March sadness
Virus forces fanless games in Italy until April 3 Calif. state of alert after first death
MILAN — All sporting events in Italy will take place without fans present for at least the next month due to the virus outbreak in the country, the Italian government announced on Wednesday.
That will likely see the Italian soccer league resume in full this weekend with the calendar pushed back a week.
Italy is the epicenter of Europe’s coronavirus outbreak. More than 100 people have died and more than 3,000 have been infected with COVID-19.
The Italian government issued a new decree on Wednesday evening, with measures it hopes will help contain the spread of the virus.
All sporting events throughout the country must take place without fans present until April 3. Schools and universities have been ordered to close until March 15.
Premier Giuseppe Conte posted a five-minute video on his Facebook page, reassuring people and saying that the decree was a way of assuring “responsible behavior.”
He said banning crowds at sporting events would help “prevent further opportunities of infection.”
A decree on Sunday extended the suspension of all sporting events in Lombardy, Veneto and Emilia-Romagna until March 8.
Elsewhere around the world, Iran said Wednesday that the coronavirus has killed 92 people amid 2,922 confirmed cases across the Islamic Republic, the highest death toll in the world outside of China.
Health Ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour announced the new figures at a news conference in Tehran, raising Iran’s death toll from the new illness to higher than Italy’s, where there has also been a spike in infections.
There are now over 3,140 cases of the new virus across the Mideast. Of those outside Iran in the region, most link back to the Islamic Republic.
The virus has sickened top leaders inside Iran’s civilian government and Shiite theocracy. Iran stands alone in how the virus has affected its government, even compared to hard-hit China, the epicenter of the outbreak. Worldwide, the virus has infected more than 90,000 people and caused over 3,100 deaths.
Experts worry Iran may be underreporting the number of cases it has.
“The virus has no wings to fly,” Jahanpour said. “We are the ones who transfer it to each other.”
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani acknowledged that the virus was in nearly all of Iran’s 31 provinces while speaking Wednesday.
“This disease is a widespread one,” he said, according to a transcript. “It encompasses almost all of our provinces and is, in a sense, a global disease that many countries in the world have become infected with, and we must work together to tackle this problem as quickly as possible.”
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia’s Deputy Health Minister Abdel-Fattah Mashat was quoted on the state-linked news site Al-Yaum saying that groups of visitors to Mecca from inside the country would now also be barred from performing the pilgrimage, known as the umrah. The crowds typically are made up of foreign residents going as large groups. Individuals and families in the kingdom can still travel to Mecca.
Saudi Arabia last week closed off the holiest sites in Islam to foreign pilgrims over the coronavirus, disrupting travel for thousands of Muslims already headed to the kingdom and potentially affecting plans later this year for millions more ahead of the fasting month of Ramadan and the annual hajj pilgrimage.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency Wednesday in response to the state’s first coronavirus-related death.
The unidentified person died Wednesday morning of COVID-19, the pneumonia-like disease caused by the virus, health officials announced. The patient was elderly and lived in Placer County, northeast of the state’s capital in Sacramento.
At least 53 people in California have tested positive for the coronavirus, with dozens more being monitored for symptoms.
Newsom said the state is working “around the clock to keep our communities safe, healthy and informed,” The Los Angeles Times reported.
That work could soon get even harder, as Newsom said 21 people on a cruise ship headed for San Francisco have reported coronavirus symptoms, according to CNN. He added that the ship would not be allowed to dock until all people on board were tested.
Newsom additionally addressed concerns over the cost of coronavirus testing, which has left some people scrambling for money and likely discouraged others from getting tested.
“People should feel confident in their ability to get tested without getting a huge bill on the back end,” Newsom said, according to the Times.