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Minggu, 15 Maret 2020

Coronavirus screening causes massive bottlenecks at O’Hare and other U.S. airports - The Washington Post

The administration announced the “enhanced entry screenings” Friday as part of a suite of travel restrictions and other strategies aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus. Passengers on flights from more than two dozen countries in Europe are being routed through 13 U.S. airports, where workers are checking their medical histories, examining them for symptoms and instructing them to self-quarantine.

But shortly after taking effect, the measures designed to prevent new infections in the United States created the exact conditions that facilitate the spread of the highly contagious virus, with throngs of people standing shoulder to shoulder in bottlenecks.

As confusion and anxiety spread, the airport situation threatened to deepen the coronavirus crisis for the Trump administration, which has struggled to mount a coherent response to the pandemic or convey a consistent message to the public about what the federal government is doing to mitigate the outbreak.

“Last night we saw [passenger] safety and security was seriously compromised and people were forced into conditions that are against CDC guidelines and totally unacceptable,” Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said in a news conference at the city’s O’Hare International Airport Sunday.

Without better communication, she warned, “you’re going to see more disasters like last night that are solely the responsibility of the federal government not listening.”

It did not help that the president’s error-filled Wednesday address announcing the sweeping new travel ban, soon to expand to the United Kingdom and Ireland, left many rushing to fly home immediately. Officials hurried to correct the president’s statement that “all travel” from Europe would grind to a halt, but the weekend mayhem spurred another scramble.

District resident Nik Kowsar, 50, said he was supposed to return home Tuesday from London but moved up his flight last night after seeing photos of passengers stuck in hours-long delays at O’Hare Saturday as they awaited screening.

There were not many empty seats, he said: “So many other people made that decision as well.”

The scenes at the airports — captured in an outpouring of angry social media posts — resembled the chaotic implementation in early 2017 of President Trump’s travel ban targeting citizens from predominantly Muslim countries, which triggered confusion and protests at U.S. airports as travelers from the Middle East were detained or sent back with almost no warning.

In a tweet posted after midnight — several hours after reports of clogged terminals started circulating — acting homeland security secretary Chad Wolf acknowledged the backup and said the Department of Homeland Security was trying to add screening capacity and help airlines expedite the process.

“I understand this is very stressful,” Wolf said. “In these unprecedented times, we ask for your patience.”

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement Sunday that it “recognizes that the wait times experienced yesterday at some locations were unacceptable.”

“With this national emergency, there will unfortunately be times of disruption and increased processing times for travelers,” the statement said.

But lawmakers were sharply critical. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) called the long lines “unacceptable” in a late-night tweet, saying the backups “need to be addressed immediately.” Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) tweeted of delays stretching up to eight hours, writing, “Admin was unprepared after Presidential ban on travel from Europe." Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) on Sunday wrote a letter to top officials at U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the CDC asking what authorities are doing to “prevent the spread of this dysfunction.”

The crowds & lines O’Hare are unacceptable & need to be addressed immediately.@realDonaldTrump @VP since this is the only communication medium you pay attention to—you need to do something NOW.
These crowds are waiting to get through customs which is under federal jurisdiction
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) March 15, 2020

Mark Morgan, acting commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, acknowledged the frustration over “longer than usual delays” but said in early-Sunday tweets that “in several airports we’re seeing an immediate improvement.”

“We appreciate the patience of the traveling public as we deal with this unprecedented situation,” Morgan wrote. “We’re continuing to balance our efficiencies with ensuring the health and safety of all American citizens through enhanced medical screening. … Nothing is more important than the safety, health and security of our citizens.”

Kowsar, the District resident who rushed home from London, said he was surprised the only question he encountered while passing through customs at Dulles International Airport was, “Do you have any health conditions to declare?”

“I thought they were going to be screening everyone and checking temperatures,” Kowsar said.

He and other passengers from the London flight said they didn’t encounter any longer than usual delays at customs. But a dozen flights from Europe and the United Kingdom are scheduled to arrive at Dulles after 3 p.m., when delays are more likely to occur.

At Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, travelers spent hours in the cramped terminal waiting to fill out questionnaires from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dorothy Lowe of Longview, Tex., said she stood in a customs line from 4 p.m. until after 7 p.m. Saturday after returning from a trip to Mexico.

“We’re all being herded in the same line standing side by side,” Lowe told WFAA-TV. “I’m less concerned about having to stand here for the amount of time that I am and more concerned about where the people are traveling from that are around me and what they may or may not have been exposed to.”

Travelers reported similar problems at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. “Just waiting in a very long line with thousands of people to clear Customs at JFK T4,” one user wrote on Twitter. “Not sure who’s really taking things seriously.”

