Following is a summary of current health news briefs.
Spanish coronavirus cases overtake China
Spain overtook China’s total number of coronavirus cases on Monday but business leaders and regional authorities criticized the government’s decision to further restrict the movement of people and keep non-essential workers at home until mid-April. An overnight death toll of 812 people brought total fatalities in Spain to 7,340, while the number of infections rose by 8% to 85,195 on Monday, against 81,470 in China, where the disease originated at the end of 2019.
Tokyo officials say daily drop in coronavirus cases not cause for optimism
Tokyo officials said a drop in daily cases of coronavirus on Monday was not a cause for optimism, as they called on citizens to refrain from outdoor activities, especially gatherings at bars, night clubs and karaokes, through April 12. A senior health department official from the Tokyo government said 13 additional cases reported on Monday were mainly driven by the limited number of outpatients on Sunday.
Ukraine dusts off Soviet-era ventilator designs to help fight coronavirus
Ukraine is dusting off Soviet-era ventilator designs that lay forgotten in a mothballed military factory for years in a bid to ramp up domestic production of equipment that could help in the fight against the coronavirus. In response to an urgent appeal by hospitals to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for ventilators, some of the country’s wealthiest men chipped in to buy machines from abroad.
Austria to make basic face masks compulsory in supermarkets
Austria will require shoppers to wear basic face masks in supermarkets in a bid to slow the still too-rapid spread of the coronavirus, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said on Monday. Austria has closed schools, restaurants, bars, cultural venues and other gathering places, including non-essential shops. People have been told to stay at home and work from there if possible.
What you need to know about coronavirus right now
Here’s what you need to know about the coronavirus right now: Trump’s about-turn
Special Report: Five days of worship that set a virus time bomb in France
From the stage of an evangelical superchurch, the leader of the gospel choir kicked off an evening of prayer and preaching: “We’re going to celebrate the Lord! Are you feeling the joy tonight?” “Yes!” shouted the hundreds gathered at the Christian Open Door church on Feb. 18. Some of them had traveled thousands of miles to take part in the week-long gathering in Mulhouse, a city of 100,000 on France’s borders with Germany and Switzerland.
New Orleans doctors scramble as coronavirus deaths, cases soar
Emergency room doctor Thomas Krajewski stopped at the hospital room door at 2 a.m. to glance at the chart. He knew instantly the long odds faced by the patient inside: A man in his 70s, with a fever, short of breath. “Do you mind calling my son?” the patient asked him. “My two grandsons tomorrow morning are going to crawl in my bed because they wake me up on the weekends, and if I’m not there, they will wonder.”
U.S. health experts pushed strongly for Trump to extend coronavirus restrictions: Fauci
White House health experts argued strongly with President Donald Trump to extend a stay-at-home order for Americans fighting the spread of the coronavirus so the country could start seeing the rates of infection come down, a top U.S. health official said on Monday. “We felt that if we prematurely pulled back, we would only form an acceleration, or a rebound of something, which would have put you behind where you were before,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in an interview with CNN.
J&J to start human testing of coronavirus vaccine by September
Johnson & Johnson plans to start human testing of its experimental coronavirus vaccine by September and make it ready for emergency use in early 2021, the drugmaker said on Monday. J&J also committed more than $1 billion of investment along with U.S. agency Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) to co-fund vaccine research, expanding a previous collaboration.
Fear on front lines as hospital staff face threats, stigma over coronavirus
Janitor Ritchie Estabillo was on his way to work when he was confronted by five men who poured bleach over his face, one of a growing number of hospital staff suffering abuse in the Philippines amid panic over coronavirus infections. His employer said Estabillo had been checked over and was unharmed but called the attackers “vile individuals” who could have cost him his sight.