IMF. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) revealed on Friday that the United States’ economy plunged 37% in the second quarter of 2020 compared to the same period last year and that it will tumble 6.6% at the end of 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.
(Bloomberg) — Hong Kong’s new outbreak has surpassed the scale of its previous wave of infections, signaling that the worst of the pandemic may be yet to come. In Spain, officials slapped new restrictions on movement and gatherings in Barcelona, while countries globally grapple with a fresh surge in infections.
A poll showed that more than half of the American public “strongly” disapproves of President Donald Trump’s handling of the pandemic.
Global Tracker: Cases top 13.8 million; deaths top 590,000U.S
Barcelona Hit With New Curbs (7:51 a.m. NY)
Catalan officials imposed new curbs on movement and gatherings in Barcelona after the business and tourism hub suffered an upsurge in new cases. Bars and restaurants will be limited to 50% capacity and night clubs, gyms, swimming pools, cinemas and theaters closed, Meritxell Budo, a regional government spokeswoman, said at a news conference. Gatherings of more than 10 people will also be forbidden. People should stay at home unless going out is absolutely necessary, Budo said. The number of new cases in Barcelona jumped to 494 last week, tripling those recorded the week before, according to data published by the regional government.
Singapore Tightens Rules for Some Travelers (7:20 a.m. NY)
Singapore will tighten rules on travelers who had been in coronavirus hotspots including Japan, Hong Kong and Australia’s Victoria state, mandating quarantine in dedicated facilities from July 20. Travelers who have been in those regions in the 14 days prior to entering Singapore won’t be able to serve their quarantine at their residence, the island’s authorities said on Friday.
President Trump’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak has the approval of 38% of Americans, down from 46% in May and 51% in March, according to the latest Washington Post-ABC poll. More than half of the public, or 52%, now disapproves “strongly” of Trump’s handling of the outbreak, roughly double the percentage who say they strongly approve and an increase from 36% in strong disapproval since March.
Luxembourg is in the middle of a second wave of infections, its health minister said this week. No other EU nation is testing as much as the tiny Grand-Duchy, which has been sending invites to citizens across the nation to get tested since May. With the number of daily tests rising, new infections have been rising day to day as well, meaning that several EU nations — Slovenia is the latest country to do so — have added Luxembourg to a red list. Germany’s Robert Koch Institute also placed Luxembourg on its list of risk countries this week.
Austria had 169 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, the highest daily rise since April 12. The number of active coronavirus infections has risen almost four-fold to 1,393 since the low of 373 on June 14, driven by clusters around evangelical churches in Linz and Wiener Neustadt, a pork-processing plant near the Czech border, and cases in Vienna.
Hong Kong’s fresh coronavirus outbreak has surpassed the magnitude of its previous waves of infection, in a cautionary tale that the worst may be yet to come in the global pandemic. Authorities reported 50 local virus cases on Friday, bringing total infections to over 350, making the Asian financial hub one of the first places in the region to see a new wave dwarf previous outbreaks.
The resurgence comes after a long stretch during which residents returned to work and normal life. About a third of infections in the new outbreak are of unknown origins, signaling that hidden chains of transmission are widespread.
Israel’s government approved new restrictions that will shutter non-essential businesses on weekends to slow a surge of cases. Visiting the beach will be banned from Friday afternoons to Sunday mornings from next weekend.
More general regulations throughout the week will close gyms, prohibit restaurants from seating customers and limit the size of gatherings. Israel now has at least 44,000 confirmed cases and nearly 380 deaths, according to health ministry data, while the unemployment rate stands at above 21%.
China locked down housing compounds across Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi. The city of 3.5 million reported six confirmed infections on Thursday and Friday, along with 11 cases where the people didn’t display any symptoms, breaking a 10-day streak of zero new domestic cases in China. The source of the new infections is unclear and the local government did not say if the cases are linked.
Tokyo saw a second straight day of record coronavirus cases Friday, with 293 reported amid growing concern about the ability of authorities to suppress the outbreak. The city had 286 cases Thursday.