As the delays stretched into the night, airports asked passengers to stay calm.

“We ask for your patience as CBP/CDC agents are conducting enhanced screening for passengers, which may cause additional delays,” the DFW Airport said in a statement Saturday night. “These measures are important for the health and safety of all.”

“Thank you for yr patience,” O’Hare tweeted to one person describing a six-hour wait for bags followed by several hours more in “shoulder-to-shoulder crowds.” The airport acknowledged customs was “taking longer than usual” because of the enhanced screenings.

“We’ve strongly encouraged our federal partners to increase staffing to meet demand,” O’Hare said.

The travel restrictions that spurred the new screening measures are set to broaden. The United States will also be banning travel from the United Kingdom and Ireland beginning Monday night at midnight, officials said, bringing the total number of U.S.-travel-restricted countries in Europe to 28.

At Dulles International Airport outside Washington on Sunday, about one-third of travelers emerging from the customs area wore masks or had them strapped around their necks.

Jana Asher, a contractor for the United Nations returning home to western Pennsylvania from South Sudan, said she was surprised that the immigration line for U.S. citizens was longer than the one for noncitizens. She said she was traveling home via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, as scheduled but had spoken with several other American passengers who had stepped up their flights after Trump announced the restrictions on travelers from Europe.

Asher, a statistics professor at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, said she plans to continue wearing a bandanna over her mouth and nose for the next 14 days to protect others in case she was exposed to the coronavirus during her international travel. One positive note: Because coronavirus is just hitting Africa, hand sanitizer there was still in ample supply, so she brought plenty home.

“I didn’t bring home toilet paper,” she said with a smile, “because it would be impossible to pack.”

Nick Miroff and Hannah Natanson contributed to this report.

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2020-03-15 19:11:34Z
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Netanyahu's rival Gantz secures 61 majority to form government - Al Jazeera English

The main rival to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu won support from Israel's Arab coalition on Sunday to form a government, potentially undermining Netanyahu's plan to stay in power atop a proposed unity cabinet to fight the coronavirus outbreak.

After a third inconclusive election in less than a year left Netanyahu still three seats short of forming a majority, the prime minister has asked his main rival, Benny Gantz, the former chief of the Israeli military, to agree to an "emergency government" to fight the global pandemic.

However, Gantz has so far been cool to the proposal, suggesting he could still try to form a minority government of his own, removing Israel's longest-serving leader.

Israel's president on Sunday said he has decided to give Gantz the first opportunity to form a new government. President Reuven Rivlin's office announced his decision late on Sunday after consulting with leaders of all of the parties elected to parliament.

Speaking at a meeting with Rivlin, Joint List head Ayman Odeh said its voters had said "an emphatic 'no' to a right-wing government and Benjamin Netanyahu".

The Joint List is now the third-biggest party in the Israeli parliament, after achieving a record showing in the March 2 election.

Odeh called Netanyahu a "serial inciter" against Israel's Arab minority. His coalition would not join a government led by Gantz, but could potentially provide it enough votes to govern.

About a fifth of Israeli citizens are Palestinian by heritage but Israeli by citizenship. But no Israeli government has ever included an Arab political party.

Netanyahu's Likud party denounced any such plans. "While Netanyahu is handling a global and national crisis in the most responsible way, Gantz is racing to form a minority government depending on supporters of terror," the party said on Twitter.

With Netanyahu facing criminal charges in three corruption cases - his trial was supposed to start on Tuesday but was postponed until May 24 amid the health crisis - political rivals have cast doubt on his motives for proposing a unity cabinet.

Gantz has said Netanyahu did not appear to be sincere, having yet to send a negotiating team to Gantz's Blue and White party. "When you're serious, we'll talk," Gantz wrote.

Liberman recommends Gantz

Hours after all 15 members of the Joint List of Arab recommended Gantz, kingmaker Avigdor Liberman, of the ultranationalist, but secular Yisrael Beiteinu party, also said on Sunday he made the same recommendation to President Rivlin.

Gantz now has a majority of 61 out of 120 members.

Following the decision by Liberman, whose party won seven seats in the March 2 vote, Rivlin summoned Gantz and Netanyahu to an "urgent" meeting at his Jerusalem residence on Sunday night, to discuss a possible emergency unity government - including Netanyahu's ruling Likud party and Gantz's Blue and White.

The latest elections on March 2 did not hand a decisive majority to either Netanyahu's bloc of right-wing and religious parties, nor the Gantz-led bloc of centre-left and Arab parties.

