GENEVA (Reuters) – A United Nations human rights expert voiced alarm on Tuesday at what he called “widespread food shortages and malnutrition” in North Korea, made worse by a nearly five-month border closure with China and strict quarantine measures against CO... More »
MADRID (Reuters) – The Spanish Balearic Islands plan to fly in thousands of German tourists from June 15, two weeks before the country as a whole starts reopening borders that have been closed since mid-March to curb the coronavirus pandemic, officials said on... More »
(Reuters) – AstraZeneca ANZ.L said on Tuesday it expects to move two COVID-19 antibody therapies it has licensed from U.S. researchers into clinical studies in the next two months as the drugmaker ramps up efforts to help combat the health crisis. The British ... More »
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Sweden’s economy looks like it has started to pick up after the impact of the novel coronavirus and measures to halt its spread, Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson said on Tuesday. “If you summarize, there are a number of indicators tha... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – The coronavirus might have been spreading in China as early as August last year, according to Harvard Medical School research based on satellite images of hospital travel patterns and search engine data, but China dismissed the report as “ri... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – As Australia moves ahead with relaxing a lockdown to curb the spread of the coronavirus, a state government gave the all clear for more than 2,000 fans to attend an Australian Rules Football game at a stadium in Adelaide this weekend. “Footb... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – Fans of the popular South Korean boy band BTS matched its $1 million donation to Black Lives Matter (BLM) in support of U.S. protests against police brutality, an organisation that runs fundraisers for the fans said on Monday. The K-pop group... More »
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Scientists in Sweden are hoping an alpaca named Tyson can help deliver a knockout blow in the fight to develop a treatment or vaccine against the novel coronavirus that has killed nearly 400,000 people worldwide. After immunizing Tyson, a... More »
(Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Convalescent plasma disappoints in Chinese trial Infusions... More »
CHICAGO (Reuters) – The COVID-19 pandemic has put a bright spotlight on weaknesses in many of the systems designed to protect Americans from risks. But with older people more susceptible to serious illness and death from the virus, the problems in our Medicare... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – The United Kingdom’s COVID-19 official death toll has reached nearly 43,000, underlining the country’s status as the worst-hit in Europe and raising more questions about Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s handling of the crisis. New official fig... More »
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) – Businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area may open for curbside retail and manufacturing, while fan-free professional sports events might be allowed as soon as June, as California continued to loosen coronavirus health restriction... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany rose by 513 to 175,210, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Tuesday, with new infections accelerating after decelerating the previous four days. The... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – The manager of South Korea’s popular boyband BTS has apologised on behalf of one of its members who went to a bar in April, contrary to government advice, just as the country is trying to contain a recent coronavirus outbreak around Seoul’s c... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Statins may help protect frail older people from ... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – The science of sewage surveillance could be deployed in countries across the world to help monitor the spread of national epidemics of COVID-19 while reducing the need for mass testing, scientists say. Experts in the field – known as wastewa... More »
(Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Normal speech sprays droplets with contagious coronavirus The thou... More »
MADRID (Reuters) – The Spanish government ordered a two-week quarantine for all travellers coming into the country from May 15 in a bid to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus after one of the Europe’s strictest lockdowns helped slow down the epidemic in S... More »
MOSCOW (Reuters) – A fire apparently started by an overloaded ventilator killed five novel coronavirus patients in an intensive care unit in a Russian hospital on Tuesday, news agencies reported. Russia’s emergency ministry confirmed the death of intensive car... More »
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s health authority said on Tuesday that the reappearance of local clusters of coronavirus cases in recent days suggests that counter-epidemic measures cannot be relaxed yet. While prevention and control efforts have normalised, that d... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s government should extend a costly job support programme until the end of the year for retail and hospitality workers hit hardest by the coronavirus, a think tank said on Tuesday, ahead of an expected government announcement. The Re... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – At the Tokyo elder-care home where 27-year-old Yoshimu works, the coronavirus has stretched already tight staffing, leaving residents to sometimes sit longer in soiled diapers or to steal food from one another. “Everything’s slower. If feedin... More »
(Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee said on Monday they jointly raised $61.7 million in April, just beating the month’s haul for presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and his party. A ... More »
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexico’s health ministry confirmed 1,305 new cases of coronavirus infections on Monday, along with 108 additional deaths. The new infections brought confirmed coronavirus cases to 36,327 and 3,573 deaths in total, according to the offic... More »
(Reuters) – Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) will add labels and warning messages on some tweets with disputed or misleading information about COVID-19, the company said on Monday, as part of a new approach to misinformation that will eventually extend to other topics. Tw... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Men’s blood contains more of enzyme that helps coronaviru... More »
LAGOS (Reuters) – Nigerian comedian Maryam Apaokagi has a sure-fire way of getting people to listen to her coronavirus health advice – she delivers it with a hard slap in the face. The 21-year-old has joined a line-up of the nation’s top performers working hea... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House has begun informal talks with Republicans and Democrats in Congress about what to include in another round of coronavirus relief legislation, officials said on Sunday, while predicting further U.S. jobs losses in the comi... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump may be open to further federal funding to help U.S. states recover funds spent battling the novel coronavirus, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett said on Sunday as Congress weighs another possible economic ... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. New coronavirus antibody test highly accurate A new antib... More »
MELBOURNE (Reuters) – At an outer suburban manufacturing plant, engineer Byron Kennedy is resetting a machine to spray-print a layer of copper on to a door handle, aiming to use the metal’s antiviral properties to counter the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic. H... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The following is a brief roundup of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. New coronavirus is adapting to different populations A ge... More »
BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Antwerp is regaining its glitz as Belgium eases a two-month nationwide coronavirus lockdown that virtually halted business in the world’s largest diamond trade centre. The return of some of the brokers, cutters and couriers who normally th... More »
MONTREAL (Reuters) – The major Canadian province of Quebec, among the worst hit by the coronavirus, started gradually restarting its economy on Monday while Prime Minister Justin Trudeau maintained his cautious stance. Quebec is allowing stores with an outside... More »
ROME/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Italy and the United States were among a slew of countries easing lockdown restrictions on Monday to resurrect economies, but officials cautioned against moving too swiftly as global deaths from the coronavirus neared a quarter of a... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – A French hospital which has retested old samples from pneumonia patients discovered that it treated a man who had COVID-19 as early as Dec. 27, nearly a month before the French government confirmed its first cases. Yves Cohen, head of resusci... More »
ROME (Reuters) – Italy’s coronavirus death toll is much higher than reported, statistics bureau ISTAT said on Monday in an analysis pointing to thousands of fatalities that have never been officially attributed to COVID-19. In its first report of the epidemic’... More »
ZURICH (Reuters) – Germany could only allow coronavirus antibody tests to help determine how freely people can move once it has advice from its ethics council, Health Minister Jens Spahn said, after securing millions of the tests from Swiss drugmaker Roche. Ge... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday he now believes as many as 100,000 Americans could die in the coronavirus pandemic, after the death toll passed his earlier estimates, but said he was confident a vaccine would be developed by t... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Monday said bipartisan discussions are underway over whether more U.S. government relief funding is needed amid the nation’s novel coronavirus outbreak, but that President Donald Trump is focused on t... More »
(Reuters) – Vir Biotechnology Inc and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc plan to begin human testing of their COVID-19 drug candidate by the end of the year, as drugmakers across the globe scramble to find therapies for the highly-infectious virus. The are currently ... More »
FRANKFURT (Reuters) – More than 10 times as many people in Germany have likely been infected with the coronavirus than the number of confirmed cases, researchers from the University of Bonn have concluded from a field trial in one of the worst hit towns. The p... More »
DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) – Coronavirus test kits used in Tanzania were dismissed as faulty by President John Magufuli on Sunday, because he said they had returned positive results on samples taken from a goat and a pawpaw. Magufuli, whose government has already... More »
LAGOS (Reuters) – Two dozen Lagos healthcare workers in scrubs and face masks rushed outside the isolation tents and, making sure to keep six feet apart on the bright green grass, danced and swayed as a saxophone and trumpet struck up the band. Inside the tent... More »
(Reuters) – Former NHL enforcer Georges Laraque, who is in a Quebec hospital after contracting COVID-19, said his condition was steadily improving but that people needed to take the respiratory disease seriously. In a series of videos posted over the weekend, ... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – France’s state-supported “StopCOVID” contact-tracing app should enter its testing phase in the week of May 11 when the country starts to unwind its lockdown, a government minister said on Sunday. Minister for Digital Affairs Cedric O, a membe... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – The number of people who have died in France after contracting the new coronavirus rose on Sunday by 135 to 24,895, the health ministry said. The number of people treated in hospital for the coronavirus and the number of people in intensive c... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Top U.S. health official Anthony Fauci will not testify next week to a congressional committee examining the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, the White House said on Friday, calling it “counterproductive” to h... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday he would like to address the ballooning national debt if he wins re-election in November, but did not provide details on how he would do so. Asked if he had a debt reduction plan, Trump told con... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Coronavirus patients with light symptoms arriving to stay at several Tokyo hotels are likely to get a lift from a pleasant surprise – a robot greeter in the lobby. Japan is now using hotels to house patients who have tested positive for the c... More »
(Reuters) – Moderna Inc and Swiss contract drugmaker Lonza Group AG said on Friday they would accelerate the manufacturing of the U.S. drug developer’s potential coronavirus vaccine. The announcement comes at a time when drugmakers are pausing clinical trials ... More »
(Reuters) – U.S. deaths from the novel coronavirus topped 60,000 on Wednesday and the outbreak will soon be deadlier than any flu season since 1967, according to a Reuters tally. America’s worst flu season in recent years was in 2017-2018 when more than 61,000... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – If you were laid off in April, the health insurance from your job may stop at the end of the month. Then what? Rest assured there are options, even if they are all expensive. If you are losing a workplace plan, you will get paperwork expla... More »
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – It’s not every day that the face of a chief epidemiologist is inked as a tattoo. But then it’s not every country that has tackled the coronavirus pandemic like Sweden. Anders Tegnell was until the start of the crisis an unknown civil serv... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Prime Minister Boris Johnson returns to work on Monday to the biggest dilemma of his premiership: how to lift the coronavirus lockdown that is destroying swathes of the British economy without triggering a deadly second wave of the outbreak.... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s economy minister urged the country’s 16 federal states on Monday to go slowly in lifting coronavirus restrictions to avoid the outbreak spreading further and being forced to backtrack later. Under Germany’s decentralised political ... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – The German government and the federal state of Hesse have agreed to provide Condor with loans worth 550 million euros ($596.31 million), the economy minister said on Monday, after the owner of Poland’s LOT pulled out of a deal to buy the air... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – Healthcare and clinical diagnostics company Novacyt has signed a supply contract with the UK’s Department of Health & Social Care (DHSC) for its product aimed at testing for the presence of the coronavirus, the company said on Monday. Under t... More »
FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German drugs and pesticides company Bayer said the economic downturn has prompted it to take a tougher stance in talks to settle claims its glyphosate-based weedkillers cause cancer, even as its earnings rose. The pandemic has significant... More »
(This April 26 story has been refiled to correct spelling of commerce ministry official’s first name in paragraph four) BEIJING (Reuters) – China is dropping a requirement that a number of key virus care products get domestic regulatory approval before export,... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain is continuing to test whether antibody tests can be used in the fight against the novel coronavirus and is hopeful they will work, junior health minister Edward Argar said on Monday. “Tests continue to be tested, the sign at the mome... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – After passing $3 trillion of coronavirus relief in a rare run of bipartisanship, Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. Congress girded for a new battle over federal assistance to states and local governments grappling with the deadly out... More »
