by Michael Mathes WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — US lawmakers worked deep into Tuesday night trying to seal a deal that buttresses the teetering economy by giving roughly $2 trillion to hospitals, businesses and ordinary Americans buckling under the strain of the coronavirus pandemic. But a full day of intense, protracted negotiating was unable to produce a viable outcome, even as the two sides — plus the White House — kept haggling and the US […]
Tag: US
California warns youths on virus after teen tests positive, dies
LOS ANGELES, United States (AFP) — California officials on Tuesday pleaded for young people to heed safety warnings over the new coronavirus after a teen tested positive and died. It would be the first known juvenile death from the COVID-19 illness in the United States. A statement by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health warned the cause of death “will require further evaluation.” “Though earlier tests indicated a positive result for COVID-19, the […]
American playwright Terrence McNally dies of coronavirus complications
NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Terrence McNally, a revered American playwright, librettist and screenwriter whose long career earned him four Tony awards and an Emmy, died Tuesday following coronavirus complications. He was 81 years old. McNally’s publicist said in a statement sent to AFP that the esteemed artist was a lung cancer survivor who lived with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. He died while hospitalized in Florida. An openly gay writer whose subject matter included […]
US coronavirus deaths now 600, almost 50,000 confirmed cases: tracker
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Six hundred people have died from the new coronavirus in the United States, while the number of confirmed cases now stands at 49,768, a tracker maintained by Johns Hopkins University showed Tuesday. The US has the third-highest number of confirmed cases globally, behind China and Italy. The death rate based on reported cases is now 1.2 percent — but the actual number believed to be infected is far higher, which […]
First known US child virus death was teen ‘in good health’
LOS ANGELES, United States (AFP) — The first known death of a child due to the novel coronavirus in the United States was a teenager in previously good health, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Tuesday. The death of the youth from Lancaster, just north of Los Angeles, was reported hours earlier by public health officials, and comes despite the disease not typically proving severe for juveniles. “A teenager in good health, succumbed to this […]
US could overtake Europe as coronavirus epicenter: WHO
GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) — The COVID-19 outbreak in the United States has the potential to exceed that in Europe, the World Health Organization (WHO) said Tuesday as the number of reported US cases surges. The pandemic began in China in December but the epicenter has since shifted from Asia to Europe. WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris told reporters during a virtual press conference that 85 percent of the new cases reported to the global body overnight […]
French lab gets US approval for quick Covid-19 test
LYON, France (AFP) — French diagnostics firm Biomerieux said Tuesday it had secured emergency approval from US regulators for a coronavirus test that can produce results in 45 minutes, potentially offering a new tool for stemming the outbreak. The company said its Biofire Covid-19 test was developed with funding from the US Defense Department, which will be distributing the tests while Biomerieux awaits full commercial approval for the US market and elsewhere. Biomerieux said it […]
Loss of smell could reveal hidden virus cases: experts
by Kelly MACNAMARA PARIS, France (AFP) — From a mother unable to smell her baby’s nappy to a lawmaker who suddenly could not taste the food, some coronavirus patients have described a loss of olfactory senses — and experts say this might be a new way to detect the virus. Ear, nose and throat (ENT) specialists in Britain, the United States and France have noted a growing number of patients in recent weeks with anosmia […]
Fear in New York, but Trump says coronavirus restrictions could ease soon
by Peter HUTCHISON / Sebastian Smith NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Anxiety ratcheted up Monday across an eerily deserted New York, America’s coronavirus epicenter, but President Donald Trump said he’d soon call for lifting the lockdown in some parts of the country. Trump — who faces reelection in November and is keen to avoid extended economic damage — told reporters he would be “opening up our country to business because our country was meant […]
Harvey Weinstein tests positive for coronavirus: report
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, US media reported Sunday. Weinstein, 68, is in prison in northern New York state after being sentenced to 23 years in jail for rape and sexual assault. The fallen film producer’s diagnosis was first reported Sunday evening by local paper the Niagara Gazette. Weinstein’s spokespeople have declined to comment to US media on the subject. The New […]
US Senator Rand Paul tests positive for coronavirus
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — Rand Paul, a critic of emergency coronavirus spending, has become the first US senator to test positive for COVID-19, the Republican lawmaker’s office said Sunday. A statement from a staff member said he was in quarantine but remained asymptomatic. As US senators work on a multi-trillion-dollar rescue package to help the US economy hit hard by the pandemic, Paul has at least twice voted against such emergency funding. Paul, who […]
Trump orders emergency medical stations for coronavirus hotspots
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday said he had ordered the deployment of emergency medical stations with a capacity of 4,000 hospital beds to coronavirus hotspots around the United States. Trump told a news conference that he had told the FEMA emergency management agency to set up the medical stations in New York, California and Washington state. He said eight stations in California would have 2,000 beds and that four stations […]





