Moscow To Launch New Surveillance App To Track Residents In Coronavirus Lockdown - NPR

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Police officers walk across an empty Red Square in Moscow on Tuesday, as the Russian capital goes into lockdown to stem the spread of the new coronavirus. Pavel Golovkin/AP hide caption

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City authorities in Moscow are rolling out new digital "social monitoring" tools targeting the public, after what officials say were constant violations of the city's quarantine imposed this week to fight the spread of the new coronavirus.

Under restrictions in place since Monday, most of the city's 12 million residents must remain indoors, barring a few exceptions — like trips to the supermarket or pharmacy, taking out the trash or briefly walking the dog.

But starting Thursday, Muscovites will have their movements tracked through a mandatory app required on their smartphones. Don't have one? The city says it will lend out devices.

"The main goal is, together with the patient, encourage that he does not go outside," said Eduard Lysenko, the head of the city's Department for Information and Technology, in an interview with Echo of Moscow radio.

In addition, Moscow residents will be obligated to register for a government-issued QR code — a small square matrix bar code containing personal data. What information the codes will hold isn't yet clear. But Russians must present it on their smartphones or carry a printout of their QR profiles to present to police, when requested. (City officials say they're also preparing to educate the public — and elder Russians, in particular — on what a QR code actually is.)

The new tools will merge with existing street cameras and face recognition software to quickly identify residents who stray from their homes and/or quarantines, say authorities.

Adding incentive to follow the rules, President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday signed a law introducing criminal penalties — including fines and up to seven years in prison -- for skipping quarantine and infecting others. The Russian leader also signed legislation granting the government additional powers to declare an immediate national state of emergency, without the parliament's approval.

Yet members of Russia's opposition — no strangers to state surveillance or prisons — are expressing particular unease about a growing digital arsenal the government says will help it fight COVID-19. A state task force on Wednesday reported more than 2,700 cases of infection and 24 deaths from the disease, with the majority of cases in Moscow.

"One thing is clear," writes Leonid Volkov, a chief strategist of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, on his Telegram channel. "The coronavirus will eventually leave but this digital concentration camp will remain."

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2020-04-01 20:36:06Z
52780692900161

Israel's coronavirus outbreak: police target ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods - The - The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/world/israeli-security-forces-crackdown-on-ultra-orthodox-community-defying-stay-at-home-orders/2020/03/31/86348977-7460-4faa-87e5-5feb162b6436_video.html

JERUSALEM — Israeli police are cracking down on ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods around the country, which have emerged as coronavirus hot spots as residents continue to ignore stay-at-home orders and bans on gatherings meant to stem the epidemic.

Authorities have carried out raids on synagogues and deployed helicopters, which hover over streets filled with black-clad religious students, after these crowded, insular communities recorded some of Israel’s highest rates of infection.

As police have pushed into some of these neighborhoods, violence has broken out. Young ultra-Orthodox men threw rocks at police in Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighborhood Monday after officers broke up a gathering at a synagogue and cited residents for straying more than 100 meters from their homes. Thirty residents were fined up to $1,400 for violating health restrictions, and the army sent patrols into the neighborhood Tuesday.

Officials are now considering locking down entire ultra-Orthodox areas.

Ronen Zvulun

Reuters

Ultra-Orthodox Jewish youths look at Israeli police as they patrol to enforce restrictions of a partial lockdown against the coronavirus disease (covid-19) in Mea Shearim neighborhood of Jerusalem on March 30, 2020.

Health Minister Yaakov Litzman, himself an ultra-Orthodox rabbi who had been criticized earlier for not clamping down more vigorously, called for police to control access to the city of Bnei Barak after an ultra-Orthodox funeral there drew hundreds of mourners in defiance of police.

“There is no public that is exempt from the regulations, and there is no population that can stand aside and not participate in the law,” Litzman said in an interview with the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.