India Crosses 1 Million Case Mark (12:05 p.m. HK)
India saw its coronavirus cases exceed 1 million, becoming the third country to cross that mark, according to its health ministry, as the virus continues to spread rapidly in the world’s second most-populous nation.
Australia’s most-populous state — New South Wales — will further tighten restrictions for gatherings and venues, including clubs and cafes, Premier Gladys Berejikliantells told reporters.
Meanwhile, Australia’s second-most populous state, Victoria, recorded its second day of a spike in coronavirus cases as its capital city Melbourne is gripped by a second wave of infections. It had 428 new cases in the past 24 hours, Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters Friday. That’s the largest single-day increase for any of Australia’s states and territories, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Nick Note: slowly but finely the mills of the Gods grind. And the vast majority of people are in denial. Soon it will be lockdowns again and then the mobs will come fighting for a potato,
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Thomas Frieden warns against rushing into reopening schools before it is safe to do so, and outlines things we all can do to ensure children can return to their schools safely. Nick Note: The yearly flu season is spread by kids going to school and passing it to their parents. Home school the kids. We are in a modern day plague. Do any of the “leaders” have a brain. Israel, Singapore, Hong Kong all opened their schools only to shut them right back down and start quarantining all over again.
WASHINGTON — On the eve of a new coronavirus reporting system this week, data disappeared from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website as hospitals began filing information to a private contractor or their states instead. A day later, an outcry — including from other federal health officials — prompted the Trump administration to reinstate that dashboard and another daily CDC report on the pandemic. On Thursday, the nation’s governors joined the chorus of objections over the abruptness of the change, asking the administration to delay it for 30 days. In a statement, the National Governors Association said hospitals need the time “to learn a new system, as they continue to deal with this pandemic. Meanwhile, the disappearance of the real-time data — the CDC dashboard was taken down Tuesday night before resurfacing Thursday morning — was a ripple effect of the administration’s new hospital reporting protocol that took effect Wednesday, according to a federal health official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. On Thursday evening, the nation’s governors objected to the abruptness of the change, asking the administration to delay the altered requirements for 30 days. In a statement, the National Governors Association said hospitals need the time “to learn a new system, as they continue to deal with this pandemic. In addition, governors urge the administration to make this information publicly available.” The disappearance of the real-time data from the CDC dashboard, which was taken down Tuesday night before resurfacing Thursday morning, was a ripple effect of the administration’s new hospital reporting protocol that took effect Wednesday, according to a federal health official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. Without receiving the data firsthand, CDC officials were reluctant to maintain the dashboard — which shows the number of patients with COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, and hospital bed capacity — and took it down, the federal health official said. The CDC dashboard states that its information comes directly from hospitals and does not include data submitted to “other entities contracted by or within the federal government.” It also says the dashboard will not be updated after July 14.
The dashboard “was taken down in a fit of pique,” said Michael Caputo, the assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services. “The idea CDC scientists cannot rely upon their colleagues in the same department for data collection, or any other scientific work, is preposterous.”
This week, the CDC, the government’s premier public health agency whose medical epidemiologists analyze the hospital data, also stopped producing reports about trends in the pandemic that had gone twice a week to states, and six days a week to officials at multiple federal agencies. Adm. Brett Giroir, an assistant secretary in the HHS who oversees coronavirus testing, was unhappy that the CDC hospital report stopped Wednesday and Thursday mornings, according to the federal health official. Caputo said that the goal is to maintain transparency, adding that conversations were still taking place between HHS officials and the CDC on a plan to keep producing the dashboard updates and the reports. “We expect a resolution,” he said. Nick Note: The data we rely upon is GONE. Your dictator elect called Putin for advise. No news means no bad news. Bottom line. Trump wants the virus to go away and the way to do this is cook the books. This is beyond criminal. I guarfucingtee you this will kill far more people. See the virus does not care about data. This will make the pandemic far far worse. We are flying blind. I can guarantee you the data far FAR far understates the number of infections and the death toll.
