be shed on this odious act which casts a shadow over our country, which has already been hit hard in recent weeks,” he said.France is in its third week of a national lockdown over COVID-19, with all but essential businesses ordered to shut and people told to stay at home.The country has been on terror alert since a wave of deadly jihadist bombings and shootings in Paris in 2015. In all, 258 people have been killed in France in what have been deemed terrorist attacks.
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Prosecutors say a man wielding a knife has attacked residents venturing out to shop in a town under lockdown south of the French city of Lyon. Two people were killed and others wounded. The anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office told The Associated Press the attack took place at 11 a.m. in a commercial street in Romans-sur-Isere. The alleged attacker was arrested by police nearby. Prosecutors did not identify him. They said he had no documents but claimed to be Sudanese and to have been born in 1987. Prosecutors couldn’t confirm French media reports that there were several other casualties, of whom three are in critical condition. They have not yet determined whether the attack was terror-related.Prosecutors said that other people were also wounded but couldn’t confirm French media reports that there were seven other casualties, of whom three are in critical condition.They also did not confirm reports that the man had shouted “Allahu akbar” (God is great) as he carried out the attack.The office said it is evaluating whether the attack was motivated by terrorism, but that it has not launched any formal proceedings to treat it as such.Like the rest of France, the town’s residents are on coronavirus-linked lockdown. The victims were carrying out their weekend food shopping on the street that has bakeries and grocers, the office said. Two-meter distancing is being encouraged as in the rest of the country.Media reported that the knifeman first attacked a Romanian resident who had just left his home for his daily walk – slitting his throat in front of his girlfriend and son.Following that, they reported, the assailant entered a tobacco shop, stabbed the tobacconist and two customers, and then went into the local butcher’s shop. He grabbed another knife and attacked a client with the blunt end before entering a supermarket.Some shoppers took refuge in a nearby bakery.There have been a number of knife attacks in France in recent months. In January, French police shot and injured a man in Metz who was waving a knife and shouting “Allahu akbar.”Two days earlier, another man was shot dead by police after he stabbed one person fatally and wounded two others in a Paris suburb. 
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An Italian oncologist and his team are treating coronavirus patients at their homes, as intensive-care units at hospitals have reached capacity.The director of the oncology ward at Piacenza Hospital in the Emilia-Romagna region on the border with Italy’s hardest-hit Lombardy region, Luigi Cavanna, and head nurse Gabriele Cremona rushed to help patients fight the new COVID-19 during the early phase of the epidemic.Cavanna has been prescribing antiviral drugs and Hydroxychloroquine to patients with the new coronavirus symptoms.”This disease can be stopped, and its spread can be stopped, because if we give (patients) an anti-viral drug, which prevents the virus from replicating, not only we can prevent the person from becoming ill, but we can probably also prevent the disease from spreading,” Cavanna said.Cavana and his team have treated more than 100 patients at home and less than 10 percent of them had to be admitted to the hospital. The other 90 percent responded successfully to home treatment and have been recovering.“Just seeing us walking in, some of them, even in their suffering were almost moved, because they thought, ‘Someone is coming to see us’. Under our monster-like appearance (referring to protective gear) they could see human features, and the impact is moving. More than one person told us: ‘It will end the way it will end, but you’ve come and for me that’s already great.’ For a doctor, this means the world,” Cavanna said.The health authority in Emilia Romagna and its regional administration have supported what has become known as the “Piacenza model,” and other teams there are practicing it.Other Italian regions have shown interest in the strategy, which could be especially successful in areas less affected by the coronavirus epidemic. 
