Dwindling cases of coronavirus across Asia Pacific, the stabilisation of the outbreak in Europe, and the gradual easing of restrictions around the world were positives offset this week by persistently high fatalities in the United States and Europe, and emerging hotspots in parts of Latin America and Russia. Beaches in Sydney and the Gold Coast were reopened as cases slowed in Australia, Hong Kong reported no new infections for the first time in almost two months, and daily cases in South Korea were kept down to the single digits. On the other hand Singapore had seen a second surge of infections, overwhelmingly caused by clusters in foreign worker dormitories, and as consecutive days of more than 1,000 new cases took the tally beyond 10,000, the country extended its circuit-breaker measures until the start of June. Singapore was now in a three-way battle with Indonesia and the Philippines for the highest number of confirmed cases in Southeast Asia, as Indonesia warned against the annual Ramadan exodus from cities to home villages, while Thailand extended a nationwide alcohol ban. Across the Middle East, Lebanon reported no new cases amid anti-government protests, infections were on the rise in Saudi Arabia and Turkey, and as recoveries outpaced infections in Israel, a coalition deal was finally agreed between political rivals Benjamin Netanyahu and Benny Gantz.
In Europe gradual gains faced off against enduring losses. Germany allowed smaller shops to reopen, the Czech Republic lifted restrictions on open-air markets, and Italy and Austria laid the groundwork for loosening up. But cultural events continued to fall by the wayside, with the cancellations of Oktoberfest and the Pamplona running of the bulls and the postponement of the European Women’s Championship, while face masks became mandatory across Germany, Ireland and Denmark put large gatherings on hold until September, and Spain, now with cases beyond 200,000, sought to extend its state of alarm. Infections kept on mounting across Russia, but while deaths remained stubbornly high in Italy and Spain, and fatalities in France surpassed 20,000, active cases and hospitalisations showed a steady retreat. The United Kingdom bucked the trend as after a couple of days below five hundred, daily fatalities shot back up to 823, public efforts towards a potential vaccine intensifying as the death toll reached a twenty-year peak.
Scientific analysis and data tracking suggested the under-reporting of deaths in China and the United Kingdom, while rectifying the first incidents of the virus in China and the United States. President Trump sought to change the narrative with a renewed focus on immigration, issuing an executive order where with exemptions for guest workers and family members, new immigration to the United States was put on hold for sixty days. Deaths in the state of New York had dropped below five hundred for the first time weeks, but spiked to a high of 379 in New Jersey, and by the middle of the week deaths in the two states had topped 15,000 and 5,000 respectively, while reopening plans courted controversy in a host of southern states. Meanwhile Mexico entered ‘phase three’, a stage of intensifying spread. Financial markets continued to feel the effects, as United States oil prices suffered their worst day on record, with one futures contract turning negative for the first time in history, meaning producers of West Texas Intermediate crude would have to pay for traders to take oil off their hands. Gross domestic product in the Chinese epicentre of Hubei shrank by 40 percent in the first quarter. And unemployment continued to soar in France and the United States. In the midst of the economic fallout, Denmark and Poland took an unusual tack by denying financial aid to firms registered in tax havens.
As the weekend edged into view, the World Health Organization warned of ‘worrying upward trends’ in parts of Latin America and Africa, but Ghana had already eased restrictions and South Africa prepared to follow suit. The country was one of several, including the United States and Mexico, to unveil a major package of economic relief. Restrictions were extended in the Philippines, Pakistan, and Indonesia, but new cases in Singapore dropped back below a thousand, measures eased in Vietnam, and Hong Kong reported no new cases for the second time this week. Turkey marked a century of parliament and announced a four-day curfew across thirty-one provinces, before the month of Ramadan commenced with social distancing but some eased restrictions across the Muslim world.
