May 29 coronavirus news

Night falls on a temporary morgue that has been constructed on the grounds of Haycombe Cemetery to accommodate victims of COVID-19 on May 1 in Bath, United Kingdom.

An additional 324 people have died from coronavirus in the UK, bringing the total number of fatalities in the country to at least 38,161, UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak said on Friday.

So far, 271,222 people have tested positive for Covid-19, an increase of 2,095 cases since yesterday, Sunak said at the daily Downing Street coronavirus briefing. 

Overall, 4,043,686 tests have been carried out in the UK, including 131,458 tests on Thursday, Sunak added.

CORRECTION: This post has been updated to reflect the latest figures on the numbers of tests carried out in the UK.

The Detroit Windsor Tunnel entrance to the customs area to enter Canada is pictured empty in Detroit on April 1.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada is looking into possibly easing some Canada-US border restrictions that would allow immediate family members to reunite.

Trudeau made clear that anyone entering Canada would still have to quarantine for 14 days but acknowledged that a number of families are facing undue hardship with the border closure.

He said he would continue to look at ways to support families going through extremely difficult times.

Some context: Canadians and permanent residents of Canada are currently allowed to enter the country at any time as long as they offer proof they will quarantine for 14 days.

The US-Canada border has been closed to all non-essential travel since mid-March.

The current agreement, set to expire on June 21, allows for essential commercial goods and workers to cross the border. 

The US missed a chance to catch imported cases of coronavirus earlier this year, genetics experts say in a new report.

Analysis of the virus by evolutionary biologist Michael Worobey of the University of Arizona and colleagues shows the first person known to have carried the infection to the United States, in Washington state back in January, may not have been the source of the later cases there.

Worobey and colleagues compared the strains of the virus that infected the first known US case, a 30-year-old traveler from Wuhan who arrived on January 15, and samples taken from a cluster of cases that popped up in the state at the end of February.

Genetic sequencing showed the samples were very similar, a finding that led officials to believe the first patient must somehow have spread the virus. 

But Worobey said scientists have since found that coronavirus mutates very slowly. He and colleagues ran computer simulations that showed there was no way the virus that came into the country with the first patient in January was the same virus infecting people six weeks later, even though it was very similar.

They concluded there had to be a second introduction of the virus in mid-February. “It looks like early to mid-February appears to be the time frame when this virus was introduced to Washington state,” Worobey told CNN.

“It seems that a virus that was probably identical to the Washington epidemic cluster got in at some point in early February and gave rise to a bunch of identical viruses,” said Joel Wertheim of the University of California San Diego, who also worked on the study.

Worobey said the second introduction of the virus may have come from Canada.

“It seems possible that the virus that eventually wound up in Washington state moved first into Vancouver and then down into Washington,” he said. “We can’t exactly say when. We can’t say who. We can’t say where from.” 

A woman walks in front of the Louvre museum on May 13 in Paris.

The Louvre museum in Paris is working to reopen on July 6, according to a statement released Friday on museum’s website.

The museum’s statement said it’s implementing a new system that will allow people to visit with “optimum security conditions.” The museum said it will follow all health rules, and visitors will have to book a slot to enter.

On Thursday, French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced that museums and monuments across France would be allowed to reopen from June 2 as France eases some coronavirus lockdown measures.

People wait in line to have their body temperature checked before entering a shopping mall in Brasilia, Brazil, on May 27.

Brazil’s economy contracted 1.5% in the first quarter of 2020 as the country became a global coronavirus hotspot.

The slowdown was the worst quarterly drop since the second quarter of 2015 (2.1%), which was the peak of the country’s last recession.

Brazil’s official statistical agency, IBGE, said the numbers reflect the impact the coronavirus is having on the economic activity of the country.

Analysts expect the country to suffer even more economic pain in the next quarter forecasting a contraction between 11-12%.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen speaks during a news conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, on May 29.

Travelers entering Denmark will be encouraged to take a randomized coronavirus test, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen announced Friday.

The government will add mobile testing stations to tourist areas and at hot spots, with the aim of keeping track of the development of the virus and possible new chains of infection.

