AP News in Brief at 6:04 a.m. EDT
Pandemic increasingly takes over daily lives, roils markets
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The coronavirus pandemic has taken over daily lives around the globe, overwhelming hospitals, shuttering schools and offices, halting U.S. presidential campaign rallies and world sports while increasing fears about the financial toll.
The intensifying spread of COVID-19 beyond Asia has dashed hopes about a quick containment, even with travel and social events curbed drastically. And political leaders were among those infected or quarantined due to potential exposure.
Asian markets were sinking further Friday, after U.S. stocks had their greatest losses since the Black Monday crash of 1987 and bad European results. Benchmarks in Japan, Thailand and India sank as much as 10%. Losses in mainland China, where the virus is subsiding, were less severe.
In the United States, Congress neared a deal with the Trump administration on a sweeping aid package with sick pay, free testing and other resources to help reassure anxious Americans and calm markets, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said.
People fretted over the health risks to the elderly, threatened jobs and dwindling savings while caring for children staying home from shuttered schools.
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European shares rebound after turbulent Asian session
BANGKOK (AP) - European markets were mostly higher Friday after a turbulent trading session in Asia.
Shares rose in Paris and London but fell 6.1% in Japan following Wall Street's biggest drop since the 1987 Black Monday crash.
Friday the 13th brought wild swings for some markets as governments stepped up precautions against the spread of the new coronavirus and considered ways to cushion the blow to their economies.
Benchmarks in Japan, Thailand and India sank as much as 10% early in the day, but India's Sensex gained 3.3% in afternoon trading. In Bangkok, the Thailand SET fell 1.3% after its 10% plunge triggered a temporary suspension of trading.
Markets worldwide have been on the retreat as worries over the economic fallout from the coronavirus crisis deepen and the meltdown in the U.S., the world's biggest economy, batters confidence around the globe.
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Analysis: With unease, Americans lurch into coronavirus era
So this is where we are:
Major League Baseball's opening day postponed. Broadway and Hollywood grinding to a halt, and March Madness canceled. Universities from Harvard to UCLA telling students to stay away. Most travelers from Europe banned. Tom Hanks, Hollywood's embodiment of everyday American-ness, in isolation in an Australian hospital with the virus. And the speaker of the House of Representatives taking this question Thursday morning: 'œHow prepared is Congress to work from home?'ť
This, in mid-March 2020, is now the very abnormal normal in the new United States of Purell - a nation that watched for weeks as the coronavirus erupted in China, South Korea, Iran and Italy before starting down the path of figuring out how to encounter this threat itself.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, something tipped. Words and phrases used intermittently in recent days began coming at Americans in a dizzying fusillade: Canceled. Postponed. Scrapped. Stay home. Don't come in. Don't embrace. Don't shake hands. Social distancing. Unprecedented. Crisis.
'œI think it's finally sinking in how serious this is, and how incredibly unprepared we are going into this. And people are scrambling,'ť says Dr. Mical Raz, a medical historian and practicing physician who teaches at the University of Rochester.
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Americans adjust to new life, hunker down amid coronavirus
Workers lost their jobs, parents came up with impromptu home lesson plans for children kept home from shuttered schools. Families fretted over dwindling retirement accounts, the health of elderly parents, and every cough and sneeze in their midst.
Millions of people settled into new and disrupted routines Thursday as the coronavirus began to uproot almost every facet of American life.
The spate of event cancellations that drove home the gravity of the outbreak a day earlier only intensified Thursday, with Disney and Universal Orlando Resort shutting down theme parks, the NCAA calling off March Madness and Broadway theaters closing their doors in Manhattan. All the major professional sports announced they are halting play, and officials ordered a shutdown of every school in the state of Ohio for three weeks.
And with the cascade of closures, a new reality set in for American households.
In the Pacific Northwest, parents scrambled to devise homeschooling using library books or apps. Others, desperate to get to work, jumped on social media boards to seek child care or exchange tips about available babysitters.
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In role reversal, Asia seeks to stop virus from coming in
BEIJING (AP) - From quarantining arriving travelers from overseas to nabbing those sneaking in with fevers, China and other parts of Asia are scrambling to prevent the new coronavirus from coming back to where it first broke out.
Just as the spread of the disease is stabilizing in much of Asia, following a major outbreak in China and sizable ones in South Korea and Japan, it is popping up in new hot spots around the world.
Those three countries announced expanded border controls this week that mimic many of the bans and restrictions placed on China in the early days of the outbreak. China, which didn't have enough protective equipment for its medical workers a few weeks ago, is now donating supplies to Italy, Iran, South Korea and other affected places.
The outbreak is far from over in Asia and could well explode again when restrictions put in place to stymie it are lifted. But the panic that seized the region has shifted to the Mideast, Europe and the Americas as those areas deal with the rapid spread of the virus for the first time.
