Tag: Europe

Evidence mounted of the devastating economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic on Thursday as hard-hit Europe moved to further ease lockdown measures that ground its economies to a halt.

Germany and France reported major slumps in industrial production and Britain said its economic output would plummet by 14 percent this year. The United States was also expected to announce new jobless figures on Thursday showing millions more out of work.

Governments around the world are under immense pressure to ease the economic pain caused by measures to stop the virus, which has claimed more than 263,000 lives and left half of humanity under some form of lockdown.

Some European nations are now cautiously easing restrictions in the hopes of stabilising their reeling economies, with some shops and schools re-opening and even Germany’s Bundesliga football league to resume on May 15, though without spectators.

US President Donald Trump is also pushing for lockdown measures to be lifted, while engaging in a war of words with China that saw him claim the pandemic was a worse “attack” on the United States than Pearl Harbor or 9/11.

But experts have warned that social distancing will remain necessary until a vaccine is developed – and governments are keen to avoid a devastating second wave of infections.

The British government was on Thursday reviewing lockdown measures, with a partial easing expected to be announced this weekend.

Trouble for tourism

The easing has already begun in Germany, Europe’s largest economy, while on May 11 France is due to start emerging from a lockdown that began in mid-March, with Prime Minister Edouard Philippe to announce on Thursday how this initial de-confinement will take shape.

Many Europeans are anxious to get back to work, like Elena Isaac, a restaurant owner in Cyprus’s now-empty beach resort of Ayia Napa.

“You can’t survive with no tourists… It is impossible,” she told AFP, as nearby residents enjoyed the loosening of a six-week lockdown with swims in the Mediterranean.

Economists have been warning for weeks that the pandemic will lead to a global economic downturn not seen since the Great Depression of the 1930s and new data is bringing the impact into sharper focus.

The Bank of England said the economic output of Britain — which has the second-highest number of deaths in the world — was set to crash 14 percent this year.

The forecast came a day after the European Union warned of a 7.7-percent eurozone contraction in 2020.

Industrial production in Germany fell by 9.2 percent month-on-month in March, official figures showed Thursday, the worst fall since the manufacturing output data series was started in 1991.

The slump in France was even greater with industrial output dropping by 16.2 percent in March on a monthly basis.

Airlines and travel are among the sectors worst hit by the pandemic, with flights grounded worldwide and social distancing measures severely limiting leisure and business trips.

The World Tourism Organization said Thursday that the number of international tourist arrivals will plunge by 60 to 80 percent in 2020 because of the pandemic.

China hits back at Trump

Most of Europe has seen a significant drop in the number of new infections and deaths from the virus, though in Russia cases are on the rise and on Thursday it reported another record increase with more than 11,000 new infections.

The United States remains the hardest-hit country, with more than 1.2 million cases and over 73,000 deaths, but Trump has said it is crucial to re-open the shuttered economy.

Heading into a re-election campaign later this year, he has also ramped up his rhetoric against Beijing, telling reporters on Wednesday that the disease that emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan last year “should have never happened”.

“Could have been stopped at the source. Could have been stopped in China,” he said. “This is really the worst attack we’ve ever had… This is worse than Pearl Harbor. This is worse than the World Trade Center.”

China on Thursday called the remarks “disharmonious, untruthful and insincere”.

“We urge the US side to stop shifting the blame to China and turn to facts,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters in Beijing.

Tom Frieden, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, predicted the US death toll could top 100,000 by the end of May.

The pandemic has hammered healthcare infrastructure in many parts of the United States, including New York City, and its impact has been particularly severe among the poorest Americans such as undocumented migrants.

‘Spectre of multiple famines’

Many of them are afraid of deportation, as well as the risk of racking up unpayable medical bills and hurting their quest to obtain legal status. As a result, many have contracted and died of COVID-19.

“He was very ill but did not want to go to the hospital,” Victoria, a Mexican nanny in New York City, said of her 69-year-old husband who had kidney problems and diabetes.

“After two weeks, when he could no longer walk or breathe, my daughter took the risk, loaded him into the car and drove him there. He died three weeks later.”

“The most devastating and destabilising effects” of the pandemic “will be felt in the world’s poorest countries,” UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs Mark Lowcock said.

“Unless we take action now, we should be prepared for a significant rise in conflict, hunger and poverty. The spectre of multiple famines looms.”

Source: france24.com

A European Parliament building in Brussels is housing 100 homeless women – many of them victims of domestic abuse – who have been severely affected by Belgium’s coronavirus lockdown.

The Helmut Kohl building, an office block in the city centre, opened its doors to them on Wednesday.

Offices have been turned into bedrooms, each for one or two women. They also get meals and medical care there.

Samusocial, a charity, says the crisis has increased domestic abuse cases.

The parliament, based in the Belgian capital, teamed up with Samusocial to run the facility, which is much-needed because social distancing has forced many women’s shelters to close.

“We’ve had many cases of women thrown on to the streets since the lockdown started, because of domestic violence, which is tending to increase,” Samusocial director Sébastien Roy told public broadcaster RTBF.

The Brussels authorities are also providing emergency accommodation for homeless people in some hotels.

The European Parliament’s buildings are mostly empty. Sessions are now attended only by a few MEPs in the chamber, with others joining by video link.

The monthly full session in Strasbourg, eastern France, has been suspended until July. For years the Brussels-Strasbourg shuttle has been criticised, including by MEPs themselves, as a waste of EU money.

