Coronavirus worldwide update

This 6 April 2020 video says about itself:

The Worst Possible People are in Charge at the Worst Possible Time | George Monbiot on Coronavirus

“Coronavirus should be a warning that our current system is not fit for purpose”

Fiction, reality and the global crisis of capitalism. 7 April 2020. As the death toll from the Covid-19 pandemic mounted on Monday, a mood of uncontrollable euphoria prevailed among investors on Wall Street: here.

On Monday evening, shortly after the announcement that another 439 people had died of COVID-19 in Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson was moved to an intensive care unit at St Thomas’ Hospital in London. Diagnosed with a coronavirus infection 11 days ago, Johnson was admitted to the hospital Sunday night with persistent symptoms of COVID-19. His condition had worsened by Monday afternoon: here.

British Queen appeals for national unity across an unbridgeable class divide: here.

Britain: NHS PORTERS at Epsom and St Helier Trust, not only have very ‘flimsy’ Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) but they are being forced to transport infected dead patients in sheets, as they have run out of body bags as the death toll mounts! The porters – who have been waiting months to get an ‘insulting’ 5p an hour pay rise from the trust – are left with just a thin plastic apron, disposable gloves and a flimsy mask as they rush around the hospital doing the difficult and highly distressing work of moving ever-increasing numbers of deceased patients: here.

Britain: THE TORY Party has launched a massive campaign to blame China to cover up their own culpability in the rapid spread of the coronavirus, which, by yesterday, has resulted in more than 48,000 people contracting the disease and 4,943 deaths in the UK: here.

Scottish care workers speak out against conditions and treatment during COVID-19 crisis. By Darren Paxton, 7 April 2020. Front line health and social care workers from the Scottish Highlands spoke to the WSWS about the conditions they are facing: here.

As it releases thousands of prisoners, UK government keeps Julian Assange locked-up in danger. By Thomas Scripps, 6 April 2020.

Refugees left to die as COVID-19 spreads across Greece. By George Gallanis, 7 April 2020. Greece’s New Democracy government is ignoring calls to move refugees, presently clustered on islands, to mainland facilities to combat COVID-19.

Frida Wattenberg was too young to get a driver’s license when the Nazis invaded her native France in 1940. But three years later, at the age of 19, she was already risking her life by helping to drive Jewish children out of occupied France into neutral Switzerland. Wattenberg died in Paris on April 3 from the coronavirus. She was 96 … Born in Paris in 1924 to Jewish parents who had immigrated from the central Polish city of Lodz, Wattenberg was an activist in the Jewish youth movement HaShomer Hatzair from her early teens. Months after the Germans invaded, Wattenberg, then 16, was recruited into the resistance: here.

French state covered up mass COVID-19 deaths in retirement homes. By Jacques Valentin, 7 April 2020.

Doctors in Germany will soon have to decide on life and death. By Peter Schwarz, 6 April 2020.

German government expands war operations despite coronavirus pandemic. By Johannes Stern, 7 April 2020. The dramatic spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has done nothing to change German war policy. The ruling class is utilising the crisis in order to push forward its foreign policy offensive: here.

COVID-19 pandemic threatens millions in war-torn Libya and Syria. By Kumaran Ira, 7 April 2020. Imperialist wars and proxy conflicts costing hundreds of thousands of lives have destroyed infrastructure critical to fight the spread of coronavirus: here.

Ontario warns of more than 10,000 COVID-19 deaths as pandemic spreads rapidly across Canada. By Roger Jordan, 6 April 2020.

Mounting coronavirus death toll in Canada’s elderly care homes. By Penny Smith, 7 April 2020. COVID-19 cases have been reported from over 600 nursing and retirement homes nationwide, with Quebec, Ontario, and British Columbia hardest hit.

Workers across Canada protest unsafe conditions amidst pandemic. As shortages of personal protective equipment persist across the country, nurses in London, Ontario stopped work on 11 occasions citing their right to refuse unsafe working conditions last week. Due to the coronavirus outbreak, established medical procedures require hospital staff to change masks before attending to each new patient. However, because of equipment shortages, London hospital authorities have allotted only four basic masks per shift, a process which threatens to transfer the virus from patient to patient. The superior N95 masks are reserved for front-line staff performing intubations and other specialized procedures. … In the Colombian municipality of Luruaco, workers at the ESE Hospital have gone on strike over not only the lack of supplies and equipment, leaving them unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic, but over nonpayment of salaries and benefits, in some cases going back months. The mayor of the town of 23,000, in the department of Atlántico, claims that she had attempted to meet with the previous director on five occasions, but the meetings never materialized. The ESE Hospital is indebted to about 30 workers, who have not received wages or any benefits—including vacation pay, pensions and copays—for four months, bringing on the strike call. In addition, ambulances have empty gas tanks and workers have no uniforms or protective equipment. The mayor blamed the previous ESE director for the crisis, but hospitals in other areas of Colombia are gravely unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic, having been defunded and ignored for years by the government. In various cities in the Caribbean region, over 200 workers have gone on strike, according to a publimetro.com report: here.

Mexico: A year after wildcat strikes involving 70,000 workers, the maquiladora workers in Matamoros are leading the fight against the dangers workers face from Covid-19: here.

The COVID-19 virus continues to spread aggressively in Peru, endangering the poorest people of Andean or Amazonian origin who have low immune defenses: here.

Letter from Indian-held Kashmir: Emergency amidst Emergency—Modi government denies Internet access imperiling lives. By Muzamil Yaqoob and Nilanjana Bhattacharya, 7 April 2020. The Indian state has refused to comply with World Health Organization guidelines to lift the internet lockdown in Kashmir, denying doctors and the public access to critical information in a life-and-death situation:.