2020-03-31: News Headlines

RT (2020-03-31). Chris Cuomo of CNN tests positive for coronavirus after scolding people who don't self-isolate. rt.com CNN anchor Chris Cuomo is self-quarantining after testing positive for coronavirus, his brother New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has confirmed, proving that even spreading hysterical fear of the virus is no protection from it. | The journalist revealed he had tested positive in a statement posted to Twitter on Tuesday, and his older brother confirmed the diagnosis during his morning coronavirus press conference in Albany,

RT (2020-03-31). Give us a password clue, Boris! PM Johnson LEAKS cabinet Zoom meeting's private ID as he tweets screenshot. rt.com Self-isolating British PM Boris Johnson has been left red-faced after making his UK cabinet Zoom meeting ID public on social media, prompting some to cheekily suggest they'll join in next time if they can guess the password. | Johnson tweeted a screenshot of his Zoom meeting on Tuesday afternoon, in which ministers and key officials all appeared on a single screen via the video conferencing app to discuss the coronavirus crisis. | However, eagle-eyed observers, like Virgin Media News' Richard Chambers, noticed that Johnson had been somewhat slack in maintaining tight security protocols by failing to hide the p…

RT (2020-03-31). Taliban team arrives in Kabul for 1st time since 2001, will monitor prisoner release — spokesman. rt.com A three-member Taliban technical team arrived in the Afghan capital on Tuesday to monitor the release of their prisoners, a spokesman for the insurgent group said. The move is part of a peace deal signed by the Taliban and the US. | Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the team's arrival in a tweet. It marked the first time a Taliban delegation has been in Kabul since the group was driven out by the US-led coalition in November 2001, AP said. | US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday praised the Afghan government negotiating team that was identified to hold talks with the Taliban as appearing to…

teleSUR (2020-03-31). Twitter Blocks Iranian Leader's Accounts. telesurenglish.net In the early hours onTuesday morning, Twitter blocked the accounts of the Islamic Revolution leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. | RELATED: According to the Twitter notification, the Iranian supreme leader accounts violate the social network policies. Twitter administration did not give more details of specific reasons for the action. | The profiles in Arab, English, and Persian were censored. Then Persian and English on…

sputniknews (2020-03-31). Emily Ratajkowski Sparkles in Nearly Nude COVID-19 Quarantine Pic. sputniknews.com Social media updates are hardly a rare thing during the global quarantine and self-isolation, but Emily Ratajkowski has made hers a bit more out of the ordinary, stretching her best angles for new shots and naturally showcasing her personal stress killer – the fluffy pup Colombo.

sputniknews (2020-03-31). Netizens Lambast Vietnamese Model For Making Swimsuit Out of Medical Masks Amid COVID-19 Pandemic. sputniknews.com The coronavirus outbreak has put immense pressure on healthcare systems and resulted in a shortage of medication and medical equipment. There have been more than 800,000 confirmed cases worldwide, with 38,000 deaths.

yenisafak (2020-03-31). Russian doctor who met Putin last week diagnosed with coronavirus. yenisafak.com A doctor who gave Russian President Vladimir Putin a tour of Moscow's main coronavirus hospital last week said on Tuesday he had himself been diagnosed with the virus.Putin visited the Kommunarka hospital last Tuesday where he chatted to the doctor, Denis Protsenko. Neither man was wearing protective equipment during their conversation, TV footage from the visit showed.Protsenko, writing on Facebook said: "Yes, I have tested positive for coronavirus, but I feel pretty good. I've isolated myself in my office. I think the immunity I've developed this month is doing its job."The Kremlin said that Putin was being reg…

IRNA (2020-03-31). Germany confirms first INSTEX transaction. iranian.com The Federal Foreign Office of Germany in a tweet confirmed the first transaction with Iran through the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX) on Tuesday. The Federal Foreign Office of Germany wrote in its Twitter page, "France, Germany and the United Kingdom confirm that INSTEX has successfully concluded its first transaction, facilitating the export …

pip.hinman (2020-03-31). Robodebt scam exposed as a rort. greenleft.org.au

Eds. (2020-03-31). Video of flour truck being looted goes viral; 'no wrong was done,' says truck owner. mronline.org 'I believe that they have done no wrong because there is widespread hunger [amidst the lockdown] and people are helpless.'