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Poland’s parliament is preparing to vote Friday on legislation that would transform the country’s May presidential election entirely into a mail-in ballot due to the health risks of having public voting stations during the coronavirus pandemic. The proposal by the populist ruling Law and Justice party to go forward with the May 10 election is controversial.  Opposition candidates say having the election during the pandemic is undemocratic and it should be postponed. They argue that opposition presidential candidates stand no chance against conservative President Andrzej Duda because they cannot campaign due to a strict ban on gatherings. Duda, meanwhile, still profits from heavy coverage on state media. Critically, even one faction in the ruling coalition is strongly opposed to holding the vote, raising speculation in Poland that Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki’s government could be toppled by the crisis.  Jaroslaw Gowin, center, the head of a faction within the ruling conservative coalition, speaks to reporters about his proposal to postpone a presidential election in Poland by two years in Warsaw, Poland, April 3, 2020.Surveys show that a large majority of voters in this European Union nation of 38 million want the election to be postponed due to the pandemic. Kamil Bortniczuk, a lawmaker with the faction opposed to the voting, told the radio broadcaster RMF FM his group would try to convince ruling party lawmakers “that Poles today do not want elections in such conditions and they cannot be prepared so quickly.” “There is not enough time to gain confidence among citizens in such a way of voting, and thus in the results of the election,” Bortniczuk said. Law and Justice officials insist that the current election timeline — voting on May 10 with a runoff on May 24 if no candidate wins 50% in the first round — is dictated by the constitution and should not be changed. The leader of the ruling party, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, insisted Friday that to postpone the election “would be completely illegal.” He said “there is no reason to postpone it at the moment if it is conducted in a safe way from a health point of view.” Poland has had far fewer coronavirus infections and deaths than fellow EU countries like Italy and Spain, but the numbers have been accelerating in recent days, reaching 2,946 infections and 57 deaths on Friday.  Some Polish media outlets have suggested the country’s true numbers are actually much higher due to low levels of testing. Polish media have also reported about people dying of pneumonia who most likely have COVID-19 but who do not show up in the statistics because they were not tested. The debate over the mail-in vote shares similarities with efforts in the United States by Democrats seeking widespread voting by mail in the November presidential and congressional elections. So far, the Democrats have not gotten the billions of dollars in federal funding required to move to widespread voting but say they will keep pressing the issue. 
 
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The European Commission said Friday that it was temporarily suspending taxes and duties on the import of medical equipment and protective wear from outside the European Union.In a video statement, Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen said the commission recognized the needs of hospitals and health care workers and was making the move to ease pressure on prices for crucial equipment.She gave the example of Italy, where customs duties of 12 percent and a value-added tax of 22 percent are levied on some face masks or protective garments imported from countries like China. The new cuts would lower prices by one-third.Likewise, she said, an average 20 percent VAT on ventilators would be removed.She said the tax and duty cuts would be applied retroactively to January 30 and be in place at least four months, longer if necessary.
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An activist doctor who had criticized Russia’s response to the coronavirus outbreak was forcibly detained as she and some of her colleagues tried to deliver protective gear to a hospital in need.  Dr. Anastasia Vasilyeva of the Alliance of Doctors union was trying to take more than 500 masks, sanitizers, hazmat suits, gloves and protective glasses to a hospital in the Novgorod region about 400 kilometers (about 250 miles) northwest of Moscow on Thursday when she and the others were stopped by police on a highway.They were accused by police of violating self-isolation regulations, currently in place in many regions, including Moscow and Novgorod. The group was taken to a police station and held for hours, and the activists had to ask hospital workers to come to the station to pick up the gear.  