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N.Y. Deaths Top 9,000; New U.S. Cases Rise 5.4%: Virus Update

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N.Y. Deaths Top 9,000; New U.S. Cases Rise 5.4%: Virus Update
An emergency medical technician (EMT), wearing personal protective equipment (PPE), prepares a stretcher at a scene in Teaneck, New Jersey, U.S. (Photographer: Angus Mordant/Bloomberg)

(Bloomberg) --

New York State has one of the world’s highest death tolls, but fewer patients went to hospitals, a positive trend noted by the governor. Fewer new deaths were reported in hard-hit Italy and France.

The rate of increase for new U.S. cases fell for a second day. A Fed banker cast doubt on a rapid recovery after economic life restarts.

France, Germany, Italy and Spain reported a slowdown in new cases, allowing governments to seek ways for safely easing lockdowns. The U.K. became the fifth nation to record more than 10,000 deaths.

Key Developments

  • Coronavirus Tracker: Global cases exceed 1.8 million; deaths top 113,000
  • Pork producer warns of meat shortages
  • NBA owner Mark Cuban sees fanless game
  • Cruise passengers spend Easter on “ghost ship”
  • Volatile data complicates ending Europe lockdown
  • China’s Harbin tightens measures
N.Y. Deaths Top 9,000; New U.S. Cases Rise 5.4%: Virus Update

N.J. Starts Planning for Possible Reopening (4:45 p.m. NY)

New Jersey reported an additional 168 deaths from Covid-19, bringing the statewide total to 2,350. Cases climbed by 6% to 61,850, a sixth straight day the increase was less than 10%.

Murphy said on CNN that said he and his staff spent time over the weekend “beginning to war-game” a possible reopening. But he said there won’t be any such move until the virus crisis has abated.

“Right now, the house is on fire, and job number one is to put the fire out,” he said.

U.S. Case Rate Falls for Second Day (4 p.m. NY)

U.S. cases rose 5.4% from a day earlier to more than 542,000 by midday Sunday, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University and Bloomberg News. The rise was below the 7.9% average daily increase over the past week.

Cases rose almost 10% for the 24 hours ended on April 8, according to the data, a rate that fell to 7.9% on Friday and 5.6% on Saturday.

New York’s cases rose about 4%. South Dakota experienced a 17% rise from Saturday, bringing the total to 730.

Elsewhere:

  • Florida added six deaths, for a statewide total to 452, the Department of Health reported. The state has 19,347 total cases. While testing has increased, only 11% are positive.
  • Rhode Island reported seven new deaths, bringing the total to 63. The Department of Health added 316 cases, for a total of 2,665.
  • Philadelphia added 16 deaths, pushing the toll to 176, with half identified as long-term care facility residents. Of the deaths, 65% were of people over age 70.

Turkish Minister Quits After Chaos (4:30 p.m. NY)

Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu quit after a hastily announced weekend lockdown led thousands of people to spill onto streets, raising the risk of a new wave of infections. Soylu said on Twitter that he took full responsibility for the lockdown.

Later Sunday, President Tayyip Erdogan said he would not accept the resignation.

The minister was criticized after giving two hours warning late Friday of the action, abruptly ending weeks of social distancing measures as Turks flocked to buy groceries.

Pork Producer Warns of Shortages (3:15 p.m. NY)

The world’s biggest pork producer warned that the closure of processing factories as employees test positive for coronavirus is pushing meat supplies “perilously close to the edge” of shortfalls.

Smithfield Foods Inc. said it will idle its Sioux Falls, South Dakota, pork-processing facility -- which accounts for 4% to 5% of U.S. production -- after state officials reported more than 200 cases of Covid-19 at that company alone.

“It is impossible to keep our grocery stores stocked if our plants are not running,” Chief Executive Officer Ken Sullivan said in the statement.

Read the full story.

Mark Cuban Predicts Fanless NBA Games (2 p.m. NY)

Mark Cuban, the owner of the National Basketball Association’s Dallas Mavericks, said crowding back into sports stadiums and arenas won’t happen until the “science” is in place to make people feel safe.

“I think initially we’ll play just for the TV cameras, with essential personnel and players,” the billionaire said on “Fox News Sunday.”

“People aren’t going to just venture outside,” he said. “They’re not going to go to large gatherings. They’re not going to feel confident right off the bat. There’s going to be a lot of trepidation.”

Read the full story.

France Cases Lowest in a Week (1:40 p.m. NY)

France’s new coronavirus cases fell to the lowest in a week and the number of intensive-care patients dropped for a fourth day. Infections rose by 2,937 to 132,591 cases, the smallest increase since April 5, the health ministry said in an emailed statement. The death toll rose by 561, the fewest in four days, to 14,393.

“We’re observing the beginning of a very high leveling off,” the health ministry said. “But we must remain vigilant because hospitals and ICUs are taking care of a very large number of patients.”

Read the full story

Turkey Deaths Climb to 1,198 (1:30 p.m. NY)

Turkey reported 97 new fatalities, bringing the death toll to 1,198 amid a two-day lockdown in major cities. The country had 4,789 new cases, a 9.2% rise from 52,167 the previous day, according to data published by Health Minister Fahrettin Koca, bringing the total to 56,956.

Mexico Exchange Chairman Dies (1:20 p.m. NY)

The chairman of Mexico’s stock exchange, Jaime Ruiz Sacristan, died early Sunday more than three weeks after he was hospitalized with coronavirus. He was 70. A statement from Bolsa Mexicana de Valores SAB didn’t cite a specific cause.

Ruiz, chairman since 2015, was among a cluster of high-profile Mexican executives who had tested positive after returning from a ski-resort vacation to Vail, Colorado, on a private jet.

