German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas addresses the media at the foreign ministry in Berlin, Germany, June 3, 2020. (KAY NIETFELD / DPA VIA AP)
RIO DE JANEIRO / LONDON / BERLIN / PARIS / JOHANNESBURG / ROME / MADRID / WASHINGTON / SANTIAGO / CAIRO / ATHENS / RABAT / NAIROBI / UNITED NATIONS / MOSCOW / STOCKHOLM / AMSTERDAM - The European Commission decided on Wednesday to classify the new coronavirus as a mid-level threat to workers, a move that allows employers in the EU to apply less stringent safety measures in the workplace than if the virus was deemed a high risk.
The decision may have wide economic and health implications as it could have an impact on companies' costs in fully restarting business activity and workers' safety.
The Commission, the EU’s executive arm, classified the new coronavirus as a level-3 hazard on a four-step risk list on which level 4 is the highest.
Under EU rules, a level-3 virus “can cause severe human disease and present a serious hazard to workers; it may present a risk of spreading to the community, but there is usually effective prophylaxis or treatment available”.
Level-4 biological agents pose a “high risk” of infection with no prophylaxis or treatment available.
Germany
Germany will lift a travel ban for European Union member states plus Britain, Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein and Switzerland from June 15 as long as there are no entry bans or large-scale lockdowns in those countries, the foreign minister said.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Heiko Maas said all countries concerned met those criteria except Norway due to an entry ban and Spain, where he said parliament was deciding whether to extend an entry ban.
Germany will lift a travel ban for EU member states plus Britain, Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein and Switzerland from June 15, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said
Maas said the travel warning would be replaced with guidelines, adding that Germans would be urged not to travel to Britain when not essential while a 14-day quarantine in place.
There were 285 new cases in the 24 hours through Wednesday morning, bringing the tally to 183,879, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. That compares with 184 the previous day. Fatalities increased by 8 to 8,563.
The reproduction factor of the virus, known as R-naught, fell to 0.89 on Tuesday from 1.20 the day before, according to the latest estimate from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI).
According to data from RKI on Wednesday, the number of confirmed cases rose by 342 to 182,370. The reported death toll rose by 29 to 8,551, the tally showed.
Parties in German Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition wrestled on Tuesday over final details of a huge stimulus package to aid recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, including whether cash incentives to buy new cars should exclude combustion engines.
Negotiations were to resume on Wednesday, a SPD party spokeswoman said. Initially, a final deal was expected on Tuesday.
The fiscal stimulus fund will include measures worth up to 100 billion euros, government and coalition sources have said.
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Spain
Spain is working on plans to gradually open its borders to tourists from countries deemed more secure in the fight against the coronavirus, possibly starting from June 22, the tourism ministry said on Wednesday.
After losing more than 27,000 people and months of economic activity to the epidemic, Spain had previously designated July 1 as the date to reopen to foreign tourism, which accounts for 12% of its output.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's government is due to lift a state of emergency on June 21, meaning that Spaniards will be able to start to move more freely again as the epeidemic recedes.
Spain reported zero additional deaths from the coronavirus for the second day running on Tuesday, with cumulative deaths unchanged from Sunday's total of 27,127, according to the health ministry.
Diagnosed cases of the disease rose by 137 from Monday to 239,932, the ministry said.
Peruvian migrants camp outside the Peruvian consulate to demand repatriation amid the spread of the new coronavirus and lack of work, in Santiago, Chile, June 2, 2020. (ESTEBAN FELIX / AP)
UN chief asks for protection of people on the move
United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday asked for protection of people on the move in the face of COVID-19.
In a video message for the launch of a policy brief on the impact of COVID-19 on people on the move, Guterres asked countries to develop a new mindset on human mobility.
People on the move face three crises rolled into one: a health crisis, a socio-economic crisis, and a protection crisis, said Guterres
"The COVID-19 crisis is an opportunity to re-imagine human mobility. Four core understandings must guide the way," he said.
