Global COVID-19 deaths surpass 650,000
PARIS (AFP) — Officials around the world on Monday reintroduced a raft of restrictions – from beach closures to quarantine measures – to try to tamp down coronavirus disease 2019 hotspots as the official global death toll passed 650,000.
European countries trying to repair the economic damage caused by earlier lockdowns struggled to balance keeping the lifeline of tourism open while guarding against new flare-ups of infection.
Spain’s tourism industry faced fresh misery after British travelers and one major tour operator canceled flights there following London’s decision to reintroduce quarantine for travelers returning from the country.
Hong Kong mandated wearing masks in public in response to a new wave of infections.
Belgium tightened its social distancing measures to try to halt what one expert called a “worrying” surge in cases.
In Washington, the White House announced that another senior administration figure, national security advisor Robert O’Brien, had contracted the virus.
As of Monday evening, the United States, the worst-hit nation, had added another 57,000 cases of infection and its recorded death toll stood at 147,588, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Until Sunday, the number of US daily infections had exceeded 60,000 for 12 straight days, with some days notching more than 70,000 new cases.
As the grim figures kept rolling in, however, the World Health Organization (WHO) argued against a wholesale closing of borders.
This was “not necessarily a sustainable strategy for the world’s economy, for the world’s poor or for anybody else,” WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan said.
Ryan added that a “global one-sizefits-all policy” was impossible because outbreaks were developing differently in different countries.