Government officials say most members of the ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, communities complied with restrictions when they were imposed nationwide more two weeks ago. But some sects have flouted these rules, in Israel as well as in sections of New York, New Jersey and London, as urgent public health messages have failed to penetrate a population isolated by cultural, religious and language barriers.

Some Haredi sects lead lives tailor-made to facilitate the spread of a new pathogen, health officials said. The ultra-Orthodox routinely have large families packed into small apartments and interact constantly with others at religious schools, synagogues and ritual baths. Many eschew smartphones, ignore mass media and distrust government authority.

“You cannot stop, you cannot even regulate, the spread of the infection inside a family of 10 or 12 in crowded into an apartment of two bedrooms,” said Moti Ravid, medical director of the Maynei Hayeshua Medical Center in Bnei Barak.

He expects contagion among the ultra-Orthodox to outpace the 40 percent rate of infection that occurred inside families in Chinese cities. “We will see 50 percent or more in these Orthodox families,” he said.

Already, the infection rate within Orthodox communities is four times of that of Israel’s general population, Ravid said. A survey by Israel’s Channel 12 news, using data provided by individual hospitals, found more than half the coronavirus patients were from the Haredi community.

In Bnei Barak, the number of cases testing positive for the virus soared from 30 to 244 over three days last week, while in Jerusalem the figure increased from 78 to 314, according to Health Ministry figures. Officials in Jerusalem on Sunday opened a converted hotel-hospital to isolate ultra-Orthodox patients, offering kosher food and holding up to 300 patients.

Jack Guez

AFP/Getty Images

Israeli medical personnel from the Magen David Adom (MDA) national emergency service swab a resident from the city of Bnei Brak at their complex for covid-19 testing in the city of Ramat Gan on March 31, 2020, part of measures imposed by Israeli authorities meant to curb the spread of covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

Overall, Israel has recorded more 4,800 infections. Nineteen have died.

Some practices that pose a heightened risk for infection are central in the religious lives of the ultra-Orthodox. Congregating multiple times a day to pray is fundamental, with a quorum of 10 adult males often required. Closing ritual baths, for instance, would mean couples are forbidden from being intimate or even touching and sleeping together.

Meanwhile, the outside world remains remote.

“Many Haredim are cut off from the digital world,” said Esty Shushan, a Haredi activist and chief executive of Nivcharot, a movement working for women’s rights in her Orthodox community. She said, “They are not updated on what is going on in the wider world.”

As the word of the outbreak spread elsewhere in Israel, the Haredim — some of whom speak Yiddish rather than Hebrew and reject the authority of the Israeli government — looked to their spiritual leaders for guidance. Some of their rabbis balked at the government’s call to close schools, reduce gatherings to no more than 10 and hold funerals only outdoors with no more than 20 participants spaced at least six feet apart.

One of the leading Haredi authorities in Bnei Barak, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, directed his followers earlier this month to keep the religious schools open, Shushan said, because studying the Torah and praying would save lives. A week later, as the number of confirmed cases mounted, he reversed himself and ordered adherents to pray alone.

Meanwhile, hundreds of ultra-Orthodox Israelis rushed back from abroad as other countries began to restrict movement. One El Al flight from New York transported at least 65 students from a Brooklyn religious school who tested positive for the virus and were quarantined upon arrival.

The ultra-Orthodox have not been the only Israelis reluctant to surrender their freedom. Sun seekers, barred from schools and offices, filled the beaches as recently as two weeks ago. But as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked people to stay home and ratcheted up restrictions, compliance climbed. And with it, public resentment over the still-crowded streets in Haredi neighborhoods.

“Yes, I’m angry,” tweeted news anchor Eylon Levy. “They — and we — don’t deserve to pay the price in blood for their medieval superstitions.”

With every circulating video of an ultra-Orthodox wedding or prayer gathering, complaints grew that police were failing to enforce regulations that held most of the country in confinement.

