As Washington nursing home assumed it faced influenza outbreak, opportunities to control coronavirus exposure passed

rehabilitation after breaking an ankle, entered on Feb. 20, his family said. Sedlacek, 86, has since tested positive for covid-19. So has his 64-year-old son, Scott. “If they were so concerned about this respiratory outbreak, why were they taking new patients?” Sedlacek’s daughter, Seri, asked as she stood outside the facility. After confirmation of the coronavirus outbreak, “no other rehab center will take him,” she said. Scott Sedlacek, who was wearing a face mask, said he has since recovered. “We had just the horrid luck of being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. In a Feb. 21 letter, Washington’s director of residential care services urged the state’s nursing homes to prepare for the coronavirus by reviewing emergency plans and checking infection and hygiene controls. Killian said he did not know whether Life Care received that letter but said: “Was there an awareness of an alert? Sure.” On Feb. 24, singer-organist Gary Lee Hood played an hour-long set of old favorites for two dozen residents enjoying a tea party. “I didn’t notice any precautions going on,” Hood said. “Nobody was wearing a mask.” Hood said he always cleaned his hands with sanitizer after shows and has not become ill. A few days later, residents at Life Care gathered for a long-planned Mardi Gras party on Feb. 26. Hot hors d’oeuvres and cake were passed as a local swing band played. The band’s leader declined to discuss the event or band members’ health. “I wish we had canceled that, but we only could make the decision on the information we had,” Killian said of the party. Nursing students and staff from Kirkland’s Lake Washington Institute of Technology were also at the home that day and the next. The college said March 4 they were quarantining for 14 days from their visit. It said one staffer tested positive for covid-19 but did not say if this was linked to the Kirkland home. It closed the college until March 20. Two recent residents of Life Care — an 86-year-old woman and a man in his mid-50s who were no longer at the Kirkland facility — died Feb. 26 from covid-19, according to a March 3 announcement from the county. Authorities announced on Feb. 28 what was then King County’s first known coronavirus case — a woman in her 50s, who had traveled from South Korea. No link has been established


Pentagon rejects proposals from military officials to stop training new recruits amid coronavirus response

The Pentagon has rejected proposals from senior U.S. military officials to temporarily halt sending new recruits to training amid the coronavirus pandemic, deciding that the process must continue to avoid harming the military, according to a planning document and three defense officials. The plans would have paused the training of thousands of new recruits who join the military each month and marked a major widening in the Defense Department’s attempt to stop infection. On Friday night, the Pentagon cut virtually all domestic travel for the next eight weeks but said that new recruit training would continue. Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper met with the service secretaries and top officers on Monday to talk about training, said the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, Jonathan Rath Hoffman. “A decision was made to continue with training missions while taking precautionary measures to limit any possible spread,” Hoffman said. "This will be continuously evaluated to ensure mission-critical requirements are met and our people are kept safe.” The decision came after discussions over the weekend about how to proceed in facilities that are notoriously susceptible to disease outbreaks due to the proximity in which recruits live and train. Army officials considered a 30-day freeze on sending additional recruits to basic training. Navy officials, citing the Army’s idea, suggested the idea of a “hybrid” plan, in which new recruits would stop reporting but recruits who already had began training would finish, according to the planning document, which was drafted within the Navy and obtained by The Washington Post. Other senior military officials raised concerns about the negative effects that stopping training could have as other service members leave active duty, said two defense officials, who like some others, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The Navy plan raised the possibility that the service might need to consider involuntarily keeping some current sailors on active duty through a policy like “stop loss,” but it was rejected, the officials said. Hoffman, in a news briefing Monday, alluded to the discussion, suggesting that a change might be coming, seemingly before the idea was scuttled. “We are taking a look at the training programs given the size of those programs and the impact a major delay on training could have,” Hoffman told reporters at the Pentagon. “We’re looking at that, and may have some update on that in the near future.” The decision to continue


Va. reports second coronavirus death; D.C., Md. restaurants and bars close as reported cases in region pass 100

