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BLANTYRE, Malawi (AFP) — Malawi on Thursday announced its first three coronavirus infections, one of the last African countries to report the potentially deadly disease. The southern African country was one of the few without any confirmed cases along with the Comoros, Lesotho, Sao Tome, and Principe and South Sudan. President Peter Mutharika said the infections were in the capital Lilongwe. The first was detected in an elderly woman who had recently traveled to India […]
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — New York mayor Bill de Blasio on Thursday urged all of the city’s residents to cover their faces when outside and near others to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. “Let’s be clear. This is a face covering. It could be a scarf. It could be something you create at home. It could be a bandana,” de Blasio told reporters. “It doesn’t need to be a professional surgical […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he has taken his second coronavirus test at the White House since the outbreak began and it was again found to be negative. “I just took it this morning,” he told a news conference. “It said the president tested negative for COVID-19.” This was Trump’s second test. This time he used a new rapid method that he said took a minute to complete and […]
by Fulya OZERKAN ISTANBUL, Turkey (AFP) — Istanbul’s opposition mayor on Thursday called for a lockdown in Turkey’s largest city after it reported the country’s highest number of coronavirus cases and criticized the lack of coordination with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Turkey’s government has announced measures to contain the spread of the virus from shutting schools, banning mass prayers, suspending international flights to restricting intercity trips. But Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu’s demand is likely to put […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — France reported 471 more deaths in hospital from COVID-19 on Thursday, bringing the country’s official toll from the coronavirus epidemic to 4,503. The French figures include only those who died in the hospital and not those who died at home or in old people’s homes. However, top health official, Jerome Salomon told reporters for the first time that an initial count had shown 884 people had died in old people’s homes […]
TEHRAN, Iran (AFP) — Iran’s parliament speaker tested positive for COVID-19, state television reported Thursday, becoming the latest official to contract the disease in the hard hit country. Ali Larijani “was tested for coronavirus after showing certain symptoms, and as the result was positive, he is currently in quarantine and undergoing treatment,” the report said. Larijani, 62, is close to the Iranian leadership and president and was re-elected in 2016 for a second term as […]
ROME, Italy (AFP) — A first prisoner in Italy has died of coronavirus, a prison watchdog group said on Thursday, calling for more early releases of inmates from the country’s overcrowded system. Two prison guards have died of the virus, and 19 inmates out of a total inmate population of 58,000 have tested positive, according to Italy’s justice ministry. “The first prisoner death from COVID-19 confirms all our worries about the tragic consequences of contagion […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Another 6.65 million US workers filed for unemployment benefits last week, the most ever recorded, as the coronavirus forces businesses to shut down nationwide, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The number of first-time applications for jobless benefits for the week ended March 28 was double the number registered in the previous week, which was revised up by 24,000 to 3.3 million — the previous record, according to the data. “Nearly […]
More than 20,000 cases of COVID-19 were registered in Latin America and the Caribbean by Wednesday — double the figure from five days ago, according to an AFP tally. As infections spread across the region, a Guatemalan migrant died and more than 20 were wounded in a riot over coronavirus fears at a holding facility for Central American migrants in Mexico, officials said. A protest by mostly Honduran migrants at the facility in southeastern […]
MADRID, Spain (AFP) — The coronavirus death toll in Spain surged past 10,000 on Thursday after a record 950 deaths in 24 hours, with the number of confirmed cases passing the 110,000 marks, the government said. Spain has the world’s second-highest death toll after Italy, with the virus so far claiming 10,003 lives although the rate of new infections and deaths continued its downward trend, the health ministry figures showed. The number of new infections […]
MADRID, Spain (AFP) — Spain registered a leap of 302,265 jobless claims in March due to the “extraordinary impact” of the coronavirus pandemic, the labor ministry said Thursday. It is reportedly the biggest monthly increase on record in the eurozone’s fourth-largest economy, which has been locked down since March 14 to try to curb the spread of the virus. The pandemic “changed the trend” in unemployment figures for March, after only 2,857 workers filled jobless […]
LONDON, United Kingdom (AFP) — Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Britain would “massively increase testing” amid a growing wave of criticism on Thursday about his government’s failure to provide widespread coronavirus screening. In a video message posted online on Wednesday night from Downing Street, where he has been in self-isolation since announcing on March 27 that he had contracted the virus, Johnson said testing was the “way through”. “We’re also massively increasing testing. As I […]