Ronen Zvulun

Reuters

Israeli police remove an ultra-Orthodox Jewish youth from a synagogue before they close it as they enforce restrictions of a partial lockdown against the coronavirus disease (covid-19) in Mea Shearim neighborhood of Jerusalem on March 30, 2020.

The tipping point came over the weekend, more than two weeks after the beginning of home isolation and following the Jewish holiday of Purim with parties and gatherings, when some 300 ultra-Orthodox packed a funeral for a rabbi in Bnei Barak. Images of mourners crowded shoulder-to-shoulder as police stood by infuriated many, including security officials.

Police defended their failure to act, saying that trying to break up the funeral could have sparked a confrontation, drawing even more Haredim to the scene and prolonging the gathering. “Usually in such funerals there are thousands of people, and it was decided that it could have got much worse,” Israel police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

Police patrols and outreach have now increased in Haredi areas, Rosenfeld said, with officers on the streets and loudspeaker warnings in Yiddish that residents must avoid congregating.

“They do not have phones, they are not online, they don’t have televisions, though some listen to the radio,” he said. “We’ve emphasized getting [the] message out with rabbis and community leaders who they listen to.”

The heightened police presence was obvious Monday on the streets of Mea Shearim. The sidewalks were less crowded than previously, but still busier than most parts of a Jerusalem that is largely a ghost city a week before Passover.

Families with children filled the pavement in many places, and men frequently stopped to stare tensely at passing police cars. One group of officers in riot gear took away a young man with side locks dangling beneath his broad black hat.

All of the police wore the masks and gloves that have become common around the city. The ultra-Orthodox remained unprotected.

Read more

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

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2020-04-01 20:41:28Z
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Israel's coronavirus outbreak: police target ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods - The - The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/video/world/israeli-security-forces-crackdown-on-ultra-orthodox-community-defying-stay-at-home-orders/2020/03/31/86348977-7460-4faa-87e5-5feb162b6436_video.html

JERUSALEM — Israeli police are cracking down on ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods around the country, which have emerged as coronavirus hot spots as residents continue to ignore stay-at-home orders and bans on gatherings meant to stem the epidemic.

Authorities have carried out raids on synagogues and deployed helicopters, which hover over streets filled with black-clad religious students, after these crowded, insular communities recorded some of Israel’s highest rates of infection.

As police have pushed into some of these neighborhoods, violence has broken out. Young ultra-Orthodox men threw rocks at police in Jerusalem’s Mea Shearim neighborhood Monday after officers broke up a gathering at a synagogue and cited residents for straying more than 100 meters from their homes. Thirty residents were fined up to $1,400 for violating health restrictions, and the army sent patrols into the neighborhood Tuesday.

Officials are now considering locking down entire ultra-Orthodox areas.

Ronen Zvulun

Reuters

Ultra-Orthodox Jewish youths look at Israeli police as they patrol to enforce restrictions of a partial lockdown against the coronavirus disease (covid-19) in Mea Shearim neighborhood of Jerusalem on March 30, 2020.

Health Minister Yaakov Litzman, himself an ultra-Orthodox rabbi who had been criticized earlier for not clamping down more vigorously, called for police to control access to the city of Bnei Barak after an ultra-Orthodox funeral there drew hundreds of mourners in defiance of police.

“There is no public that is exempt from the regulations, and there is no population that can stand aside and not participate in the law,” Litzman said in an interview with the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.

Government officials say most members of the ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, communities complied with restrictions when they were imposed nationwide more two weeks ago. But some sects have flouted these rules, in Israel as well as in sections of New York, New Jersey and London, as urgent public health messages have failed to penetrate a population isolated by cultural, religious and language barriers.

Some Haredi sects lead lives tailor-made to facilitate the spread of a new pathogen, health officials said. The ultra-Orthodox routinely have large families packed into small apartments and interact constantly with others at religious schools, synagogues and ritual baths. Many eschew smartphones, ignore mass media and distrust government authority.

