The outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic has become the epicenter of concerns around the world after infecting more than 500,000 people globally and killing 22,000 more, according to data from the John Hopkins Center in the United States.
In U.S, the number of infected already exceeds 82,000 and there have been at least 1,000 deaths, according to the NBC News count.
These are the most relevant information on Thursday, March 26, 2020:
United States surpasses China in number of infections
The United States has registered more than 82,000 cases of coronavirus, surpassing China as the country with the most infections, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
The second place is occupied by China, the epicenter of the pandemic, with 81,000 cases and the third place is Italy with 80,000. The latter country has also registered the highest number of deaths, more than 8,000.
Deaths in New York increase by 100 in one day. “Under any projection hospitals will collapse”
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo warned Thursday that “under any projection we make, even the most realistic ones, the capacity of hospitals will collapse.”
“Our goal is to lower the contagion curve. But as low as we have it, hospitals are going to collapse in the same way,” Cuomo said at his daily news conference.
There are already more than 33,000 infected in that state, the one with the most patients with COVID-19 in the entire country. And only in the last 24 hours, the deceased increased by more than 100, reaching 366.
The state is working on getting more hospital beds and increasing the number of ventilators for the most critically ill patients. According to Cuomo, an average critical person needs a ventilator for 3 to 4 days, while COVID-19 patients are using it for 11 to 20 days.
China temporarily closes its border to avoid second wave of infections
The Chinese Foreign Minister reported Thursday that China will temporarily close its borders to foreigners from any country, to avoid an increase in the curve of imported coronavirus infections.
Foreigners with residence visas will not be able to enter the country from next Saturday. Furthermore, all free transit visas will be temporarily suspended.
Diplomats, foreigners who travel to China to carry out essential tasks, scientists or people who carry out humanitarian emergency tasks are the exceptions to this determination.
“The suspension is a temporary measure that China is required to take in light of the outbreak situation and the practices of other countries,” the authority said in a statement.
Despite the fact that the number of domestic infections in China has decreased, the cases of patients with COVID-19 arriving from abroad are increasing. There are currently some 81,000 infected cases and they have almost passed away 3,300 people.
The term to obtain the Real ID is extended
The Department of Homeland Security announced that it will extend for a year the period to obtain the Real ID, the new identification document that will be requested for those who make trips to the interior of the country, who need to enter federal, military or government buildings or to buy ammunition.
[¿Quiénes necesitan el Real ID?]
More than 10,000 Americans have been brought home by the State Department
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Thursday that more than 10,000 Americans have been brought home from abroad after being stranded by flight cancellations and restrictions imposed to curb the coronavirus pandemic.
“There is still a lot of work to do. We have a lot of people trying to come back and with the cancellation of flights in several countries, in many cases without notice, there is still an important task, “Pompeo was quoted as saying by CNN.
There are still some 50,000 people the department is contacting to help them return to the United States.
USA reaches a record number of requests for unemployment benefits
Unemployment claims have skyrocketed in the United States due to the economic crisis unleashed by the coronavirus pandemic. Until last week, they were 3,283,000 people those who applied for the subsidy, reaching a new record in the history of the country.
The number is greater than the entire population of the cities of Chicago or Houston.
The impact of the coronavirus, which has already left more than 1,000 deaths in the country, in the largest economy in the world is shaking the labor market, which has gone from the 281,000 requests of the week before to this new record number.
White House business adviser Peter Navarro said in an interview with Fox News that the number of unemployed is “totally expected because President Trump’s strategy is basically social distancing in order to fight the virus.”
The measures to face the pandemic have forced the closure of businesses, restaurants, gyms, entertainment venues, in addition to notably reducing the operations of airlines, cruise ships and tourism companies. Sports and music events have also been canceled.
The previous record of unemployed people was 695,000 in October 1982. In March 2009, 665,000 requests for subsidy were registered.
Federal Reserve Chairman: “We may already be in a recession”
The coronavirus pandemic is putting unprecedented pressure on the US economy, as recognized by Federal Reserve President Jerome Powell on Thursday. “We may already be in a recession,” he admitted in an interview on Savannah Guthrie on the show. TODAY from NBC.
However, Powell has promised that the central bank will continue to use tools to fight the economic slowdown caused by the global health crisis. “There may be a good economic rebound at the end of this,” he added.
“There is nothing fundamentally wrong with our economy, quite the contrary. When it comes to this loan, we are not going to run out of ammunition, that will not happen. We still have room for maneuver in other dimensions to support the economy,” he added.
The Senate approves the economic stimulus package for the coronavirus
After reaching an agreement with the White House for a $ 2 trillion economic stimulus package, The Senate approved Wednesday night the historic measure that will seek to counter the negative effects of the coronavirus pandemic on the country’s productive activities.
The measure will include checks for $ 1.2 billion for millions of Americans and more aid for the unemployed, as well as a fund to rescue companies most affected by the crisis caused by the coronavirus.
Now the law must now go to the Democrat-majority House of Representatives, where it will have to be passed before going to the office of President Donald Trump for ratification.
[Cinco claves del tercer plan de estímulo económico en el combate al coronavirus]
Bolivia tightens measures and declares health emergency
The measures to control the coronavirus are tightened in Bolivia, after the episodes of non-compliance with the quarantine, which led the interim government to declare a health emergency on Wednesday, when the confirmed cases in the country rose to 38.
