US, Australia and Thailand also report first deaths from coronavirus
while bans are put in place around the world on large gatherings. Follow
live news
Boris
Johnson views a map of the spread of coronavirus in Italy on a visit to
Public Health England. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the
UK leapt to 35 after 12 new patients were identified in England
Photograph: Henry Nicholls/PA
The first person in Scotland has tested positive for Coronavirus.
The announcement brings the number of cases confirmed in the UK today alone to 13, and the total number of cases up to 36.
The patient, who is a resident of the Tayside area and had recently
travelled from Italy, has now been admitted to hospital and is receiving
treatment in isolation.
Clinicians have also started to gather details of the places they have
visited and the people they have been in contact with since they
returned to the UK.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has chaired a meeting of the Scottish
Government Resilience Committee this evening and will be taking part in
the UK Government’s resilience meeting, chaired by the prime minister,
tomorrow morning.
Sturgeon said: “First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said: “Our first thoughts
must be with the patient diagnosed with coronavirus, I wish them a
speedy recovery.
“Scotland is well-prepared for a significant outbreak of coronavirus but
there is currently no treatment or vaccine. Early detection measures
will continue to be vital in helping to prevent the spread of the virus.
“People have a vital role to play in helping us contain any outbreak by
following the latest health and travel advice, and following basic
hygiene precautions, such as washing hands frequently, not touching
their face and covering their nose and mouth with a tissue when coughing
or sneezing.”
There have been a total of 698 negative test results in Scotland since the outbreak began.
Sky News is reporting that Scotland has just reported its first
confirmed case of coronavirus, bringing the total in the UK up to 36.
The total new cases reported in the UK today is now 13 – the biggest single-day jump the UK has seen.
The director general of France’s health service, Jérôme Salomon, has
given the latest figures and there’s another leap on Sunday. The number
of confirmed cases has risen to 130, from 100. Of that, 116 people are
in hospital – nine of them in a serious condition – and 12 people
recovered. There have been two deaths
New cases include two children, a one-year-old and a five-year-old, who
have been hospitalised in Strasbourg in eastern France along with their
27-year-old mother who also tested positive. Their condition has been
described as not worrying.
Salomon says French travellers should avoid journeys abroad outside the
European Union “unless strictly necessary”. Nevertheless, he pointed out
the death rate worldwide is 3.4% of confirmed cases.
The Manga and Sci-Fi Show salon planned for next week in Paris, which
was to have featured giant karaoke and K Pop concerts, has been
cancelled.
Nine of Germany’s 16 states now have cases of COVID-19, with Frankfurt,
Hamburg and Bremen among the cities reporting their first infections, DW has reported.
Germany’s centre for disease control and prevention, the Robert Koch
Institute, said the number of people infected rose to 129 on Sunday, up
from 66 on Saturday.
Almost half of the cases, 74 in total, have been confirmed in North
Rhine-Westphalia, which is Germany’s most populous state. Bavaria has
the next highest number of confirmed cases, with 23, followed by
Baden-Württemberg with 15.
The Health Secretary Matt Hancock has said people should “still go about
their business”, but that the government was “considering all options”.
In an interview with Sky News a few minutes ago, he insisted the government’s plan was “very clear”. What are the government’s steps?
Firstly, the government are trying to contain the virus, he said. This
meant that “every single case found here gets immediate treatment”, with
their contacts tracked down and given medical advice or checks.
Hancock said that the government were trying to delay the onset of the
virus, having determined that the UK would be better able to cope with a
mass spread of coronavirus in the summer.
He also said that the government had invested £40 million into finding a
vaccine and treatments for disease. He warned that a vaccine was “still
many months off” even with an accelerated process, but treatments for
those who have virus already were “more optimistic”. What should the public do?
When asked if people should follow World Health Organisation advice to
other parts of the world that over 60s should avoid shared spaces, he
said no, as the cases were still “relatively low”.
“If we get to a position where this is endemic around the world and large scale here, we will change advice,” he added.
He also said that stopping flights from China was not the answer, comparing it to Italy, who did stop flights and have much higher numbers of cases than the UK.
He echoed Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s earlier statement that the best
thing the public can do is wash their hands for 20 seconds.
As Johnson referenced earlier, albeit slightly less clearly, the
government are telling children to sing ‘happy birthday’ whilst washing
their hands to ensure they wash for long enough.
The Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, said there needed to be “more
direction from the Prime Minister” and accused him of being slow to
organise COBRA meetings - the government’s emergency response committee.
He said that the NHS were “really doing their best” and said that
clinicians would “always rise to the challenge”. However, he alleged
that 80% of the beds needed for coronavirus are already taken up, saying
that years of austerity meant resources to tackle the spread of the
virus would be stretched.
Non-essential British embassy staff in Tehran are being withdrawn with
immediate effect due to the virus, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
(FCO) has confirmed. The FCO also warned that the embassy’s help to
British nationals in Iran would be limited.
A statement said: “As of 1 March, dependants and some staff from the
British Embassy are being withdrawn from Iran due to the ongoing
coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. Essential staff needed to continue
critical work will remain.