China reported Friday just eight new cases of the virus in the previous 24 hours, and three were imported from Italy, the United States and the United Kingdom. The number has dropped sharply form a month ago, when the daily figure was in the thousands. Nearly 90 imported cases have been identified in recent weeks.
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Pentagon: US strikes Iran-backed group that hit Iraq base
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. launched airstrikes in Iraq, targeting the Iranian-backed Shiite militia members believed responsible for the rocket attack that killed and wounded American and British troops at a base north of Baghdad, the Pentagon said.
U.S. officials said multiple strikes by U.S. fighter jets on Thursday hit five locations and mainly targeted Kataib Hezbollah weapons facilities inside Iraq. A Defense Department statement said the strikes targeted five weapons storage facilities 'œto significantly degrade their ability to conduct future attacks.'ť
The strikes marked a rapid escalation in tensions with Tehran and its proxy groups in Iraq, just two months after Iran carried out a massive ballistic missile attack against American troops at a base in Iraq. They came just hours after top U.S. defense leaders threatened retaliation for the Wednesday rocket attack, making clear that they knew who did it and that the attackers would be held accountable.
'œThe United States will not tolerate attacks against our people, our interests, or our allies,'ť Defense Secretary Mark Esper said. 'œAs we have demonstrated in recent months, we will take any action necessary to protect our forces in Iraq and the region.'ť
The Pentagon statement said the facilities hit in the precision strikes were used to store weapons used to target the U.S. and coalition forces. It called the counterattack 'œdefensive, proportional and in direct response to the threat'ť posed by the Iranian-backed Shiite militia groups.
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Florida could be knockout punch for Sanders' 2020 campaign
MIAMI (AP) - Florida has never been known as a place of stability, especially in its politics.
And yet stability is what has been on the minds of many Democrats in the state who say they'll vote for former Vice President Joe Biden in Tuesday's presidential primary election instead of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
'œI like some of Sanders' ideas, but he's a little too extreme for me,'ť said Jeanne Hilburn, a 76-year-old retired teacher who lives in the suburbs of Tampa. 'œA lot of Democrats are like me - we want stability.'ť
As the race for the Democratic nomination enters a penultimate phase, with Sanders' campaign on the brink of collapse and Biden's ascendant, attention is turning to places like Florida, which is holding its primary on Tuesday along with Ohio, Illinois and Arizona. Florida has 219 delegates, the biggest prize of next week's election.
Few places hold the electoral cachet of Florida, which has been among the most coveted swing states in the last three decades, including during the contentious, chaotic recount of 2000. It is a vital state for President Donald Trump, who would have almost no path to reelection without it.
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1 year later, New Zealand mosque attacks alter many lives
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (AP) - Fifty-one people were killed and dozens more injured when a lone gunman attacked two mosques in Christchurch last year. New Zealanders will commemorate those who died on the anniversary of the mass killing Sunday. Three people whose lives were forever altered that day say it has prompted changes in their career aspirations, living situations and in the way that others perceive them.
Aya Al-Umari
Aya's older brother Hussein, 35, was killed in the attack at the Al Noor mosque
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When she first heard there had been a shooting at the mosque, Aya Al-Umari rushed to her brother's house and then to the Christchurch Hospital, hoping to find out something, anything, about him. She was confronted with an overwhelming scene. Children were crying. Adults were covered with blood. Nothing was comprehensible. She spotted a policewoman, who calmed her down, told her to go home and promised to update her hourly.
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AP PHOTOS: Unsettled Tokyo in black and white
The notoriously crowded Tokyo morning rush-hour trains are sparsely populated. Classrooms are eerily empty. Store shelves are bare.
People with gas masks pop up throughout a city overwhelmed by fear of the spread of the new coronavirus, which is altering daily life and casting doubt over the Summer Olympic Games.
Struck by the contrast of the white protective masks against the stark cityscape, AP photographer Jae. C. Hong captured the unsettling new norm in black and white.
An English church in Roppongi no longer asks its members to high-five during Sunday services. Instead, they give a Japanese-style bow to each other.
A luxurious department store in the Ginza shopping district put out an apologetic notice on its cosmetics floor saying that their employees are not allowed touch customers to prevent the spread of the virus.
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Tom Hanks, Rita Wilson taking diagnoses 'one day at a time'
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Tom Hanks said he and wife Rita Wilson were taking their new coronavirus infection 'œone day at a time" while Australian television hosts who had interviewed Wilson were awaiting test results Friday.
Australia has stepped up its response to COVID-19 by recommending people avoid organized, nonessential gatherings of 500 or more from Monday and to reconsider all international travel.
Hanks and Wilson have been isolated in stable conditions in a Gold Coast hospital following their diagnosis.
The couple used a social media post to thank "everyone here Down Under who are taking such good care of us.'ť
'œWe have Covid-19 and are in isolation so we do not spread it to anyone else,'ť Hanks said in a post.