In Brief: April 19, 2020

US governors feel heat to reopen from protesters, president

AUSTIN, Texas — Stores in Texas can soon begin selling merchandise with curbside service, and hospitals can resume nonessential surgeries. In Florida, people are returning to a few beaches and parks. And protesters are clamoring for more.

Governors eager to rescue their economies and feeling heat from President Donald Trump are moving to ease restrictions meant to control the spread of the coronavirus, even as new hot spots emerge and experts warn that moving too fast could prove disastrous.

Adding to the pressure are protests against stay-at-home orders organized by small-government groups and Trump supporters. They staged demonstrations Saturday in several cities after the president urged them to “liberate” three states led by Democratic governors.

Protests happened in Republican-led states, too, including at the Texas Capitol and in front of the Indiana governor’s home. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott already said that restrictions will begin easing next week. Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb — who signed an agreement with six other Midwestern states to coordinate reopening — said he would extend his stay-at-home order until May 1.

For the first time in weeks, people were able to visit some Florida beaches, but they were still subject to restrictions on hours and activities. Beaches in big cities stayed closed.

In nod to normalcy, Pence celebrates Air Force Academy grads

AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. — In a symbolic nod to normalcy, Vice President Mike Pence delivered a commencement address to the U.S. Air Force Academy’s graduating class on Saturday, telling the cadets that by setting off on their mission to defend the nation they “inspire confidence that we will prevail against the invisible enemy in our time as well.”

Pence’s trip, only his second outside Washington in the last six weeks, was aimed at showing that the country is on course to gradually reopening after weeks of the coronavirus shutdown.

He spoke at a scaled-down ceremony at the academy outside Colorado Springs, where hundreds of graduating cadets in blue and white dress uniforms sat eight feet apart, taking up an area nearly as large as a football field.

“I know we gather at a time of great challenge in the life of our nation,” Pence said as he began his remarks. “And while we don’t quite look like the usual graduation at the Air Force Academy, let me tell you, this is an awesome sight. And I wouldn’t be anywhere else but with the 62nd class of the Air Force Academy, the class of 2020.”

From wire sources

The event usually attracts a big crowd to Falcon Stadium, which has a maximum capacity of more than 46,000. President Donald Trump spoke last year. But this year, the pandemic forced the academy to close the ceremony to visitors, including friends and family of the nearly 1,000 graduates.

Fear meets fortitude in Peru hospital hard hit by COVID-19

LIMA, Peru — Seated in a wheelchair at one of Peru’s oldest hospitals, 84-year-old Emma Salvador struggled for each breath, aided by an oxygen mask pinching her face. Her son fanned her with folded sheets of paper, wishing he could do more.

“Seeing her in such pain is what overwhelms me,” said José Gonzalez, 57, who confessed fearing that the worst outcome awaited his mother, while encouraging her to drink some water.

This scene Friday at the Dos de Mayo Hospital in Lima depicts just one of the 13,489 new coronavirus cases in the South American country, which faces a growing number of patients desperate for emergency attention.

Doctors say they’re doing all they can to treat patients throughout the country that’s reporting the second largest number of coronavirus cases in Latin America following Brazil, which has more than double the number. Decades of economic growth in Peru did not include extensive investments in the health system.

Founded in 1875, the Dos de Mayo hospital has long been the preferred choice of medical students eager to gain experience treating a wide spectrum of illnesses. It’s no different now, with tents recently set up on a patio to care for roughly 100 patients a day — including criminals hospitalized under police supervision.

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Former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill dies at age 84

Paul O’Neill, a former Treasury secretary who broke with George W. Bush over tax policy and then produced a book critical of the administration, died Saturday. He was 84.

O’Neill’s son, Paul O’Neill Jr. confirmed that his father died at his home in Pittsburgh after battling lung cancer for the last couple of years. After a few surgeries and chemotherapy, he decided against any further intervention four or five months ago, he said.

“There was some family here and he died peacefully,” the son said. “Based on his situation, it was a good exit.”

A former head of aluminum giant Alcoa, O’Neill served as Treasury secretary from 2001 to late 2002. He was forced to resign after he objected to a second round of tax cuts because of their impact on deficits.

O’Neill’s blunt speaking style more than once got him in trouble as Treasury secretary. He sent the dollar into a tailspin briefly in his early days at Treasury when his comments about foreign exchange rates surprised markets. In the spring of 2001, O’Neill jolted markets again when during Wall Street’s worst week in 11 years, he blandly declared “markets go up and markets go down.”