After a night in custody, Vasilyeva appeared in court on charges of defying police orders. Two long court hearings later, she was ordered to pay fines totaling the equivalent of $20.”It was not about the money for them, It was about breaking me,” Vasilyeva said afterward. “But I’m even more convinced that we’re doing the right thing, and we will definitely keep on doing it.”Stay-home orderTwo weeks ago, Russia reported only a few hundred coronavirus cases and insisted the outbreak was under control. As the virus spread and more infections were reported this week, however, residents of Moscow and other cities were ordered to stay home.On Friday, officials reported 4,149 cases in the country, four times more than a week ago. The government sought to reassure the public that Russia has everything it needs to fight the outbreak and even sent planeloads of protective gear and medical equipment to Italy, the U.S. and other countries. Still, hospitals across the country complained about shortages of equipment and supplies, and earlier this week, the union began a fundraising campaign to buy protective gear for hospitals.Vasilyeva, who has become the most vocal critic of the Kremlin’s response to the virus, accused authorities of playing down the scale of the outbreak and pressuring medics to work without sufficient protection.”We realized that we can’t just sit and watch; otherwise it is going to be too late,” she said in a tweet Monday announcing the campaign.After being released from the police station, Vasilyeva was almost immediately detained again and charged with defying police orders. Video posted on Twitter by activists shows a dozen police officers gathering around Vasilyeva and two of them dragging her into the station.Assault accusationAccording to Ivan Konovalov, spokesman of the Alliance of Doctors, Vasilyeva was physically assaulted in the process and even fainted briefly. “We thought we may run into some difficulties, but no one could even imagine anything like that,” said Konovalov, who accompanied Vasilyeva to the Novgorod region.  The incident elicited outrage from other activists.”Why are they harassing this person, because she brought masks for the doctors? Bastards,” tweeted opposition politician Alexei Navalny, who supports the Alliance of Doctors and works closely with Vasilyeva.  Natalia Zviagina, Russia director of Amnesty International, said in a statement that “it is staggering that the Russian authorities appear to fear criticism more than the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.””By keeping her behind bars, they expose their true motive — they are willing to punish health professionals who dare contradict the official Russian narrative and expose flaws in the public health system,” Zviagina said.Russian military planes with medical supplies sit at Batajnica military airport near Belgrade, Serbia, April 3, 2020. The Russian Defense Ministry said it has sent medical and disinfection teams to Serbia to help fight the coronavirus.With the outbreak dominating the agenda in Russia, anyone who criticizes the country’s struggling health system becomes a thorn in the Kremlin’s side, said Abbas Gallyamov, a former Kremlin speechwriter-turned-political analyst.  “The pressure will continue, because right now the most important political issue is on the table: How will the voters see the authorities after the crisis —as effective and acting in people’s interests, or ineffective, out of touch with the people, and in need of being replaced?” Gallyamov said.  Doctors’ unions say a shortage of protective equipment is one of the most pressing problems amid the outbreak. Konovalov said the Alliance of Doctors has gotten about 30 requests for protective gear from hospitals and medical facilities across Russia, and 100 more generic complaints about a lack of protective equipment.  Ambulance workers complainAndrei Konoval, chairman of the Action medical union, echoed that sentiment.”It is a serious problem that the authorities have started to solve, but not as fast as we want them to,” Konoval said, adding that his union is getting complaints from ambulance workers, who are often the first to come in contact with potentially infected patients.  Russian authorities sought to put a good face on the crisis. The Health Ministry said the outbreak has so far taken a “fortunate” course, while the Defense Ministry said it was sending another 11 planes with medical specialists and equipment to Serbia, a close ally of Moscow.In Moscow, which has the largest number of cases reported in the country, Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill was driven around the city in a van carrying an icon, praying for the epidemic to end. Media reports said the motorcade caused traffic jams as it traveled around the capital.
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Setting up makeshift ICU wards in libraries and conference centers, embattled European medical workers strained Friday to save thousands of desperately ill coronavirus patients as stocks of medicine, protective equipment and breathing machines grew shorter by the hour.
A maelstrom of coronavirus deaths and job losses slammed the United States and Europe. Some 10 million Americans have been thrown out of work in just two weeks, the most stunning collapse the U.S. job market has ever witnessed. Global confirmed infections surged past 1 million and deaths hit 53,000, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.  
Experts say both numbers are seriously under-counted, due to the lack of testing, mild cases that were missed and governments that are deliberately underplaying the impact of the pandemic.  