Firstly, exclusion is costly and inclusion pays. Secondly, human dignity must be upheld in face of the pandemic. Thirdly, no one is safe until everyone is safe. Lastly, people on the move are part of the solution, Guterres said.
People on the move, such as refugees and internally displaced persons who are forced to flee their homes from violence or disaster, or migrants, face three crises rolled into one: a health crisis, a socio-economic crisis, and a protection crisis, said Guterres.
One third of the world's internally displaced population live in the 10 countries most at risk for COVID-19, Guterres said.
The UN chief expressed gratitude to countries, especially developing countries, that have opened their borders and hearts to refugees and migrants, despite their own social, economic and health challenges.
Global tally
Global COVID-19 deaths surpassed 380,000 on Wednesday, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.
More than 6.3 million COVID-19 cases have been reported around the world, according to the CSSE.
The United States reported the most COVID-19 cases and deaths, with a tally surpassing 1.8 million and a death toll over 106,000. Other countries with over 20,000 fatalities included Britain, Italy, France, Spain, and Brazil, the CSSE data showed.
Belgium
Belgium will allow almost all businesses to reopen on June 8, including cafes and bars, following its lockdown to combat the coronavirus, the country's prime minister said on Wednesday, although social distancing measures will remain.
Belgium will reopen its borders on June 15. However, cultural activities will continue without any public until July 1, when cinemas and other cultural spaces can open with a maximum of 200 people, Prime Minister Sophie Wilmes told a news conference.
Belarus
Belarus reported 861 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, taking its total to 45,116.
Of all the country's confirmed cases, 20,171 people have recovered so far, while 248 people with chronic diseases have died, according to the Belarusian Health Ministry.
As of Wednesday, some 574,000 tests for COVID-19 have been conducted across the country, the ministry said.
Austria
Austria is lifting all coronavirus-related border restrictions, including quarantines for new arrivals, from all of its neighbouring countries except Italy as of Thursday, Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg said on Wednesday.
"We will lift all the coronavirus-related border and health checks in relation to seven bordering countries - those are Germany, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Slovakia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Hungary. We are thereby returning to the pre-corona situation regarding these countries," Schallenberg said at a news conference.
Brazil
Brazil registered another record number of novel coronavirus deaths over the last 24 hours, the health ministry said on Tuesday evening, as the pandemic in Latin America's largest country shows no signs of slowing down.
The nation registered 28,936 additional cases, the ministry said, and 1,262 deaths. There are now 555,383 total confirmed cases in Brazil and 31,199 deaths.
The fresh record comes as some Brazilian leaders, including right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, continue to belittle the virus, warning that the economic fallout from quarantine measures will be worse than the virus itself.
"We lament all deaths, but it's everyone's destiny," Bolsonaro said in front of the presidential residence in Brasilia earlier on Tuesday.
Even in states and cities where leaders had previously instituted lockdown orders, authorities have been rapidly loosening restrictions in recent days, despite the number of daily new cases continuing to grow in most regions.
Chile
Chile on Tuesday said a total of 108,686 people have tested positive for the novel coronavirus since the COVID-19 outbreak began, and 1,188 people have died from the disease.
A record 3,527 new cases were detected in the past day, the highest single-day tally yet since the outbreak began here three months ago, and 75 more deaths were reported.
Health Minister Jaime Manalich said the government has modified its method of registering COVID-19 deaths to include those who had yet to receive the results of their tests before they died.
Czech Republic
Czech Republic and Slovakia will fully restore free movement between the two central European neighbours from midnight, the two countries' prime ministers said on Wednesday.
The announcement was made as Slovak Prime Minister Igor Matovic arrived to Prague for his first foreign trip and met his Czech counterpart Andrej Babis, news agency CTK reported.
A hotel employee disinfects a table at a hotel in Cairo, Egypt, on June 2, 2020. (AHMED GOMAA / XINHUA)
Egypt
Egypt on Tuesday saw a record single-day rise of 47 COVID-19 deaths, bringing the death toll in country to 1,052, said the Egyptian Health Ministry.