from Chief Operating Officer Stephen Neill. At Holy Trinity, an Episcopal school in Prince George’s County, officials told parents and staff that two faculty members have tested positive and recommended that students in the school’s high school prep program self-quarantine through March 25. The University of Virginia also announced its first covid-19 case Monday, though officials there did not provide details. In the District, Howard University canceled in-person classes for the rest of spring, as well as its commencement ceremony, after someone at a March 7 Charter Day dinner tested positive. Others who attended the dinner were told to report to their doctor if they begin exhibiting flu-like symptoms. The District also recorded its first known infection at United Medical Center, the public hospital in Southeast Washington. There, an emergency room doctor has tested positive, while a hospital gastroenterologist has self-quarantined after he began to feel unwell. The hospital did not provide details for the ER doctor. Wayne Turnage, D.C. deputy mayor for health and human services, said the gastroenterologist’s wife had tested positive for coronavirus after returning from travel abroad. The gastroenterologist is awaiting his test results, Turnage said. Meanwhile, tensions grew over efforts to keep people from further spreading the virus in public gathering places. Hogan said he plans to use 2,200 National Guard troops plus state police to enforce his executive order, which also bans gatherings of 50 or more people indefinitely. He said his administration will work to add 6,000 beds to hospitals for increased capacity and temporarily ban proceedings for evictions and utility shut-offs. “It’s impossible to know how long this threat will continue,” he said. Keith Jones, the owner of the popular Chick & Ruth’s Delly in Annapolis, sat in one of the restaurant’s trademark tiny booths Monday — a day before the normally busy St. Patrick’s Day holiday — trying to devise a plan that would allow him to stay afloat and avoid laying off workers. “We don’t really know what’s going to happen,” Jones said. “We’re in uncharted waters.” In the District, Health Director LaQuandra Nesbitt said the city’s closure order includes health spas, massage establishments and any other venue where 50 or more people might gather. The closure of restaurants and bars was to take effect Monday night. The order affecting theaters, gyms and other venues takes effect Tuesday. Officials in Arlington called on bars and restaurants in the county to


The British government’s response to the coronavirus has been a disaster

would coincide with flu season and place the National Health Service under unimaginable strain. But we have no idea if there will be a second wave or when that would occur. Fortunately, Monday saw a request for people to limit social interactions, including “working from home where they can and avoiding pubs, clubs, and other venues.” Time will tell how well these requests — not orders — are adhered to. The idea of trying to bring on herd immunity is flawed for many reasons. One of them is the way it does not take into account the element of time. We have learned from the stars that what we see right now are a very delayed report of what was actually happening in the past. When it comes to the coronavirus, that means that when we identify a “confirmed case,” this gives us more information about the past than the current situation. Several steps have already happened before a person is confirmed to have the disease. The first step is infection — no one sees this in real time, but it happens when contact occurs between someone who is infected and someone who isn’t. (Spoiler alert: Contact has a major role in this horror movie, and we need to give it a walk-on part instead.) Once the virus has established itself in a person, it sets up shop, it multiplies, it works its way around the body — and, after maybe a week, it starts to make itself known. Say you get a fever, maybe a bit of a cough. You go to the doctor. By the time you get tested, a whole week could have elapsed since the actual infection. The time lag between diagnosis and death is even longer — researchers have already established it takes about a month to die of covid-19. So in places where there has been poor testing (including the U.K., where testing is focused on those at risk of severe illness), deaths attributed to the coronavirus are telling us that transmission happened five weeks earlier. Meanwhile, the virus has been gate-crashing restaurants, bars, schools, colleges and the subway, gleefully infecting person after person through our main protagonist: contact. Viruses don’t care which country you live in. The rest of the world (with notable exceptions) watched from afar as Wuhan, China, built a new hospital specifically for covid-19 patients, and then as parts of


The Middle East is already wracked by war. Now it must confront the coronavirus, too.

BEIRUT — The Middle East is shutting down as the novel coronavirus accelerates its spread across a part of the world where war, famine, financial collapse and political unrest threaten to compound the impact of the disease. The vast majority of the 16,659 infections reported in the region as of Monday are in Iran, one of the world’s worst-hit countries and the origin of most of the 1,692 cases counted in other Middle Eastern and North African countries. As the numbers climb around the region, governments are starting to act, upending life in a part of the world that has historically served as a crossroads of religion, trade and travel. Prayers are being canceled, bars and cafes closed, flights grounded, and festivals and pilgrimages called off. The al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, and the Shiite Muslim shrine in Karbala, Iraq, are among the great religious sites that have been closed. Barbar, a beloved Lebanese eatery renowned for having stayed open throughout the country’s long civil war, has shut for the first time in memory. Iraq is bracing for the imposition of a curfew starting Tuesday after the government declared a state of emergency. Lebanon began a two-week lockdown on Monday, and Saudi Arabia ordered government offices, businesses and malls to close. Trade and travel are skidding to a halt. Saudi Arabia has suspended all travel in and out of the kingdom. The United Arab Emirates has suspended flights to many locations and stopped issuing visas, but said on Tuesday it would continue to allow visa-free entry to many countries, including the United States. Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq are sealing their borders and will close their airports within days. The interruption of economic activity is going to exact a heavy toll on the region’s already struggling citizens at a time of severe economic strain, political instability and conflict, analysts say. “There’s a series of cascading crises which ultimately feed into one another, an interconnected web of catastrophes,” said Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “These countries are not facing one; they are facing two or three crises simultaneously.” A decade of upheaval since the Arab Spring revolts has ravaged economies that were in trouble before the coronavirus crashed global markets. The oil price war launched by Saudi Arabia — partly as a consequence of the coronavirus and the collapse in worldwide


