LONDON — A weekly survey by Britain’s statistics agency shows an average of nearly 52,000 daily coronavirus cases, an increase of nearly 50% in the most recent week.
The Office for National Statistics says cases “continued to rise steeply,” with an average of 51,900 new cases between Oct. 17-23. That’s up from 35,200 cases from Oct. 10-16.
The numbers are based on more than 600,000 swab tests taken from people with or without symptoms. It doesn’t include those in hospitals or care homes.
The highest rates were registered in areas in the northern England, where restrictions have been tightened the most.
___
HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:
— US average daily coronavirus cases rising to 74,000
— Germany reports daily record of 18,681 coronavirus cases
— Trump and health advisers go their separate ways on virus
— Trump’s campaign rallies among the nation’s biggest events held in defiance of coronavirus-related crowd restrictions.
— Belgian virus numbers keep rising; lockdown considered. Non-essential shops are expected to face temporary closure.
— New York City hospitals and nursing homes brace for a potential resurgence of coronavirus patients.
___
Follow AP’s coronavirus pandemic coverage at http://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
___
HERE’S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:
WARSAW, Poland — Poland reached another daily record with more than 21,600 coronavirus cases registered on Friday.
There were 202 more deaths, 35 considered caused by COVID-19 alone. The Health Ministry says more than 15,400 people were hospitalized and more than 1,250 are on ventilators.
Nearly 7,700 hospital beds for COVID-19 patients and more than 520 ventilators are still available in the nation of 38 million, the ministry says.
Authorities are concerned about a possible spike in cases following street demonstrations against the recent tightening of the abortion law. A march is expected Friday in Warsaw, the second week of protests.
___
BERLIN — Germany’s health minister says when a vaccine for the coronavirus is ready, it will be equally distributed among all European Union member nations.
Jens Spahn told EU health ministers the plan is to wait for Phase 3 trials to be completed and organize fair distribution.
“All 27 member states, no matter how big they are, how small they are, what their GDP is will participate, and get doses from the very beginning proportional to their population size,” he says.
The German minister, who was in quarantine after testing positive for the coronavirus, has stressed comprehensive clinical trials are needed first. He says it must be “secure and safe, that is very important for acceptance.”
EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides added a vaccine wouldn’t be a “silver bullet” that immediately ends the pandemic and people would need to maintain precautions.
___
WASHINGTON — The seven-day rolling average for daily new coronavirus cases in the U.S. rose over the past two weeks from 52,350 to more than 74,180.
That’s according to data through Wednesday from Johns Hopkins University, marking a return to levels not seen since the summer surge. The rolling average for daily new deaths rose over the past two weeks from 724 to 787.
Positive test rates have been rising in 45 states, according to the COVID Tracking Project. Fifteen states have positive test rates of 10% or higher, considered an indicator of widespread transmission.
Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary Adm. Brett Giroir said earlier his week the proof of the uptick is the rising numbers of hospitalizations and deaths.
The U.S. leads the world with 8.9 million confirmed coronavirus cases and more than 228,000 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
___
BERLIN — Germany’s health minister says when a vaccine for the coronavirus is ready, it will be equally distributed among all European Union member nations.
Jens Spahn told EU health ministers the plan is to wait for Phase 3 trials to be completed and organize fair distribution.
“All 27 member states, no matter how big they are, how small they are, what their GDP is will participate, and get doses from the very beginning proportional to their population size,” he says.
The German minister, who was in quarantine after testing positive for the coronavirus, has stressed comprehensive clinical trials are needed first. He says it must be “secure and safe, that is very important for acceptance.”
EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides added a vaccine wouldn’t be a “silver bullet” that immediately ends the pandemic and people would need to maintain precautions.
___
BERLIN — German authorities have added almost all of Austria and Italy to the list of high-risk areas for COVID-19.
Travelers returning to Germany from countries or regions on the list, which is updated weekly, have to go into 14-day quarantine and take a test for the coronavirus.
