Japan & Russia Report Worrisome Surge In New Cases, Britons Warned Lockdown To Be Extended: Live Updates

As Holy Week draws to a close and the long Holiday Weekend begins, the optimism that helped inspire the biggest bounce since the ‘rona rout appears to have faded, and Dow futs are back to being three figures in the red Thursday morning, pointing to a lower open as traders realize the ‘plateaus’ supposedly reached in Italy, Spain and New York didn’t really mean anything. And while the Germans truly do seem to be on top of things, other hotspots in Europe are already cropping up, as China tightens its borders as experts warn about a ‘second wave’.

Over the past 24 hours, the US reported 32,176 new cases of coronavirus and 1,901 new deaths, raising its totals to 432,727 cases and 14,768 dead, with the most widely followed projections suggesting that the US will pass half a million confirmed cases before Easter Sunday. Yesterday, NY reported its biggest one-day jump in deaths yet, and the pace of spread appeared to accelerate across Europe.

Now, we wake of Thursday morning to find that officials in Tokyo and Moscow have reported record numbers of new cases (that, and Russia recorded its biggest daily jump in deaths).

Meanwhile, as the US moves to try and stop the IMF from approving Iran’s request for a $5 billion bailout, the Ayatollah has once again chosen to retaliate in the only venue Trump truly understands: Twitter.

#CoronaVirus is a major problem for mankind. But we won’t forget that in Vietnam, Iraq, etc. hundreds of thousands of ppl were killed by the US. Even now, millions suffer from the tyranny of the US & its allies in Yemen, Palestine, etc.
Mankind has worse problems than Corona.

— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) April 9, 2020

Experts in Europe insist that the lockdowns, social distancing and other measures taken to combat the spread of the virus, and that may be true, but what about places like Iran, Afghanistan or other battered, broken countries that simply don’t have the resources to combat the virus. To be fair, Iran, despite the sanctions, still has money and resources, relative to places like Syria, which is struggling with an outbreak that has alarmed international aid agencies.

Despite the continuing civil war, a war seemingly without end as it nears the 10-year mark, enough tests have been run on Syrian citizens that 19 have been confirmed, and two deaths have been confirmed. Testing, however, is “virtually non-existent” throughout the country, and many fear that the camps of impoverished, displaced peoples in the country will be rapid breeding grounds for the virus.

However, since the west and Iran have their hands full, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is going to need to rely on whatever he receives from Russia to combat the virus. And  on Thursday, Russia reported 1,459 new cases of coronavirus and 13 new deaths, the biggest daily increase to date, bringing its total case load past 10k. In total, 76 Russians have died.

As the race for treatments continues, Pfizer reportedly expects to be able to test a new antiviral medication for coronavirus in humans by August or September, accelerating the clinical trial timeline as the US drug giant expands its work in the battle against the virus. On the political front, Oliver Dowden, the UK culture secretary, has suggested the public should prepare for an extension of the current three-week coronavirus lockdown that ends on Monday. Foreign secretary Dominic Raab, who is deputizing for Mr Johnson while the prime minister is in intensive care, will chair a virtual meeting of the government’s emergency planning committee (Cobra) on Thursday afternoon. Meanwhile, polls show support for a national unity government – as it gradually becomes clear that, after spending his third night in the ICU, the PM might need another week or two to recover.

As the numbers of new cases continue to fall, Spain’s government is hailing “encouraging” progress, a sign that the strict lockdown imposed by PM Pedro Sanchez last month, is working. However, members of the opposition have accused the government of deliberately undercounting cases, and since testing is uneven across the country, it’s extremely likely that the true number of cases is at least modestly higher than the total recorded.

According to official figures published on Thursday, so far 15,238 people with coronavirus have died, 683 of them in the last 24 hours, compared with 757 the previous day and a peak of 950 a week ago. Overall, Spain has now confirmed 152,446 cases of the virus as of Thursday morning, an increase of 4% over Wednesday’s count. This is roughly the same rate of increase that has been observed throughout this week, and is below the 25%-30% growth rates seen in the very recent past.

And apparently, even an unprecedented pandemic isn’t enough to inspire comity among the member states of the fractious EU. As we noted last night, the ECB’s Christine Lagarde urged them in a letter published in several European dailies to set their differences aside and agree on a multilateral plan that will be strong enough to help revive Europe’s recession-bound economy. EU governments ratcheted up the pressure on the Netherlands on Thursday to unblock half-a-trillion euros of economic support ahead of a meeting of finance ministers, as the country has emerged as a key antagonist to Italy in the negotiations to help support Europe’s most damaged economies. The Scandinavian countries like Netherlands have seen the virus spread, but mortality rates have remained low. 

But even as the outbreak finally appears to be heading down the back slope in Italy and Spain, other European nations, the Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, etc., are rising up to take their place.