LAWMAKERS ACROSS THE WORLD TEST POSITIVE

BRUSSELS: Michel Barnier, the European Union’s chief negotiator for the bloc’s future relationship with Britain after Brexit, has been infected with the new coronavirus.

The 69-year-old Barnier said in a Twitter video message Thursday that he is doing well and has a good morale. “I am following all the necessary instructions, as is my team,” Barnier said from his home, where he has been confined.

“For all those affected already, and for all those currently in isolation, we will get through this together.”

In Brazil, Senate president Davi Alcolumbre, mining and energy minister Bento Albuquerque, and national security minister Augusto Heleno, one of the president’s top advisors, said on Wednesday they had tested positive for new coronavirus

With the two cabinet members, a total of 17 people have now tested positive for the virus who accompanied President Jair Bolsonaro on a trip to the US earlier this month to meet with President Donald Trump.

They include his communications chief, another senator and Brazil’s top diplomat to the US.

Bolsonaro has tested negative for the virus, as has Trump.

In the US, two lawmakers including a Florida representative on Wednesday became the first members of Congress to announce they have tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

Republican congressman Mario Diaz-balart’s office said in a statement that “just a short while ago, he was notified that he has tested positive for Covid-19.”

In the western state of Utah, Democrat Be n Mcadams became the second congressman to announce that he has tested positive.