Parliament President David Sassoli, who toured the Helmut Kohl facility, said “this emergency affects all of us” and “in Brussels there is a lot of pain now”.

“I think this crisis should push all of us, the institutions included, to set a good example.”

Source: bbc.com

The first human trial in Europe of a coronavirus vaccine has begun in Oxford.

Two volunteers were injected, the first of more than 800 people recruited for the study.

Half will receive the Covid-19 vaccine, and half a control vaccine which protects against meningitis but not coronavirus.

The design of the trial means volunteers will not know which vaccine they are getting, though doctors will.

Elisa Granato, one of the two who received the jab, told the BBC: “I’m a scientist, so I wanted to try to support the scientific process wherever I can.”

The vaccine was developed in under three months by a team at Oxford University. Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at the Jenner Institute, led the pre-clinical research.

“Personally I have a high degree of confidence in this vaccine,” she said.

“Of course, we have to test it and get data from humans. We have to demonstrate it actually works and stops people getting infected with coronavirus before using the vaccine in the wider population.”

Prof Gilbert previously said she was “80% confident” the vaccine would work, but now prefers not to put a figure on it, saying simply she is “very optimistic” about its chances.

So how does the vaccine work?

The vaccine is made from a weakened version of a common cold virus (known as an adenovirus) from chimpanzees that has been modified so it cannot grow in humans.

The Oxford team has already developed a vaccine against Mers, another type of coronavirus, using the same approach – and that had promising results in clinical trials.

How will they know if it works?

The only way the team will know if the COVID-19 vaccine works is by comparing the number of people who get infected with coronavirus in the months ahead from the two arms of the trial.

That could be a problem if cases fall rapidly in the UK, because there may not be enough data.

Prof Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, who is leading the trial, said: “We’re chasing the end of this current epidemic wave. If we don’t catch that, we won’t be able to tell whether the vaccine works in the next few months. But we do expect that there will be more cases in the future because this virus hasn’t gone away.”

The vaccine researchers are prioritizing the recruitment of local healthcare workers into the trial as they are more likely than others to be exposed to the virus.

A larger trial, of about 5,000 volunteers, will start in the coming months and will have no age limit.

Source: bbc.com

Glastonbury’s famous Pyramid Stage will remain dark in June, as the festival becomes the latest event to be canceled due to coronavirus.

Taylor Swift, Sir Paul McCartney and Kendrick Lamar were due to appear, alongside Diana Ross and Dua Lipa.

“We’re so sorry that this decision has been made,” a statement said. “It was not through choice.”

Just six days ago, organizer Emily Eavis said she had “fingers firmly crossed” the event would go ahead.

But after the government advised people to avoid mass gatherings on Monday, cancellation became increasingly likely.

Organizers took the decision before 1 April, when festival-goers were expected to pay the remaining balance of their £270 tickets.

Fans who had already paid the £50 deposit will be allowed to roll over that sum to next year, guaranteeing “the opportunity to buy a ticket for Glastonbury 2021”, organisers said. Refunds will also be available for those who want them.

More than 200,000 people, including 135,000 ticket-holders, would have descended on Worthy Farm in Somerset if the festival had gone ahead from 24 to 28 June.

Other acts on the line-up included Noel Gallagher, Lana Del Rey, Herbie Hancock, the Pet Shop Boys, AJ Tracey and Haim.

“We very much hope that the situation in the UK will have improved enormously by the end of June,” said Michael and Emily Eavis in a statement.

“But even if it has, we are no longer able to spend the next three months with thousands of crew here on the farm, helping us with the enormous job of building the infrastructure and attractions.”

Saying 2020 would now be an “enforced fallow year” for the festival, they apologised for letting fans down.

“We were so looking forward to welcoming you all for our 50th anniversary with a line-up full of fantastic artists and performers that we were incredibly proud to have booked.”

They added: “We look forward to welcoming you back to these fields next year and until then, we send our love and support to all of you.”

BBC Radio 2 DJ Jo Whiley echoed many fans’ sentiments when she wrote on Twitter: “This is so devastatingly disappointing for so many people on so many levels.

“Next year Glastonbury is going to be off the scale,” she added. “But for now much love to Emily Eavis and the Glasto family.”

Musician Billy Bragg, who is an annual fixture at the festival, also expressed his disappointment.

Meanwhile, pop culture journalist Natalie Jamieson issued an open call for the BBC to raid its archive of Glastonbury footage to broadcast an “ultimate Glastonbury line-up” on the last weekend of June.

“Am still gonna need a live-music fix & it could bring *such* joy,” she wrote.

Glastonbury’s cancellation comes after BBC Radio 1 cancelled plans to host its Big Weekend festival in Dundee in May.

Source: bbc.com

The U.S. will restrict all travel from Europe with the exception of the U.K. starting later this week in an effort to curtail the spread of the new coronavirus, President Donald Trump announced Wednesday evening.

Addressing the nation from the Oval Office, Trump said the restrictions, which will go into effect on Friday, “will be adjusted subject to conditions on the ground,” and exemptions would be made for U.S. nationals “who have undergone appropriate screenings.”

“We made a life-saving move with early action on China. Now we must take the same action with Europe. We will not delay,” he said.

The announcement comes on the same day the World Health Organization officially termed the spread of COVID-19 a global pandemic and as the U.S. capital declared a state of emergency.

Source: www.aa.com.tr