Across Europe fatalities in Italy and Spain fell to their lowest in a month, as more countries talked of easing restrictions. Greece marginally extended its lockdown, and Belgium reported an excess mortality rate of 80 percent amid suggestions that the country was actually over-reporting fatalities by incorporating every suspected case of COVID-19. Alarums sounded for the situation in care homes, which were reportedly responsible for up to half of Europe’s coronavirus deaths. Germany followed China, the US, and the UK by approving human trials of vaccine candidates, the first human trial in Europe began in Oxford, but trials of the potential treatment remdesivir suggested the antiviral medicine brought no benefit. Deaths in Sweden passed 2,000, and a revised study by the public health agency suggesting that 26 percent of Stockholm will soon have been infected by coronavirus brought renewed attention to possible immunity and infection rates. In a similar sort of study, antibody tests in New York City indicated infections in approximately a fifth of New Yorkers. If science led the way, Donald Trump backpedalled frantically as he pondered whether the virus might be cured by inserting sunlight beneath the skin or injecting disinfectant. Meanwhile the death toll in America passed 50,000, even as deaths stabilised in New Jersey and New York, and while Gretchen Whitmer extended Michigan’s stay-at-home order, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Alaska began to open up.
Over the weekend bleak reports concerning the situation in Ecuador were at least partially confirmed when increased testing capacity saw the total number of cases double in the span of a day, placing the country second in Latin America to Brazil, which was experiencing stretched hospitals and political tumult. The Saudi-led coalition extended its unilateral ceasefire in Yemen, and despite a spike in cases India suddenly opened shops. In Australia and New Zealand, Anzac Day was celebrated from driveways and deserted memorial sites, and Italy and Portugal marked Liberation Day still largely confined to their homes. While the World Health Organization had launched an initiative to accelerate work on tests, drugs, and vaccines, on Saturday the agency warned that evidence for immunity among recovered patients remained slight. Doctors in Pakistan went on hunger strike over the lack of personal protective equipment, the latest in a line of protests after anti-government demonstrators socially distanced in Israel and freedom fighters clustered in the United States earlier in the week. With 813 new deaths, the tally in Britain surpassed 20,000. There were now more than 200,000 deaths across the globe.
Wuhan was declared free of coronavirus on Sunday as the last patients left hospitals, and zero deaths were reported in South Korea and Hong Kong, though cases in Singapore saw a slight uptick. South Africa established four levels of restriction to be implemented from the beginning of May, even as cases across the continent rose to 30,000 following a recent spurt. Sri Lanka reimposed lockdown after a surge in naval cases, recoveries outpaced infections in Turkey, and Iran made plans to reopen mosques. Infections in Russia stormed past 80,000, but otherwise the crisis across Europe showed all the signs of easing up. Italy recorded its lowest daily death total since 14 March, as the country outlined plans to reopen the economy starting 4 May. Fatalities fell in France, cases remained low in Germany, and children in Spain were allowed outdoors after weeks of confinement as deaths dropped to their lowest for five weeks. The death toll even flattened in the United Kingdom, just in time for Boris Johnson to return to work. Andrew Cuomo in New York tentatively discussed reopening plans, and a stay-at-home order was allowed to expire in Colorado as more states took pains to ease the economic impact.
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With the week in American football set to be dominated by the NFL’s first ever virtual draft, Rob Gronkowski ran a seam route as the retired three-time Super Bowl-winning tight end announced his return to the sport by way of a trade, leaving the New England Patriots to partner up with his old pal Tom Brady at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Brady’s departure after twenty years and six Super Bowl rings as a Patriot had already sent New England fans into a funk, with Gronkowski’s decision to also switch allegiances leaving an especially sour taste. Together Brady and Gronkowski formed arguably the greatest quarterback and tight end duo in the history of the NFL, Brady’s pocket passing and big-game composure allied to Gronkowski’s versatility as a blocker and receiver leading the Patriots to Super Bowl triumphs in 2014, 2016, and 2018. With 1,163 yards, Gronkowski maintains the record for the most receiving yards by a tight end in the postseason, while he is ranked first among NFL tight ends for average yards per target and average yards and touchdowns per game. Lacking cap space, with Gronkowski adamant that it was Brady or nothing, the Patriots traded him to the Buccaneers for a fourth-round draft pick.
The 2020 NFL draft had been scheduled for Paradise, Nevada, before the spread of coronavirus forced officials, players, and fans alike indoors. Instead the event proceeded remotely, with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announcing the picks from his basement in Bronxville against a backdrop of virtual feeds. Head coaches and general managers convened via Microsoft Teams, fans cheered and jeered as they faced down disconnection, and lag times left players responding to their selection as if in slow motion, celebrations postponed while they flicked through their mobile phones. Meanwhile the NFL went hard on tales of tragedy, as college statistics and personal metrics played second fiddle to elaborate depictions of trauma and grief. So we learned that the mother of one player had survived West Nile virus, and that another player’s father died when he slipped on gravel and got hit by a pickup truck. Every other player seemed to have suffered some foul circumstance, and in terms of coverage and yards the Grim Reaper dominated the field, as deaths were reported from blood clots and coronavirus, while one particular unfortunate lost his father in a boating accident then his brother a couple of years later by lightning strike.