“In the event that the situation deteriorates further, the ability of
the British Embassy to provide assistance to British nationals from
within Iran may be limited.”
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The Trump administration has accused the public of overreacting to the
impact of the coronavirus on the economy, and insisted that stocks would
bounce back.
The S&P 500 index dropped 11.5% last week as coronavirus spread -
the worst weekly drop since the 2008 global financial crisis.
“The stock market that saw some downturns this week, it will come back,”
Vice President Mike Pence, who is leading the government’s response to
the virus, told NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The fundamentals of this
economy are strong.” he added.
Pence also said the government was doing “everything possible” to
prevent the virus from spreading and that he was “confident” the United
States was prepared.
U.S. Health Secretary Alex Azar told Fox News Sunday that the public was over-reacting to the current threat. The situation in the US
A Washington man in his 50s with underlying health conditions was the
first American to die from the virus, officials confirmed on Saturday.
How the man contracted the virus is still not known.
Over the weekend, new cases were confirmed in Chicago and Rhode Island.
Morocco is set to postpone sports and cultural events over coronavirus
fears, the government health committee has announced. It’s currently
unclear how widespread this measure will be.
Morocco says it has tested 25 people suspected of having the coronavirus
but all have been negative, and the country does not have any confirmed
cases.
Oman has suspended Italian tourist flights from Salala airport for a month, in an attempt to halt the spread of the virus.
Qatar has also announced a temporary ban on visitors from Egypt via
intermediate points, the state news agency reported on Sunday.
Two new cases were confirmed in Qatar on Sunday, bringing its total to 3.
A school in Dublin is set to close for two weeks after a student tested positive for coronavirus, according to the Irish Times.
The teenager is the first person in the Republic of Ireland to test
positive for the virus, and the case was announced on Saturday evening.
The individual became ill in recent days after returning from Italy and
is currently in isolation in a Dublin hospital.
Students at the school are being told to self-isolate at home if they start presenting symptoms.
Andrew Tatem, professor within geography and environmental science at
the University of Southampton, has warned that the recent imported cases
of coronavirus into China are indicative of a “move towards a global pandemic”.
“We’ve reached a stage now where China’s major efforts to stop the
outbreak within its borders have meant that it likely has stronger
coronavirus surveillance and detection capabilities than anywhere else
in the world,” he said.
“The fact that China is now detecting and reporting imported cases that are coming from Iran and
the UK is an indication of how the geographical balance of this
outbreak is shifting as we seemingly move towards a global pandemic.”
The Dominican Republic has confirmed its first case of coronavirus – a tourist visiting the country from Italy.
The patient is a 62-year-old man, who is in a stable condition. He has
been taken to an isolation room in a military hospital near the capital,
the country’s health minister, Rafael Sanchez, said at a press
conference.
Another tourist, a 56-year-old man from France, is under observation at hospital and awaiting test results for coronavirus.
On Friday, the Dominican Republic cancelled all flights from Milan for
30 days. The government also said that all travellers retuning from
Italy would have to undergo epidemiological reviews at airports.
Speaking at a laboratory at the Public Health England national infection
service in Colindale, north London, Boris Johnson praised the work of
PHE.
He said there were likely to be more cases of coronavirus but said:
“We’ve got a great plan to tackle the spread of coronavirus and I’m
confident that in the NHS we’ve got professionals who are able to cope
with it.”
He also gave tips for stopping the spread of coronavirus:
“The best way we can help the NHS and help ourselves to stop the spread
of the illness is to wash our hands. It’s 20 seconds, it’s two times
happy birthday. With hot water and soap.”
Boris Johnson spoke after the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the UK leapt to 35. Photograph: Henry Nicholls/PAThe
prime minister will be chairing another Cobra meeting on coronavirus on
Monday. “We will be setting out the various measures in the way public
should be responding, and public bodies should be responding.”
He wouldn’t be drawn on the details of what these measures might look
like. “I don’t want to go now into the kind of things that might be
necessary,” he said. “There’ll be questions we might need to consider
about very big public events.”
Johnson also said the government may need to consider closing schools,
but expressed that he wanted them to remain open and did not want
children to be sent home “unnecessarily”.
“Coronavirus is of concern, but we amply have the resources to deal with it. Believe me, we are going to beat this,” he said.
The number of confirmed cases in Italy has risen to almost 1,700, and
the death toll has increased by five to 34, Reuters reports.
There were 1,128 cases and 29 death as of last night.
This is the largest jump the spread of the virus in one day, Sky News says.
Good evening, I’m Molly Blackall, taking over the live coverage of coronavirus for the next few hours.
If you spot something I miss, do drop me a tweet: @mollyblackall.
Boris Johnson has been on a visit to laboratory at the Public Health
England National Infection Service in Colindale, north London.
Johnson’s
visit came as the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the UK leapt
to 35 after 12 new patients were identified in England Photograph:
Henry Nicholls/PA
Boris
Johnson views a map of the spread of coronavirus in Italy on a visit to
Public Health England. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the
UK leapt to 35 after 12 new patients were identified in England
Photograph: Henry Nicholls/PA
