BEAUMONT, Texas — This article contains ongoing U.S. and international updates on the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects. Here are some key updates for Sunday, April 19, 2020. You can find more details by scrolling through the story.
- Japanese health ministry said cases surpassed 10,000. This excludes the 720 cases from the cruise ship quarantined near Tokyo.
- South Korea has reported eight more cases of the coronavirus over the past 24 hours.
- Look back at the Saturday, April 18 blog at this link
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Latest updates:
Here are the latest updates from around Southeast Texas, Texas, Louisiana and some from the world (all times are local Central Daylight Time)
April 19, 2:15 p.m.-- Port Arthur's Little Theater announced that they are temporarily closed and hope to reschedule their next production for August 2020. all membership tickets for the 2019-2020 season would be honored for the later show.
Press release from Port Arthur's Little Theater...
We truly do miss the opportunity to provide entertainment to our patrons and community and hope that we can safely get back to "business as usual" soon.
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There were more than 734,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States at midnight EDT Sunday, according to Johns Hopkins University. There have been over 38,000 deaths in the U.S. and 66,000 recoveries. More than 3.6 million tests have been conducted.
Worldwide, there have been 2.3 million cases, 160,000 deaths and 594,000 recoveries.
For most people, the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough, that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death.
Over a thousand virus cases on French ship
Figures from France's military leadership show more than half the sailors aboard the country's flagship aircraft carrier contracted the new virus as the ship traveled through the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean.
A navy official says 1,046 of the 1,760 people aboard the Charles de Gaulle tested positive for the virus.
Navy Chief of Staff Adm. Christophe Prazuck attributed the quick spread to the “great population density aboard the ship.”
Speaking Saturday evening to Europe-1 radio, Prazuck said virus protection measures weren’t followed properly, which “did not allow us to detect the beginning of the epidemic, and therefore to contain it.”
The ship is undergoing a lengthy disinfection process since returning to its home base in Toulon last week.
24 more Taiwanese crew members from naval ship have virus
Two dozen crew members of a Taiwanese naval ship have tested positive for the new coronavirus after returning from a nearly two-month training mission that took them to the Pacific island nation of Palau.
Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control said Sunday that 21 more cases had been identified from a refueling ship, on top of three reported Saturday. More than 700 officers and sailors from the refueling ship and the two warships that took part in the mission are in quarantine for 14 days.
The CDC said that a Taiwanese student returning from the United States had also tested positive. That brought the total for Sunday to 22, an upward spike for the self-governing island. New cases had fallen to single digits in the past week, including three days in which none were reported.
Japan passes 10,000 cases of COVID-19
Japanese health ministry said Sunday that 568 new cases of the coronavirus were reported the day before, bringing a domestic total to 10,361. A combined total including 712 others from a cruise ship quarantined near Tokyo earlier this year came to 11,073, with 174 deaths.
The number of cases is still relatively small compared to the U.S. and Europe, but that’s only as many as Japan’s limited testing has detected and actual infections are believed to be far more widespread.
Japan has finally started setting up additional testing centers in Tokyo and elsewhere, allowing primary care doctors to send suspected patients directly to testing stations rather than having them go through public health centers to screen eligibility, an earlier requirement that had prevented and delayed testing and treatment of many people.
South Korea reports 8 more cases over 24 hours
South Korea has reported eight more cases of the coronavirus over the past 24 hours, the first time for a daily jump in the country to drop to a single digit in about two months.
The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the additional figures released Sunday took the country’s total to 10,661 with 234 deaths.
It says 8,042 of the total have been recovered and released from quarantine and that 12,243 others were under tests to determine whether they contracted the virus.
South Korea’s caseload has been waning in recent weeks since it recorded hundreds of new cases every day between late February and early March, mostly in the southeastern city of Daegu and nearby areas.
Despite the recent downward trend, South Korean officials have warned about the possibility of a broader “quiet spread” with people easing up on social distancing.
McDonald's closes Singapore restaurants
Fast food giant McDonald’s says it will suspend all operations in Singapore from Sunday for two weeks after seven of its employees tested positive for the coronavirus.
McDonald’s said in a Facebook post it decided to follow the Health Ministry’s advise to shut down until May 4 when Singapore’s partial lockdown ends. It said in would continue to pay the salaries of 10,000 employees working in more than 135 outlets across the city-state.
Singapore on Saturday reported a record daily jump of 942 new infections, the highest one-day spike in Southeast Asia, for a total to 5,992. The government has made it mandatory for people to wear masks outside their homes and imposed strict social distancing measures.