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2020-03-15 19:01:28Z
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Live Coronavirus Updates and Coverage - The New York Times

新冠病毒疫情最新消息

Here’s what you need to know:

Milan on Sunday. The caseload in Italy topped 24,700, even as the entire country has been locked down. — Credit...Alessandro Grassani for The New York Times

Italy faces a staggering increase in cases and deaths, as restrictions multiply around the world.

The coronavirus continued its assault on Italy, the hardest hit country outside of China, with officials on Sunday reporting the number of deaths rose to 1,809 — a 25 percent increase over the day before and the largest one-day uptick yet of any country.

The 368 deaths Italy reported exceeds the highest single-day number China reported at the height of its outbreak. China’s highest daily toll was on Feb. 13, when the country reported 254 new deaths, according to the World Health Organization.

The staggering caseload in Italy topped 24,700, even as the entire country has been locked down for a week.

Facing dramatic increases in their own case numbers, Spain and France announced drastic countrywide restrictions this weekend. The countries are the hardest hit after Italy.

On Sunday, Spanish officials reported nearly 8,000 cases of coronavirus and 288 deaths. The country ordered all residents to confine themselves to their homes — and to leave only to buy food, go to work, seek medical care or assist older people and others in need. The government also ordered all schools, restaurants and bars to close.

The Spanish authorities said that Mr. Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, had tested positive for the virus.

France announced the closing of all “non-indispensable” businesses as of midnight, including restaurants, bars and movie theaters, after a sharp uptick in coronavirus cases. French cases doubled over the last 72 hours to about 4,500 on Saturday. There have been 91 deaths, and 300 coronavirus patients are in critical condition — half of them under 60 years of age.

On Sunday, France’s transportation minister said the country would begin reducing plane, train and bus services between cities.

One after another, countries around the world on Sunday continued to implement extraordinary measures as they raced to contain the spread of the coronavirus, closing schools, shuttering restaurants and bars, mandating quarantines and severely limiting travel.

Austria banned gatherings of more than five people and imposed steep fines for those who disobeyed a far-reaching curfew. Public parks, sporting fields and restaurants will close from Monday onward. Anyone disobeying the new rules could face fines of up to 3,600 euros. Travelers from Britain, the Netherlands, Russia and Ukraine are being added to a lengthening list of those banned from entering Austria.
The Netherlands announced a lockdown that will last until April 6, closing most schools and child care facilities. Restaurants, cafes, gyms and sporting clubs will also be closed.
In Lebanon, banks will close until March 29, according to a Lebanese media report.

A top U.S. health official says Americans should be prepared to ‘hunker down.’

A top health official said on Sunday that stronger efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus would roll out over the next several weeks, a period he characterized as crucial for controlling the outbreak.

Appearing across a number of Sunday morning news programs, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that travel bans enacted last week have helped curb transmission, but that U.S. citizens would have to make personal sacrifices and comply with government guidelines to avoid a “worst-case scenario.”

On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Dr. Fauci cautioned, “Americans should be prepared that they are going to have to hunker down significantly more than we as a country are doing.”

While the Trump administration has banned international travelers coming from high-risk countries and regions, such as China, Iran, and much of Europe, Dr. Fauci said domestic travel restrictions hadn’t been seriously discussed.

“I don’t see that right now or in the immediate future,” he said on “This Week.” “But remember, we are very open-minded about whatever it takes to preserve the health of the American public.”

The administration’s evaluation of the virus’s impact comes as many companies, universities and school districts are already announcing voluntary closings and suspension of normal operations. Last week, over a dozen states began to shutter public schools, and colleges and universities worldwide announced class suspensions and plans to move to online instruction.

In an interview with Brianna Keilar on CNN, Dr. Fauci said that progress was being made with companies like Walmart and CVS to improve diagnostic and testing capabilities. But he cautioned that disruptions to daily life were likely to continue.

“For a while, life is not going to be the way it used to be in the United States,” he said. “We have to just accept that if we want to do what’s best for the American public.”

Meanwhile, Daniel Goldman, who as the top investigator for the House Intelligence Committee played a leading role in the impeachment of President Trump, has tested positive, a House official confirmed on Sunday.

Mr. Goldman left the committee earlier this month. The panel’s chairman, Representative Adam B. Schiff of California, said Sunday that neither he nor any of his other aides were exhibiting symptoms. Mr. Schiff had already canceled public events and directed his staff to work from home.

In the U.S., the virus has profoundly changed daily life.

The United States began a new week on Sunday in a profoundly different place than it was seven days ago.