“You cannot stop, you cannot even regulate, the spread of the infection inside a family of 10 or 12 in crowded into an apartment of two bedrooms,” said Moti Ravid, medical director of the Maynei Hayeshua Medical Center in Bnei Barak.

He expects contagion among the ultra-Orthodox to outpace the 40 percent rate of infection that occurred inside families in Chinese cities. “We will see 50 percent or more in these Orthodox families,” he said.

Already, the infection rate within Orthodox communities is four times of that of Israel’s general population, Ravid said. A survey by Israel’s Channel 12 news, using data provided by individual hospitals, found more than half the coronavirus patients were from the Haredi community.

In Bnei Barak, the number of cases testing positive for the virus soared from 30 to 244 over three days last week, while in Jerusalem the figure increased from 78 to 314, according to Health Ministry figures. Officials in Jerusalem on Sunday opened a converted hotel-hospital to isolate ultra-Orthodox patients, offering kosher food and holding up to 300 patients.

Jack Guez

AFP/Getty Images

Israeli medical personnel from the Magen David Adom (MDA) national emergency service swab a resident from the city of Bnei Brak at their complex for covid-19 testing in the city of Ramat Gan on March 31, 2020, part of measures imposed by Israeli authorities meant to curb the spread of covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

Overall, Israel has recorded more 4,800 infections. Nineteen have died.

Some practices that pose a heightened risk for infection are central in the religious lives of the ultra-Orthodox. Congregating multiple times a day to pray is fundamental, with a quorum of 10 adult males often required. Closing ritual baths, for instance, would mean couples are forbidden from being intimate or even touching and sleeping together.

Meanwhile, the outside world remains remote.

“Many Haredim are cut off from the digital world,” said Esty Shushan, a Haredi activist and chief executive of Nivcharot, a movement working for women’s rights in her Orthodox community. She said, “They are not updated on what is going on in the wider world.”

As the word of the outbreak spread elsewhere in Israel, the Haredim — some of whom speak Yiddish rather than Hebrew and reject the authority of the Israeli government — looked to their spiritual leaders for guidance. Some of their rabbis balked at the government’s call to close schools, reduce gatherings to no more than 10 and hold funerals only outdoors with no more than 20 participants spaced at least six feet apart.

One of the leading Haredi authorities in Bnei Barak, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, directed his followers earlier this month to keep the religious schools open, Shushan said, because studying the Torah and praying would save lives. A week later, as the number of confirmed cases mounted, he reversed himself and ordered adherents to pray alone.

Meanwhile, hundreds of ultra-Orthodox Israelis rushed back from abroad as other countries began to restrict movement. One El Al flight from New York transported at least 65 students from a Brooklyn religious school who tested positive for the virus and were quarantined upon arrival.

The ultra-Orthodox have not been the only Israelis reluctant to surrender their freedom. Sun seekers, barred from schools and offices, filled the beaches as recently as two weeks ago. But as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked people to stay home and ratcheted up restrictions, compliance climbed. And with it, public resentment over the still-crowded streets in Haredi neighborhoods.

“Yes, I’m angry,” tweeted news anchor Eylon Levy. “They — and we — don’t deserve to pay the price in blood for their medieval superstitions.”

With every circulating video of an ultra-Orthodox wedding or prayer gathering, complaints grew that police were failing to enforce regulations that held most of the country in confinement.

Ronen Zvulun

Reuters

Israeli police remove an ultra-Orthodox Jewish youth from a synagogue before they close it as they enforce restrictions of a partial lockdown against the coronavirus disease (covid-19) in Mea Shearim neighborhood of Jerusalem on March 30, 2020.

The tipping point came over the weekend, more than two weeks after the beginning of home isolation and following the Jewish holiday of Purim with parties and gatherings, when some 300 ultra-Orthodox packed a funeral for a rabbi in Bnei Barak. Images of mourners crowded shoulder-to-shoulder as police stood by infuriated many, including security officials.