More sporting events are disrupted by the coronavirus, but the NFL draft trudges on

who will play their first season in the city this fall, to host a future draft and “other major NFL events,” including the Super Bowl. NASCAR, which Friday announced it was postponing upcoming races at Atlanta and Homestead-Miami, went a step further Monday — postponing all race events through May 3. That includes the April 19 race at Richmond Raceway and May 3 race at Dover International Speedway. Citing guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, NASCAR said in a statement that it was postponing the races (seven in all) in the interests of “the health and safety of our fans, industry and the communities in which we race.” NASCAR plans to resume competition at Martinsville, Va., on May 9, and, according to its statement, intends to hold all 36 Cup races planned this season after determining the rescheduled dates later. As Olympic organizers cling to plans to stage the Tokyo Games this summer, U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee officials informed would-be 2020 Olympians of new rules and restrictions that will change the way athletes based at its Colorado Springs training center prepare in the coming weeks. While many Olympic hopefuls train in cities throughout the country, hundreds are based at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. Under the new protocols unveiled Monday, only athletes, coaches and Olympic officials who use the complex full time, many of whom live in dorm rooms on the sprawling campus, can continue using the center. That means no American athlete who isn’t already classified as a resident can visit the complex for training or testing. This restriction is expected to remain in place until at least April 3, according to a letter the training center sent to U.S. athletes and Olympic officials Monday. In the letter, the USOPC also asks athletes based at the training center to take their temperature twice daily and consult medical staff if it reaches 100.4 degrees. While the training center doesn't typically release details on who uses the training complex at any given time, it’s not uncommon for 225 athletes to be stationed there, about 75 percent of whom are considered residents. The complex can serve 500 athletes and coaches, with more than 240 dorm rooms on site. Several U.S. Olympic teams use the space year-round or regularly, including boxing, cycling, shooting and wrestling. The center also occasionally hosts athletes from other countries. According to


Food banks are seeing volunteers disappear and supplies evaporate as coronavirus fears mount

Hunger advocates say they are growing increasingly concerned about how they are going to get food to millions of vulnerable Americans, especially in coronavirus “hot spots” across the country — and the many more facing food insecurity because of business closures and market upheaval. The widening coronavirus outbreak is making it difficult for food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens to fulfill their missions at a time when they are needed the most, advocates say. The challenges are greatest in the areas that have been hardest hit by the virus and where there has been a significant decrease in food donations from grocery stores. Advocates also say that as grocery stores grapple with panic-buying and empty shelves, their focus has shifted to restocking and adequately sanitizing grocery surfaces. “Not in my lifetime has there been a precedent for this,” said Catherine D’Amato, chief executive of the Greater Boston Food Bank, which is servicing two coronavirus hot spots, Boston and Pittsfield, Mass. “We know how to respond to fires, earthquakes, floods. There isn’t a playbook for this.” Food donations from grocery stores and financial donations from corporations have sharply decreased, even as the logistics of safely feeding the hungry have become more complex. Volunteers at food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens are staying away for fear of becoming infected by the coronavirus. School closures, job disruptions, lack of paid sick leave and the coronavirus’s disproportionate effect on older adults and low-income families have further contributed to the demands placed on food banks. On Friday, Feeding America established the COVID-19 Response Fund, which seeks $2.65 million to help food banks across the country support communities affected by the pandemic. Northwest Harvest, which operates across Washington state, a hot spot for the virus, said it has already seen a surge of hunger. “About three weeks ago, we recognized this was going to be really big and we began developing crisis management plans for it affecting 800 households, 8,000 households or 800,000 households,” said Thomas Reynolds, chief executive of Northwest Harvest. That number, Reynolds said, is tracking toward the high end, with 640,000 households affected across the state. Many are families who were already food-insecure and now find themselves with children out of school — children who ordinarily received more than half of their daily nutrition at school through free and reduced-price meals. The rest, Reynolds said, are laid off food-industry workers and


