Coronavirus latest: Global COVID-19 deaths reach 275,000
– The global death toll from COVID-19 has surpassed 275,000, while almost 4 million people are known to have been infected
– Brazil, the hardest-hit country in Latin Amerca by the coronavirus crisis, has reported 751 new deaths, bringing its total to nearly 10,000
– The World Health Organization announced that it is $1.3 billion (€1.2 billion) short of the $1.7 billion required to fund its global coronavirus response effort. The statement came shortly after the US withdrew funding from the WHO
– COVID-19 deaths in Italy surpassed 30,000, after health authorities reported 243 new fatalities. Only the US and UK have recorded more deaths from the virus
Updates in Universal Coordinated Time (UTC/GMT)
11:50 Germany’s coronavirus lockdown has prompted many to try their luck at setting records within their own four walls. RID, the institute responsible for registering records set in German-speaking countries, said that people practicing martial arts had been particularly active in submitting new record attempts.
RID chief Olaf Kuchenbecker told the DPA news agency that submissions included an attempt to crush as many cans as possible within a set time and an attempt to smash coconuts with your elbow. One Austrian national was able to reduce eight 28-centimetre pans into rolls of metal within one minute.
The most well-known attempt at setting a world record in recent weeks
saw 1,320 record the song “Rock You Like a Hurricane” by the Scorpions within the confines of their homes. The performances from more than 40 countries were edited together by music teacher Jens Illemann in the German state of Schleswig Holstein
and the finished product is to be released on Youtube later on Saturday.
11:02 China has admitted “shortcomings” in its public healthcare system that the were exposed by the emergence of the novel coronavirus. Li Bin, deputy director of China’s National Health Commission, made the rare admission, saying authorities were not adequately prepared for the outbreak. He said Beijing would now build a “centralised, unified and efficient” leadership system that would allow it to respond more quickly and effectively to any public health crisis in the future.
China has faced criticism both at home and abroad for downplaying the virus and concealing information about the outbreak when it first emerged in the central city of Wuhan in December.
On Friday, Beijing said it would support a World Health Organization-led review into the global response to the coronavirus outbreak — once the pandemic is over.
Read more: Does US-China coronavirus blame game threaten scientific investigation?
10:43 At least three people have been killed and several others wounded in Afghanistan during a protest demanding more coronavirus aid. Protesters in Ghor province gathered saying they had not received the food packages of flour and rice, donated by a charity.
Police opened fire after protesters damaged property near the governor’s
office in the provincial capital Firuzkoh and attacked the security forces, provincial councillor Abdul Basir Qaderi told Germany’s DPA news agency. Warning shots and water cannon had failed to disperse the protesters, he said.
“The city is in a military situation now,” Qaderi added. “There are tanks on the roads.”
A spokesman for the provincial governor said that gunmen were seen among the protesters.
Ghor is one of the most deprived, undeveloped, and insecure provinces in the country.
10:00 The daily coronavirus death toll in Spain has fallen to 179, down from 229 on Friday, according to the country’s health ministry. The overall death toll currently stands at 26,478, while confirmed infections rose to 223,574.
The country’s health minister has said the government will begin lifting restrictions on movement — in place for nearly two months — for just over half of the country’s population starting next week. Health Minister Salvador Illa on Friday said that areas that have met requirements for easing restrictions account for 51% of the country’s 47 million people.
From Monday, those areas will be free to reopen outdoor seating areas at smaller restaurants and bars to serve 50% of their normal capacity. Gatherings in groups of up to 10 people, family reunions, outdoor markets, church services, and museum openings will also be permitted.
The Madrid region, with over 64,000 confirmed infections, and large parts of Catalonia, with more than 51,000 cases, have not qualified for the partial lifting of restrictions.
09:38 Over 5,000 people gathered late Friday night in the Slovenian capital of Ljublijana to protest restrictions imposed by the government to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Smaller rallies took place in other cities, the country’s press agency reported Saturday.
In the capital, demonstrators rang bells outside of the parliamentary building to express their disconcent with the measures. Restrictions, imposed since mid-March, are gradually being lifted, but a ban on gatherings and protests remains in force.
The rallies also protested alleged corruption in the right-wing nationalist government of Prime Minister Janez Jansa. The government is reported to have procured anti-coronavirus products from abroad by way of a local distributor. The distributor, which is closely linked to top government officials, is suspected of over-charging.
09:26 Germany’s Bundesliga soccer players will only be allowed to celebrate a goal with “brief elbow or foot contact” when matches resume again on May 16 after weeks off due to the coronavirus.