RT (2020-03-30). 'Incredibly selfish': Labour MP who broke Covid-19 travel rules to wish elderly father happy birthday leaves people divided. rt.com A UK lawmaker who traveled miles to celebrate the birthday of his father — ex-Labour leader Neil Kinnock — going against government lockdown rules on coronavirus, provoking fierce debate on the rights and wrongs of such action. | Stephen Kinnock — the Labour MP for Aberavon in South Wales — tweeted on Saturday a picture with his parents in their front garden in London in aid of his father's birthday, insisting that he and his wife were abiding by social distancing rules. | However it prompted a telling off from the police via Twitter who deemed it "not essential travel," and urged Kinno…

RT (2020-03-30). Twitter REMOVES posts by Brazil's Bolsonaro in crackdown on information that 'may increase risk' of Covid-19 spread. rt.com In an unprecedented move, Twitter has yanked two posts by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, in which he took aim at coronavirus lockdowns as part of his controversial campaign to avoid a shutdown of the economy. | Bolsonaro has become the first ever head of state to have his tweets censored by the platform under recently-updated guidelines, requiring users to remove content that defies "global or local health authorities recommendations" aimed at halting the spread of the deadly disease that has already taken hold in the Latin American country. | I could be mistaken but I'm pretty sure these two tweets from…

RT (2020-03-30). Number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in Netherlands surpasses 11,000 as death toll nears 900. rt.com Dutch authorities have registered 884 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of infected nationwide to 11,750. The grim tally linked to the dreaded virus has jumped by 93 to 864. | The number of coronavirus hospitalizations in the Netherlands has almost reached 4,000, the national RTL broadcaster reported, as 507 new patients were admitted to hospitals over the last 24 hours. The Netherlands' National Institute for Health (RIVM) confirmed the numbers in its official Twitter account. | Sinds gisteren zijn er in Nederland: | – 93 mensen overleden aan COVID-19 gemeld (Totaal 864) | – 507 mensen opgenome…

RT (2020-03-30). Iran's Covid-19 death toll reaches 2,757 with almost 41,500 identified cases. rt.com There are 41,495 Covid-19 cases in Iran, the country's health officials reported in the latest update. The death toll from the pandemic has reached 2,757 in the Islamic Republic, a nation hit hard by the viral disease.

RT (2020-03-30). Billy Joe Saunders' boxing license suspended following controversial video. rt.com The British Boxing Board of Control has suspended WBO super-middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders after he released video in which he appeared to condone men engaging in domestic violence during coronavirus isolation. | Undefeated Saunders, 30, released the video to social media showing him striking a punching bag and offering advice on techniques to use on one's spouse or girlfriend should tempers begin to fray during the current period of social distancing. | Saunders issued an apology following a social media backlash, saying that he "would never condone" domestic violence and implied that the video was…

teleSUR (2020-03-30). Outcry as Migrants in India Are Sprayed With Disinfectant. telesurenglish.net Health workers in India caused outrage Monday on social media after spraying a group of migrant workers with chemical disinfectant, amid fears that a massive displacement of people from cities to the countryside could spread the novel coronavirus. | RELATED: | A video that circulated online showed a group of migrant workers in a district in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh being doused in disinfectant by health offic…

WSWS (2020-03-30). China: COVID-19 hospital construction worker's protest blog goes viral before being deleted. wsws.org The worker described the wage theft and repressive conditions suffered by thousands of construction employees who build hospitals in Wuhan at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.

teleSUR (2020-03-30). Colombia: Violence Against Social Leaders Continues. telesurenglish.net Harassment and violence against social leaders in Colombia has continued, despite the ongoing quarantine that has been imposed due to the Covid-19 outbreak. | RELATED: Social and agricultural leaders comply with isolation in their homes as part of the restrictive measures for the spread of the virus. Because of this circumstance, they are easy targets for violent acts. | The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights said on Twitter this week that the aggression against John Restrep…

teleSUR (2020-03-30). St. Kitts and Nevis Thanks Cuba for Its Aid Against COVID-19. telesurenglish.net The government of Saint Kitts and Nevis expressed Saturday its appreciation and gratitude for the assistance Cuban authorities are providing to the Caribbean island to help it handle the novel coronavirus outbreak. | RELATED: | In a message published on Twitter, Saint Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Timothy Harris announced that a Cuban medical team is arriving at the country to help cure the COVID-19 cases and prevent their increase.

Health Care Voter, Indivisible, others (2020-03-30). Live Stream: Health Care Town Hall: Our Lives On The Line Series Kick-off. indybay.org Live stream on Facebook…

sputniknews (2020-03-30). #LETSLOVESUHO Trends Worldwide as EXO Leader's Solo Album, MV Released. sputniknews.com The leader of the popular K-pop boy band EXO has finally made his solo debut, showing his warm and tender side.

sputniknews (2020-03-30). 'Now isn't the Time to Do That': US Congressman Again Slams Hillary Clinton Over Her Trump Jab. sputniknews.com On Friday, Hillary Clinton shared a recent report from The New York Times about the US now leading the world in the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases, tweeting that President Trump "did promise 'America First'".