seniors practicing social distancing. According to WhyHunger, a national nonprofit organization working to end hunger and poverty, many food banks, food pantries and soup kitchens are canceling volunteer shifts altogether. Many organizations have volunteer bases largely made up of people over 60 years old, who are considered more vulnerable to the virus and therefore likely to maintain social distance at home. Northwest Harvest, which receives 95 percent of its donations from private donors, has put out a call for volunteers among high school seniors, college students and furloughed workers, hoping to recruit a workforce that can be mobilized quickly to fill meal boxes that can be distributed via pop-up sites at places such as community centers and Boys & Girls Clubs. Although they aren’t yet able to quantify the decline in volunteer numbers, Kathryn Strickland, chief network officer at Feeding America, a network of 200 food banks, said many member food banks have reported steep declines. Greater Boston Food Bank has reported volunteerism diminished as much as 95 percent. At Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard in Bloomington, Ind., which had operated more as a community grocery store, offering recipes for patrons and cooking classes for children, staff shut down programming and shifted on Friday toward distributing prepackaged boxes of groceries for pickup in the truck bay. The pantry also canceled its largest fundraiser of the year, which typically raises about a third of its operating budget. It has lost about three-quarters of its 500 volunteers because of college closures and the self-imposed isolation of its older volunteers. “I think this crisis magnifies what is so flawed about our response to hunger in this country,” said Amanda Nickey, who heads Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard. “As a nation we take for granted that food pantries, soup kitchens and food banks are just a part of life. We rely on emergency food providers to meet a basic everyday need and think this is perfectly acceptable, and when a crisis happens we’re asked to do even more and potentially put ourselves at risk of exposure and illness.” The Capital Area Food Bank in Washington has seen a dramatic decrease in donations from grocery stores, said chief executive Radha Muthiah. The food bank says 55 to 60 percent of its food is donated. “We’re getting calls from grocery store partners saying, ‘Look, we can barely keep things on the shelves,’” Muthiah said. “What does that mean? That means


The Statue of Liberty and Washington Monument, symbols of freedom, shuttered due to coronavirus

Area said its closure followed the guidance of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, along with “recommendations from state and local public health authorities in consultation with National Park Service public health service officers.” That area is currently scheduled to reopen at the end of the month. Sites at Golden Gate include the Presidio Visitor Center. On the Mall, they include the Old Post Office Tower, which is on Pennsylvania Avenue NW in the same building that now houses the Trump International Hotel. Golden Gate was the most popular site in the nation last year and attracts more than 15 million visitors annually. The Washington Monument, by contrast, attracted about 800,000. Overall, 327 million people entered a national park in 2019. Of the 10 most popular sites, only the Golden Gate Recreation Area was closed. The four most visited sites behind it, totaling about 45 million visitors combined, are the Blue Ridge Parkway in Kentucky, Great Smoky Mountains National Park straddling North Carolina and Tennessee, Gateway National Recreation Area in New York and the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. During the past week, as the coronavirus outbreak spread and social distancing was identified as a key way to prevent infection, interest groups and former workers called for the entire national park system — 419 sites covering 84 million acres — to be closed. Park Service officials at the Statue of Liberty and other park sites in New York City asked their superiors Friday for permission to shut down but did not receive it, according to two individuals familiar with the decision who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. On Monday, they were told they could follow federal, state and local public health guidance. In a statement Monday, the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks demanded the closure of all parks. “The National Park Service should close all facilities that require employees and/or members of the public to be in proximity in confined spaces,” the statement said. “In addition, park superintendents should be authorized to close any other facilities, such as restrooms, that they don’t have the ability to sanitize properly.” National parks are suffering from a lack of much needed repairs tied to a $12 billion maintenance backlog. “We fully recognize that calling for a nationwide closure of national park sites is unusual,” the coalition said. “But these are unprecedented times that call for unprecedented measures.”