Europe’s three worst-hit countries — Italy, Spain and France — surpassed 30,000 dead, over 56% of the world’s death toll. From those countries, the view remained almost unrelentingly grim, a frightening portent even for places like New York, the epicenter of the U.S. outbreak, where trucks have been fork-lifting bodies outside overflowing morgues.
One Spanish hospital turned its library into a makeshift intensive-care unit. In France, space was being set aside for bodies in a vast food market. The French prime minister said he is “fighting hour by hour” to ward off shortages of essential drugs used to keep COVID-19 patients alive in intensive care.  
Philippe Montravers, an anesthesiologist in Paris, said medics are preparing to fall back on older drugs, such as the opiates fetanyl and morphine, that had fallen out of favor, as newer painkillers are now in short supply.  
“The work is extremely tough and heavy,” he said. “We’ve had doctors, nurses, caregivers who got sick, infected … but who have come back after recovering. It’s a bit like those World War I soldiers who were injured and came back to fight.”  
Some glimmers of hope emerged that Italy, with nearly 14,000 dead, Spain and France might be flattening their infection curves and nearing or even past their peaks in daily deaths.  
Spain on Friday reported 932 new daily deaths, just slightly down from the record it hit a day earlier. The carnage most certainly included large numbers of elderly people who authorities admit are not getting access to the country’s limited breathing machines, which are being used first on healthier, younger patients. More than half of Spain’s 10,935 deaths have come in the last seven days alone.
Some European officials are tentatively talking about the future, how to lift the nationwide lockdowns that have staved off the total collapse of strained health systems. Still, the main message across the continent was “stay at home.”
In France, the government warned Parisians not to even think about going anywhere for the Easter school vacation starting this weekend, setting up roadblocks out of the city to nab those with antsy children trying to escape lockdowns.
Beyond Europe, coronavirus deaths mounted with alarming speed in New York, the most lethal hot spot in the United States, which has seen at least 1,500 virus deaths. One New York funeral home had 185 bodies stacked up — more than triple its normal capacity.  
“It’s surreal,” owner Pat Marmo said, adding that he’s been begging families to insist hospitals hold their dead loved ones as long as possible. “We need help.”
Roughly 90% of the U.S. population is under stay-at-home orders, and many factories, restaurants, stores and other businesses are closed or have seen sales shrivel. Economists warned that U.S. unemployment would almost certainly top that of the Great Recession a decade ago and could reach levels not seen since the Great Depression in the 1930s.
“My anxiety is through the roof right now, not knowing what’s going to happen,” said Laura Wieder, laid off from her job managing a sports bar in Bellefontaine, Ohio.  
The pandemic will cost the world economy as much as $4.1 trillion, or nearly 5% of all economic activity, the Asian Development Bank said Friday.  
At least a million people in Europe are estimated to have lost their jobs over the past couple of weeks as well. Spain alone added more than 300,000 to its unemployment rolls in March. But the job losses in Europe appear to be far smaller than in the U.S. because of countries’ greater social safety nets.
Estimates in China, the world’s second-largest economy, of those who have lost jobs or are underemployed run as high as 200 million. The government said Friday it would would provide an additional 1 trillion yuan ($142 billion) to local banks to lend at preferential rates to small- and medium-sized businesses.
With more than 245,000 people infected in the U.S. and the death toll topping 6,000, sobering preparations were underway. The Federal Emergency Management Agency asked the Pentagon for 100,000 more body bags.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. But for others, especially older adults and people with health problems, it can cause pneumonia and lead to death. The World Health Organization said this week that 95% of the deaths in Europe were of people who were over 60 years old.
White House coronavirus task force coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx said U.S. infection data suggested that Americans need to emulate those European nations that have started to see the spread of the virus slowing through strict social distancing.  
The Trump administration was getting ready to recommend that ordinary Americans wear non-medical masks or bandannas over their mouths and noses when out in public so stocks of medical-grade masks could be preserved for those on the front lines.  