Citing an internal German Football League (DFL) document, German newspaper Bild reported that players were instructed to avoid high fives, hugging, and spitting, and that there would be no child mascots, no handshakes, and no team photos. Teams will also come out of the tunnel at different times.
The document requests that players on the bench wear masks and that they leave seats empty between each person.
“The coach may remove the nose and mouth mask to call out instructions, as long as he keeps a minimum distance of 1.5 meters (5 feet) from all other people,” Bild wrote, citing the document.
Time spent in the locker room should be limited to a bare minimum of “30 to 40 minutes” for each individual.
09:05 German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas says Europe must acknowledge that it “wasn’t well-prepared” for the coronavirus pandemic. In a statement marking Europe Day, Maas said that initially most countries, including Germany, were focused on coping with the outbreak at home.
While defending the national response as “necessary, in order to safeguard our ability to act and then also help other,” Maas said the European Union had “grown in the crisis.”
The EU’s sluggish response has given way to cross-border medical aid, a massive financial support package and coordinated scientific research programs.
Maas called the solidarity provided by EU member states “unique in the world,” adding that Germany wants the bloc to emerge from the crisis stronger. Berlin takes over the six-month rotating presidency of the 27-nation EU on July 1.
Read more: Coronavirus latest: EU wants bloc’s borders sealed until June 15
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Welcome Back!
Shops across Europe were forced to close their doors to prevent the spread of COVID-19, including this fashion store on Makarios Avenue in downtown Nicosia, Cyprus. A stay-at-home order had been in place on the island since late March. On May 4 President Nicos Anastasiades allowed construction sites and small retail stores to open again. People should be able to move freely again on May 21.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Beach days are back
People in Portugal are now able to enjoy strolling along the beach again. Under the country’s state of emergency, which was introduced on March 18, beaches were shut, along with non-essential businesses and restaurants. People were still able to go outdoors and exercise, but now have more freedom to go to shops and hairdressers. However, face masks are still required in closed spaces.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Time for a trim
Hairdressers were also allowed to reopen in Greece on May 4, including this salon in Athens. Other businesses to open up after a six-week lockdown include florists, bookstores and other small stores. Restaurants and bars will have to wait until the end of the month. Greeks can also leave their homes without needing a form stating their reason, but face masks are mandatory in public transport.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Face mask to ride
Rules requiring face masks on public transport are now commonplace throughout Europe. In Hungary’s capital Budapest, transport workers were offering travelers masks at Nyugati Square. Budapest remains under stricter restrictions than the rest of the country. Other cities can begin to open up some stores, museums and public spaces.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Out and about
Public spaces in Spain had been deserted. For 48 days residents were not allowed to leave their homes except for food, medical reasons, or to walk the dog. Restrictions and social distancing rules are still strict, but people are finally able to go out for exercise. People in the capital Madrid pounced on the opportunity.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Back to work
Italy was also under an extremely strict lockdown, with people only allowed to go out for very limited reasons. But on May 4 it slowly began to allow some people to return to work, under social distancing conditions. Workers at a shoe factory in Castelnuovo Vomano, in Teramo province, have to work wearing face masks and separated by plastic screens. Construction workers can also return to sites.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Paying respects
The lifting of restrictions in Italy also allows up to 15 people to attend a funeral, albeit while wearing masks. During its lockdown, Italy banned funerals to stop the spread of COVID-19, which denied many people the chance to say goodbye to loved ones.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
School’s in
Austria is making sure 100,000 final-year students are able to return to school before their leavers’ exams. Teachers like Richard Fischer in Vienna handed out medical face masks to students before the start of lessons. The country is also allowing people to visit relatives in care homes again. Small shops and other businesses were already allowed to reopen on April 14.
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Coronavirus: Europe slowly begins to wake up
Up and running
In Germany professional footballers have been in training, despite competitions currently being suspended. Like other clubs, Bundesliga champions Bayern Munich have been putting their players through their paces, albeit only in small groups. The Bundesliga is targeting May 15 to restart, the first major European league to do so. Fans won’t be allowed into stadiums, however.
08:30 Amid a rise in home deliveries during the lockdown, a Dutch startup is flouting years of tradition in Germany by providing a groceries-to-your home service on a Sunday, when all shops are normally closed.
The online grocery store Picnic had previously offered Sunday deliveries exclusively to health workers. “Now we want expand Sunday deliveries to include all customers,” Picnic founder and director Frederic Knauft told Die Welt.