2020 Winter All-Met: Girls’ basketball first team, second team and honorable mention

WINTER ALL-MET 2020 Boys’ basketball The following student-athletes have been selected to The Washington Post’s 2020 All-Met team for girls’ basketball: Madison Scott, F, Sr., Bishop McNamara While solidifying herself as one of the country’s best defenders, Scott led the Mustangs to their first Washington Catholic Athletic Conference title since 2008. Against one of the area’s toughest schedules, the McDonald’s all-American guarded top players from around the country and in one of the nation’s most talented conferences. A forward with guard skills who had a major growth spurt entering her junior year, Scott averaged 13.3 points, 8.9 rebounds and 2.0 blocks. She will play at Mississippi. Alyssa Andrews, F, Jr., Colgan One of Northern Virginia’s most versatile players, Andrews averaged 22.1 points, 12.1 rebounds and 2.8 blocks and powered the Sharks to the Virginia Class 6 Region B title. Azzi Fudd, G, Jr., St. John’s The two-time All-Met Player of the Year returned in January from a major knee injury to lead the Cadets to their fifth consecutive D.C. State Athletic Association title. Kaniyah Harris, G, Sr., C.H. Flowers The Howard signee did a little bit of everything, averaging 11.2 points, 7.2 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 4.0 steals as the defending Maryland 4A champion returned to the state semifinals before games were postponed. Parker Hill, F, Jr., Churchill One of the area’s most dominant post players, Hill averaged 16 points, 11 rebounds and 3.5 steals as the Bulldogs cruised through Montgomery County and into the Maryland 4A semifinals. Kaylah Ivey, G, Sr., Riverdale Baptist The Boston College signee was the focal point of one of the country’s top teams, averaging 16.1 points and 4.9 assists a game. Chetanna Nweke, F, Sr., Stone Ridge The Princeton commit averaged 23 points and guided the Gators to their first appearance in the Independent School League Class AA title game in 22 years. Delicia Pinnick, G, Sr., New Hope Pinnick flourished as one of the area’s best shooters, helping her squad finish second at the National Association of Christian Athletes Division I tournament. Kiki Rice, G, So., Sidwell Friends Also an All-Met forward in soccer, the D.C. Gatorade player of the year was among the area’s leaders in points (26.8), assists (5.6) and rebounds (10.7) while helping the Quakers claim the Independent School League Class AA regular season title. Eniya Russell, G, Sr., Pallotti The McDonald’s all-American led the Panthers to their first Interscholastic


An AU student and a guest at a Howard University event test positive for coronavirus

A student living on campus at American University and a guest who attended a Howard University-sponsored event with about 1,200 other people have tested positive for covid-19, officials announced Monday. The AU student traveled within the United States and returned to campus before spring break ended, then started showing symptoms, officials said in an email. Leaders at Howard announced that the individual who has the virus attended the university’s Charter Day Dinner on March 7, an event that celebrates the signing of the university charter. The D.C. Department of Health is investigating the Howard-related case and declined to answer questions about how the individual contracted covid-19. The university has been advised that the chances others at the event contracted the virus are low, said Wayne A.I. Frederick, Howard’s president, in a letter to the campus. Officials at AU have been planning for such a situation, said David Reitman, medical director of the school’s Student Health Center. “We have taken proactive steps such as moving to online classes and telework to enhance social distancing,” Reitman wrote in a message to the campus. “By limiting the number of people on campus, we can reduce the potential for community spread of covid-19 even after an individual here has received a confirmed diagnosis.” The student is receiving medical care and has been self-isolating in a room on campus that has private bathroom facilities, Reitman said. An investigation from the city’s health department determined there were no close contacts on campus. Both universities in recent days have prohibited face-to-face teaching for the rest of the semester, a measure that will affect more than 23,000 students. Howard canceled graduation and class reunion activities scheduled to take place between May 7 and 11. “Given that Howard’s commencement activities garner crowds of thousands and the numerous elders and children regularly in attendance, we will cancel the event to avoid the potential for additional virus spread, which would be problematic,” Frederick said. More than 100 people Reitman warned that with increased testing, the number of cases will continue to grow. “It is important to remember that most people who contract covid-19 develop mild to moderate illness without the need for medical care,” Reitman said. “People in the higher risk categories — those who are older or who have underlying health issues — should take extra care.” The pandemic has upended higher education. George Washington University officials on Monday said


Chinese citizens abroad seek refuge from the coronavirus pandemic — at home

As the coronavirus started spreading across the United States last week, New York University student Jane Zhang knew what she needed to do. She needed to seek shelter from the outbreak. At home. In China. “China has already contained the situation, and there are no new domestic cases in Beijing,” the 19-year-old sophomore said, “but I think the number of people with the virus in the United States is going to rise exponentially.” So on Friday, the day the number of cases in New York state rose 30 percent overnight, she boarded a flight home to the Chinese capital. It just feels safer, she said, because authorities there have made more of an effort to ensure public health. “The Chinese government basically pays for a patient’s recovery, so we don’t have to worry about how much treatment is going to cost,” she said, making a contrast with the U.S. health-care system. Plus, she said, Americans didn’t seem to be taking the outbreak seriously enough. In a matter of weeks, China has gone from being the epicenter of the virus to almost the only refuge from it, prompting hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens abroad to flock home. About 20,000 people a day are arriving on flights into China, while five times as many arrive by land or sea, state media reported. With many flights to China canceled amid the outbreak, seats were already relatively scarce. But the sudden spike in demand means prices have skyrocketed, with the few remaining economy-class seats from U.S. airports going for four or five times the usual rate. Xiangyuan Li, a freshman at Franklin & Marshall College in Pennsylvania, had already decided to return home to Chengdu after being told on Thursday that his classes would move online. It would be boring with everyone gone from his college town, and he was worried about not being able to get into China for his summer internship. But the growing outbreak in the United States cemented his decision. “Certainly, China is indeed very safe now,” Li said, while the United States is becoming more dangerous. “The U.S. can’t test everyone, like in China. Testing an entire planeload of passengers and providing results the next day is impossible in the U.S.,” he said, referring to the entry procedures he went through on arrival in his home country. There has also been a rush of returns from Britain since