A total of 1,152 new cases were recorded, raising the total number of confirmed cases to 27,536, the ministry's spokesman Khaled Megahed said in a statement.
It was the sixth consecutive day for Egypt's COVID-19 daily infections to surpass 1,000.
Megahed added that 380 coronavirus patients were completely cured and discharged from hospitals on Tuesday, increasing the total number of recoveries to 6,827.
France
France's coronavirus death toll rose by more than a 100 for the first time in 13 days on Tuesday, an increase that includes nursing homes data again after a three-day interruption.
The health ministry said the number of fatalities had risen by 107 to 28,940, the fifth-highest tally in the world.
These data were reported the day after Parisian cafes and restaurants reopened for the first time in 11 weeks as the country eases lockdown measures.
The ministry said the number of people in hospital fell by more than 260 to 14,028, and the number of people in intensive care fell by 49 to 1,253.
Ghana
The number of COVID-19 cases in Ghana increased to 8,297 after 227 more cases were confirmed as of Tuesday, data from the Ghana Health Service (GHS) said.
Two more deaths were reported, raising the death toll to 38.
Another 39 patients have recovered, bringing the number of recoveries to 2,986.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said the country's entry points will remain closed until further notice.
Greece
Greece reported 19 new confirmed COVID-19 infections on Tuesday, including 12 people on a plane from Doha.
The 12 individuals were on a flight carrying 91 people from Doha to Athens that landed on Monday. Tests were carried out for the coronavirus and the passengers were taken to a quarantine hotel, authorities said.
Those who tested positive will be in quarantine for 14 days, and those who tested negative will remain in quarantine for seven days, the civil protection ministry said.
By Tuesday, Greece had reported a total 2,937 confirmed cases and 179 deaths.
Iceland
Iceland is proceeding with plans to test all incoming airline passengers for COVID-19 from June 15, in a bid to salvage tourism, its biggest export.
The tests will be carried out directly upon arrival at Keflavik Airport, at an estimated cost for the first two weeks of operations of 160 million kronur (US$1.2 million), assuming an average of 500 tests per day.
The tests will be free of charge for passengers during that initial 2-week trial period.
People wearing face masks walk across Piazza della Signoria in Florence, Italy, on June 2, 2020. (TIZIANA FABI / AFP)
Italy
Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte will unveil his plan late Wednesday to rebuild a battered economy on the day Italians end almost three months of lockdown measures and can again travel freely.
The move comes as new virus cases continue to decline and as Italians can again travel within the country without restrictions starting Wednesday.
The health ministry on Tuesday reported 55 fatalities, the fewest in more than a week. New cases rose by 318 to 233,515, with almost 60 percent of new infections in Lombardy. The region, which includes financial center Milan, accounts for almost half of the more than 33,500 fatalities nationwide and still has the highest ratio of new cases per 100,000 people.
Lines for reopened ferry service between Sicily and the Italian mainland began forming as early as 4 am, la Repubblica reported, with most of the traffic heading away from the island.
Italy will now allow travelers from other European Union states to enter without undergoing quarantines.
Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio is due to meet his French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian on Wednesday to hammer out details for cross-border travel between the two countries, daily La Stampa reported. Di Maio is also seeking French support in easing travel restrictions for Italians heading to other European destinations, including Greece, Stampa said.
Kenya
Kenya's Ministry of Health said Tuesday 72 more people tested positive to COVID-19, increasing the national tally to 2,093.
Rashid Aman, chief administrative secretary in the Ministry of Health, said two more deaths were reported, raising the death toll to 71.
Aman said another 17 patients have recovered, bringing the total number of recoveries to 499.
Latvia
Latvia will open its borders to most European countries on Wednesday without requiring visitors to self-isolate, as the Baltic nation prepares to exit emergency coronavirus measures, the government said on Tuesday.
Imposed self-isolation will be scrapped for people arriving from European countries where the infection rate is deemed to be low.