As a response to the coronavirus outbreak, in early March, the German government gave supermarkets the option to open on Sundays in order to reduce supply shortages. But all major supermarkets rejected the offer, saying it would overburden their staff. Sunday openings would have also caused conflicts with trade unions and the Christian church in Germany, both staunch advocates for keeping shops closed on Sundays.
Picnic, however, has taken up the offer. A test phase of Sunday deliveries is now taking place in the city of Viersen in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
08:11 The United States has blocked a United Nations Security Council vote on a resolution urging a ceasefire in war-ravaged countries, to focus resources on the fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
US diplomats told reporters later that ongoing disagreements with China were a factor in this decision, which Washington has accused of repeatedly blocking resolutions.
Washington also refused to support language contained in the draft to describe the World Health Organization (WHO). US President Donald Trump last month announced the US would suspend funding to the WHO, accusing the Geneva-based body of downplaying the seriousness of the outbreak in January and refusing to publicly condemn China’s handling of the crisis.
07:35 Singapore has reported 753 new infections, its health ministry reported Saturday, bringing the city-state’s total cases to 22,460. The health ministry said the vast majority of new infections were migrant workers who live together in dormitories.
Officials have said the upsurge among foreign workers was expected amid ongoing virus testing at dozens of dorms that have been locked down. Singapore will allow selected businesses to operate on May 12 in a gradual rollback of a two-month lockdown that is expected to end June 1.
07:29 Chinese President Xi Jinping has written a letter offering to help North Korea fight the coronavirus outbreak, Chinese state television has reported.
In the note to his North Korean counterpart Kim Jong Un, the Chinese leader said he had significant concerns about the situation in the isolated country but that he was pleased that North Korea had achieved positive results in its attempt to slow the deadly infection.
07:00 The northern German state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania has become the first to reopen restaurants, after weeks of country-wide closures due to the coronavirus. Other German states are expected to follow suit in the coming days and weeks.
Restaurants must follow strict hygiene and social distancing measures, including keeping 1.5 meters (5 feet) of space between dining groups. This means eateries will only be able to accommodate about half of their regular number of customers, according to the regional president of DEHOGA, the German Hotel and Restaurant Association, Lars Schwarz. He said he expects around one-third of restaurants in the area to reopen on Saturday.
Restaurants are also only allowed to serve state residents. Schwarz recommended that diners call ahead to make reservations and said that at least one guest per table will be required to provide contact information in case an outbreak connected to the restaurant develops.
Read more: Coronavirus outbreak closes German meat-packing plant
06:21 A US federal court has halted a ban on mass gatherings from applying to in-person religious services in the state of Kentucky, opening a path for Sunday church services to take place.
A temporary restraining order stops Governor Andy Beshear’s administration from enforcing a block on large gatherings “at any in-person religious service which adheres to applicable social distancing and hygiene guidelines.”
The ruling sided in the case with Tabernacle Baptist Church in Nicholasville, Kentucky, but applies to all places of worship in the state. Two other federal judges had previously upheld the ban.
In the new ruling, Van Tatenhove said the governor had “an honest motive” for safeguarding his state’s residents, but that he did not provide “a compelling reason for using his authority to limit a citizen’s right to freely exercise something we value greatly — the right of every American to follow their conscience on matters related to religion.”
The judge said that Tabernacle had alleged irreparable injury and that the church was likely to succeed in its case.
05:28 The state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia has called for Germany to reopen its border with France.
“The lockdown there [France] is ending on May 11,” Armin Laschet told the German dailies Stuttgarter Zeitung and Stuttgarter Nachrichten. “That would be a good moment to signal to our neighbor that we’re striving for a collective European response to fighting the pandemic.”
Laschet, who is also a candidate to lead Germany’s center-right CDU party, called for Germany to reach out to Austria to discuss reopening that border. The last weeks were “too focused on the nation-state and too little on Europe,” he said. Laschet has been in favor of keeping borders open since the beginning of the outbreak.
Laschet’s comments contrasted with those of German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, who recently said closed borders had been a “part of our success thus far in containing the virus.”
Seehofer is seeing mounting pressure both in and outside Germany to open the country’s borders. The state premier of Saarland Tobias Han on Friday called for the borders with France to be opened, while Luxembourg and Austria have also called for their borders with Germany to be reopened.
Read more: Coronavirus: EU urges closing external borders until mid-June
04:47 European Union states are too reliant on non-EU countries for medical supplies, German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier has said, a point that Germany will focus on when it takes over the EU presidency in July.
“The current crisis shows that we have to avoid one-sided dependency and diversify international supply chains to a greater extent,” Altmaier told Reuters in remarks published Saturday. Europe needs to become less dependent on non-European suppliers of medical protection gear such as face masks, he added.