The prime minister said at a news briefing that tourists from Germany, Norway and Iceland will be able to enter Denmark starting June 15.

Tourists must document that they have booked a stay of at least six overnights in Denmark. And while tourists are welcome to visit Copenhagen, they will not be allowed to spend the night in the capital.

The prime minister noted that the government expects to open up for other Schengen areas and the United Kingdom after the summer. The border to Sweden will remain closed for now.

Some context: Denmark has recorded zero coronavirus deaths in 24 hours for the fifth time in the past two weeks, according to the country’s Serum institute for disease control said. 

A person holds a cigarette in Moscow on May 12.

The World Health Organization (WHO) called on tobacco and nicotine industries across the world to stop taking advantage of the global pandemic and marketing directly to children and teens. 

Ruediger Krech, health promotion director at the WHO, said Thursday that more than 40 million teenagers around the globe have already started to use tobacco. 

Every year on May 31, the WHO celebrates World No Tobacco Day (WNTD) to raise awareness on the deadly effects of smoking. 

“We see hundreds of thousands of people - of smokers - wanting to quit during this crisis,” Krech said. “There’s a huge uptake of tobacco cessation programs and demand to us to support people in quitting smoking.”

Countries like Mexico, India, Jordan, Indonesia and China, along with parts of central and eastern Europe, have all seen an increase of cessation during the pandemic. 

“We are now looking for new technology solutions to make available to help those who want to quit,” Vinayak Prasad, coordinator with the No Tobacco Unit at WHO, said.

WHO said in a statement that it is launching a kit aimed at teenagers to “alert them to the tobacco industry tactics used to hook them to addictive products.”

“The toolkit exposes tactics, such as parties and concerts hosted by the tobacco and related industries, e-cigarette flavors that attract youth like bubble-gum and candy, e-cigarette representatives presenting in schools, and product placement in popular youth streaming shows,” Prasad said.

Adriana Blanco Marquizo, convention secretariat head at WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, said it is important to arm younger people to fight the tactics.

“Adolescents and young people can be empowered to protect themselves when they understand the intention of this industry – an industry that really wants them hooked in an addictive behavior, just in order to keep the profits, even if it goes against public health,” she said. 

The coronavirus pandemic has infected more than 5.8 million people globally. If you’re just joining us, here are the latest developments:

A cleaner wearing a protective mask walks past a high school in Seoul, South Korea, on Friday, May 29.

More than 500 schools closed again Friday to students after briefly reopening, as South Korea moves to stamp out a resurgence of the coronavirus in the capital, Seoul, and its surrounding metropolitan area.

Parks, art galleries, museums and theaters operated by the government in the Seoul metropolitan area – home to about half the country’s population of nearly 52 million – have also been closed to the public for the next two weeks.

Government hosted events in the metropolitan area will be canceled or postponed as well, Health Minister Park Neung-hoo said Thursday. The authorities have recommended that private academies and internet cafes there close too until June 14.

Park also asked people living in the Seoul metropolitan area to refrain from going outside or holding events for the next fortnight.

The coronavirus outbreak includes a cluster in a logistics center in Bucheon. Almost 100 cases had been linked to the logistics center cluster as of Friday, Vice Health Minister Kim Gang-lip said in a briefing. So far, 3,836 people out of 4,351 workers and visitors at the center had been tested, he said.

Read more here.

English Premier League soccer matches will make a provisional return on Wednesday June 17, ending a three-month break to the top-flight competition because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Police forces in England have requested that six of the matches – including the game in which Liverpool could secure the league championship – take place at neutral venues, the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) confirmed Friday.

Liverpool are two currently wins away from claiming a historic title – its first in 30 years. The team sits 25 points clear of second-placed Manchester City with nine full rounds of match fixtures remaining.

A hearse arrives at a temporary morgue near Green-Wood Cemetery the Brooklyn borough of New York City on May 27.

At least 101,621 people have died in the US from coronavirus, according to Johns Hopkins University, with at least 1,721,926 cases recorded across the country.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases. 

The US has the highest number of deaths and cases globally.

CNN is tracking Covid-19’s spread across the nation here.

