The Latest on the coronavirus pandemic. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death.
—Britain reports nearly 20,000 deaths from virus.
—France won’t reopen its restaurants, bars and cafes before June.
WILLMAR, Minn. — A Hormel Foods subsidiary says it’s halting production at a pair of Minnesota turkey-processing facilities after some employees tested positive for the coronavirus.
Jennie-O Turkey Store Inc. says 14 employees have tested positive at two plants in Willmar, in western Minnesota, as of Thursday. The plants employ about 1,200 workers.
The plants are the latest to close nationally as meat processing plants wrestle with coronavirus infections among workers. The company didn’t immediately respond to a question about how many turkeys the plants process daily.
Jennie-O President Steve Lykken says the facilities will be deep cleaned while the company figures out a plan to reopen. He says the company has taken steps to protect workers, including physical distancing and personal protective equipment.
WASHINGTON — Officials say the top Navy officer has recommended the reinstatement of the aircraft carrier captain fired for sending a fraught email to commanders pleading for faster action to protect his crew from a coronavirus outbreak.
Adm. Mike Gilday has recommended that Navy Capt. Brett Crozier be returned to his ship. That’s according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the results of an investigation that have not yet been made public. Gilday met with Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on Tuesday and with Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Friday morning to lay out his recommendations. An official says Esper has asked for a delay in any public announcement while he considers the recommendation.
—Lolita C. Baldor and Robert Burns reported.
UNITED NATIONS — The president of the world’s largest humanitarian network is urging governments to start thinking about something like the Marshall Plan that helped countries recover after World War II to help nations tackle the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
Francesco Rocca, who leads the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies which operates in 192 countries, also warned of the risk that the COVID-19 crisis will lead to social unrest, hunger and starvation.
Rocca said COVID-19 is also going to have “a great social impact in every part of the world” and “we need to plan together with institutions a social response before it is too late.”
ROME — Opposition lawmakers in Italy are demanding that the justice minister tell Parliament’s anti-Mafia commission how a convicted organized crime boss was given house arrest due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Italian state TV said Pasquale Zagaria had been receiving cancer treatment at a hospital ward for prisoners on the island of Sardinia. But after the ward was converted to care for inmates with coronavirus infections, that treatment wasn’t available and he was transferred to temporary house arrest.
State TV said the justice minister had ordered an administrative investigation into Pasquale Zagaria’s transfer.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice has rolled out aggressive steps to reopen daycare places and restaurants without setting specific benchmarks on testing, equipment and coronavirus tracking.
Speaking in broad strokes, the Republican governor said he wanted daycares and outdoor seating at restaurants to open as soon as possible. The strategy comes days after he announced hospitals will resume elective procedures as early as next week.
Justice, a billionaire coal and agricultural businessman without previous government experience, said the state will take “baby steps” in lifting virus restrictions to avoid a jump in cases.
OLYMPIA, Wash. — Washington Gov. Jay Inslee has announced a plan that allows existing construction projects to resume as long as strict coronavirus social distancing protocols are followed.
Before work on the projects can resume, all contractors must develop and post a plan at each site that addresses use of the personal protective equipment like masks and gloves, on-site social distancing and sanitation. In addition, a site-specific supervisor will be designated to enforce the safety plan to monitor the health of employees, and employees will undergo training on the new policies.
Construction was halted under the stay-at-home order and closure of non-essential businesses that Inslee ordered last month.
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JUNEAU, Alaska — Alaska is allowing restaurants to resume dine-in service and retail shops and other businesses to reopen, all with limitations, under an initial phase of a plan to restart parts of the economy affected by coronavirus concerns. At least one city, Juneau, asked that business owners wait for local officials to weigh in.
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has said health considerations must come first and that officials feel good about the state’s numbers, health care capacity, equipment and ability to track cases.
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ROME — The Italian government is asking Parliament to authorize staggering sums of new spending, drastically driving up the national public debt, after the COVID-19 outbreak made the country one of the most stricken by the pandemic.
Premier Giuseppe Conte’s Cabinet has decided on a revised budget for this year, one that calls for 55 billion euros ($60 billion) in debt, 24.85 billion ($27.5 billion) next year, and similarly high debt for several more years. The budget must be approved by parliament.
The government says it must beef up the national health system, whose intensive care units were sorely tested by huge numbers of coronavirus patients, as well as provide additional funds for law enforcement and civil protection agencies to deal with the emergency. More funds will also be earmarked for private and public economic sectors and to provide safety measures for workers heading back to work after national lockdown, now in its seventh week.
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SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Puerto Rico’s Department of Corrections says it will test all the nearly 9,000 inmates being held across the U.S. territory to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Officials say 6,000 employees, including prison guards who work at the island’s 32 correctional facilities, also will be tested.
Corrections Secretary Eduardo Rivera says officials have been testing new inmates since April 8.
The announcement comes after a handful of inmates in recent days tested positive even though they were asymptomatic.
Puerto Rico has reported at least 77 deaths and more than 1,270 confirmed cases of COVID-19.
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DENVER — Health officials have ordered the immediate closure of a Walmart in suburban Denver after three people connected to the store died after being infected with the coronavirus and at least six employees tested positive.
The Tri-County Health Department announced late Thursday that a 69-year-old man who worked for a private security company at the store died along with a 72-year-old store employee and her 63-year-old husband, who did not work at the store.
The health department said the store didn’t adhere to social distancing requirements under Colorado’s stay-at-home order that allows some businesses deemed essential, like the Walmart, to remain open.
The dates of the deaths were not disclosed.