Analysis of millions of coronavirus tweets shows ‘the whole world is sad’

In the outpouring of social media messages about the coronavirus pandemic, the collective mood is grim, experts found. Manlio De Domenico De Domenico filtered messages for emotional content, examining tweets for neuroticism and other psychological characteristics. He also scanned them for misinformation. What’s happened during the worldwide outbreak of the disease covid-19 is different from the “standard circulation of fake news,” he said. “The amount of unreliable news is a huge potential threat to public health.” The World Health Organization, even before it declared the coronavirus outbreak to be a pandemic, labeled the onslaught of messages as an infodemic. “The covid-19 outbreak and response has been accompanied by a massive ‘infodemic’ — an overabundance of information, some accurate and some not — that makes it hard for people to find trustworthy sources and reliable guidance when they need it,” said Tarik Jasarevic, a spokesman for the World Health Organization. There was trouble from the beginning. “The lack of good information in the first weeks gives oxygen to misinformation,” said Cristina Tardáguila, associate director for the International Fact-Checking Network. She has been debunking coronavirus claims since they first appeared around Jan. 24, when hoaxes flooded social networks in Asia. Tardáguila said the coronavirus outbreak has provoked the strongest action from fact-checkers she’s ever seen. More than 90 fact-checking organizations banded together in response, Tardáguila said, representing nearly 40 countries, 15 languages and every time zone. (The network maintains a running Twitter list of its latest fact checks.) The WHO is working with Twitter, Facebook and other platforms to restrict coronavirus misinformation. The organization also enlisted Instagram and YouTube influencers to spread accurate news. De Domenico answered The Washington Post’s questions about social media messages while the scientist was isolated at his home in Italy. The following Q&A has been condensed and edited for clarity. Q: In the United States, are there any unusual emerging trends? A: Overall, for the USA this risk is high when compared to other countries such as Singapore, [but recently] the infodemic risk is slightly decreasing for the USA. Q: Does the artificial activity from bots seem to have a particular goal? A In practice, their only goal is to generate more chaos and confusion in the online social system. However, it is well known that this might have harmful consequences in the physical world: from political elections to finance, and now to public health. Q: You’ve


Athletes donate signed items to raise money for coronavirus relief efforts

Simone Biles donated a signed leotard. Michael Phelps offered an autographed swimsuit. Shaun White promised a snowboard with his signature. The trio of Olympic champions are among the growing list of athletes from more than a dozen sports who are participating in “Athletes for Relief,” a fundraising campaign to benefit coronavirus outbreak response efforts. The campaign was launched Saturday night by the sports and entertainment agency Octagon, which represents hundreds of clients across a variety of sports. By Tuesday morning, more than 70 athletes, coaches and sports personalities, including Washington Mystics forward and WNBA MVP Elena Delle Donne, Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry and former Red Sox slugger David Ortiz, had donated signed items to be raffled off in early April. Anyone who makes a contribution of at least $25 will be eligible to win, and all of the funds raised will go to the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, which established a covid-19 Response Fund to support local nonprofit organizations working in areas that have been hit especially hard by the pandemic. When athletes started making public and private donations to support those affected by the coronavirus outbreak last week, Octagon executive David Schwab and his colleagues saw others in the sports community asking what more they could do to help. “I thought the least we could do was help build and facilitate a site to give these athletes a platform to continue doing great work themselves,” Schwab said in a phone interview. “It’s something they can do together.” After the idea was proposed, Schwab said “dozens and dozens” of Octagon employees worked to get the campaign, which is being hosted on the fundraising platform PledgeIt.org, operational within 24 hours. The Harlem Globetrotters donated a signed jersey and basketball, while retired English cricketer Darren Gough contributed a signed cricket ball. ESPN host Trey Wingo autographed a morning show script. There’s no donation limit, and one anonymous donor gave $1,000 to be entered to win a basketball signed by Hall of Famer Nancy Lieberman. “I continue to be impressed every hour,” Schwab said, “because a different athlete calls and says, ‘I want to do it. This is what I can give. How fast can you get my item up?’ And this is in addition to their personal financial contributions, and any other resources that they’re providing. It’s neat to see the initiative, and that all these athletes are trying to


