The number of people infected with the coronavirus worldwide has exceeded 3.7 million, according to the latest data, over 264,000 people have died. The President of the United States said that Russia had accepted his offer to send ventilators. France announced a gradual easing of quarantine measures, while in the UK the Notting Hill Carnival was cancelled for the first time in history. In addition, Poland is holding its presidential elections by mail, Brazil has recorded the highest increase in deaths in the southern hemisphere, and the UN says that $6.7 billion, not $2 billion as previously planned, will be needed to fight the pandemic and its consequences in the poorest countries.
According to Reuters, Donald Trump announced that Russia has agreed to accept a shipment of American ventilators to treat Covid-19 patients. According to the American president, he made the offer during a phone conversation with Vladimir Putin, and the Russian leader agreed. According to Trump, Russia is facing difficulties in fighting the disease. In turn, the website of the Russian president published a message about a telephone conversation between Putin and Trump, saying only that “from the American side it was proposed to send a batch of medical equipment to Russia.” “Bilateral cooperation in discussing the situation of the coronavirus pandemic was positively assessed,” the Putin website also reported. In early April, Russia sent a shipment of medical equipment to the United States to combat the coronavirus. However, it turned out that the American authorities would pay only half the cost of the cargo, despite earlier statements by the Kremlin that it was humanitarian aid, and Trump welcomed the Russian initiative. According to American experts, part of the cargo delivered by Russia turned out to be useless.
In France, the quarantine should be relaxed as of Monday. French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced Thursday the easing of quarantine measures as of next Monday. We explain quickly, simply, and clearly what happened, why it matters, and what happens next. The number of episodes should remain the same. End of Story Podcast Advertising Restrictions are being gradually eased. In regions where there is a risk of a second outbreak, the government has designated them “red zones” and strict measures will remain in place. These are mainly regions in the northeast of the country, where major cities such as Paris (Île-de-France), Lille (Hauts-de-France) and Strasbourg (Grand Est) are located. The “red” regions also include Bourgogne-Franche-Comté and the overseas territory of Mayotte, near Madagascar. “In the ‘red zones’, schools will not open for a long time and parks will remain closed. In the ‘green zones’, schools, cafes and restaurants will be able to operate from June. But even after the restrictions are lifted, residents of France who want to travel more than a hundred kilometers from their homes will need to present a special document.” This week, quarantine measures were eased in most European countries: at the beginning of the week, about three million citizens returned to work in Italy; at the end of last week, partial easing of the quarantine was implemented in Spain and Austria; and in Germany, most shops were reopened and the decision was made to resume football. The German Bundesliga soccer season, suspended for more than two months, will resume on May 16, it was announced Thursday. It will be the first European soccer league to resume games suspended due to the Covid-19 epidemic. The vice president of the German Koch Institute, Lars Schaade, warned Thursday of the possibility of a second wave of the coronavirus. The number of infected people is decreasing, but this is an ambiguous signal, he cautioned.
The social and economic consequences of the pandemic will hit the most vulnerable countries hardest, the United Nations said Thursday. Mark Lowcock, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, warned that the pandemic could lead to famine in several countries. “If nothing is done now, we should be prepared for an increase in the number of conflicts, hunger and poverty,” he said. The Bank of England predicts a record decline in the UK economy in 2020. It predicts that the UK’s GDP could fall by 14% by the end of the year. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, this will be the biggest drop in GDP since 1949. If we believe the restored archives of the Bank of England, this decline can also be called the sharpest contraction in economic growth since 1706. In 2021, however, the regulator predicts a 15% increase in GDP. Over the past day, 615 people in Brazil have died from the coronavirus, the highest mortality rate in South America. The Brazilian president is one of the few in the world who has not imposed a quarantine.
Unemployment rates in the United States are still very high, even compared to the 2008 recession. Nearly 3.2 million Americans reported losing their jobs last week. This brings the total number of jobless claims to 33 million since mid-March, when businesses across the country began closing due to the epidemic. At the same time, the Labor Department’s weekly report showed that the number of people filing for unemployment benefits was lower than a week ago, when 3.8 million people reported losing their jobs. This number has been falling steadily in recent weeks, but experts point out that unemployment rates in the U.S. are still very high, even compared to the 2008 recession. Unemployment data for April will be released on Friday.
The Notting Hill Carnival is one of the most spectacular and largest events in the UK. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Thursday that the government will exercise extreme caution as it considers ways to ease quarantine measures. On Sunday, Johnson is expected to announce some easing of the lockdown in the country from next week, but apparently these measures will be extremely limited. The government will not do anything that would risk a second wave of the epidemic, and every step will be based on science and current data, according to the prime minister’s statement. Johnson also said that the country’s authorities will closely monitor the consequences of any relaxation of social distancing measures and will not hesitate to tighten the rules if necessary. Organizers of one of Britain’s largest mass events – the famous Notting Hill Carnival – have announced that it will be cancelled this year for the first time in its 54-year history. Last year, more than a million people attended the carnival, which takes place over two days on the last weekend of August in London’s Notting Hill. “We are developing an alternative form of conducting the carnival, which, we hope, will preserve the spirit of carnival in the hearts of people who will be able to enjoy it while staying safely at home and still feel their connection and involvement,” – say the organizers’ statement.
The Japanese government has approved the use of remdesivir to treat the symptoms of coronavirus. This is the second country in the world, after the United States, where this drug is officially recommended for the treatment of Covid-19. Earlier, it was reported about the failure of the drug in trials in China, which showed that remdesivir did not improve the condition of patients and did not reduce the presence of the pathogen in the blood of the sick. The failure of remdesivir in trials became known after the accidental publication of a World Health Organization document. However, the drug manufacturer Gilead stated that the WHO document distorted the research results. In response, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the drug was still effective and that patients who took it experienced coronavirus symptoms an average of three days earlier. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) then officially recommended the use of remdesivir against coronavirus. In the United Kingdom, remdesevir is currently undergoing trials and is not yet recommended for coronavirus patients.
Singer Madonna announced that she had contracted the coronavirus during her world tour Madame X. The singer performed several concerts in Portugal, the United Kingdom and France, but in March she suspended the tour after the French government imposed quarantine restrictions. “Towards the end of my tour, in Paris, more than seven weeks ago, I fell ill, as did many other artists on my show. At the time, we thought it was just a bad case of the flu,” the 61-year-old singer wrote on Instagram, noting that she had donated one million dollars to the search for a Covid-19 vaccine. She explained that she is not currently ill, but the test for Covid-19 antibodies came back positive.