(CNN)Most humans fall into one of four blood groups — A, B, AB or O. Ordinarily, your blood type makes very little difference in your daily life except if you need to have a blood transfusion. However, people with Type A may have a higher risk of catching Covid-19 and of developing severe symptoms, recent research has suggested, while people with Type O blood have a lower risk. These study results follow evidence from past research that certain blood groups are more vulnerable to other diseases like cancer. But why we have blood types and what purpose they serve is still largely unknown, and very little is known about their links to viruses and disease. Unlocking what role blood types play would potentially help scientists better understand the risk of disease for people in different blood groups. “I think it’s fascinating, the evolutionary history, even though I don’t think we have the answer of why we have different blood types,” said Laure Segurel, a human evolutionary geneticist and a researcher at the National Museum of Natural History in France. Blood types were discovered in 1901 by the Austrian immunologist and pathologist Dr. Karl Landsteiner, who later won a Nobel Prize for his work. Like other genetic traits, your blood type is inherited from your parents. Prior to the discovery of blood groups, a transfusion, a now common lifesaving procedure, was a high-stakes process fraught with risk. Pioneering physician Dr. James Blundell, who worked in London in the early 1800s, gave blood transfusions to 10 of his patients — only half survived. What he didn’t know is that humans should only get blood from certain other humans. Here’s why: Your ABO blood group is identified by antibodies, part of the body’s natural defense system, and antigens, a combination of sugars and proteins that coat the surface of red blood cells. Antibodies recognize any foreign antigens and tell your immune system to destroy them. That’s why giving someone blood from the wrong group can be life-threatening. For example, I have type A+ blood. If a doctor accidentally injected me with type B, my antibodies would reject and work to break down the foreign blood. My blood would clot as a result, disrupt my circulation and cause bleeding and difficulties breathing — and I would potentially die. But if I received type A or type O blood, I would be fine. Your blood type is also determined by Rh status — an inherited protein found on the surface of red blood cells. If you have it, you’re positive. If you don’t, you’re negative. Most people are Rh positive, and those people can get blood from negative or positive blood type matches. But people with Rh-negative blood typically should only get Rh-negative red blood cells (because your own antibodies may react with the incompatible donor blood cells.) That leaves us with eight possible primary blood types, although there are a few more rare ones. A handful of studies have shown a link between blood type and the novel coronavirus, though most involved a small number of people and some were not peer reviewed. A team of European researchers who published their findings in the New England Journal of Medicine in June found people with Type A blood had a 45% higher risk of becoming infected than people with other blood types, and people with Type O blood were just 65% as likely to become infected as people with other blood types. They studied more than 1,900 severely ill coronavirus patients in Spain and Italy, and compared them to 2,300 people who were not sick. A similar effect for Hong Kong health care workers with blood group O was observed during the SARS outbreak, which infected 8,098 people from November 2002 to July 2003 and is from the same family of viruses.
July 16 (Reuters) – Florida reported on Thursday the largest one-day increase in deaths from the novel coronavirus since the pandemic began and its second-largest increase in cases ever. Florida announced 13,965 new cases on Thursday, bringing the total number of cases in the state and the center of the latest outbreak to over 315,775, according to the state health department. Florida’s COVID deaths rose by 156 to a total of 4,782, surpassing its previous one-day record of 133 new deaths on July 12. Hospitalizations of patients with COVID-19 was the highest ever reported at 8,626 currently hospitalized, up 321 in the past 24 hours, according to a state agency. Nick Note: This is what is called the START of the second wave,,,,,,, It will be a LOT more fun their the first one. This time their will be no issue…… people sacred shit will be good little boys and girls and in desperation will lock themselves in their houses.
LONDON (Reuters) – OPEC fears its record oil cuts will fail to rebalance the market and solve the worst glut in history if a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic undermines an economic recovery later this year, according to internal OPEC research seen by Reuters.
OPEC, Russia and their allies, a group known as OPEC+, said they would ease record oil curbs from Aug. 1 citing a gradual recovery in demand as global lockdowns loosen up.