Is the damage caused by the lockdown worse than the virus itself? That’s a question raised by some world leaders and commentators who claim that economic and social hardship caused by strict coronavirus restrictions places a heavier burden on society than the death rate caused by the disease.

These lockdown skeptics point to the tens of millions of US jobs lost in an economic downturn not seen since the Great Depression, the warning by the European Commission of a recession of “historic proportions” and the Bank of England’s fear that the British economy is facing its worst crash in three centuries.

The drumbeat of dissent had its moment on the popular British debate show, the BBC’s Question Time, when Luke Johnson, a prominent UK businessman with a maverick streak, argued in the May 14 broadcast that the UK had over-reacted to Covid 19. “Imagine the agony of 2 million more people,” he said of the number who could lose their jobs amid a sustained UK lockdown. “How many deaths might flow from that?”

US President Donald Trump made similar claims in late March, telling Fox News: “You’re going to lose more people by putting a country into a massive recession or depression.”

His Brazilian counterpart Jair Bolsonaro insists that economic stagnation will hurt Brazil more than the virus itself, and on Thursday called the decision made by governors and mayors to close some non-essential sectors of the economy “a terrible disgrace.”

Read more here.

Grave diggers carry the coffin of a Covid-19 patient, in a section of a cemetery reserved for coronavirus victims, outside Moscow on May 26.

Moscow health authorities have revised the city’s coronavirus death toll for April, revealing that more than twice as many people died than previously reported.

Officials raised the documented number of fatalities attributed to Covid-19 to 1,561 up from 636.

CNN and other news outlets reported in mid-May that Moscow saw a mortality spike in April, adding an estimated 1,800 excess deaths in comparison with previous year averages.

Russia’s official number of Covid-19 deaths has been relatively low compared to countries with similar numbers of overall infections, and observers have questioned official counting methods that permit ascribing deaths in patients who tested positive for coronavirus to other causes such as terminal illnesses and other underlying conditions.

In the report, the city health department said it revised the toll according to new counting guidelines and included even the “most debatable” cases in its overall figures.

The report reveals that, in addition to the initially reported 636 fatalities, another 756 people who tested positive for coronavirus died in April. Their deaths were originally ascribed to other causes, but for some, “the virus became the catalyst for the main condition” and its lethal complications, the report states.

Authorities also added 169 deaths to the toll to include people who tested negative for coronavirus, but for whom coronavirus was established as the main cause of death through post-mortem examination. 

Moscow authorities said that, even with a revised death toll, the Russian capital’s mortality rate from Covid-19 remains lower than in other comparably large cities such as London and New York. 

City officials as well as Russia’s central government have warned the public the numbers for May will be higher.

Russia’s regions have mostly followed Moscow’s lead in its response to the pandemic as well as with counting cases, so revising the counting method may lead to an increase in the death toll across the country. 

Some regions have been reporting “double statistics,” releasing numbers of deaths in coronavirus-positive patients that have been officially ascribed to other causes in national figures. 

Officials in Dagestan, one of the worst hit areas in Russia, have previously said publicly their overall death toll was much higher than what is reflected in federal statistics. 

Renault employees gather on May 29 in Choisy-le-Roi, near Paris, to protest against the company's cost-cutting plan at its core French operations.

Renault is slashing 14,600 jobs as part of a major overhaul designed to reduce costs and help the French carmaker survive the coronavirus pandemic. Some 4,600 positions will be eliminated in France, with 10,000 more in other markets.

The company announced Friday that it will cut costs by more than 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion) over the next three years. It also plans to reduce the number of cars it makes each year from 4 million to 3.3 million by 2024, and will stop selling Renault-branded vehicles in China.

Renault (RNLSY) is part of the world’s biggest carmaking alliance, alongside Nissan (NSANF) and Mitsubishi (MBFJF). Earlier this week, the companies announced they would make fewer models, share production facilities and focus on the existing geographic and technological strengths of each carmaker as they try to slash costs amid the pandemic.

Renault said changes were needed because of the scale of the economic fallout from the pandemic, as well as stricter emissions standards. The company, which employs 180,000 people around the world, said it would consult with unions about restructuring some of its plants in France.