Shortages of critical equipment led to fierce competition between buyers from Europe, the U.S. and elsewhere. A regional leader in Paris described the scramble to source masks a “worldwide treasure hunt.”  
French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said worldwide usage of essential drugs and disposable equipment, such as ventilator mouthpieces, used by intensive care units is “exploding in unimaginable proportions,” with a “nearly 2,000 percent increase” in demand “because it is happening everywhere in the world and at the same time.”  
Gov. Andrew Cuomo warned that New York could run out of breathing machines in six days. 
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Prince Charles on Friday remotely opened the new Nightingale Hospital at London’s main exhibition and conference center, a temporary facility that will soon be able to treat 4,000 people who have contracted COVID-19.
Charles said he was “enormously touched” to be asked to open the temporary facility at the ExCel center in east London and paid tribute to everyone, including military personnel, involved in its “spectacular and almost unbelievable” nine-day construction.
“An example, if ever one was needed, of how the impossible could be made possible and how we can achieve the unthinkable through human will and ingenuity,” he said via video link from his Scottish home of Birkhall.
“To convert one of the largest national conference centres into a field hospital, starting with 500 beds with a potential of 4,000, is quite frankly incredible.”
The new National Health Service hospital will only care for people with COVID-19, and patients will only be assigned there after their local London hospital has reached capacity.
Charles, who earlier this week emerged from self-isolation after testing positive for COVID-19, said he was one of “the lucky ones” who only had mild symptoms, but “for some it will be a much harder journey.”
He expressed his hope that the hospital “is needed for as short a time and for as few people as possible.”
The hospital is named after Florence Nightingale, who is widely considered to be the founder of modern nursing. She was in charge of nursing British and allied soldiers in Turkey during the Crimean War of the 1850s, her selfless care earning her the reputation as the “Lady with the Lamp.”
Natalie Grey, the head of nursing at NHS Nightingale, unveiled the plaque formally opening the hospital on the prince’s behalf.
Further new hospitals are being planned across the U.K., including in Birmingham, Glasgow and Manchester, to alleviate the pressure on the NHS during the coronavirus pandemic.
“In these troubled times with this invisible killer stalking the whole world, the fact in this country we have the NHS is even more valuable that before,” said Health Secretary Matt Hancock, who also contracted COVID-19 and only emerged from his self-isolation on Thursday.
The number of people in Britain dying after testing positive for COVID-19 has been increasing sharply over the past couple of weeks. The latest U.K. figures showed that the number of people to have died increased in a day by 569 to 2,921.
Like many other countries, Britain is in effective lockdown, with bars and nonessential shops closed in order to reduce the rate of transmission, the hope being that it will eventually reduce the peak in deaths. Hancock would not be drawn across several interviews about when he expects the peak to be, beyond that it’s likely to occur in “coming weeks.”