The group expects oil demand to climb by 7 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2021 after falling 9 million bpd this year. OPEC wants to lift its output by 6 million bpd in 2021. But internal research by OPEC, seen by Reuters, suggests those targets could be at risk if a second wave of the virus forces new lockdowns around the world. Such a scenario would push demand down by 11 million bpd in 2020 and, most importantly for OPEC, lead to bigger inventories, a key measure OPEC uses to monitor the efficacy of output cuts. “It should be noted in this scenario that the overall stock build reaches an unprecedented high of 1.218 billion barrels in 2020,” OPEC said in research prepared for Wednesday’s OPEC+ panel meeting where ministers recommended easing output cuts. Such a figure would mean putting into storage the equivalent of more than 12 days of global oil output due to poor demand. Under the “second wave” scenario, global stocks would fail to drawdown in the third quarter and would only modestly decline in the fourth quarter, staying about 149 million barrels above a five-year average in industrialised OECD nations. OPEC has said it wants to keep inventories at or below the five-year average. Its current base case scenario foresees OECD stocks staying 104 million barrels below a five-year average in the OECD by the end of 2020 after a drawdown later in the year. Nick Note: Lets do a calculation here. Forget negative oil. When 7 million BPD of demand was taken out of the market Brent fell to $24 a barrel. What happens in the coming lock down when demand drop by 10 million BPD. This time we are going under $20 a barrel. And that will be before the end of this year. If the magic vaccines comes and IF it works in large populations it 1.5 years away at best. Plenty of time for 10.00 Brent
Los Angeles (AFP) – The number of new coronavirus cases and fatalities continued to mount across the United States on Wednesday, with Texas and Oklahoma recording new highs.
Johns Hopkins University, which tracks the spread of the disease, said late Wednesday that 67,632 new cases of the disease had been reported across the country in the previous 24 hours, a new national record.
The Texas Department of State Health Services reported 10,791 new cases and 110 new fatalities, saying in a tweet that both numbers “are new highs” for the state.
Oklahoma — where the governor, Kevin Stitt, announced Wednesday he had tested positive for the virus — recorded 1,075 new cases, a single-day record.
And Alabama also hit a grim milestone, recording 47 deaths, the highest in one day.
The disease has also been spreading rapidly in other states, notably Florida, which has recorded nearly 302,000 cases of coronavirus since the pandemic began.
California has also seen a surge in recent weeks, prompting officials to reimpose lockdowns.
The state reported its second highest single-day increase in coronavirus cases and deaths on Wednesday, with 11,125 new cases and 140 additional deaths.
“We are in an alarming and dangerous phase in this pandemic here in L.A. County,” said Barbara Ferrer, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health director, as she announced 44 additional deaths from the virus on Wednesday and 2,758 new cases.
“These alarming trends reflect behaviors from three weeks ago,” she added, saying that the county was seeing the highest rates of hospitalizations since the beginning of the pandemic.
She said there were currently 2,193 people hospitalized in the county due to the virus.
“Younger people are being hospitalized at a faster rate than ever before,” Ferrer said.
The latest research models show the number of US deaths projected to rise to over 150,000 by next month. The death toll currently stands at more than 136,400 and there have been more than 3.5 million people infected in the US since the outbreak began.
Though the number of new cases slowed in late spring, they began to climb again in mid-June as states lifted restrictions and the wearing of a mask became a political dividing line.
President Donald Trump finally wore a mask publicly last week for the first time during the pandemic as he visited a military hospital.
Facial coverings have been recommended by health officials as a precaution against spreading or becoming infected by coronavirus, but many US states have been slow in imposing the wearing of masks in public. Nick Note: Regard your paper face mask as a bandaid on a gunshot would to your liver. With the PROVEN aerosol spread and the more virulent and deadlier mutation this is now a global plague that will kill hundreds of million and infect a billion people or more. To be clear here the genie is out of the bottle. their are to many hotspots globally to isolate this. As a gruesome footnote. When traditional flu season starts in October prepare for riots and massive lockdowns. You have a short window to get supplied. What are now spot shortages soon will be a supply chain breakdown. As they trick the wage slaves to go back to work it is there death sentence. And for more good news their will be no vaccines in time. that is taking a giant leap of faith and assuming a vaccine is possible.
WASHINGTON—Millions of Americans who have missed rent payments due to the coronavirus pandemic could be at risk of being evicted in the coming months unless government measures to protect them are extended, economists and housing experts say.