yenisafak (2020-03-30). Chinese philanthropist sends medical aid to Europe. yenisafak.com A Chinese businessman and philanthropist on Monday said his foundation will rush urgent medical aid to Europe, the new epicenter of coronavirus.In a tweet, Jack Ma, founder of China's Alibaba Group, called for unity in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed over 34,600 lives across the globe since last December."Jack Ma Foundation and Alibaba Foundation will donate additional urgent equipment including 800 ventilators, 300,000 sets of protective gowns and 300,000 face shields to hospitals in Europe. #OneWorldOneFight," he tweeted.He previously sent medical aid to many countries in Asia and Afr…

Caitlin A. Johnstone (2020-03-30). All the craziest things about America are being highlighted by this virus. mronline.org "Corona is a black light and America is a cum-stained hotel room," comedian Megan Amram colorfully tweeted a couple of weeks ago. Her observation has only grown more accurate since.

teleSUR (2020-03-29). Turkey Becomes Latest Victim of Coronavirus as Death Toll Soars. telesurenglish.net In the past 24 hours in Turkey, 16 more people lost their lives due to COVID-19, raising the death toll to 108, Turkish Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said on Saturday night. | RELATED: | The total number of novel coronavirus cases rose to 7,402 in Turkey, the minister tweeted, which is a significant rise in the total number of people infected by the illness. | A total of 7,641 tests were performed on Saturd…

teleSUR (2020-03-29). US Teen Dies After Being Rejected by Clinic for No Insurance. telesurenglish.net A 17-year-old U.S. citizen with symptoms of coronavirus did not receive medical attention at an emergency clinic because he did not have health insurance, Lancaster Mayor Rex Parris said on March 25 in a video posted on YouTube. | RELATED: | "He did not have insurance, so he was not treated," Parris said, adding that medical personnel at this emergency center, whose name was not released by authorities, advised…

IRNA (2020-03-29). Zarif warns US to stop aiding war crimes. iranian.com Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in a message referred to the US' background of sabotage and assassinations and warned Americans to stop aiding war crimes. twitter.com/JZarif/status/1244229089772224512 "The US has gone from sabotage & assassinations to waging an economic war & #EconomicTerrorism on Iranians—to #MedicalTerror amidst #covid19iran," Zarif wrote on his Twitter account on Sunday, adding: …

RT (2020-03-29). ONE MUST PAY: Trump promises Harry & Meghan no free ride in US. rt.com President Donald Trump has assured Britain's Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle that the US taxpayer won't be footing their security bill, after the absconding royals left Canada to settle in Los Angeles. | "I am a great friend and admirer of the Queen & the United Kingdom," Trump tweeted on Sunday. "It was reported that Harry and Meghan, who left the Kingdom, would reside permanently in Canada. Now they have left Canada for the US however, the US will not pay for their security protection. They must pay!" | I am a great friend and admirer of the Queen & the United Kingdom. It was reported that Harry and Megh…

The Canary (2020-03-28). NHS staff launch website to help colleagues working in 'scary' and 'heartbreaking' environments. thecanary.co Two friends have launched a free set of online resources to help NHS staff cope with the stresses of working during the coronavirus pandemic. | Trained cognitive behavioural hypnotherapists Slee Parrish and Alex James designed The website contains instructions for a set of eight techniques, accompanied by simple YouTube videos, to help staff manage feelings of fear, anxiety and stress while they are at work. | This includes breathing exercises, guided meditatio…

Conn Hallinan (2020-03-27). How austerity and anti-immigrant politics left Italy exposed to viral blitzkrieg. peoplesworld.org As the viral blitzkrieg rolls across one European border after another, it seems to have a particular enmity for Italy. The country's death toll has far surpassed China's, and scenes from its hospitals look like something out of Dante's imagination. Why? Italy has the fourth-largest economy in the European Union, and in terms of health …

RT (2020-03-27). 'Open your STUPIDLY abandoned plant': Trump lashes out at GM & Ford over ventilator delay. rt.com President Donald Trump has lost his patience with automakers who promised to produce ventilators to treat Covid-19 patients, threatening to invoke his emergency powers to force General Motors and Ford to live up to their pledge. | "They said they were going to give us 40,000 much needed Ventilators, 'very quickly,'" Trump tweeted on Friday. "Now they are saying it will only be 6000, in late April, and they want top dollar." | He added that it's "always a mess" with GM CEO Mary Barra, and that he will invoke the Defense Production Act, a piece of wartime legislation giving the president the power to order manuf…

Staff (2020-03-24). Economist Jeffrey Sachs: Trump "Understands Nothing, Listens to Nothing" as Pandemic Surges in U.S. democracynow.org As #NotDying4WallStreet trends on Twitter, President Trump defies his top scientists and soaring infection rate, saying he will ease restrictions soon to jumpstart the economy. We speak with economist Jeffrey Sachs about the stimulus package that failed to pass again Monday, as Democrats called the measure a slush fund for corporations. Sachs also led the WHO's Commission on Macroeconomics and Health from 2000 to 2001 and played a key role in conceiving and establishing the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which helped distribute new medicines to fight infectious diseases.