Besides the six other confirmed cases, three employees suspected of having COVID-19 are awaiting test results.
Walmart said in a statement that the store’s temporary closure would allow it to be cleaned and sanitized.
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PARIS — France plans to keep thousands of newly built intensive care units ready for a second wave of virus cases, even though the first wave is now receding.
Health authorities say France doubled its number of intensive care beds to more than 10,000 as the virus raced across the country.
“We need to keep the beds in case of a return of the epidemic,” national health agency director Jerome Salomon says. “We need to maintain a vigilant posture.”
Now fewer than 5,000 people are in intensive care with the virus, but people with other severe illnesses also need the beds.
France has reported more virus deaths than any country but the U.S., Italy and Spain. Salomon has announced more than 22,000 virus deaths so far in French hospitals and nursing homes.
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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says his comments suggesting people can ingest or inject disinfectant to fight COVID-19 was an attempt at sarcasm.
Trump noted Thursday that researchers were looking at the effects of disinfectants on the virus and wondered aloud if they could be injected into people, saying the virus “does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it would be interesting to check that.”
But speaking to reporters in the Oval Office Friday, Trump insisted his comments were misconstrued. “I was asking the question sarcastically to reporters like you, just to see what would happen,” Trump said.
Trump’s comments on disinfectants at Thursday’s briefing came after William Bryan, who leads the Science and Technology Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security, spoke about how researchers are testing the effect of disinfectants on virus-laden saliva and respiratory fluids on surfaces.
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Apple and Google have outlined new privacy protections for smartphone apps that could help public health agencies send alerts to people if they spent more than 5 minutes near someone who later tested positive for COVID-19.
The tech giants announced earlier in April that they are jointly working to introduce a new app-building interface in May for billions of Apple and Android phones around the world.
The partnership will enable public health agencies to build phone apps that use Bluetooth short-range wireless beacons to automatically detect the proximity of nearby phones without revealing anyone’s identity or location.
The companies have so far resisted a push from some governments that want them to loosen privacy restrictions to make it easier for health agencies to track the whereabouts of COVID-19 patients and their contacts.
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WASHINGTON — The Pentagon says the USNS Comfort, a Navy hospital ship that has been in New York harbor for several weeks to help fight the coronavirus, will return to its home port of Norfolk, Virginia.
Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman did not say when the ship would depart New York. Once it is back in Norfolk, it will restock and prepare to deploy again if requested. Hoffman says it will be up to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to decide whether the Comfort should undertake a coronavirus support mission elsewhere.
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DENVER — Denver Mayor Michael Hancock has extended the city’s stay-at-home order and non-essential business closures through May 8 just as fellow Democrat and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis prepares to relax some statewide restrictions next week.
Hancock insists the extra time is needed to ramp up coronavirus testing and contact tracing and ultimately “box in” the virus — ensuring “it is our punk and that we are not its punk anymore.”
Polis cited the economic and psychological toll the statewide stay-at-home order has taken in announcing this week that some limits will be relaxed on Monday and that non-essential businesses can reopen, with distancing measures, on May 1.
Polis has said local governments will have flexibility to adopt their own measures to fight the coronavirus pandemic.
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OKLAHOMA CITY — Salons, spas and barbershops opened up across Oklahoma despite concerns from medical professionals and a steady increase in the number of COVID-19 deaths and reported cases.
Gov. Kevin Stitt authorized such personal-care businesses to open earlier this week, citing an overall decline in the number of people being hospitalized for the illness. Those businesses are directed to keep social distance, wear masks and frequently sanitize equipment.
Some of the state’s largest cities, including Norman, Oklahoma City and Tulsa, are opting to keep their bans in place until at least the end of the month.
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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has signed a nearly $500 billion coronavirus aid package into law, the latest federal government effort to stimulate a reeling economy and overwhelmed hospitals.
The legislation is the fourth coronavirus relief bill passed by Congress. All told, Congress has delivered at least $2.4 trillion for business relief, testing and treatment, and direct payments to individuals and the unemployed, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
The latest bill includes more than $300 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program, which gives small firms loans that could be forgiven if they use them on wages, benefits, rent and utilities and $60 billion for Small Business Administration disaster assistance loans and grants. It also includes $75 billion in grants for hospitals, and $25 billion to improve coronavirus testing.
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LONDON — The British government says 684 more people with the coronavirus have died in U.K. hospitals, increasing the total reported to 19,506.
That’s higher than 616 deaths in the previous 24-hour period. There has been increasing scrutiny of the U.K. figures for understating the actual number of coronavirus-related deaths because they don’t include deaths in care homes or elsewhere in the community.
The U.K.’s death toll is the fourth highest in Europe, behind Italy, Spain and France, all of whom have reported more than 20,000 deaths.
The government also says the number of daily tests increased by around 5,000 to 28,532.
On Friday, an online link to an expanded testing program for essential workers stopped accepting applications after a few hours because of “significant demand.”
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PARIS — France won’t reopen its restaurants, bars and cafes before June. Authorities also announced reinforced financial support for the sector amid the virus crisis.
Finance minister Bruno Le Maire says the government is deferring tax payments and extending short-term unemployment to businesses that won’t be allowed to reopen next month. He says small companies of less than 20 employees can apply for emergency aid of up to 10,000 euros ($10,786).
Most French businesses are set to reopen on May 11. However, the schedule for restaurants, bars and cafes won’t be decided before the end of May, Le Maire said.
France, one of the most popular tourist destinations with more than 80 million foreign visitors each year, is planning an investment fund to help relaunch that sector.
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