Cruise ship carrying more than 200 Americans is turned away from Spanish port after former passengers were diagnosed with coronavirus

More than 200 Americans are among more than 1,400 people on a cruise ship that was barred from disembarking passengers in the Spanish Canary Islands on Sunday as nations worldwide impose lockdowns and close borders to guard against the coronavirus. The Costa Luminosa, operated by a subsidiary of Carnival Corp., is one of a number of cruise ships unable to find ports willing to accept thousands of passengers as the crisis intensifies. All major ocean and river cruise lines around the world have temporarily suspended new voyages to try to contain the outbreak, which has infected passengers and crew members on two Carnival-owned Princess Cruise ships, as well as other cruise lines. The Costa Luminosa passed through the Strait of Gibraltar on Tuesday and was headed toward its next scheduled stop in southern France, but it remains unclear what will happen when it arrives. France began a lockdown Tuesday ordered by President Emmanuel Macron. There are 233 Americans aboard, the company said. Some passengers are growing increasingly anxious, according to relatives who have spoken to them. A number have developed coughs and one woman told her daughter that the crew appeared overwhelmed by the need to deliver food to all the cabins. Symptoms of the coronavirus include coughing, fever and shortness of breath. Costa Cruises, which operates the ship, said in a statement that there was a delay in organizing room service for the first meal when passengers were sequestered in their cabins, but that food delivery is now running smoothly. The company said three passengers who disembarked the ship since Feb. 29 have since tested positive for covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. Three more passengers were allowed to disembark in the Canary Islands on Sunday after complaining of breathing difficulties or a fever, but the Spanish government would not allow other passengers to disembark because the nation’s ports were closed, the company said. Rossella Carrara, a vice president of the Costa line, said in an email to The Washington Post on Tuesday afternoon that “at the moment the health situation on board is under control, with no need for medical disembarkations.” The ship, she said, is sailing off the Spanish Coast heading to Marseille, France, in hopes of docking and disembarking passengers there on Thursday. It is not clear how French authorities will handle the situation. The French Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request


Testing positive: One woman’s journey from perfect health to the coronavirus

By last Wednesday, the tickle in Alison McGrath Howard’s throat had turned into chills, though not severe enough to keep her from seeing six patients who came to her Northwest Washington office for psychotherapy. Twenty-four hours later, while walking her dog, Howard felt dizzy and fatigued. She anxiously catalogued her recent activities: grocery shopping, hanging with her two teenagers, going to her book club and attending a conference in Manhattan with 1,100 therapists from around the world. On Monday, Howard, 54, learned that she had tested positive for the novel coronavirus. “Oh no,” she said when the infectious disease specialist called with the results. Now she is quarantined in her apartment, among the growing list of more than 100 people from across greater Washington known, as of Monday night, to have the virus. The victims span the region and all its variety: an Episcopal rector who may have infected congregants at his Georgetown church; two Northern Virginia military personnel; half a dozen Marylanders who traveled on a Nile River cruise ship; an American University student; the head of Gonzaga College High School; doctors and staff from the National Institutes of Health, Johns Hopkins Hospital and the United Medical Center. As of Monday night, the region’s two fatalities were men in their 70s from Virginia’s Peninsula region. Both died of respiratory failure. As she lies listless in her Cathedral Heights apartment, Howard thinks about whom she could have unwittingly infected: a patient with a heart condition; the pregnant woman who sat next to her at book group; her son and daughter, both of whom are now staying with her ex-husband. Her week-long passage from perfect health to the grip of a ferocious virus is emblematic of what government officials fear awaits tens of thousands of Americans now ordered to remain at home. While she does not know how she became infected, Howard suspects it was while she was in New York in early March, attending a conference of the American Group Psychotherapy Association. Perhaps she caught the virus, she said, when she joined hundreds at a conference-sponsored dance at a Sheraton hotel near Times Square. Or maybe it occurred when she took a break and walked through the Metropolitan Museum of Art; or when she visited the top of Rockefeller Center and a stranger sneezed on her. It was only after she came home, as she felt symptoms she initially associated


Penguins toured an aquarium that closed because of coronavirus concerns. The videos were exactly what we needed.

