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by Michael Mathes WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Republican opposition to expanding certain unemployment benefits was delaying Senate passage Wednesday of the largest economic rescue package in modern US history, amid fears that New York could be the next epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic. The United States now has over 65,000 confirmed cases, the third-highest number globally behind China and Italy. About half are in New York state. “We still have the trajectory going up,” […]
(Eagle News)–The easterlies are affecting Southern Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao today. The Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration said as a result, partly cloudy to cloudy skies with isolated rainshowers or thunderstorms are expected over the provinces of Batanes, Cagayan, Isabela, Quirino, Nueva Vizcaya, Aurora, Abra, Benguet, Ifugao, Mt. Province, Kalinga, Apayao, Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, La Union and Pangasinan. Light to moderate winds coming from the east to southeast will prevail over Northern […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — There is a strong chance the new coronavirus could return in seasonal cycles, a senior US scientist said Wednesday, underscoring the urgent need to find a vaccine and effective treatments. Anthony Fauci, who leads research into infectious diseases at the National Institutes of Health, told a briefing the virus was beginning to take root in the southern hemisphere, where winter is on its way. “What we’re starting to see now… […]
LIMA, Peru (AFP) — Authorities called Wednesday for worried Peruvians to stop killing bats after rescuing 200 that was going to be burnt by peasants believing them to be spreading the coronavirus. “We must not distort the situation due to the pandemic. Bats are not our enemies,” the National Service of Wild Forests and Fauna (SERFOR) said in a statement on Wednesday. SERFOR called for calm after peasants in Culden, in the northern Cajamarca region, […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US Defense Secretary Mark Esper ordered a 60-day freeze Wednesday on moves by US troops and civilian defense employees overseas in an effort to halt the spread of the coronavirus. The move stopped the deployment or redeployment of some 90,000 US service members for the next two months. It also freezes in place the families of service members who traveled overseas with their deployments. “This measure is taken to aid […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Robots are expected to demonstrate their value for “dirty and dangerous” medical tasks in the fight to quell the coronavirus pandemic, researchers said Wednesday. An editorial in Science Robotics noted that robots can help with telemedicine, decontamination, handling of hazardous waste and monitoring compliance with voluntary quarantines. “Historically, robots have been developed to take on dull, dirty and dangerous jobs,” the researchers wrote. “As epidemics escalate, the potential roles of […]
ABUJA, Nigeria (AFP) — Nigeria on Wednesday received test kits and protective gear from China’s richest man, Jack Ma, to help fight novel coronavirus, which has so far claimed one life and infected 45 others in Africa’s most populous nation. Nigeria’s top health official, Abdulaziz Abdullahi, told AFP that the country had received 100,000 face masks, 1,000 protective gowns and 20,000 test kits. The equipment will be distributed to frontline health workers and hospital laboratories, […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — Metro and rail services in Paris and its suburbs will be cut to a minimum as part of the nationwide coronavirus lockdown, officials said Wednesday. Both Paris transport operator RATP and national rail group SNCF have already sharply reduced services since the home confinement orders came into effect on March 17. They apply to all but essential employees and those who cannot work from home. Starting Thursday, about 50 of the […]
by Suzauddin RUBEL with Sam JAHAN in Dhaka KUTUPALONG, Bangladesh (AFP) — The sewage-soaked alleys and cramped canvas and bamboo shacks that house one million Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh are a horrifying scene for experts watching the coronavirus pandemic creep closer. The wretched conditions in the camps, where most of the stateless Muslims arrived in 2017 to escape a Myanmar military clampdown across the nearby border, are fertile ground for any disease. The public in […]
by Hazel WARD, with Philippe RATER at the United Nations MADRID, Spain (AFP) — More than three billion people are living under lockdown measures as soaring death tolls in Europe and the US on Wednesday underlined a United Nations warning that the coronavirus pandemic threatens all of humanity. As the global death toll soared past 20,800, Spain joined Italy in seeing its number of fatalities overtake China, where the virus first emerged just three months […]
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Social distancing appears to be slowing the spread of the coronavirus in New York, the epicenter of America’s pandemic, Governor Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday. In his daily update on efforts to contain the deadly pandemic, Cuomo said projection rates suggested hospitalizations were increasing at a slower rate than before. “The arrows are headed in the right direction,” he told reporters. Cuomo said New York was still “on the way […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — The number of confirmed cases of the new coronavirus in the United States reached 60,115 on Wednesday while 827 people had died, a tracker run by Johns Hopkins University showed. The tracker showed 600 deaths around 24 hours earlier. The US has the third highest number of confirmed cases behind China and Italy, and the US death rate is now 1.38 percent, based on reported cases. The true number of […]