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, there would be no Sunday worship in many churches. No “Selection Sunday” for college basketball tournaments. No trips to the library in Los Angeles, or Broadway shows in New York, or visiting Grandma at a Florida nursing home.

By Sunday morning, known cases of coronavirus in the United States exceeded 2,700, spread across 49 states, prompting the mass cancellation of events and the reordering of American public life. Just one week ago, fewer than 500 cases of the illness had been diagnosed in the country. President Trump, who had initially refrained from getting tested, finally underwent testing for the virus — his results were negative, his doctor said.

The scope of the public health crisis became even clearer over the weekend as officials in Louisiana, New York and Virginia reported their first deaths tied to the coronavirus. Only West Virginia was without a single diagnosis.

Nationwide, businesses, schools and public officials continued to struggle with an outbreak that has left more than 50 people dead in the country and upended nearly all aspects of public life. More than 400 new cases have been reported in each of the last three days alone.

At Columbia in New York, the university’s president, Lee C. Bollinger, said that “one of the members of our community has been infected.” In a statement, the university asked those able to leave their dorms to do so by Tuesday.

Officials announced the deaths of a woman in New York City and a man in Rockland County on Saturday, the state’s first attributed to the virus. And two members of the State Assembly tested positive for the coronavirus. Pressure is growing for broader shutdown of New York City.

City Council members have begun calling on Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio to close restaurants and bars. “Something has snapped in the last 12 hours,” Councilman Mark D. Levine, a Manhattan Democrat, tweeted. “Today must be the day we move to #ShutDownNYC.”

Mr. Cuomo appeared to acknowledge the pressure. “The decision each of makes now will impact us all tomorrow,” he wrote on Twitter. “STAY HOME.”

Puerto Rico’s governor, Wanda Vázquez, ordered those on the island to stay indoors from 9 p.m. until 5 a.m. from Sunday night until at least March 30, saying that residents had failed to comply with requests to observe social distancing. She also ordered all businesses to close except for supermarkets, pharmacies, gas stations and banks.

And Maryland’s governor ordered casinos, racetracks and betting facilities to close “indefinitely.”

In the Omaha, Neb., area, officials reported the first known instance of community spread. In Illinois, a nursing facility where a woman tested positive for the virus was placed on lockdown. And in Pittsburgh, where the first local cases were announced on Saturday, city leaders urged bars to promote social distancing by limiting the number of people they allowed inside.

Two American emergency-room doctors — one in Washington State and one in New Jersey — were in critical condition with Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, the American College of Emergency Physicians said on Saturday. Dr. William Jaquis, the organization’s president, said it was unclear whether the doctor in Washington, who is in his 40s, had contracted the virus at the hospital. The physician in Paterson, N.J., who is 70, had been leading his hospital’s emergency preparedness.

Georgia said on Saturday that it would push back its presidential primary, originally scheduled for March 24, until May 19 — becoming the second U.S. state to delay voting in response to the outbreak. Officials in the next four states scheduled to vote in the primary — Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Ohio — have indicated that they intend to hold their elections on Tuesday as planned.

Authorities in Texas began preparing judges for the possibility that they may have to be ready to order the quarantine of coronavirus patients who refuse to isolate themselves.

And in some areas, officials were making provisions to house and isolate large numbers of people with the virus. But when officials in Washington State chose two locations to house people exposed to the virus, they picked poorer neighborhoods, drawing ire from local officials who noted that their communities had not yet experienced any cases. Dana Ralph, the mayor of Kent, south of Seattle, said residents wondered whether their neighborhoods were being sacrificed to protect wealthier ones.

The closing of schools in more than a dozen states continues to create concerns that children may miss meals and parents may not be able to stay home from work. After Los Angeles Unified School District said that it was closing, school officials said they would open 40 family resource centers to provide child care and meals to students whose parents cannot get out of work. North Carolina on Saturday became the latest state to close its public schools.

At U.S. airports, passengers coming from Europe describe long waits and confusion.

As the U.S. government rushed on Saturday to implement Mr. Trump’s restrictions on travel from Europe, part of an effort to stop the spread of the coronavirus, chaos ensued at some of America’s biggest airports.

In Dallas, travelers posted photos on Twitter of long winding lines in the airport. In New York, customs agents in paper and plastic masks boarded a flight from Paris. And in Chicago, where travelers reported standing in line for hours, Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois tagged Mr. Trump in a series of angry tweets about the long waits, saying, “The federal government needs to get its s@#t together. NOW.”

Paige Hardy, an American student who left behind her graduate studies in London because she feared a broader travel ban, said a series of confusing announcements in the air and upon landing in Dallas led to alarm on the plane late Saturday. She posted a video on Twitter of travelers being asked to raise their hands if they had been in mainland Europe. Because of the delay, she also missed her connecting flight.