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Orthodox churches empty for Easter amid pandemic

KYIV, Ukraine — Orthodox priests in much of Europe held Easter services in churches empty of parishoners because of restrictions imposed to block the spread of coronavirus.

In Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kyiv, priests at the services that began late Saturday night wore the elaborate robes that characterize Orthodoxy’s most important holy day and choirs sang, but worshipers could only see them on TV or online broadcasts.

Police were deployed outside hundreds of churches in Ukraine to ensure that anyone who came to stand outside a service observed regulations calling for social distancing and banning large gatherings.

A small exception was made at the Pechersk monastery in Kyiv, where police allowed worshipers to enter the church one at a time, with the next person going inside when another left. About 100 people stood outside the monastery waiting to be let in.

The monastery, a major tourist attraction because of its extensive system of caves and catacombs, was closed under quarantine; more than 90 of its monks have been identified as infected with coronavirus and at least two have died.

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Racial toll of virus grows even starker as more data emerges

As a clearer picture emerges of COVID-19’s decidedly deadly toll on black Americans, leaders are demanding a reckoning of the systemic policies they say have made many African Americans far more vulnerable to the virus, including inequity in access to health care and economic opportunity.

A growing chorus of medical professionals, activists and political figures is pressuring the federal government to not just release comprehensive racial demographic data of the country’s coronavirus victims, but also to outline clear strategies to blunt the devastation on African Americans and other communities of color.

On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its first breakdown of COVID-19 case data by race, showing that 30% of patients whose race was known were black. The federal data was missing racial information for 75% of all cases, however, and did not include any demographic breakdown of deaths.

The latest Associated Press analysis of available state and local data shows that nearly one-third of those who have died are African American, with black people representing about 14% of the population in the areas covered in the analysis.

Roughly half the states, representing less than a fifth of the nation’s COVID-19 deaths, have yet to release demographic data on fatalities. In states that have, about a quarter of the death records are missing racial details.

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AP PHOTOS: For Milan nurse, virus patients enter the soul

MILAN — The coronavirus brings with it forced isolation: Family members can’t visit hospitalized patients. Nursing homes bar their doors to outsiders. People with mild cases or who have been in contact with infected persons must stay in quarantine.

Cristina Settembrese spends her days caring for COVID-19 patients in a hospital ward, and when she goes home, her personal isolation begins by her own choice.

The 54-year-old has been a nurse since she was 18. Two months ago, the infectious disease ward where she works at San Paolo Hospital in Milan started treating only COVID-19 patients. Suddenly, she had to learn how to operate machines she likens to “helmets” to help patients breathe. She studied the operating instructions at home in a kind of self-taught cram course.

While patients with coronavirus often experience mild or moderate symptoms, possible complications like pneumonia can put their lives at risk.

Two days after Italy’s first confirmed case in late February, Settembrese sent her 24-year-old daughter, Rebecca, from their home in the Milan suburb of Basiglio to live with her sister. The nurse was worried she might inadvertently infect her daughter.

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Beyoncé, Gaga offer hope at all-star event fighting COVID-19

NEW YORK — Lady Gaga, Stevie Wonder, Lizzo, Shawn Mendes and others sang classic songs brimmed with messages of hope and change during a TV special aimed at fighting the coronavirus, while Beyoncé and Alicia Keys spoke passionately about how the virus has disproportionately affected black Americans.

Beyoncé made a surprise appearance on Saturday’s TV special “One World: Together At Home,” thanking “delivery workers, mail carriers and sanitation employees” for their hard work during the pandemic.

“Black Americans disproportionately belong to these essential parts of the workforce that do not have the luxury of working from home. And African American communities at large have been severely affected in this crisis. Those with pre-existing conditions are at an even higher risk. This virus is killing black people at an alarmingly high rate here in America,” Beyoncé said.

African Americans account for more than one-third of COVID-19 deaths in the United States where the race of victims has been made public. Data from states, cities and counties show black people are regularly overrepresented compared to their share of the population.

“Please protect yourselves,” Beyoncé continued. “We are one family. We need you. We need your voices, your abilities and your strength all over this word. I know it’s very hard but please be patient, stay encouraged, keep the faith, stay positive and continue to pray for our heroes.”