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The coronavirus pandemic has hit a grim milestone — 1 million confirmed cases.The count by Johns Hopkins University says almost one-fourth, 236,000, are in the United States.The worldwide death toll stands at more than 53,000. Italy reported the most fatalities with more than 13,000 and climbing daily.A question on nearly everyone’s lips in the U.S. is, “Do I need to wear a mask?” Some experts have said anyone who is not sick or caring for someone who is doesn’t need one. They say a mask won’t stop the virus.Other experts say even minimal protection from a face covering is better than nothing at all.New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is recommending New Yorkers wear a scarf, bandana, or some homemade covering over their mouths and noses – but not a surgical mask. He says those should be reserved for medical professionals.Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is also asking people to cover their mouths in public.U.S. President Donald Trump said the White House task force is still putting together guidelines on whether to wear a face covering.“If people wanted to wear them, they can. It’s not a bad idea, at least for a period of time,” Trump said.A transit police officer checks the temperature of a truck driver as a preventive measure against the new coronavirus, during a partial curfew ordered by the government in Villa Nueva, Guatemala, on April 2, 2020.The White House said Trump was tested again for the coronavirus, using a test that gives results in 15 minutes. The president tested negative and was pronounced “healthy.”The World Bank approved nearly $2 billion in funds for 25 of the world’s poorest countries to battle the coronavirus pandemic.India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, and Ethiopia will get most of the first payments. The money is specifically earmarked for critical medical supplies, including masks and ventilators.Bank President David Malpass says the institution could provide as much as $160 billion in such help over the next year.India’s lockdown of more than 1 billion people has left hundreds of millions homeless and without food, prompting Prime Minister Narendra Modi to beg for their forgiveness.In Brussels, NATO foreign ministers have tasked the alliance’s top military officer, U.S. Air Force Gen. Tod Wolters, “to coordinate the necessary military support to combat the crisis, to speed up and step up assistance.”Wolters will procure cargo planes and other aircraft to deliver medical supplies as well as surplus stocks across the 30-member bloc.Meanwhile, Portugal announced a ban on all commercial flights arriving at its airports, and its citizens won’t be allowed to visit other towns except for work. The new restrictions take effect April 9 and are set to last five days.“The virus doesn’t travel by itself,” Prime Minister Antonio Costa said Thursday. “This Easter period is a particularly critical time and that’s why it is essential to restrict movement in the national territory.”The government is also pardoning inmates sentenced to two years or less to prevent a spread of the virus in jails.People wait in line to buy supplies amid the spread of the coronavirus disease in Guayaquil, Ecuador, April 2, 2020.Portugal has a little more than 9,000 confirmed cases.Also Thursday, three anonymous Iraqi doctors involved in testing say the country has thousands of coronavirus cases – far more than the government’s official count of 772.Iraq’s health ministry simply said the sources reporting what the doctors allege are “incorrect.”In Seattle, Washington, federal officials have proposed a $611,000 fine for the nursing home where 40 people died of coronavirus.The Life Care Center was ground zero early in the U.S. outbreak.Federal regulators say the facility had a nuber of serious problems including failing to quickly identify and properly treat residents during a spate of respiratory illnesses that turned out to have been caused by the coronavirus.The nursing home has yet to respond to the proposed fine.Also Thursday, the U.S. Postal Service said 22 countries have informed them that they can no longer process or deliver mail arriving from other nations because of disruptions in service caused by the coronavirus.They include India, Kuwait, Honduras, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa, and 17 other countries.And Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is ordering police to confront anyone who is violating the lockdown on Luzon and “shoot them dead.”Duterte appeared on television Thursday after residents in a poor section of Manila protested in the streets against what they say is the government’s negligence to deliver food and supplies.Women buy medicinal plants in Asuncion, Paraguay, on April 2, 2020.”I will not hesitate. My orders are to the police and military, as well as village officials, if there is any trouble, or occasions where there’s violence and your lives are in danger, shoot them dead. Do not intimidate the government. Do not challenge the government. You will lose.”Government officials hastily followed up on Duterte’s remarks to say he was simply using his usual tough rhetoric to illustrate how serious the coronavirus is.Police Chief Archie Gamboa said the president was “just overemphasizing on implementing the law in this time of crisis,” and police officers realize that they are not going to kill anyone for protesting.
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Russia says it’s entering a new phase in its fight against the spread of COVID-19. A near countrywide quarantine is just the latest in a series of government measures aimed at stopping a contagion that has infected over 3,500 Russians and killed 30 thus far.  But as Charles Maynes reports from Moscow, the Kremlin’s approach to the virus has been evolving over time.
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 Germany’s foreign minister Thursday warned NATO members against taking advantage of the coronavirus pandemic to spread “disinformation,” “propaganda” and “fake news.”Speaking ahead of a video teleconference of alliance foreign ministers, Heiko Maas said, “There are some who abuse this situation for propaganda purposes” and try to show themselves in a better light.He urged both the European Union and NATO to take counter measures to ensure available information is “fact-based” and not “fake news.”Maas did not name specific nations, but the Reuters news agency, citing a document it had reviewed last month, reports the EU claimed Russian media had launched a significant disinformation campaign against the West to generate panic and sow distrust regarding the governmental responses to the crisis.Reuters reports Moscow denied the allegations.