“It truly felt like an apocalyptic scenario,” said Ms. Hardy, who left many of her belongings behind in England and was unsure whether she would be able to return.

The confusion came as concern spread about the coronavirus pandemic, which has now been identified in more than 2,700 people in the United States and has prompted Mr. Trump to declare a national emergency.

“At this time, we are working quickly with our partners to operationalize a plan which will outline where these travelers will be routed and what the screening process will be,” said Marcus Hubbard, a spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Chad Wolf, the acting secretary of Homeland Security, said on Twitter that he was aware of the delays and was working to add staffing.

American Airlines said on Saturday that it would suspend almost all of its long-haul international flights beginning Monday in response to decreased demand. The airline said the suspensions would last until at least May 6 and would represent a 75 percent decline in international capacity compared with the same period last year.

On Twitter, President Trump revisits a favorite target: Hillary Clinton

President Trump launched a Twitter broadside against his former political foe, Hillary Clinton, on a day that he said would be devoted to national prayer as the country braced itself for the coronavirus outbreak to get worse.

In a tweet on Sunday, Mr. Trump praised Judicial Watch, a nonprofit organization that has for decades made Mrs. Clinton a target through a string of lawsuits aimed at undermining her credibility and painting her as corrupt.

“Great Job by Judicial Watch,” Mr. Trump posted, promoting a news alert from the group about a legal development in the group’s ongoing fight to get Mrs. Clinton’s depositions about her emails and Benghazi attack records.

“Potentially a treasure trove,” Mr. Trump continued. “Too bad you are not given more help, but it will all work out!”

The Vatican will close Holy Week celebrations to the public.

The Vatican said on Sunday that its traditional services during the week before Easter, which usually draw tens of thousands of people, would not be open to the public next month.

Holy Week, the week before Easter — which falls on April 12 this year — features a series of events presided over by the pope, including a celebration of Good Friday, which in recent years has been held at the Colosseum in Rome.

Since Italy began locking down cities to try to contain the coronavirus, two of the pope’s weekly events, which also draw large crowds — his Wednesday general audience and his Sunday Prayer — have been livestreamed from the library in the papal palace. Last Sunday, the prayer was shown on two large screens in St. Peter’s Square, which has since been closed.

The Vatican said those two events would continue to be shown by livestream on the Vatican News website through Easter. It gave no details about how the Holy Week celebrations would be carried out.

Italy has been the European country hardest hit by the virus, with more than 21,000 people infected and 1,441 deaths.

Several politicians have tested positive for the coronavirus, and on Friday, Giorgio Valoti, the 70-year-old mayor of Cene, a small town northeast of Milan, died. His son, Alessandro, announced the death on Facebook.

Nike stores to shut in the U.S. and beyond.

Nike said on Sunday that it would shut all of its stores in the United States, Canada, Western Europe, New Zealand and Australia from Monday until March 27 to fight the spread of the coronavirus.

Stores in South Korea, Japan, most of China and in many other countries will continue normal operations, the company said in a statement.

The Nike store closings come days after the company encouraged its workers in the United States to work from home if possible, starting on Monday.

They followed similar moves by companies like Urban Outfitters, which said on Saturday that it would shut all its stores until further notices, and Apple, which said that it would close its stores outside mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan for two weeks.

Coronavirus Map: Tracking the Spread of the Outbreak

The virus has infected more than 156,800 people in at least 131 countries.

German carmakers says factories will remain open, for now.

In Germany, which has been hit hard by the coronavirus, factories will continue to churn out automobiles — at least for the time being, carmakers said on Sunday.

Volkswagen, the world’s largest carmaker, has closed or is planning to temporarily close factories outside Germany, including one in Chattanooga, Tenn. But its German locations are continuing to operate, a company spokesman said. BMW factories are also operating “according to plan,” a BMW spokesman said.

Yet German factories may soon run short of workers. About 800,000 people work for car companies or parts suppliers in Germany, almost as many as work in the car industry in the United States. The German government has not yet imposed a nationwide lockdown, but schools in many regions are suspending classes. Assembly line employees may not be able to come to work because they need to care for their children.

Under pressure to add stricter restrictions, Britain will ask older residents to self-isolate.

As countries across Europe impose lockdowns and restrict travel, Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain is facing a swelling tide of opposition to his government’s more relaxed measures to stem the coronavirus.

In an open letter, nearly 350 scientists and doctors called on him to immediately impose the kind of social distancing steps that countries like Italy, France and Spain have adopted.

