Coronavirus death toll Saturday doubled to 21 as the killer bug sweeps Britain.
Ten patients who had tested positive for the deadly bug died – up from yesterday’s 11 fatalities recorded this week as countries continue to go into lockdown in a desperate attempt to stop the spread.
There are currently 820 cases of coronavirus in the UK.
And the fallout over coronavirus Saturday saw Jet2 cancel all of its flights to Spain after the country declared a state of emergency.
In the UK, Boris Johnson will next week ban all mass gatherings in a bid to fight coronavirus.
The PM decided on the move after a host of cancellations — from the London marathon to the Premier League, sources said.
It comes as it was revealed a newborn baby had become one of the youngest in the world to test positive for the virus.
Mr Johnson this week announced only the most serious ill will be tested for coronavirus, while others exhibiting symptoms were told to self-isolate.
And in a thinly-veiled swipe, WHO’s director general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, warned every case needed to be tested and treated to “break the chains”.
He said: “You can’t fight a virus if you don’t know where it is.
“Find, isolate, test and treat every case to break the chains of Covid transmission. Every case we find and treat limits the expansion of the disease.
“Do not just let this fire burn. Any country that looks at the experience of other countries with large epidemics and thinks ‘that won’t happen to us’ is making a deadly mistake.”
Europe became the new coronavirus epicentre this week as the number of deaths globally surpassed 5,000.
Yet Chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance said it was wrong to implement knee-jerk measures “that seem instantly attractive”.
Sir Patrick said if 60 per cent of healthy Brits catch coronavirus, it will help protect the most vulnerable by creating “herd immunity”.
His believes it would stop it spreading among the rest of the population.
The contagion would otherwise return next winter, when the NHS is ill-equipped to cope.
He added: “Our aim is to try and reduce the peak, broaden the peak, not suppress it completely.”
Meanwhile in the US, Donald Trump has launched coronavirus testing centres at local supermarkets and car parks.
Care homes now have orders that any resident with a cough or fever must be immediately isolated — and cared for by staff in protective masks and gloves.
Sick people will be banned from visiting. But some families fear loved ones would die alone.
Several providers have already started telling families to stay away.
Similarly, Apple will shut all of its retail stores outside of China for two weeks to help control the spread of the coronavirus.
Chief executive Tim Cook announced the move in a letter posted to the company’s website, writing that Apple learned lessons from the closures of its stores in “greater China” during the worst of the outbreak there.
“One of those lessons is that the most effective way to minimise risk of the virus’s transmission is to reduce density and maximize social distance,” he wrote.
The measure affects the hundreds of Apple stores across the globe and is set to last until March 27.
This week, the iPhone maker reopened all 42 of its locations in China after they began to be shuttered in early February as the number of coronavirus cases skyrocketed there.
China has since seen steep declines in the number of new infections, leading the World Health Organisation to say on Friday that the epicentre of the pandemic had shifted to Europe.
Mr Cook said all affected hourly employees would continue to be paid as if the stores were open and that all sites are undergoing a deep cleaning.
According to him, Apple has donated $15 million to the global response to the pandemic.
The U.S. tech giant, which makes many of its products in China, warned last month it no longer expected to meet its previous quarterly earnings guidance as a result of the virus.
It cited worldwide iPhone supply problems due to factory closures and falling demand in China.
(dpa/NAN)