Police defended their failure to act, saying that trying to break up the funeral could have sparked a confrontation, drawing even more Haredim to the scene and prolonging the gathering. “Usually in such funerals there are thousands of people, and it was decided that it could have got much worse,” Israel police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

Police patrols and outreach have now increased in Haredi areas, Rosenfeld said, with officers on the streets and loudspeaker warnings in Yiddish that residents must avoid congregating.

“They do not have phones, they are not online, they don’t have televisions, though some listen to the radio,” he said. “We’ve emphasized getting [the] message out with rabbis and community leaders who they listen to.”

The heightened police presence was obvious Monday on the streets of Mea Shearim. The sidewalks were less crowded than previously, but still busier than most parts of a Jerusalem that is largely a ghost city a week before Passover.

Families with children filled the pavement in many places, and men frequently stopped to stare tensely at passing police cars. One group of officers in riot gear took away a young man with side locks dangling beneath his broad black hat.

All of the police wore the masks and gloves that have become common around the city. The ultra-Orthodox remained unprotected.

Read more

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

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2020-04-01 19:42:00Z
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Coronavirus news: Putin sends military plane to U.S. with supplies to fight COVID-19 after talking with Trump - CBS News

A Russian military plane carrying medical equipment has departed for the United States, the defense ministry in Moscow said Wednesday, as the Kremlin flexes its soft power amid the coronavirus pandemic. The Antonov-124, "with medical masks and medical equipment on board", left for the U.S. overnight, a statement said, without providing further details.

Video released by the ministry showed the cargo plane loaded with boxes preparing to take off from a military airbase near Moscow early Wednesday morning.

Российский самолет с медицинскими масками и медицинским оборудованием на борту вылетел в США. В американской администрации ранее сообщили, что ожидают его прибытия 1 апреля.

Видео: ТАСС/Минобороны России pic.twitter.com/6PPhYfRAbb

— ТАСС (@tass_agency) April 1, 2020

Contacted by AFP, the defense ministry refused to provide any further information on the delivery, which came after Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke with U.S. counterpart Donald Trump on Monday.

Coronavirus: The Race To Respond ›

More in Coronavirus: The Race To Respond

Russia has previously sent medical supplies and experts to coronavirus-hit Italy as part of a humanitarian effort that analysts said carried geopolitical overtones.

Moscow said the aid for Italy included some 100 virus specialists with experience dealing with Ebola and swine fever, but Italian media have reported that much of the aid was not useful in the fight against the virus.

Last month, Russia said it had sent nearly 1,000 coronavirus testing kits to ex-Soviet states and countries including Iran and North Korea.

The U.S. now has 188,663 confirmed coronavirus cases, by far the highest of any country, according to a Johns Hopkins tally, and more than 4,000 deaths.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday that Putin expected the U.S. to return the gesture if Russia faces a similar crisis and U.S. producers have increased their capacity to produce medical supplies.

"Today, when the situation touches absolutely everyone and is of a global nature, there is no alternative to acting together in the spirit of partnership and mutual assistance," he said.

Mr. Trump said earlier this week that "Russia sent us a very, very large planeload of things, medical equipment, which was very nice."

Health officials in Russia have registered a sharp increase in the number of infections, with 2,337 cases and 17 deaths confirmed, according to the latest figures Wednesday.

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2020-04-01 19:47:18Z
52780692900161

Rouhani: U.S. has lost opportunity to lift Iran sanctions amid coronavirus - Reuters

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran’s president said on Wednesday that, with the advent of the coronavirus, the United States had missed a historic opportunity to lift sanctions on his country, though the penalties had not hampered its fight against the infection.

On Tuesday, U.S Secretary of State Mike Pompeo raised the possibility that Washington might consider easing sanctions on Iran and other nations to help fight the epidemic, but gave no concrete sign it plans to do so.

