This 9 April 2020 video from the Netherlands says about itself:
When spring comes
Zoom into the world of birds that inhabit our city parks during springtime. See how they collect food, nest building material and interact with each other.
“When spring comes” was recorded in a small but old Amsterdam city park, called Frankendael. A place that was once a green and lush 17th-century country seat for rich people fleeing the inner city now lives on as a city park with many different trees, plants and birds.
In US news and current events today, hundreds of bodies had to be laid to rest in mass graves in Manaus, an Amazon city in Brazil. Now the city’s mayor, Mayor Arthur Virgilio Neto, is asking Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg to help save the lives of the people risking COVID-19 to protect the Amazon.
BOLSONARO MARCHES BRAZIL TOWARD POLITICAL CRISIS Far-right Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro is imploding. “So what?” he told reporters last week, about the mounting coronavirus death toll. Nightly protests, during which Brazilians bang pots and pans from their rooftops and balconies, have intensified. Bolsonaro’s approval ratings are at their lowest, and governors who rode his coattails have abandoned him. Brazil’s Supreme Court is investigating claims of impropriety, and nearly half of Brazilians now support Bolsonaro’s impeachment. [HuffPost]
With Brazil on course to become new COVID-19 epicenter, Bolsonaro escalates back-to-work campaign: here.
In the asylum seekers centre of Sneek, the coronavirus was diagnosed among 22 residents. The health authority of Fryslân province thinks it will not stop at 22.
According to regional broadcaster Omrop Fryslân, almost 600 people live in the asylum seekers centre in Sneek.
German slaughterhouse near the Dutch border closes because of coronavirus contagion
A slaughterhouse in the German town of Coesfeld, about 30 kilometres from Winterswijk, is temporarily closed due to a particularly high number of coronavirus infections within the company. This has been announced by the Minister of Health of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Yesterday, the number of infected workers at the Westfleisch factory was 129. Thirteen of them were taken to hospital. … The infected people who are not in the hospital are quarantined, like the people they have had contact with.
Because the limit of 50 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants per week has been exceeded in Coesfeld, the announced relaxations of coronavirus rules in the district have been postponed to May 18.
In a survey of 1,250 Dutch primary school teachers, a third expressed concern that primary schools are to reopen on May 11.
In the survey, carried out by the National Institute for Public Health and Environment, half of the teachers questioned agreed with a return to work but thought it too soon. Four percent said they would refuse to return to work.
The results of a study of contamination risk posed by COVID-19 to children and young people has yet to be published.
The number of strikes by teachers and health care workers in the Netherlands last year was at a 25-year high. Over 300,000 workers took part in 26 separate strikes. Around 90 percent of all those on strike in the Netherlands last year were teachers or care workers.
As the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide approaches 4 million and the pandemic could be with us for months or years, we look at who can access drugs like remdesivir, being developed by pharmaceutical giant Gilead, which has the patent for the drug and is poised to make massive profits. We look at how much drugs like remdesivir will cost, and who can access them, with writer Achal Prabhala, coordinator of the AccessIBSA project, which campaigns for access to medicines in India, Brazil and South Africa.
TRUMP ADMIN. SHELVES CDC GUIDE TO REOPENING Detailed documents created by the nation’s top disease investigators meant to give step-by-step advice to local leaders deciding when and how to reopen public places such as mass transit, day care centers and restaurants during the still-raging pandemic has been shelved by the Trump administration. The 17-page report by a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention team was supposed to be published last Friday, but agency scientists were told the guidance “would never see the light of day.” White House officials reportedly had religious and economic objections. [HuffPost]
ONE OF TRUMP’S PERSONAL VALETS TESTS POSITIVE FOR COVID-19 A personal military valet of Trump has tested positive for the coronavirus, rattling the White House. “We were recently notified by the White House Medical Unit that a member of the United States Military, who works on the White House campus, has tested positive for coronavirus,” deputy White House press secretary Hogan Gidley said. [HuffPost]