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Spain’s health officials reported 950 deaths from COVID-19 since Wednesday, a new one-day record in fatalities that pushes the nation’s total deaths during the outbreak to over 10,000. Speaking at a news briefing in Madrid Thursday, Spain’s medical emergency chief, Fernando Simon, said that while coronavirus cases rose to 110,238, the rate of spread in the nation is stabilizing. Health ministry officials say figures show the virus was spreading at a daily rate of 20 percent until March 25. Since then they say that rate has dropped to less than 12 percent, showing orders for residents to stay at home are working.  Spain trails only Italy in total deaths from the virus and behind only Italy and the United States for total cases.
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Keeping up to date about the coronavirus can be a problem for migrants who do not speak the language of the country in which they are living. In the Netherlands, a group of volunteers is trying to address the problem with a help desk aimed at recent immigrants.Every afternoon, calls come streaming into the coronavirus help desk, a service in the Netherlands for newcomers who do not speak the national language, Dutch.From two- to four p.m., volunteers answer calls from an immigrant population that hails mostly from Syria and Eritrea. Co-founder Milka Yemane explains that the service fills a gap in the coronavirus prevention campaign.“We got a lot of questions from newcomers, from refugees about the corona crisis, but also about what was the government saying about it?,” asked Yemane . “What do we need to know? Why are the schools closing, et cetera, et cetera. So, we said, it is so important to also offer them this very important information in these times in the languages that they know best.”Seven civil society groups started the service, which is operated entirely by volunteers.  Operators at the help desk speak Arabic and Tigrinya, the Eritrean national language.  Yemane says they plan to add other languages. Providing information to communities that don’t speak the national language fluently had a catastrophic impact in Sweden. Six of the first 15 coronavirus casualties in Sweden had a Somali background. The Swedish government has now committed to providing coronavirus-related news in 15 languages, including Somali.Catherine Woollard is the director of the European Council on Refugees and Exiles. She underlines the importance of understanding the communities of people with migrant and refugee backgrounds.“It’s very important to assess the needs of different groups and to take then a tailored approach,” said Woollard . “There are those people with a background in migration, who may be disproportionately carrying out work that has become essential, both high-level high skilled clinical work but also low-paid undervalued work, that may be putting them at greater risk.”The coronavirus help desk says that the group of newcomers in the Netherlands adds up to about 100,000 people.Yemane says the support does not stop with just translating the information but that people also need follow-up support.“If you have symptoms you can call your doctor, for instance. But then the next problem sometimes is that they cannot call the doctor because of the language barrier,” said Yemane . “So, then we have like this back office for questions that cannot be answered right away, and also call their doctor for them.”Other European countries, like Belgium, have also announced measures to share coronavirus-related news in additional languages. 
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The United States says it has delivered 128 anti-tank Javelin missiles to Estonia as part of a larger contract with the Baltic NATO member and the U.S. Department of Defense.
 
The U.S. Embassy in Tallinn said in a statement on Thursday that “the shipment will continue to build upon Estonia’s defensive capabilities and further strengthens our nations’ strategic integration” within NATO, of which Estonia has been a member since 2004.
 
Washington has provided Estonia, a staunch military ally, with over $100 million in joint defense cooperation over the past few years, the U.S. Embassy said.
 
The FGM-148 Javelin is an infrared-guided anti-tank missile that can be carried and launched by a single person. It is manufactured by a joint venture between Raytheon Company and Lockheed Martin Corp.
 
In December, the Estonian defense ministry said the United States has allocated $175 million in military aid to the Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania for 2020.
 
The three countries are all NATO members and all of them border Russia.
 
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