“The United States lost the best opportunity to lift sanctions,” Hassan Rouhani said in a televised cabinet meeting. “It was a great opportunity for Americans to apologize ... and to lift the unjust and unfair sanctions on Iran.”

The coronavirus has killed more than 3,000 people in Iran with confirmed infections close to 48,000, making it the worst-hit country in the Middle East and prompting China and the United Nations to urge the United States to ease sanctions.

“Americans could have used this opportunity and told the Iranian nation that they are not against them,” Rouhani said. “Their hostility (toward Iranians) is obvious.”

Friction between Tehran and Washington has increased since 2018, when U.S. President Donald Trump pulled the United States out of Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with six nations and re-imposed sanctions, crippling Iran’s economy.

Trump has adopted a “maximum pressure” policy on Iran aimed at persuading Tehran to negotiate a broader deal that further constrains its nuclear program, limits its missile program and curbs its use of proxy forces in Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon.

Washington has offered humanitarian assistance to its longtime foe. But Iran’s top authority Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has rejected the offer.

Although Iranian authorities have said U.S. sanctions had hindered its efforts to curb the outbreak, Rouhani said :”The sanctions have failed to hamper our efforts to fight against the coronavirus outbreak.”

FILE PHOTO: Iranian President Hassan Rouhani speaks during a meeting of the Iranian government task force on the coronavirus, in Tehran, Iran, March 21, 2020. Official Presidential website/Handout via REUTERS

“We are almost self-sufficient in producing all necessary equipment to fight the coronavirus. We have been much more successful than many other countries in the fight against this disease,” Rouhani said.

Several countries, including the United Arab Emirates, China, Britain, France, Qatar and Turkey, have sent shipments of medical supplies, including gloves and surgical masks, to Iran.

In the first transaction conducted under a trade mechanism set up to barter humanitarian goods and food after Washington’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal, Germany said on Tuesday that France, Germany and Britain had exported medical goods to Iran.

Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Philippa Fletcher and John Stonestreet

Our Standards:The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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2020-04-01 18:45:09Z
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Japan is 'on the brink' as it struggles to contain coronavirus and its medical system could collapse - Daily Mail

Japan is 'on the brink' as it struggles to contain coronavirus and its medical system could collapse, health chief and minister warn

• 'Fundamental responses' needed to prevent medical system from collapsing
• Prime Minister Abe says Japan 'barely holding the line' on the spread of the virus
• Japan bans foreign entry from 73 countries and imposes two-week quarantines 
• Country has some 2,362 cases of Covid-19 and 67 deaths overall; Tokyo with 587
• Coronavirus symptoms: what are they and should you see a doctor?

By Rory Butler For Mailonline

Published: 15:54 BST, 1 April 2020 | Updated: 16:35 BST, 1 April 2020

Japan is 'on the brink' as it struggles to contain coronavirus and its medical system could collapse, officials in the country have warned.

Economics Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura said Japan 'must prevent infections from spreading further no matter what' and warned that 'we have come to the edge of edges'.

His warning came as Shigeru Omi, head of the Japan Community Healthcare Organisation, said 'fundamental responses' to prevent coronavirus from causing the country's medical system to collapse could be enacted today. 

Japan has confirmed 2,362 cases of coronavirus and 67 deaths. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe faces increasing pressure to declare a state of emergency.  

Medical experts in Japan advising Abe warned the spread of Covid-19 was putting mounting strain on hospitals in Tokyo, the city of Osaka, and other prefectures.  

Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seen here at a parliamentary meeting today wearing a protective mask

Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe looking under pressure while at a committee meeting today

As part of new measures to regulate the spread of the contagion, Japan is banning foreign entry from 73 countries.

It will also demand anyone arriving from abroad to be in quarantine for two weeks.

Speaking at a news conference today, medical adviser Omi said Japan's health system was at present risk of collapse, before a spike in infections.

'Fundamental responses should be made as early as today or tomorrow,' he said.

While many countries around the world fight to stem the deadly pandemic by imposing strict lockdown measures, Prime Minister Abe faces similar public pressure to do the same.