"It means that self-isolation ... will have to be observed only for those travellers who have been in Sweden, the UK, Portugal, Belgium, Malta, Ireland or Spain over the past two weeks," Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins told reporters.
Latvia will end a state of emergency, which enables the government to impose measures to curb the epidemic on June 9, but some measures will remain.
The country currently has had 1,071 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 24 deaths.
Libya
The Libyan National Center for Disease Control on Tuesday reported 14 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in Libya to 182, including 52 recoveries and five deaths.
In a statement later Tuesday, the center said it received a total of 504 suspected samples, 490 of which tested negative and 14 positive.
Malawi
The government of Malawi announced that a presidential task force on COVID-19 has recommended to the president a possible reopening of all school institutions by July 13.
"It is worth pointing out the re-opening of schools, colleges and universities amidst the COVID-19 pandemic that has led to loss of lives globally including four in Malawi, is an attempt to ensure a proper balance between the right to education and the right to life. It is for this reason that the taskforce resolved to consult various stakeholders to come up with a common position that ensures safe return to learning," a press release by the Ministry of Education reads.
The task force announced that it was working in a systematic and fact-based way to ensure that all of its decision making is informed by the best of public health data and global best practices to ensure a safe reopening of schools.
Mexico
Mexico's deputy health minister said on Tuesday that the coronavirus had reached its maximum intensity in the country after the ministry reported a record increase in daily cases.
The ministry said on Tuesday there were an additional 3,891 cases of the coronavirus and 470 more deaths. That brought the total number of known cases to 97,326, with 10,637 deaths. Health authorities have said the real number of cases is higher.
"The coronavirus epidemic is at its maximum level of intensity," Hugo Lopez-Gatell, who has spearheaded the country's response to the outbreak, said during a regular news conference.
Lopez-Gatell added that the decline in cases was usually slower than the ascent.
Morocco
The COVID-19 pandemic in Morocco on Tuesday continued its downward trend for the fifth day in a row, with 33 new cases recorded.
The new cases pushed the country's tally to 7,866, according to Mouad Mrabet, coordinator of the Moroccan Centre for Public Health.
The death toll rose to 206 after one more death was registered in the last 24 hours, Mrabet said.
Another 517 patients have recovered, the biggest single-day rise in recoveries, taking the tally of recoveries to 6,410.
Netherlands
The Dutch government intends to cull the mink at farms where animals have been infected with the coronavirus, broadcaster RTL reported on Wednesday, citing sources in The Hague.
Coronavirus has been detected at eight farms in the Netherlands, and the Agriculture Ministry last month reported two cases where mink are believed to have transmitted the disease to humans.
Portugal
The Portuguese government said it’s in advanced talks with Germany about setting up an “air corridor” for tourists.
The government also started talks about this with the UK last week, Economy Minister Pedro Siza Vieira said at a parliamentary hearing in Lisbon.
Countries are discussing how they can resume flights depending on the stage at which the coronavirus outbreak is being contained in different destinations, he said.
The minister expects restrictions on flights within the EU may be lifted during the second half of June. The land border with Spain will be closed until July, but flight connections may probably resume from the second half of June, he said.
Russia
Russia reported 8,536 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Wednesday, bringing its nationwide tally to 432,277, the third highest in the world.
The death toll reached 5,215 after authorities said they had recorded another 178 deaths from the virus in the past day.
Somalia
Somalia's health ministry on Tuesday confirmed 66 new cases of the coronavirus, bringing the total number of infections to 2,089.
Health Minister Fawziya Abikar said the death toll remained at 79 as no deaths were recorded in the last 24 hours.
Abikar said 19 more patients have recovered, bringing the total number of recoveries to 390.
South Africa
A South African high court declared some of the government's coronavirus lockdown regulations unconstitutional on Tuesday but suspended the order for 14 days, leaving the rules in place for now.
The court declared rules governing levels three and four of the lockdown to be "unconstitutional and invalid". "The regulations...in a substantial number of instances are not rationally connected to the objectives of slowing the rate of infection or limiting the spread thereof," the written judgement reads.