They warned that Britain’s approach — in which the government has talked of impending moves like quarantining older residents and closing schools but pushed off the timing for 10 days or longer — was putting lives at risk.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the British broadcaster Sky News that the action plan under consideration including asking Britons over 70 to self-isolate for up to four months to reduce their risk of contracting the virus. The government is also expected to ban large gatherings starting next week and to order people over age 70 to remain at home.

The rate of infection in the country has been climbing as rapidly as elsewhere in Europe. Britain had at least 1,370 confirmed cases and 35 deaths as of Sunday, and the United States this weekend extended its ban on travelers from most of Europe to include those coming from Britain, as well.

On Sunday, Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office also advised against “all but essential travel to the U.S.A., due to restrictions put in place by the U.S. government” on foreign nationals arriving from Britain and Ireland from Monday.

In Manila, a lockdown stirs old fears about martial law.

Manila, the densely populated capital of the Philippines, went under lockdown on Sunday as the government sought to assure citizens that the heavy presence of security forces did not herald a return to martial law.

Carol Araullo, head of a civic group, Bayan, said President Rodrigo Duterte’s lockdown order “appears to focus mainly on limiting the movement of the people rather than addressing the more urgent health requirements and economic needs” of Manila residents. She said it included no provisions for a quarantine system or free testing for the capital’s many poor people, nor did it deploy “doctors, nurses and other health workers in the communities.”

Mr. Duterte’s government banned public gatherings, suspended classes for a month, imposed a limited curfew and restricted travel in and out of the Manila metropolitan area. Soldiers and police officers set up checkpoints on Sunday morning, stopping vehicles and checking the temperatures of people inside.

Mr. Duterte announced the measures on Thursday, emphasizing that they were to protect the public and that there would be no return to military rule. Many Filipinos have vivid memories of decades of martial law under President Ferdinand Marcos, who was driven out of power in 1986.

“Do not be afraid of the soldiers — these are your soldiers,” Mr. Duterte said. “The armed forces is there to serve you and they are under orders from civilian authorities.”

Mr. Duterte, an admirer of Mr. Marcos, placed the southern island of Mindanao under martial law for more than two years after an Islamist uprising there. During that time, he mused that it might become necessary to extend it to the whole country.

The Philippines has confirmed 111 coronavirus infections and eight deaths. A lawmaker said Sunday morning that an employee of the Philippine House of Representatives had died after testing positive for the virus.

Beijing says new arrivals will have to quarantine, and cover their own costs.

China’s capital, Beijing, is toughening its rules for international arrivals, requiring everyone arriving from overseas to spend 14 days at a quarantine site beginning on Monday.

All arrivals will have to pay for their own quarantine stay, officials said on Sunday. Beijing announced a mandatory quarantine last week, but allowed arrivals to complete the two-week isolation at home or in a hotel. The new rules will allow limited exceptions for home quarantine.

Chinese officials have made a priority of controlling the spread of the virus in the capital. As of Saturday, the city had recorded 415 confirmed infections, including eight deaths and 353 people who have been treated.

As it tightens restrictions on people entering the country, the Chinese government also is leading a sweeping campaign to purge the public sphere of dissent, censoring news reports, harassing citizen journalists and shutting down news sites.

But Chinese journalists, buoyed by an outpouring of support from the public and widespread calls for free speech, are fighting back in a rare challenge to the ruling Communist Party.

They are publishing hard-hitting exposés describing government cover-ups and failures in the health care system. They are circulating passionate calls for press freedom. They are using social media to draw attention to injustice and abuse, circumventing an onslaught of propaganda orders.

The authorities have struggled to rein in coverage of the outbreak, in part because the Chinese public has resorted to innovative methods to preserve a record of what has transpired.

When the magazine Profile published a damning interview with a doctor who was warned not to share information about the virus as it first spread in Wuhan, the article disappeared. But Chinese internet users brought the story back to life, using emojis, morse code and obscure languages to render the interview in ways that would evade censors.

“This time the government’s control of free speech has directly damaged the interests and lives of ordinary people,” said Li Datong, a retired newspaper editor in Beijing. “Everyone knows this kind of big disaster happens when you don’t tell the truth.”

A former passenger on a cruise ship heading to France dies of the coronavirus.

A 68-year-old Italian man who had been a passenger on the Costa Luminosa cruise ship died of Covid-19 on Saturday in the Cayman Islands, the hospital and government there said.