Setting an example - Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe looks about the committee today

Prime Minister Abe agreed Japan was 'barely holding the line' on the spread of the virus, adding the country remains 'at a critical point'

Calls for a state of emergency, granting local governors more weight in telling Japanese people to remain indoors and to close schools, are among the demands Abe faces. However, in many cases, the relevant laws include no penalties.

While Japan has some 2,362 cases of Covid-19 and 67 deaths overall, the capital Tokyo has bore the brunt with another 66 cases today, for a total of 587, according to public broadcaster NHK. 

At a parliamentary committee today, Prime Minister Abe agreed Japan was 'barely holding the line' on the spread of the virus, adding the country remains 'at a critical point where virus cases could surge if we let down our guard.'

Those sentiments were echoed by Economics Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who said people who study infectious diseases had been alarmed about the capacity of the health system in the capital. Experts, he added, said Japan was on the verge of crisis.

'We must prevent infections from spreading further no matter what. We have come to the edge of edges, to the very brink,' added Nishimura.

Medical adviser Omi said that despite Japan not having witnessed dramatic spikes in infection, more reports of the virus was having a constricting effect on medical supplies.

Fellow medical expert from Hokkaido University, Hiroshi Nishiura, heaped yet another supplies warning on top of Omi's, saying strained parts of Japan could witness similar shortages of respirators seen elsewhere.

As a precaution, people living in areas that have seen sharp spikes in Covid-19 cases in the past week have also been warned to stay home and not gather in groups larger than 10.

While residents in Tokyo were again told to remain off the streets and out of bars and eateries by Governor Yuriko Koike.

'People are saying "I didn't think I was infected myself",' she told reporters. 'I want everyone to share the awareness that one should both protect oneself while also avoiding spreading the virus.'  

Tokyo schools shut down at the start of March will remain closed until May 6. Schools in other regions however should decide their own measures 'based on local conditions', experts advised.

Increasing calls for a lockdown in Japan are happening on social media, according to Reuters. Some Twitter users have pointed to stricter measures abroad. 

Japan's economy was on the brink of recession before the Covid-19 pandemic began. A Bank of Japan poll indicated industrial manufacturers in the country were at the 'most pessimistic for seven years,' according to a Reuters report. 

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2020-04-01 17:50:11Z
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Lindsey Graham threatens US-Chinese trade over 'disgusting' wet markets - New York Post

Sen. Lindsey Graham threatened that the US-China trade relationship will “change” if Beijing fails to shut down wet markets that sell wild, and at times live, animals that could transmit viruses to humans once eaten.

Speaking during an interview on “Fox & Friends” Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Chairman said that he would be writing a letter to the Chinese ambassador telling him, “If you don’t shut those wet markets down, our trading relationship is going to change.”

Wet markets are an outdoor series of stalls selling meat, fish, produce, and other perishable goods which are popular throughout Asia and Africa. Both living and dead animals being sold at these markets include pigs, oxen, duck, chicken, bats, dogs, monkeys and cats.

“What can China do to help the world? Shut those markets down,” Graham added when talking to the network.

“We think … this whole thing started from a transmission from a bat to a human. About the last three or four pandemics have come from the Chinese wet markets.

“I don’t think this came from a Chinese military lab, but these wet markets are gross, they’re just absolutely disgusting, selling exotic animals that transmit viruses from animals to human beings. Those things need to shut down.”

In the weeks since Beijing has gotten a better handle on the virus, lifting the nationwide lockdown and encouraging people to reenter society, Chinese nationals have begun purchasing meat from wet markets again, causing alarm for Graham.

“The source of this virus is the Chinese wet markets. But when you look — have doctors who come on and ask them, how many diseases have come from China through these wet markets where you intermingle all kinds of exotic animals, it’s just really a gross display of how you prepare food, that needs to stop.”

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2020-04-01 17:35:41Z
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