ATLANTA (Reuters) – With the U.S. coronavirus death toll topping 51,000 and nearly one in six workers out of a job, Georgia, Oklahoma and several other states took tentative steps at reopening businesses on Friday, despite disapproval from President Donald Tru... More »
(Reuters) – New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on Friday pointed to research showing that strains of the novel coronavirus entered his state from Europe, not China, and said that travel bans enacted by U.S. President Donald Trump were too late to halt its spread. ... More »
(Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s suggestion that ultraviolet light could be inserted into coronavirus patients was widely panned on Friday, but a California company thinks it’s a perfect solution for decontaminating airplanes. Dimer UCV Innovations cr... More »
(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday reported 865,585 cases of the novel coronavirus, an increase of 37,144 from its previous count, and said the number of deaths had risen by 2,437 to 48,816. The CDC reported its tal... More »
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Singapore said on Tuesday it had preliminarily confirmed 1,111 new coronavirus cases, taking the city-state’s total infections to 9,125. The health ministry said most of the cases were migrant workers living in dormitories, a group that a... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese police have reported that 11 people whose deaths were deemed to be unnatural in the past month subsequently tested positive for the new coronavirus, media said on Tuesday. Japan, with more than 260 virus-related deaths according to p... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s confirmed coronavirus cases rose by 1,785 to 143,457, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Tuesday, marking a slight increase in the number of new infections after two days of declines. New in... More »
MANILA (Reuters) – Singapore is facing a very challenging situation to tackle a sharp increase in coronavirus infections, but has the healthcare system and risk management capacity to handle it, the World Health Organization’s regional chief said on Tuesday. T... More »
HARRISBURG, Pa. (Reuters) – The U.S. debate over restrictions for fighting the coronavirus intensified on Monday, as protesters labeled mandatory lockdowns as “tyranny,” while medical workers and health experts cautioned that lifting them too soon risked unlea... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Congress on Monday inched toward a $450 billion deal to help small businesses and hospitals hurt by the coronavirus pandemic, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi saying negotiators had come to terms on the ‘principles’ of the packag... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Monday Republican and Democratic negotiators have come to terms on the “principles” of the next coronavirus relief package, which is expected to focus on more aid for small businesses and be taken ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday he was working with state governors to make sure they had the resources needed to ramp up coronavirus testing and added that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo would visit the White House to discuss... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday he hoped negotiators in Congress would reach a deal to provide more aid for small businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic, with a vote possible in the Senate on Tuesday. “We hope to have an ... More »
(Reuters) – From tinkling harmonies as the virus disarms cells to clashing and stormy as it replicates, U.S. scientists have translated the novel coronavirus’ spiked protein structure to music in an effort to better understand the pathogen. Professor Markus Bu... More »
(Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s former deputy campaign chairman Rick Gates has asked to serve his remaining 45-day “intermittent” prison sentence from his home over fears of contracting the coronavirus, a court filing showed. Gates is urging a modifi... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. Senate Republican and a Democrat proposed a $500 billion rescue package for state and municipal governments on Monday, as it became increasingly clear that the next coronavirus relief bill will not include money for reeling local ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Democrats and Republicans are near agreement on extra money to help small businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic and could seal a deal as early as Monday, President Donald Trump said on Sunday. Trump told his daily White House ... More »
(Reuters) – Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Beyonce and Oprah Winfrey on Saturday headlined a special broadcast of music, comedy and personal stories celebrating those around the world on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic.... More »
CHICAGO (Reuters) – In what now seems like a galaxy far, far away, Republican lawmakers routinely talked up the idea of raising the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67. In fact, we were in that galaxy just three years ago. A higher Medicare age was an awful... More »