The ship left Fort Lauderdale, Fla., three weeks ago for a cruise in the Caribbean, returned and departed again on March 5. It now has 1,427 passengers onboard. Two other Italian passengers tested positive for the illness in San Juan, Puerto Rico, after one fell ill a week ago. The ship, which was turned away from Antigua and Spain, is scheduled to dock on Thursday in Marseille, France, where Italian passengers will be taken back to Italy, according to a statement on the company’s website.

The man had two heart attacks onboard the vessel and was evacuated and admitted to a hospital on Feb. 29 in critical condition, according to a statement from the Health City Cayman Islands Hospital. He developed a dry cough six days later but had no other coronavirus symptoms.

A test taken on Monday came back positive for the coronavirus three days later — and a day before the passengers who disembarked in San Juan were confirmed to have the virus. His death was caused by pneumonia, “with acute respiratory distress,” from the coronavirus disease, according to a doctor quoted in a news report.

The hospital has quarantined members of its staff and their families, and has been closed to new patients for two weeks, the statement said. The man’s wife was quarantined.

Despite the positive tests on the Italian passengers on Friday, the cruise line began stricter protocols, such as having dinner served by employees, only this weekend, other passengers said.

The cruise line said it increased sanitary protocols late Saturday afternoon after receiving confirmation from the Puerto Rican government about the Italian couple hospitalized there.

“We confirm no guests or crew with health issues,” the company said in an email to The New York Times. It did not respond this weekend to specific requests for information about the man in the Cayman Islands.

Reporting was contributed by Mitch Smith, Mark Landler, Jonathan Weisman, Elisabetta Povoledo, Andrea Salcedo, Austin Ramzy, Tiffany May, Iliana Magra, Cliff Levy, Kristen Danis, Katrin Bennhold, Jason Gutierrez, Mariel Padilla, Robert Chiarito, Isabel Kershner, Mujib Mashal, Raphael Minder, Neil MacFarquhar, Jack Ewing, Najim Rahim, Livia Albeck-Ripka, Hannah Beech, Marc Santora, Julie Bosman, Richard Fausset, Johanna Berendt, Richard C. Paddock, Muktita Suhartono, Elian Peltier, Damien Cave, Javier Hernandez, Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Mihir Zaveri, Patricia Mazzei, Frances Robles, Badra Sharma, Annie Karni, Abdi Latif Dahir, Zach Montague, Claire Moses and Nina Siegal.

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https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMiPmh0dHBzOi8vd3d3Lm55dGltZXMuY29tLzIwMjAvMDMvMTUvd29ybGQvY29yb25hdmlydXMtbGl2ZS5odG1s0gFCaHR0cHM6Ly93d3cubnl0aW1lcy5jb20vMjAyMC8wMy8xNS93b3JsZC9jb3JvbmF2aXJ1cy1saXZlLmFtcC5odG1s?oc=5

2020-03-15 18:20:24Z
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Coronavirus screening causes massive bottlenecks at O’Hare and other U.S. airports - The Washington Post

“AT THIS MOMENT, HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE ARRIVING FROM NUMEROUS COUNTRIES ARE JAMMED TOGETHER IN A SINGLE SERPENTINE LINE VAGUELY SAID TO BE ‘FOR SCREENING,’ ” read a tweet from Tracy Sefl, who wrote that she waited for several hours to be screened at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.

“Authorities are going to have to deal with the ramifications of the breakdown of whatever this system is supposed to be,” she wrote. “Not to mention needless exposure risks from containing thousands of passengers like this.”

“I understand this is very stressful,” Wolf said. “In these unprecedented times, we ask for your patience.”

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement Sunday that it “recognizes that the wait times experienced yesterday at some locations were unacceptable.”

“With this national emergency, there will unfortunately be times of disruption and increased processing times for travelers,” the statement said.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) called the long lines “unacceptable” in a late-night tweet, saying the backups “need to be addressed immediately.”

The crowds & lines O’Hare are unacceptable & need to be addressed immediately.@realDonaldTrump @VP since this is the only communication medium you pay attention to—you need to do something NOW.
These crowds are waiting to get through customs which is under federal jurisdiction
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) March 15, 2020

Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) tweeted shortly after that he was in contact with Pritzker about delays for O’Hare arrivals stretching up to eight hours.

“Admin was unprepared after Presidential ban on travel from Europe,” Durbin said.

As the delays stretched into the night, airports asked passengers to stay calm.

“We’ve strongly encouraged our federal partners to increase staffing to meet demand,” O’Hare said.

At Dulles International Airport outside Washington on Sunday, about one-third of travelers emerging from the customs area wore masks or had them strapped around their necks.

“I didn’t bring home toilet paper,” she said with a smile, “because it would be impossible to pack.”

Nick Miroff contributed to this report.