The draft itself contained few surprises, as standout quarterback Joe Burrow of Louisiana State University went first to the Cincinnati Bengals, leaving the talented but injury-plagued left-hander Tua Tagovailoa to the Miami Dolphins in fifth. Justin Herbert was up next for the Los Angeles Chargers, and that was it for quarterbacks until the Green Bay Packers sprung the surprise of the first round, opting for a long-term replacement rather than stacking Aaron Rodgers with weapons, as with the twenty-sixth pick they plumped for an unheralded Jordan Love. The defensive end Chase Young was the second pick of the draft, selected by the Washington Redskins, and the cornerback Jeff Okudah embarked for the Detroit Lions in third, before Andrew Thomas in fourth to the New York Giants emerged as the first of six offensive tackles swiftly taken off the board. Speedster Henry Ruggs led a flurry of wide receivers, and the first round was strong on coverage defense, while as the weekend progressed fans and pundits were left to pore over a total of 255 picks carried during the course of seven rounds. The gambit proved successful, as the virtual draft attracted a record 15.6 million viewers on opening night.
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Vitamin D deficiency may be on the rise and incomes and enterprise waning, but as folk stay glued to their couches at least Netflix is getting its fix. The streaming service added nearly 16 million new subscribers in the first three months of 2020, representing growth of 22 percent year-on-year, and more than doubling the company’s own projections for the first quarter. The 15.8 million additional subscribers takes the total number of Netflix subscribers worldwide to 182 million. Driving viewing habits, particularly as lockdowns and stay-at-home orders took hold in March, were the Netflix original action comedy Spenser Confidential, peeked by 85 million households, the Spanish crime drama Money Heist caught by 65 million, and the pop-cultural phenomenon Tiger King, with 65 million households held rapt by the saga of big cat conservationists and Joe Exotic. Still in a letter to shareholders Netflix sounded a note of caution, accepting that amid production flux and rising competition, ‘some of the lockdown growth will turn out to be pull-forward from the multi-year organic growth trend, resulting in slower growth after the lockdown is lifted country-by-country’.
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Beyond cleansing the air and replenishing the earth, widespread coronavirus lockdowns are furnishing the housebound with a plethora of livestreams and virtual concerts. Wednesday was the fiftieth anniversary of Earth Day, an event prompted by the environmentalists John McConnell and Denis Hayes with political support and financial backing from the United Auto Workers, which was marked for the first time in 1970 across thousands of streets, schools, and university campuses in America, before growing to become a global celebration. The first Earth Day was instrumental in the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency and a wave of legislation including the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Endangered Species Act, while with support from UNESCO and secretary-general U Thant it also led to the first ever United Nations conference on the environment. Anniversary editions in 1990 and 2000 entrenched Earth Day as one of the world’s most popular and socially conscious secular holidays, while in 2016, Earth Day was marked by the signing of the Paris climate agreement.
With a focus on climate action and lockdowns underway in many of the event’s familiar locations, Earth Day 2020 meant virtual festivities, talks, film screenings, and conservation efforts. Pathway To Paris, a nonprofit cultural endeavour which draws on the arts in an attempt to realise the goals of the Paris agreement, organised a livestream concert for Sunday, celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of Earth Day with a slew of big-name rock stars including Patti Smith, Michael Stipe, Cat Power, and Flea. Johnny Depp was among the late additions sprinkling a little extra stardust over the event, which advocated for the planet live over Instagram. Separately over the weekend in an effort to spread the joy and artistry of international opera, the Met presented the At-Home Gala, presided over by general manager Peter Gelb and music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, featuring more than forty leading singers from fifteen countries and three continents. Streamed freely via the Metropolitan Opera’s website, the gala lavished listeners with the likes of sopranos Anna Netrebko and Angel Blue and tenors Lawrence Brownlee and Piotr Beczala, while also offering attentive viewers a glimpse into their homes.