Read more here.

Berlin is further easing its coronavirus restrictions, by allowing pubs and fitness studios to reopen and increasing limits for public gatherings, according to the region’s Senate.

Starting this weekend, outdoor prayer services with an unlimited number of people will be allowed in Germany’s capital, in time for the Christian holiday of Pentecost.

Starting on Tuesday, June 2, pubs will be allowed to reopen – but rather than standing at a bar, guests will need to sit at tables set 1.5 metres (about 5 feet) apart. Nightclubs remain closed.

Open-air events such as concerts or film screenings will be allowed starting June 2, though they will have a cap of 200 people. This limit will be increased to 500 by June 16, and up to 1,000 participants by June 30.

Indoor cinemas that meet hygiene rules will be allowed to reopen on June 30.

The Senator of the Interior of Berlin, Andreas Geisel, has warned that stricter rules would be reimposed if the coronavirus situation deteriorates again.

The number of confirmed cases in Germany increased by 741 to 180,458 on Friday, according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases. The reported death toll also rose by 39 to 8,450.

People walk in Tokyo's Akihabara area on May 27.

If you’re just joining us now, here are the latest developments on the global coronavirus pandemic.

New daily case figures are starting to hold steady or tick downward nationally – but that doesn’t mean things are improving everywhere.

The risk is still high in places like Montgomery, Alabama. This morning, there were just two unoccupied ICU beds in Montgomery. In the county, cases have more than quadrupled since the state began reopening.

“We can’t fast forward to the end of this movie,” warned Montgomery Mayor Steven Reed.

And today, California reported its biggest ever one-day jump, with 2,617 new cases.

In every southern state except Florida and Texas, new case counts are still climbing.

The US now has more than 1.7 million cases of Covid-19 and more than 101,600 related deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The UK’s furlough scheme needs to be “tapered down” as people begin returning to work, said Environment Secretary George Eustice on Friday.

“The furlough scheme has been incredibly important in terms of keeping people on standby and ready to return to work,” Eustice told Sky News.

Eustice added that about 8.4 million people were using the British government’s furlough scheme, which was put in place to support workers during the coronavirus crisis.

A visitor wearing a face mask walks down the stairs at the Tokyo Tower on May 28 in Tokyo.

The Japanese capital Tokyo will enter Phase 2 of its reopening plan on midnight June 1, this coming Monday, said the city’s governor, Yuriko Koike.

Phase 2 means that schools, tutoring centers, gyms, theaters, malls and other non-essential retail locations can reopen.

Restaurants are still advised to close at 10 p.m.

Tokyo just lifted its state of emergency on Monday. It was one of the last prefectures to emerge from the emergency order, which had been lifted from other low-risk areas earlier this month.

The US reported 21,760 new cases of coronavirus and 1,174 related deaths today, according to Johns Hopkins University.

That brings the national tally to at least 1,721,753 cases and 101,616 deaths.

The totals includes cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases. 

New York is the hardest-hit state, with 366,733 cases and 29,529 deaths. New Jersey, Illinois and California follow.

Take a look at CNN’s live tracker of US cases:

As the American death count from coronavirus ticks above 100,000, the panel assembled by President Donald Trump to confront the pandemic has been sharply curtailed while the White House looks ahead to reopening.

Vice President Mike Pence convened the White House coronavirus task force on Thursday for the first time in a week. The group of doctors and high-ranking administration officials, which met daily even on weekends at the height of the pandemic, has seen its formal sessions reduced from three per week at the start of May to one per week now, according to White House schedules.

The task force has essentially been sidelined by Trump, said senior administration officials and others close to the group, who described a greatly reduced role for the panel created to guide the administration’s response to the pandemic.

Asked about the dwindling number of task force meetings, one administration official said there are not as many decisions that need to be made on an urgent basis.

Read the full story here:

US President Donald Trump, flanked by (from R) Response coordinator for White House Coronavirus Task Force Deborah Birx, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, US Vice President Mike Pence and Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci, speaks during the daily briefing on the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, in the Brady Briefing Room at the White House on March 25, 2020, in Washington, DC.