KIEV (Reuters) – Ukrainian brothers Nikita and Egor Zigura work on their sculpture of a giant fingerprint as art enthusiasts look on via a live-streaming internet link and make bids for the developing work. The online auction is part of a new “Stay Art Home” s... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s finance minister has told colleagues the economy could shrink by up to 30% this quarter because of the coronavirus lockdown, a newspaper reported, as the soaring death toll gave little hope restrictions would soon be lifted. The nu... More »
MANILA (Reuters) – The Asian Development Bank [ADB.UL] announced on Monday it was tripling the size of its rescue package to $20 billion to help developing countries in Asia counter the severe macroeconomic and health effects of the coronavirus pandemic. It pr... More »
MADRID (Reuters) – Spaniards at the country’s main transport hubs were handed face masks on a rainy Monday morning as the government relaxed some of the tough lockdown measures designed to rein in the coronavirus health crisis which has claimed nearly 17,000 l... More »
NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – India and Pakistan are planning to partially open up some parts of the economy, officials in the two countries said on Monday, as the costs of harsh lockdowns to limit the outbreak of the coronavirus mount across the region. Ind... More »
HO CHI MINH CITY (Reuters) – A Vietnamese entrepreneur in Ho Chi Minh City has invented a 24/7 automatic dispensing machine providing free rice for people out of work following an ongoing nationwide lockdown to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. Vietnam... More »
CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan Cardinal Baltazar Porras led Easter Mass on Sunday from an empty church, offering a sermon that was broadcast over Instagram to hundreds of people quarantined in their homes because of the coronavirus pandemic. Standing before 51... More »
(Reuters) – The technology arm of Britain’s National Health Service has been working on a mobile phone app with Alphabet Inc’s Google and iPhone maker Apple that the government hopes will help in ending the coronavirus lockdown, the Sunday Times newspaper repo... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The two top Republicans in the U.S. Congress vowed on Saturday to oppose Democrats’ demands to match a $250 billion proposal to aid small businesses during the coronavirus pandemic with the same amount for hospitals and state and local g... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and congressional leaders will hold bipartisan negotiations on a new coronavirus-response bill with the goal of reaching a deal by early next week, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said on Fri... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that he will soon be announcing a second coronavirus task force, creating a council to focus on re-opening the country after the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic passes. “We will be announcing tha... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republican and Democratic U.S. senators will introduce legislation on Friday seeking to reaffirm the country’s commitment to global health amid the coronavirus crisis, including reestablishing a panel – similar to one disbanded by Presid... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Congressional leaders and U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will hold bipartisan negotiations on the contents of a new coronavirus response bill with the goal of reaching a deal by early next week, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Sch... More »
(Reuters) – Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on Thursday proposed expanding access to Medicare and forgiving some student debt in new overtures to supporters of onetime rival Bernie Sanders. Biden, who became Democrats’ presumptive nominee when Sand... More »
JAKARTA (Reuters) – As coronavirus cases surge in Indonesia, doctors are working double-time treating patients both at hospitals and online through healthtech startups – an approach that is quickly becoming part of the national healthcare system. Doctor Mohamm... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A partisan skirmish in the U.S. Senate cut short a Republican effort to speed $250 billion in new assistance to small businesses on Friday, forcing Republicans and Democrats to negotiate over how best to help independent firms reeling fr... More »
NEW YORK(Reuters) – The crisis posed by COVID-19 is worrisome enough for full-time employees. Imagine life as a freelancer. Your income can vary wildly from month to month and is likely being cut back as companies shave costs. Your check may come in the mail, ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist whose progressive agenda pushed the Democratic Party sharply to the left, ended his White House campaign on Wednesday, clearing the way for a Nov. 3 election battle between former Vice President Joe... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – Investor morale in the euro zone fell to an all-time low in April and the bloc’s economy is in deep recession due to the coronavirus, which is “holding the world economy in a stranglehold”, a survey showed on Monday. Sentix’s index for the e... More »