Puja Mehta, Daniel F McAuley, Michael Brown, Emilie Sanchez, Rachel S Tattersall, Jessica J Manson, HLH Across Speciality Collaboration, UK (2020-03-16). [Correspondence] COVID-19: consider cytokine storm syndromes and immunosuppression. thelancet.com As of March 12, 2020, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been confirmed in 125 048 people worldwide, carrying a mortality of approximately 3 ∑7%,1 compared with a mortality rate of less than 1% from influenza. There is an urgent need for effective treatment. Current focus has been on the development of novel therapeutics, including antivirals and vaccines. Accumulating evidence suggests that a subgroup of patients with severe COVID-19 might have a cytokine storm syndrome. We recommend identification and treatment of hyperinflammation using existing, approved therapies with proven safety profiles to addre…

Justin Stebbing, Anne Phelan, Ivan Griffin, Catherine Tucker, Olly Oechsle, Dan Smith, Peter Richardson (2020-02-27). [Comment] COVID-19: combining antiviral and anti-inflammatory treatments. thelancet.com Both coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) are characterised by an overexuberant inflammatory response and, for SARS, viral load is not correlated with the worsening of symptoms.1,2 In our previous Correspondence to The Lancet,3 we described how BenevolentAI's proprietary artificial intelligence (AI)-derived knowledge graph,4 queried by a suite of algorithms, enabled identification of a target and a potential therapeutic against SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; the causative organism in COVID-19).

Elaine Y P Lee, Ming-Yen Ng, Pek-Lan Khong (2020-02-24). [Comment] COVID-19 pneumonia: what has CT taught us? thelancet.com In late December, 2019, a cluster of cases of viral pneumonia was linked to a seafood market in Wuhan (Hubei, China), and was later determined to be caused by a novel coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; previously known as 2019-nCoV).1 The genome sequence of SARS-CoV-2 is similar to, but distinct from, those of two other coronaviruses responsible for large-scale outbreaks in the past: severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV; about 79% sequence identity) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV; about 50%).

Yang Pan, Daitao Zhang, Peng Yang, Leo L M Poon, Quanyi Wang (2020-02-24). [Correspondence] Viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in clinical samples. thelancet.com An outbreak caused by a novel human coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was first detected in Wuhan in December 2019,1 and has since spread within China and to other countries. Real-time RT-PCR assays are recommended for diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection.2 However, viral dynamics in infected patients are still yet to be fully determined. Here, we report our findings from different types of clinical specimens collected from 82 infected individuals.

Uduak Okomo, Olubukola T Idoko, Beate Kampmann (2020-02-20). [Comment] The burden of viral respiratory infections in young children in low-resource settings. thelancet.com Acute lower respiratory infections (ALRI), encompassing bacterial and viral pneumonias, acute viral bronchiolitis, and bacterial and viral bronchitis, remain the leading cause of global child mortality.1 The thrust of global prevention and treatment efforts has been directed against bacterial causes of ALRI, and deaths from bacterial pneumonia have decreased substantially since 1990 because of improved access to health care and life-saving antibiotics, as well as increased use of vaccines targeted at bacterial respiratory pathogens.

Claudio Ronco, Paolo Navalesi, Jean Louis Vincent (2020-02-06). [Spotlight] Coronavirus epidemic: preparing for extracorporeal organ support in intensive care. thelancet.com Zoonotic viral infections are more frequently crossing species to infect human populations. In 2003, the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus was transmitted to humans from exotic animals in wet markets in China, and in 2015, the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) virus was transmitted from camels in Saudi Arabia. In both cases, and with the 2019 coronavirus outbreak in China, the original host of the virus is likely to be bats.

Nermin Diab, Matthew B Stanbrook, M Hashim Khan, Anju Anand (2020-02-05). [Correspondence] Nicotine patches with e-cigarettes for smoking cessation: Twitter discussion from a respirology journal club. thelancet.com On Dec 12, 2019, our Twitter-based University of Toronto Respirology and Sleep Journal Club1 discussed Walker and colleagues' pragmatic, randomised, parallel-arm trial designed to look at the effectiveness of combining nicotine patches with an e-cigarette (with and without nicotine) on 6-month smoking abstinence.2 Our discussions highlighted the challenges of studying populations of smokers in general, given the habitual nature of the exposure, challenges related to follow-up, and a need for reliable and valid objective measures of smoking abstinence (appendix).