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Coronavirus screening causes massive bottlenecks at O’Hare and other U.S. airports - The Washington Post

The scenes at the airports — captured in an outpouring of angry social media posts — resembled the botched implementation in early 2017 of President Trump’s travel ban targeting citizens from predominantly Muslim countries, which triggered chaos and protests at U.S. airports as travelers from the Middle East were detained or sent back with almost no warning.

“I understand this is very stressful. In these unprecedented times, we ask for your patience,” Wolf said.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a statement Sunday that it “recognizes that the wait times experienced yesterday at some locations were unacceptable.”

“With this national emergency, there will unfortunately be times of disruption and increased processing times for travelers,” the statement said.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker called the long lines “unacceptable” in a late-night tweet, saying the backups “need to be addressed immediately.”

The crowds & lines O’Hare are unacceptable & need to be addressed immediately.@realDonaldTrump @VP since this is the only communication medium you pay attention to—you need to do something NOW.
These crowds are waiting to get through customs which is under federal jurisdiction
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) March 15, 2020

Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) tweeted shortly after that he was in contact with Pritzker about delays for O’Hare arrivals stretching up to eight hours.

“Admin was unprepared after Presidential ban on travel from Europe,” Durbin said.

At Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, travelers spent hours in the cramped terminal waiting to fill out questionnaires from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dorothy Lowe, of Longview, Tex., said she stood in a customs line from 4 p.m. until after 7 p.m. Saturday after returning from a trip to Mexico.

“We’re all being herded in the same line standing side-by-side,” Lowe told WFAA. “I’m less concerned about having to stand here for the amount of time that I am, and more concerned about where the people are traveling from that are around me and what they may or may not have been exposed to.”

As the delays stretched into the night, airports asked passengers to stay calm.

“We ask for your patience as CBP/CDC agents are conducting enhanced screening for passengers, which may cause additional delays,” the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport said in a Saturday night statement. “These measures are important for the health and safety of all.”

“Thank you for yr patience,” O’Hare tweeted to one person describing a six-hour wait for bags followed by several hours more in “shoulder-to-shoulder crowds.” The airport acknowledged customs is “taking longer than usual” because of the enhanced screenings.

“We’ve strongly encouraged our federal partners to increase staffing to meet demand,” O’Hare said.

The travel restrictions that spurred the new screening measures are set to broaden. The United States will also be banning travel from the United Kingdom and Ireland beginning Monday at midnight, officials said, bringing the total number of U.S. travel-restricted countries in Europe to 28.

At Dulles International Airport on Sunday, about one-third of travelers emerging from the customs area wore masks or had them strapped around their necks.

Jana Asher, a contractor for the United Nations returning home to western Pennsylvania from South Sudan, said she was surprised that the immigration line for U.S. citizens was longer than the one for noncitizens. She said she was traveling home via Addis Ababa on schedule but had spoken with several other American passengers who had stepped up their flights after Trump announced the restrictions on travelers from Europe.

Asher, a statistics professor at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, said she plans to continue wearing a bandanna over her mouth and nose for the next 14 days to protect others in case she was exposed to the coronavirus during her international travel. One perk: Because coronavirus is just hitting Africa, hand sanitizer there was still in ample supply, so she brought plenty home.

“I didn’t bring home toilet paper,” she said with a smile, “because it would be impossible to pack.”

Nick Miroff contributed to this report.

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Coronavirus screening causes massive bottlenecks at O’Hare and other U.S. airports - The Washington Post

The administration announced the “enhanced entry screenings” Friday as part of a suite of travel restrictions and other strategies aimed at slowing the spread of the coronavirus. Passengers on flights from more than two dozen countries in Europe are being routed through 13 U.S. airports, where workers check their medical histories, examine them for symptoms and instruct them to self-quarantine.

“AT THIS MOMENT, HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE ARRIVING FROM NUMEROUS COUNTRIES ARE JAMMED TOGETHER IN A SINGLE SERPENTINE LINE VAGUELY SAID TO BE ‘FOR SCREENING,’” read a tweet from Tracy Sefl, who wrote that she waited for several hours to be screened at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport.

As confusion and anxiety spread, the debacle threatened to deepen the coronavirus crisis for the Trump administration, which has struggled to mount a coherent response to the pandemic or convey a consistent message to the public about what the federal government is doing to mitigate the outbreak.

“I understand this is very stressful. In these unprecedented times, we ask for your patience,” Wolf said.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a similar statement, saying, “We’re continuing to balance our efficiencies with ensuring the health and safety of all American citizens through enhanced medical screening in accordance with CDC guidelines due to the global COVID-19 pandemic.”