Related article As US deaths top 100,000, Trump's coronavirus task force is curtailed

Health workers receive visitors at a temporary Covid-19 testing center in Bucheon, south of Seoul, on May 27.

South Korea recorded 58 new coronavirus cases and no new deaths on Thursday, said authorities Friday.

That brings the national total to 11,402 cases and 269 deaths.

Authorities are also working to contain a new cluster that emerged this week in a logistics center near Seoul. A total of 96 cases have been linked to the cluster, said Vice Health Minister Kim Gang-lip.

Of 4,351 workers and visitors at the center, 3,836 people had been tested for the virus.

Online learning: Meanwhile, 502 schools in Seoul metropolitan area had switched to online classes due to the recent outbreaks and clusters, said Vice Education Minister Park Baeg-beom.

As of Thursday, 838 schools across the nation had postponed reopening of the schools and continued with online classes, the Education Ministry said.

A staff member wearing a face shield and mask conducts body temperature checks for visitors at the entrance of the 332.9m (1,092ft.) high Tokyo Tower on May 28, as the city's landmark reopened.

Japan reported 63 new coronavirus cases and seven new deaths on Thursday – the biggest one-day jump in infections since May 14.

Of the new cases on Thursday, 21 came from the southern city of Kitakyushu. The city had reported zero new infections for 23 days – then it saw its numbers spike again, raising fears that a second wave may be arriving. Kitakyushu has now reported 43 new cases in the past six days.

This raises the national total to 17,431 cases and 887 deaths, including the cases and deaths from the Princess Diamond cruise ship.

President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro, wearing a face mask with a print of Brazil's Coat of Arms and written God above all, Brazil above all, watches supporters of his government who waited for him outside the Palácio do Alvorada on May 27 in Brasilia.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called for the economy to open up, saying that the closures in non-essential sectors were ““a terrible disgrace” for the country. 

Speaking in a Facebook live on Thursday, Bolsonaro said that he wants the economy “to run again.”

“Its been 70 days now that I am saying that we have two problems: life and the virus, of course, but also unemployment,” Bolsonaro said.

Bolsonaro added that he supported “vertical isolation,” in which elderly and vulnerable people like his mother stay home, but allows “young people” to return to work.

Controversial president: Critics have lambasted Bolsonaro’s approach to the pandemic, both within the country and internationally.

Arthur Virgilio Neto, the mayor of a Brazilian city that was badly hit with the virus, called on Bolsonaro to resign.

Brazil has suffered more infections than every country in the world except the United States, and is yet to reach a peak of cases and fatalities, experts warn.

People enjoy the warm and sunny weather relaxing on the pavement outside their homes in the Shorefields area of Liverpool on May 28 in Liverpool.

The British public is staying home despite Prime Minister Boris Johnson recently easing lockdown restrictions, according to a new study by King’s College London. 

The study showed that one in seven adults surveyed did not leave their home once in the previous week and 41% of people did not leave their home for five or more of the past seven days.

These numbers show “the seriousness with which the public are still treating the Covid-19 crisis,” Duffy said.

More people are also wearing face masks, according to the study which showed that the number of people wearing them has doubled from six weeks ago.

“Compared with six weeks ago, compliance remains very high and virtually unchanged” for measures such as social distancing and hand washing, the study said.

Some context: Prime Minister Johnson said on Thursday that Britain will begin lifting restrictions starting Monday in a phased approach. 

The relaxation comes after the death rate in the UK has fallen consistently. From a peak of 943 deaths on April 14, the UK announced 256 coronavirus-related deaths on Thursday – a significant but diminishing toll.

Earlier tonight, CNN hosted a global town hall on the coronavirus pandemic, covering facts and fears surrounding the disease.

Actress Taraji P. Henson, World Health Organization official Maria Van Kerkhove, and science writer and author of “Spillover” David Quammen were among the guests who spoke to CNN tonight.

Watch all the highlights here:

Related article Watch the entire CNN coronavirus town hall

There are still several virus hot spots around the world causing concern, said a top World Health Organization official on CNN’s Global Town Hall earlier tonight.