Those with negative test results can end their quarantines.
Critics have pointed out that the threshold of 50 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants per week, which is the main criteria for determining which countries appear on the list, has now been passed in much of Germany itself.
Germany’s disease control agency reported Friday that the country saw another new daily record number of confirmed cases, with 18,681. The new cases take the country’s total in the pandemic to almost half a million.
___
BRATISLAVA, Slovakia — Confirmed coronavirus infections in Slovakia have hit a new record high as the country gets ready for a nationwide testing.
The Health Ministry says the day-to-day increase in the country of 5.4 million reached 3,363 on Thursday, over 300 more than the previous record set on Saturday.
Slovakia has a total of 55,091 confirmed cases, including 212 deaths.
The government wants to use antigen tests for testing almost the entire population older than age 10 over the two weekends. It’s not compulsory and free of charge.
Antigen tests are less accurate than PCR tests, but have the advantage of producing faster results.
Slovakia so far has conducted a relatively low number of virus tests compared with other European countries. Authorities hope the broad testing program will help them respond to the pandemic more effectively.
___
PRAGUE — The Czech economy has slightly recovered in the third quarter of 2020 following a record decline in the previous three months.
The preliminary figures published by the Czech Statistics Office on Friday show the Czech economy contracted by 5.8% year-on-year but increased by 6.2% compared with the previous quarter.
In the second quarter, the Czech economy contracted by a record of 10.9% year-on-year.
Analysts expect the recovery to be limited because the Czech Republic is currently experiencing one of Europe's worst coronavirus outbreaks and has imposed tight restrictive measures that will slow business activity again.
Bars, restaurants, hotels and most stores have been closed among other measures to curb a record surge in known infections.
___
HONG KONG — Customs agents in the southern Chinese city of Hong Kong have seized 100,000 counterfeit face masks and arrested one person in what the government called the largest operation of its kind on record.
The masks were set to be shipped overseas and had a market value of almost $400,000, the government’s Information Services Department reported Friday.
The masks were seized at a storehouse in Hong Kong on Wednesday after agents received a tip-off, the department said, leading to a further raid on a trading company where a 71-year-old manager was arrested
“Initial investigations revealed that unscrupulous merchants intended to transship the batch of masks overseas for sale and profit. Customs is looking into the source of the face masks involved in the case," the department said in a news release.
Customs agents launched an operation codenamed “Guardian” across the city in late January involving spot checks on common protective equipment such as masks, resulting in 80 arrests and the seizure of nearly 6 million face masks, along with other items, the department said.
Mainland China is a major source of personal protective equipment such as masks and bodysuits, some of which have been found to be counterfeit or of inferior quality.
___
PARIS — People leaving Paris before a nationwide lockdown took effect brought traffic jams to freeways around the French capital.
The four-week lockdown that started at midnight requires residents to stay home except for one hour of daily exercise or to attend medical appointments or to shop for essentials.
French media reported traffic jams around the Paris region stretched for miles as many residents headed for country or family homes in search of more space than the typically cramped Paris housing. Many motorists also were leaving to celebrate this weekend's All Saints’ Day holiday.
French President Emmanuel Macron says authorities would be “tolerant” about families returning from the holidays on Monday, but inter-regional travel is otherwise strictly prohibited.
___
MADRID — The Spanish economy has rebounded a record quarter-to-quarter 16.7% from July to September, bringing the country out of the technical definition of recession.
Preliminary data released Friday by Spain’s National Statistics Institute showed that domestic demand over the summer was the main driver of the recovery. However, the third quarter growth did not offset the 17.8% GDP loss of the second quarter and the 5.2% loss in the first three months of the year, when the pandemic hit the country.
Output in Spain was down 8.7% in the third quarter compared to the same period a year before.
Nearly all Spaniards are facing a weekend with restrictions on leaving the regions where they live as authorities try to contain a sharp resurgence of reported coronavirus cases but refrain from a full lockdown to try to prevent further economic deterioration.