Italy Daily Deaths Fewest Since March 19 (12:10 p.m. NY)

Italy reported 431 new deaths in the past day, the fewest in more than three weeks, as declining numbers of intensive care patients pointed to a lessening severity of the country’s outbreak. The country had 619 fatalities a day earlier.

The daily count is the lowest since March 19, when Italy registered 427 dead. Total fatalities reached 19,899, the most in Europe.

The country reported 4,092 new cases, compared with 4,694 a day earlier, civil protection officials said.

Read the full story

Fed Official Warns of Flare Ups (12:05 p.m. NY)

Without an effective therapy or a vaccine, the U.S. could expect 18 months of rolling shutdowns as the outbreak recedes and then returns, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Neel Kashkari said.

“We’re looking around the world. As they relax the economic controls, the virus flares back up again,” Kashkari said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

“This could be a long hard road that we have ahead of us until we get either to an effective therapy or a vaccine,” he said. “It’s hard for me to see a V-shaped recovery under that scenario.”

Read the full story.

N.Y. Deaths Fall for Third Day (11:40 a.m. NY)

New York State had 758 deaths in the past 24 hours, down from 783 the day before and the third straight day of declines, Governor Andrew Cuomo said at his daily press conference.

It’s the sixth straight day of more than 700 deaths in the state, a fact Cuomo called “tragic.” Total deaths are 9,385, exceeded only by the tolls in Italy, Spain, France and the U.K.

Cases reached 188,694, a rise of 8,236, the Department of Health reported, around one-in-ten of reported cases around the world.

N.Y. Deaths Top 9,000; New U.S. Cases Rise 5.4%: Virus Update

D.C. Mayor Sets Reopening Criteria (11 a.m. NY)

Washington will lift restrictions when the number of cases, deaths and hospitalizations shows “sustained periods of decrease,” Mayor Muriel Bowser said as President Donald Trump hints at easing limits by May 1. Bowser said D.C. cases will peak in June, later than in other cities.

“We’re going to follow what the data on the ground tells us,” Bowser said on “Fox News Sunday” when asked about the president’s comments.

Deaths in U.K. Top 10,000 (10:54 a.m. NY)

The U.K. became the fifth country to record more than 10,000 deaths from the coronavirus. A daily increase of 737 brings the total number of Britons to die from the disease to 10,612, the Health Ministry said on Sunday.

“The U.K. is likely to be certainly one of the worst, if not the worst affected country in Europe,” Jeremy Farrar, a member of the scientific panel advising the government on the pandemic, told the BBC on Sunday.

Fauci Says Reopening Could Start in May (9:48 a.m. NY)

Parts of the U.S. may be ready in May to ease emergency measures taken against the pandemic but there’s no universal “light switch” to flip on, Anthony Fauci said.

“It could probably start at least in some ways maybe next month,” Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday.

Boris Johnson Released (8:28 a.m. NY)

The U.K. prime minister has been discharged from the hospital and will continue his recovery at the government’s country residence Chequers, a government spokesman said in a statement on Sunday.

“On the advice of his medical team, the PM will not be immediately returning to work,” the spokesman said.

Boris Johnson thanked NHS staff yesterday, saying “I owe them my life.”

China’s Harbin Tightens Measures (8:27 a.m. NY)

The northeastern Chinese city of Harbin extended its quarantine for certain visitor arrivals.

Arrivals from overseas or domestic regions with high risks are required to quarantine for 14 days at designated site first, then another 14 days at home, according to a statement from the municipal government. These visitors would also required to take two nucleic acid tests and a serum antibody test.

Portugal Cases Rise, Fewer in ICU (8 a.m. NY)

Portugal reported a higher daily number of new confirmed coronavirus cases, while the number of patients in intensive care fell.

There were 598 new cases in a day, up from 515 on Saturday, taking the total to 16,585, the government said on Sunday. The total number of deaths increased to 504 from 470 reported through Saturday morning. Hospitalizations rose to 1,177 from 1,175, while patients in intensive care fell to 228 from 233.

Netherlands Has Fewer Than 100 Deaths in Day (7:45 a.m NY)

The Netherlands recorded 94 new fatalities from the virus, the first time since March 30 that the number dropped below 100. The 4% increase to 2,737 is the slowest since the total tally hit double digits in the middle of March. The increase in new hospital admissions remained at their low point of 2%, whereas total confirmed cases rose a stable 5% to 25,587.

Spanish Cases Fall (5:47 p.m. HK)

Spain reported 619 deaths from the coronavirus on Sunday as the total number of people who have died in the country approaches 17,000. Fewer new cases of the disease were reported than the day before. There were 4,167 new infections in the 24 hours through Sunday, pushing the total above 166,000, according to Health Ministry data.

Iran Lifting Travel Ban (3:50 p.m. HK)

Iran will lift a ban on civilians traveling between provinces from April 20, President Hassan Rouhani said on state television. The announcement follows the easing of some social-distancing regulations on the business sector as Iran tries to alleviate the virus’s toll on its sanctions-hit economy. The death toll in Iran has risen to 4,357, with over 70,000 known cases.

China Stops Trial of a Gilead Drug (11:45 a.m. HK)

A Chinese trial of Gilead Sciences Inc.’s antiviral drug remdesivir was stopped after failing to enroll enough patients with severe symptoms, the company’s Chief Executive Officer Daniel O’Day wrote in an open letter dated April 10.

China previously said it would announce the results of two remdesivir trials for patients with mild to severe symptoms on April 27. The discontinuation of the severe patient trial came as the number of cases dropped in China. “The publication of data from the China remdesivir trials rests with the Chinese investigators, but we have been informed that the study in patients with severe symptoms was stopped due to stalled enrollment,” O’Day said.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.

With assistance from Bloomberg