“For this, we need a European industrial strategy to strengthen the industrial base in Europe, combined with good framework conditions, especially for small and medium-sized companies.”
The economy minister cautioned that this new focus does not mean a “farewell to globalization.”
“On the contrary, it underlines the importance of clear international trade rules that everyone must abide by,” he said. He insisted that the new strategy must be in line with World Trade Organization (WTO) regulations.
Germany is currently in the process of changing its foreign trade regulation to require that the government be informed when countries outside of the EU purchase stakes in key healthcare companies.
04:32 Turkey has imposed a fresh weekend curfew in 24 cities and provinces. Residents of Ankara and Istanbul were among those ordered to stay home from midnight Friday. Only bakeries, pharmacies and grocery stores are allowed to remain open. However, the government still plans to loosen some of its restrictions from Monday, including the reopening of shopping centers and hair salons. Turkey has seen 135,569 confirmed infections and 3,689 people have died.
03:43 Magician Roy Horn, who was a part of the German entertainer duo “Siegfried Roy,” died at the age of 75 after contracting COVID-19, his spokesman Dave Kirvin said. Horn, an animal tamer and magician, gained notoriety for his appearances with white tigers and lions, alongside his partner Siegfried Fischbacher.
His career ended in 2003, when he was mauled by a tiger, inflicting injuries that he never fully recovered from.
“Roy was a fighter his whole life including during these final days,” his stage partner Fischbacher said in a statement.
03:25 South Korea registered 18 new cases of the coronavirus on Saturday — 12 of these were in Seoul.
While health authorities did not immediately release further details, the new transmissions are being linked to night clubs in the Itaewon entertainment district in Seoul.
On Friday, medical workers began contact tracing after a 29-year-old man who visited three nightclubs in the district last week later tested positive for the virus.
At least 15 of the new transmissions were linked to him.
Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said the government will employ ”all available resources” to locate and isolate those infected.
An administrative order has also been released advising nightclubs and similar facilities across the country to close for a month.
The total number of confirmed cases in the country has risen to 10,840, with 256 deaths.
Read more: Coronavirus: How major sports are returning in South Korea
02:24 Argentina on Friday extended its lockdown in the capital but relaxed restrictions elsewhere in the country.
A day before they were set to expire, social distancing measures in Buenos Aires were extended to May 24.
President Alberto Fernandez made the announcement in a television address, saying that he was “extremely proud” of citizens for adhering to strict social distancing protocols. He added that the measures helped the country achieve its goal of flattening the infection curve.
The mayor of Buenos Aires, Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, announced that children will now be allowed to exercise outside on weekends when accompanied by their parents.
Argentines have been under a strict quarantine since March 20. In April, they were allowed to take short walks outside their homes during the day.
The country has reported a total of 5,611 cases of COVID-19 and 293 deaths.
02:07 The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany has risen by 1,251 to 168,551, according to figures from the Robert Koch Institute released on Saturday. The total number of deaths rose by 147 to 7,369.
01:44 The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported 28,974 new cases of COVID-19, bringing the total to 1,248,040. The number of deaths has risen by 2,180 to 75,477.
The US is the world’s worst-affected country in the coronavirus pandemic.
00:50 Mexico has reported 1,906 new coronavirus cases and 199 fatalities, bringing the total number of confirmed infections to 31,522 and the death toll to 3,160.
The new figures follow the murder of three sisters, all of whom were nurses working in Mexico’s government hospital system. The women were found to have been murdered by strangling, authorities in the northern border state of Coahuila said. No motive has been determined yet, but the triple-murder has raised fears that a trend in attacks on health care workers is escalating further.
In other parts of Mexico, nurses have been hit, kicked off public transport, and had cleaning fluids poured on them. Mexican health authorities have denounced the attacks and urged medical personnel not to wear uniforms or scrubs on the street to avoid being targeted.
Read more: Mexico drug cartels turn charities in coronavirus pandemic
00:00 Catch up on yesterday’s coronavirus news: EU wants bloc’s borders sealed until June 15
In reporting on the coronavirus pandemic, unless otherwise specified, DW uses figures provided by the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) Coronavirus Resource Center in the United States. JHU updates figures in real-time, collating data from world health organizations, state and national governments and other public official sources, all of whom have their own systems for compiling information.
Germany’s national statistics are compiled by its public health agency, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI). These figures depend on data transmission from state and local levels and are updated around once a day, which can lead to deviation from JHU.
kp,lc, dv/mm (AFP, AP, Reuters, dpa)
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