The WHO is keeping a close eye on very large increases in case numbers in Russia, Africa, the Americas, some countries in South Asia and a few countries in Europe, said Maria Van Kerkhove, technical lead for the WHO’s coronavirus response.

She said she hopes a vaccine could be deployable by the end of the year – but that’s if everything goes right. Scientists are working around the clock on more than 100 vaccine candidates, she said, but the accelerated schedule cannot compromise on safety or efficacy. 

The least predictable aspect of the pandemic is exactly how unprepared we are to deal with it, said author David Quammen on CNN’s Global Town Hall Thursday.

“The science was there. The scientists knew about this,” said Quammen, who wrote “Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic.”

“Scientists could provide the warnings, public health officials could echo the warnings to political leaders, but political leaders tend to be risk averse, and as Bill Gates said, it would cost billions and billions of dollars.”

But billions of dollars are nothing compared to the toll of the pandemic, he said.

The threat of wild animals: The world also needs to protect the environment much better, he said. The world’s hunger for meat, timber and minerals has disrupted the Earth’s wild ecosystems putting us all in danger. 

“As we do that, we’re coming in contact with all these wild animals that carry all these viruses and as long as we keep doing that, we’re going to be facing these spillovers in these outbreaks in the future,” Quammen said.  

Watch:

Brazil reported 26,417 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Thursday, a record high for the country, bringing the nationwide total to 438,238, according to the Brazilian Health Ministry.

The country also recorded 1,156 new coronavirus-related deaths over the past 24 hours, according to its health ministry, raising the overall death toll to 26,754.

Thursday is the third day in a row that Brazil has recorded more than 1,000 deaths in a day.

View of an almost empty hall at Guarulhos International Airport in Guarulhos, near Sao Paulo, Brazil, on May 26.

The mayor of Sao Paulo announced new guidelines on Thursday to gradually reopen the city, despite high levels of infections and deaths related to Covid-19. 

Mayor Bruno Covas said during a news conference today that several sectors in the city will be allowed to submit health and sanitary reopening plans to officials starting on Monday.

Once these plans are approved by the city government, they can reopen.

Among the businesses allowed to submit reopening plans are offices, retail stores, car dealerships, real estate agencies and shopping malls. Food courts and gyms are excluded. There is no outlook yet for the reopening of schools or parks.

This comes as experts warn Latin America is the new global epicenter of the pandemic. Brazil surpassed Russia over the weekend in the number of coronavirus infections and is now the second highest in the world.

ICU beds in Sao Paulo are at a 92% occupancy, the mayor said on Thursday. He added more ICU beds have been brought in and more are on their way, but the number of ICU bed occupied is slightly higher than it was two weeks ago.

On Wednesday, Sao Paulo reported 129 new deaths and 3,096 new confirmed cases, which accounts for 15% of all the new cases in Brazil. The city has recorded a total number of 54,948 Covid-19 cases.

A couple wearing face masks walks at the Retiro Park in Madrid on May 26.

Spain will start easing lockdown restrictions starting Monday, the country’s Health Minister and a top aide announced Thursday. 

“From Monday, around 70% of the Spanish population, or 32 million people will be in phase two. Around 30% of the population or 15 million people will be in phase one and 45,000 people will be in phase three,” Spain’s Health Minister Salvador Illa said at a news conference.

At the start of this week, just over half of the population was still on the more restrictive phase one.

Parts of the regions of Castilla, Valencia, Catalonia, Murcia, Andalucia and Castilla and Leon will move to phase two, which allows meetings of up to 15 people who don’t live together, some restaurant service indoors, and the opening of stores, cinemas and museums but with occupancy limits.

Four small islands in Spain’s Balearic and Canary Islands with small populations and low infection risk will advance to phase three, with further restrictions on movement and gatherings eased.

The Madrid region, which includes Spain’s capital and surrounding cities, will remain in phase one without any changes, the health officials explained.

“All of this evolution is due to the effort made by the population and the health system to control this epidemic,” said Dr. Fernando Simón, Spain’s director of the Center for Health Emergencies.

Simón also told reporters that “small re-emergences” have been identified very quickly and are being closely monitored by local authorities to “avoid a new outbreak and maintain this favorable tendency.”