Coronavirus world round-up: US suspends travel from Brazil as cases surge
by Annelies GartnerPresident Donald Trump on Sunday further limited travel from the world's coronavirus hotspots by denying entry to foreigners coming from Brazil, which is second to the US in the number of confirmed cases.
Mr Trump had already banned certain travellers from China, Europe, the United Kingdom and Ireland and, to a lesser extent, Iran. He has not moved to ban travel from Russia, which has the world's third-highest caseload.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany cast the step announced on Sunday as another "decisive action to protect our country" by Mr Trump, whose management of the crisis has come under sharp scrutiny.
The US leads the world with more than 1.6 million confirmed coronavirus cases and a death toll that is expected to surpass 100,000 later this week, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.
Brazil, now Latin America's hardest-hit country, is second, with more than 347,000 cases and more than 22,000 deaths. Third on the list is Russia, with more than 344,000 reported cases and more than 3,500 deaths.
On Sunday, Mr Bolsonaro hailed supporters rallying in the country's capital to back his administration as an unfolding political scandal adds to the public health crisis driven by the outbreak. Surrounded by security guards wearing masks, but not wearing one himself, Mr Bolsonaro was shown in a live streaming video on his Facebook page greeting protesters waving Brazilian flags and calling him a "Legend".
Crowds gather in the US to celebrate Memorial Day
The Memorial Day weekend marking the unofficial start of summer in the US meant big crowds at beaches and warnings from authorities on Sunday about people disregarding the social-distancing rule.
Sheriff's deputies and beach patrols tried to make sure people kept their distance from others as they soaked up the rays on the sand and at parks and other recreation sites around the country.
In the Tampa area along Florida's Gulf Coast, the crowds were so big that authorities took the extraordinary step of closing parking lots because they were full.
On the Sunday talk shows, Dr Deborah Birx, coordinator of the White House coronavirus task force, said she was "very concerned" about scenes of people crowding together over the weekend.
"We really want to be clear all the time that social distancing is absolutely critical. And if you can't social distance and you're outside, you must wear a mask," she said on ABC's This Week.
In Missouri, people packed bars and restaurants at the Lake of the Ozarks, a vacation spot popular with Chicagoans, over the weekend. One video showed a crammed pool where vacationers lounged close together without masks, St. Louis station KMOV-TV reported.
Late on Sunday night, Donald Trump tweeted that US schools should reopen 'ASAP' as 'much very good information now available'. He named Steve Hilton in the tweet, after the former Downing Street adviser had appeared on Fox News calling for children to immediately return to school, decrying 'arbitrary' social distancing protocols and 'unscientific nonsense' of temperature checks.
Spain easing lockdown restrictions
In Spain, lockdown measures will finally be eased for people in Madrid and Barcelona from Monday, while elsewhere the first beaches are due to reopen.
Residents in the two cities can now meet in groups of up to 10 people in their homes or on the terraces of bars and restaurants.
The gates of the capital's parks will also be reopened, and major museums will be able to receive a limited number of visitors.
The Madrid and Barcelona regions, the most populated in the country, and a large part of Castile-Leon in the northwest are moving into the first phase of Spain's four-phase deconfinement programme, following what has been one of the strictest lockdowns in the world.
These regions have been on a slower deconfinement track as they bore the brunt of the pandemic in Spain, which has killed more than 28,700 people to date, one of the world's highest tolls.
Everyone must continue to wear a mask, which is already compulsory in buildings and on public streets when it is not possible to keep a distance of two metres.
Millions of Aussie kids return to school
In Australia, millions of children returned to schools in the states of New South Wales and Queensland as numbers of Covid-19 patients in hospitals across the country fall.
The two states on Monday joined the less populous Western Australia and South Australia states and the Northern Territory in resuming face-to-face learning, instead of studying from home online.
The remaining jurisdictions - Victoria and Tasmania states and the Australian Capital Territory - plan to send students back to school in stages through early June.
While New South Wales, Australia's most populous state, and Queensland, the third-most populous state, agree on reopening schools, they differ on reopening their common border.
India records biggest one-day rise in infections
India on Sunday reported 6,767 new coronavirus infections, the country’s biggest one-day increase.
Government data shows the number of coronavirus cases in the world’s second-most populous country are doubling every 13 days or so, even as the government begins easing lockdown restrictions.
India has reported more than 131,000 infections, including 3,867 deaths.
"The increasing trend has not gone down," said Bhramar Mukherjee, a professor of biostatistics and epidemiology at the University of Michigan, referring to India’s cases. "We've not seen a flattening of the curve."
Mukherjee's team estimates that between 630,000 and 2.1 million people in India - out of a population of 1.3 billion - will become infected by early July.
India's health ministry did not respond to a request for comment on how it will cope with the predicted rise in infections, given that most public hospitals are overcrowded at the best of times. The federal government has said in media briefings that not all patients need hospitalisation and it is making rapid efforts to increase the number of hospital beds and procure health gear.
Japan approves plan to end Tokyo's state of emergency
Experts on a special government panel have approved a plan to remove a coronavirus state of emergency from Tokyo and four other remaining prefectures, paving the way for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to declare entirely ending the measure to allow businesses to gradually resume.
Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura told reporters that experts on a government-commissioned panel approved the plan to end the state of emergency that has lasted for more than a month and a half.
Social distancing curbs were removed for most of the country on May 14 as new infections fell, but the government had kept Tokyo and four other prefectures under watch.
Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike has said the capital would swiftly move into "stage one" of the lifting of curbs when the government ends the state of emergency. That would allow libraries and museums to reopen, and restaurants to stay open until later in the evening. Subsequent stages would see theatres, cinemas and fairgrounds reopen.
While the world's third-largest economy has escaped an explosive outbreak with some 17,000 infections and 825 deaths so far, the epidemic has tipped it into a recession and plunged Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's popularity to multi-year lows.
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