“It is very serious,” warned the interim president of Bolivia, Jeanine Áñez, about the problems of enforcing the quarantine that has been in force since last Sunday.
Áñez addressed the nation accompanied by his cabinet from the Government Palace in La Paz, to emphasize that the failure to comply with the quarantine increased the risk of contagion in the country.
For this reason, his cabinet agreed to declare a “state of sanitary emergency,” which will be in effect from midnight until April 15, while quarantine had been decreed until April 4.
New York exceeds 30,000 cases and alerts of economic hole
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Wednesday that the number of coronavirus cases now exceeds 30,000 and deemed the $ 2 trillion fiscal stimulus package going to the US Congress insufficient. because the allocation that would correspond to the state, epicenter of the pandemic in the country, is “a drop” in front of the economic “hole” that it is estimated will cause in its accounts.
In his daily update broadcast online, Cuomo reported that there are 30,811 COVID-19 positives in the state, of which 3,805 (12%) are hospitalized and of them 888 (3%) are in intensive care (ICU), ” predominantly older people, with previous health problems or immunosuppressed “. 285 people have died so far.
The governor stressed that the state is “hunting for positives” to reduce the spread of the pathogen and that control of population density, through measures such as social distancing and the closing of businesses, is helping to slow down the pace of hospitalizations, whose number has gone from doubling every two days to almost five.
Cuomo said that New York “will return the favor” and “pay dividends” for the government’s efforts to deal with the pandemic, but criticized as insufficient the fiscal stimulus package that is addressed to Congress after being approved last night by the Senate, and which provides for direct payments and unemployment benefits to citizens, as well as to states and companies affected by the public health crisis unleashed by COVID-19.
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The state of New York corresponds to 3.8 billion dollars and the city of New York 1.3 billion of the estimated 2 billion of the plan, according to what he said, which is “terrible”.
“It is a drop in a bucket,” said Cuomo, who warned that the state will have a “hole as big as $ 15 billion” in costs and said the allocation falls short to “plug it.”
Mexico reports a sixth victim and increases the number of infections to 475
The Mexican health authorities reported on Wednesday the sixth death from COVID-19 in the country and a total of 475 infections, an increase of 14.73% in the last 24 hours, equivalent to 70 new cases.
The total number of infections reflects that accumulated since the detection of the first case in Mexico, on February 27, explained at a press conference the undersecretary of Prevention and Health Promotion, Hugo López-Gatell.
Regarding the five deaths and 405 cases reported on March 24, the number of infections rose to 475 with a sixth death, that of a 70-year-old man who also suffered from obesity and hypertension, López-Gatell said.
The expert confirmed the existence of 1,656 suspected cases of COVID-19 that are being studied and pointed out that another 2,445 have already been ruled out as infected with the disease.
WTO warns of worse global crisis than 2008
The director general of the World Trade Organization (WTO), Roberto Azevedo, warned that the world is facing an economic crisis worse than the one suffered in 2008, for which it must prepare with international collaboration and open markets, since “no country is self-sufficient. “
“The most recent projections predict a recession accompanied by job losses worse than the one caused by the financial crisis 12 years ago,” Azevedo said in a message recorded from his home and posted online by official WTO channels.
“COVID-19 threatens the lives of millions of people around the world, and although above all it is a health crisis, the pandemic will also have an inevitable impact on the economy, trade, jobs and well-being,” predicted the Brazilian politician.
200,000 jobs in Mexico’s hotel sector at risk
The coronavirus crisis puts 200,000 jobs in the Mexican hotel sector at risk and has already caused the closure of 153 establishments, the Mexican Association of Hotels and Motels (AMHM) reported in a statement on Wednesday.
The organization, which groups 100 hotel affiliates and more than 4,000 lodging establishments nationwide, noted that beach destinations have only a hotel occupancy of between 10% and 15%, while destinations such as Oaxaca and Mérida only have 5 %.
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For the next three weeks, the association reported a cancellation rate of 100% in destinations such as Puebla, Nuevo León and Acapulco, as well as one of up to 90% in Cancun, Tabasco and Huatulco.
Before the cancellations, he warned of losses of 25 million pesos (more than 1 million dollars) in Mexico City and more than 12 million pesos (about 500,000 dollars) in Guanajuato.
In addition, it foresaw the closure of another 85 properties “in the course of these days” on beaches such as Cancun and Nuevo Vallarta, and the main cities of the country, such as Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara, among other destinations.
Mexican Governor: “If they are rich they are at risk, the poor are immune”
The governor of the Mexican state of Puebla, Luis Miguel Barbosa Huerta, affirmed this Wednesday that the rich are the people most vulnerable to the coronavirus because “the poor are immune.”
In a press conference to offer an overview of the COVID-19 cases in Puebla, Barbosa highlighted before journalists that they observe the detail that “the majority of those infected are people who have financial comfort in their lives.”
“If they are rich they have the risk; if they are poor they are not. The poor are immune,” said Barbosa, governor of the National Regeneration Movement (Morena), the same political force as President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Thousands of Ecuadorians abroad due to the pandemic demand to return to their country
Between 1,700 and 4,000 Ecuadorians, according to different sources, are abroad without the option of being able to enter the national territory due to the closure of borders by COVID-19, and waiting for their government to offer them a solution.
The decision to suspend commercial arrival flights for international passengers on March 17, has left Ecuadorians who traveled abroad for tourism, studies, work or short-stay visits scattered across different countries, and who have urged the authorities to through different channels to favor their return.
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