Although Spain's official tally records 1.1 confirmed COVID-19 cases, the government has acknowledged that the true figure, including missed cases, could be at least three times higher. At least 35,000 people in Spain have died with the virus during the pandemic.
___
BUDAPEST, Hungary — The number of coronavirus-related deaths in Hungary rose to an all-time high on Friday, prompting the government to tighten oversight over compliance with regulations to stem the spread of infections.
Hungarian health authorities reported that 65 patients died in the past 24 hours, while the number of confirmed new cases increased to 3,286 from 2,194 on Thursday.
The government has not announced new restrictive measures despite the steep rise in infections but Prime Minister Viktor Orban stressed Friday that authorities will hand out fines to everyone failing to wear a mask where required.
“I do not believe in multiplying the rules, but in enforcing existing ones,” Orban said in a radio interview.
Hungary’s chief medical officer announced Thursday that wearing masks will be mandatory in restaurants and bars as well except during consumption. Police will be authorized to close establishments that don't enforce the regulations.
The central European nation has recorded 71,413 confirmed infections since the start of the pandemic, including 1,699 deaths.
___
BRUSSELS — Belgian coronavirus cases continued their record rise on Friday before the government met to consider tougher restrictions on movements that would amount to a quasi-lockdown.
After surpassing the spring record on Thursday, the number of patients in Belgian hospitals broke the 6,000-mark and stood at 6,187, a rise of 263 in a day.
After measures were beefed up earlier in the week, the government was to meet again later Friday to consider further restrictions. Non-essential shops are expected to face temporary closure.
Patients in intensive care units reached 1,057 from 993 the day earlier, and virologists have said that unless tougher measures having a quick impact the saturation point of 2,000 patients will be reached on Nov. 6. Hospital authorities stood first in line to demand action since they say the health system is at the point of collapse.
___
NEW DELHI — India has reported 48,648 new coronavirus cases, continuing a downward trend in infections while the country’s caseload crossed 8 million and trailed the U.S.
The Health Ministry also reported 563 deaths in the past 24 hours, raising the overall death toll to 121,090 on Friday.
The slowdown in the pandemic in India has lasted more than a month and the country has reported fewer than 60,000 cases for nearly two weeks. According to the Health Ministry, India has 594,386 active cases, which suggests that more people are recovering than those who are testing positive for the virus.
But even as cases are dropping nationwide, the capital New Delhi is facing what could be a third wave of infections.
The national capital, which recently became the worst-hit city in India, is among the few regions in the country that is increasingly seeing a spike in new infections from last week.
New Delhi has 30,952 active cases of the virus. It has been clocking more than 5,000 cases daily in the last three days. The surge in new infections comes at a time when pollution levels have started to soar in the capital, exacerbating respiratory illnesses among many.
___
TOKYO — Japan’s coronavirus cases has topped 100,000, nine months after a first case was found in mid-January, according to the health ministry figures released Friday.
The country confirmed 808 new cases on Thursday, bringing the cumulative cases to 100,334, including 712 cases found on a cruise ship earlier this year, according to the ministry figures.
About one-third of the cases come from Tokyo, where 221 cases were confirmed Thursday, bringing a prefectural total to 30,677, with 453 deaths. Nationwide, Japan has more than 1,700 deaths.
Experts say Japan has so far managed to avoid “explosive” infections as in Europe and the U.S. without enforcing lockdowns, most likely thanks to the common use of face masks and disinfectant, as well as other common preventive measures including social distancing.
Japan had a nationwide state of emergency in April and May, and experienced a less serious second wave in August, but has since been seeing a slight uptrend in new cases in northern Japanese prefectures, setting off concerns of a surge in the winter.
Experts have urged extra caution at dining and drinking parties and workplaces. According to health ministry data, nearly half of the new cases were in their 20s and 30s.
___
Looking to generate income with your stock portfolio? Use these ten stocks to generate a safe and reliable source of investment income.
Get This Free Report