South Africa's cabinet said that because the effect of the court decision was suspended for 14 days, current lockdown regulations remained in place, and that it would comment further when it had fully studied the judgment.
According to the judgement, all regulations under level three and four must be reviewed and amended giving due consideration to their impact on individual rights, aside from a few exceptions including the closure of borders, nightclubs and casinos.
South Africa has so far reported 35,812 confirmed cases and 705 deaths.
Sweden
Sweden should have done more to combat the coronavirus and prevent a much higher national COVID-19 death rate than in neighboring countries, the chief epidemiologist at the Public Health Agency said on Wednesday.
Nearly 4,500 Swedes have died in the outbreak, a higher mortality rate than in Denmark, Norway and Finland, and criticism has been growing over the government's decision not to impose lockdown measures as strictly as elsewhere in Europe.
While most of Europe, including Norway, Denmark and Finland, closed schools, shops and businesses, bringing much of society to a halt, Sweden has relied more on voluntary measures, social distancing and common-sense hygiene advice to stem the outbreak. It shut care homes to visitors in late March, but around half of the deaths in the country have been among elderly people living in care facilities.
Earlier this week, Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said the government would launch an enquiry into the handling of the pandemic.
Uganda
Uganda on Wednesday reported 18 new cases of COVID-19, taking the total number of infections in the country to 507, the Ministry of Health said.
Three more patients were discharged from the northern Gulu Regional Referral Hospital, taking the total number of recoveries to 82.
Uganda has not registered any deaths related to COVID-19, according to a statement by the ministry'.
A group of people relax at Potters Fields Park by the River Thames in London, June 2, 2020, following the relaxation of lockdown restrictions in place to curb the spread of the coronavirus. (VICTORIA JONES / PA VIA AP)
UK
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is in charge of the government's coronavirus response and always has been, junior health minister Edward Argar said on Wednesday after a report claiming that Johnson was taking control of the crisis.
Johnson said that quarantine measures Britain plans to introduce for almost all international travellers from June 8 are vital to ensure the country's rate of COVID-19 infection does not increase again.
Asked about Britain's COVID-19 tracing system, Argar said: "We are into the thousands being successfully traced at the moment."
On Tuesday, Interior Minister Priti Patel and Transport Minister Grant Shapps said that Britain's 14-day quarantine for travelers arriving from abroad, which will be introduced from June 8, is crucial to avoiding a second wave of the coronavirus outbreak in the country.
The ministers said that as of now, COVID-19 tests or rapid temperature tests were not effective, as infected passengers may not have any symptoms and tests may also not work where a passenger may have only just caught the virus.
Details of the plan to impose the quarantine will be published Wednesday.
Another 324 COVID-19 deaths were registered as of Monday afternoon, bringing the death toll in the country to 39,369, the Department of Health and Social Care said. As of Tuesday morning, 277,985 people in Britain have tested positive for the disease, said the department.
Any resurgence of COVID-19 in Britain would probably be local and patchy, testing coordinator John Newton said.
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US
A senior US Army vaccine researcher said on Tuesday it was reasonable to expect that some sort of coronavirus vaccine could be available to part of the US population by the end of the year.
Army researchers said work was underway with US and international companies, including AstraZeneca PLC, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna Inc and Sanofi SA, to develop anti-body drugs and vaccines and the military planned to test its own vaccine candidate on humans in the late summer.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday reported a total of 1,802,470 cases of the new coronavirus, an increase of 14,790 cases from its previous count Monday, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 761 to 105,157.
Zambia
The Zambian government said on Tuesday that the country's fight against the COVID-19 pandemic was on the right track.
Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services Permanent Secretary Amos Malupenga said there was a need to demystify the disease by freely talking about it and undergoing tests.
He said that based on the statistics announced on Monday, the government was confident that it was on the right track in the fight against the pandemic.
Zambia has so far reported a total of 1,089 cases and seven deaths.