Nearly 12 million adults live in households that missed their last rent payment, and 23 million have little or no confidence in their ability to make the next one, according to weekly Census Bureau data
About a third of the country’s renters are protected by an eviction moratorium that covers properties with federally insured mortgages. That expires July 25. Many renters are jobless and depend on supplemental weekly unemployment benefits of $600 that are due to end on July 31. A number of cities and states have broader protections that will remain in place longer. Boston has banned evictions from public housing through the end of the year. Pennsylvania recently extended its moratorium against evictions for nonpayment of rent until Aug. 31. The White House is negotiating with Republicans and Democrats in Congress to pass another round of economic relief during the last week of July. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has said supplemental jobless benefits have created a disincentive to return to work as the economy starts to reopen and should be reduced. House Democrats voted in May to expand the eviction moratorium to cover all residential dwellings and extend it by a year. The bill included an extension of enhanced jobless benefits and $100 billion in rental assistance. The office of Sen. Mike Crapo (R., Idaho), chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, declined to comment on any GOP plan to keep people in their homes because negotiations are under way. Paying rent is a struggle for Americans whose jobs evaporated when government-imposed lockdowns closed businesses ranging from barber shops and restaurants to stores and fitness centers. More than 18 million people were receiving unemployment insurance during the last week of June.
“They all had jobs, and they had economically viable jobs, (Nick Bit: What everyone fails to understand with the global plague many jobs of a should we say lower skill levels are no more) but we told them they couldn’t work—to protect us—and now we’re going to kick them out of their houses,” said Shamus Roller, executive director of the National Housing Law Project.
Depending on the jurisdiction, landlords must give notice if they plan to evict tenants, often 30 days in advance. Housing experts say some landlords are willing to offer flexibility to tenants in financial distress, given the difficulty of finding new tenants in a downturn, and about 1.5 million adults had their last rent payment deferred, according to census data. But such help isn’t always available. Homelessness rises with unemployment, according to a model by White House economist Kevin Corinth, based on data from the 2007-09 downturn. He found that each percentage-point increase in the unemployment rate forces about 21,500 people nationwide into homelessness. The U.S. jobless rate in June was 11.1%, up from 3.5% in February. Evictions have begun to creep up in cities where state moratoriums have expired, the group’s data show. Eviction filings in Milwaukee shot up to 1,447 in June, after Wisconsin’s moratorium expired, from 61 in May. “Milwaukee may be the canary in the coal mine,” said Alieza Durana, a spokeswoman for Eviction Lab. Even with eviction protection and unemployment benefits, Americans have fallen through the safety net.
Nick Note: is it not time for a reality check here. the worker bees have lost their wage slave jobs in mass. Restaurants are not going to come back. Travel and leisure is dead on arrival. Sporting Arenas and Theater events will be no more. Its time we suck it and realize its a brand new much poorer world. And the things the masses lusted after are gone gone i tell you. This constant need for amusement in discos, bars, sporting events, beaches and other crowd fests are over Over OVER and people who made their living in these industries that are a vestige of the greatest pig out consumerism orgy even surpassing the Romans in their final days. Americans have become addicted to the pursuit of pleasure and enjoy and EXPECT constant diversions sexual deviance and to be amused instead of spending their time wasted on this bullshit becoming productive. Their just reward will be groveling in the dirt for a potato!
Crude prices declined nearly 1% on Thursday following OPEC’s decision to ease oil output cuts to 7.7 million barrels per day. in the month of August, Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman confirmed on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Mexico refused to participate in further production cuts, Saudi Arabian Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman unveiled, claiming that the country fulfilled its obligations in May and June. However, due to compensations for the failure of some countries to comply fully with the reduction agreement during the previous period, the “effective” level of cuts will amount to at least 8.11 million bpd in August, he clarified. The exact amount of reductions will remain unclear as the non-complying members did not present their compensation plans for June yet, he warned. The underperformers are required to do so by the end of July, OPEC said in a separate statement. Nick Note: OPEC is making the same mistake that is being made the world over. And that is bowing to commercial interests and coming out of lock down to soon. OPEC is upping production at the very time lockdowns will begin again. This is not the end but the very begging of what will be the end.