Daily COVID-19 pandemic roundup: March 31
(Update: adds information from the WHO, the US, Germany and Latin America)
Miami Desk, Mar 31 (EFE).- Here is a roundup of stories from around the world related to the coronavirus pandemic:
WHO: The World Health Organization reported Tuesday that the confirmed number of Covid-19 cases worldwide rose to 754,948, 61,000 more than on the previous day, while the death toll rose to 36,571, an increase of 3,465 in the past 24 hours.
US: Authorities in Florida’s Broward County will announce on Wednesday whether they will authorize two Holland America cruise ships, one of them carrying dozens of Covid-19 patients, to dock at Port Everglades so that occupants may disembark, according to certain specific conditions.
US: Pop singer Rihanna and rapper Jay-Z will each donate $1 million via their respective foundations to fight the coronavirus pandemic in Los Angeles and New York, respectively. The funds will be used to help undocumented workers, prison inmates, indigent people, the elderly and the children of medical personnel battling the epidemic in the two cities.
GERMANY: German automakers Volkswagen, Porsche and BMW will extend their ongoing production shutdown by 10 days, until April 19, amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
LATIN AMERICA: Inter-American Development Bank president Luis Alberto Moreno said Tuesday that the Covid-19 pandemic will cause a “very significant recession” in Latin America this year, given that the “pre-conditions” of low growth and the US-China trade war have already affected the region’s economy.
AMERICAS: The Pan American Health Organization said Tuesday that the coronavirus crisis will “accelerate and worsen” in the Americas until it peaks, probably in “one or two months,” but the region still has the opportunity to mitigate the impact depending on the measures they use to fight it.
PANAMA: About 20 banks in Panama announced that they will postpone for 90 days credit card payments and personal loan payments, as well as home mortgages and automobile loans due to the Covid-19 crisis.
NICARAGUA: Nicaragua’s group of experts on the Multidisciplinary Scientific Committee said that the country’s state-run schools and some of the private colleges and universities are running a “high risk of contagion” in the Covid-19 pandemic if they do not suspend classes, noting that as of March 25 165 countries had closed schools to limit the spread of the disease.
URUGUAY: Uruguay’s main opposition party, the leftist Broad Front, which governed the country in coalition for the most of the last 15 years, on Tuesday expressed its support for the Luis Lacalle Pou government’s creation of a Coronavirus Fund, although it called the move “insufficient.”
MEXICO: Non-essential businesses and other commercial activities in Mexico City must shut down starting on April 1 to try and limit the spread of the coronavirus, capital Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum said, urging the public to remain at home.
COLOMBIA: Colombian authorities confirmed 108 new cases of Covid-19 on Tuesday, bringing the total to 906, of whom 16 people have died.
GERMANY: Lothar Wieler director of the Robert Koch Institute warned that the death rate in the country will increase as the outbreak progresses after Germany reported around 67,000 infections and fatalities approaching 700.
RUSSIA: Denis Protsenko, head clinician of City Clinical Hospital No. 40 Kommunarka, on the outskirts of Moscow, has tested positive for the virus a week after he met Russian President Vladimir Putin during a visit to the facility.
AFRICA: The continent continued to be one of the least affected areas with around 5,400 cases and 170 deaths.
GREECE: There were concerning images of long queues of people at cash points trying to withdraw wages and pensions at the end of the month, with police intervening in some places after the number of infections doubled in the past week to around 1,200 with almost 50 deaths.
EUROPEAN UNION: The EU granted around 240 million euros to improve the health care of Syrian refugees and vulnerable people in Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon, bringing the total aid granted to these groups to more than two billion euros.