public, animal care staff and veterinarians are onsite 24/7,” a spokesman said in a Monday email to The Washington Post. “Without guests in the building, caretakers are getting creative in how they provide enrichment to animals — introducing new experiences, activities, foods and more to keep them active, encourage them to explore, problem-solve and express natural behaviors." To the delight of those stuck at home, the aquarium documented the penguins’ expedition on social media. Amid an onslaught of anxiety-provoking news, many experienced a rare moment of joy upon seeing Wellington, a 30-year-old rockhopper penguin who is one of the oldest in the United States, seemingly overcome with excitement. “A much needed bright spot with everything else going on in the world,” wrote one of the thousands of people thanking the aquarium on Facebook. With their doors closed for the time being, many zoos and aquariums are encouraging online visits instead. Without ever leaving the house, frazzled parents and lonely telecommuters can watch Zoo Atlanta’s pandas munch on bamboo, check in with giraffes at the Houston Zoo, and keep close tabs on the beluga whales at the Georgia Aquarium. The Monterey Bay Aquarium’s webcams capture live footage of everything from sea otters to leopard sharks, while Baltimore’s National Aquarium offers virtual visitors the opportunity to relax by watching tranquil jellyfish float by. Starting this week, the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden is hosting virtual animal shows for children whose schools have shut down, though adults may also find them enjoyable. Monday’s educational safari in Cincinnati featured Fiona the Internet-famous hippopotamus, who snapped her fearsome jaws and devoured squash, a cucumber and a head of lettuce. Tuesday’s live stream will feature Rico the porcupine, the zoo said. Meanwhile, animals accustomed to unending streams of tourists are newly free to roam, and getting a rare opportunity to see what it’s like on the other side of the glass. On Monday, the Toronto Zoo posted a photo of a donkey and a polar bear — safely separated by protective barriers — giving each other quizzical looks as keepers led hoofed mammals on a tour of the zoo. That same day, the Fort Worth Zoo shared a video of Hector, a Patagonian mara, getting to meet three river otters. Both species seemed equally intrigued by the other. “If this is the latest trend then I’ll get behind it,” one person responded. Allyson Chiu contributed reporting.


Two budding cellists, 9 and 6, serenade an elderly neighbor — and a locked-down world

The operatic voices and accordions played from the balconies of quarantined Italians into the otherwise silent neighborhoods reverberated this week in Columbus, Ohio, where Rebecca Tien and her two young children were among the millions listening. In a family of musicians, both kids were cello players. They didn’t have a balcony but they and their neighbors had a porch. And Tien, inspired by the Italian serenades, had an idea. She called her next-door neighbor, Helena Schlam. The 78-year-old lived alone. She was self-quarantining amid the coronavirus pandemic and had not left her home in five days. “I said, ‘Would you like the kids to come play [a concert] on your porch?’ ” Tien recalled in an interview with The Washington Post. “ ‘You can listen through your living-room window.’ ” Schlam came out on the porch instead. On Monday afternoon, Tien’s children, 9-year-old Taran and 6-year-old Calliope, became the latest musicians to bring a little joy to those who might be needing some in this troubled time. They set up their music stands on the far end of the porch, playing songs from Suzuki Book One for cello in unison. The pair bowed after each song, Taran in a suit and Calliope in a pink party dress, as Schlam applauded from the other end of the porch, at least a safe six feet away. She looped in her grandchildren in Israel, who were self-quarantining, too, and told Taran and Calliope they just gave “their first international concert," Schlam said. Later, Tien said, Schlam told her: “Music is how we’re going to get through this.” That much has proved true for everyone from professional musicians to casual listeners — even as the coronavirus pandemic is changing the way we consume music. In Italy over the weekend, tenor Maurizio Marchini roared Giacomo Puccini’s “Nessun dorma” from his balcony to his quarantined town. Countless others have taken to their rooftops and windows to belt out the Italian national anthem at 6 p.m. every evening. Elsewhere, dozens of performers and thousands of fans have turned to the live stream — the pandemic’s living-room-friendly alternative to packed, sweaty venues. Orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic and those at the Royal Opera of Versailles and Metropolitan Opera have delivered masterful performances to eerily empty concert halls, as audiences watched online. Artists including Neil Young, John Legend, Coldplay and Yo-Yo Ma have turned to the live stream


China and the U.S. blame each other for the coronavirus. But both countries made similar mistakes.

schools and other institutions within Wuhan. When Li tried to spread the word to his fellow medical school alumni, hospital disciplinarians forced him to sign an anti-rumormongering confession. This classification of articles and blogs into two categories — either discipline-prone rumors or permitted information — fits what political scientist Molly Roberts defines as fear-based censorship. Afterward, government officials proceeded as though the disease wasn’t harmful enough to deter Lunar New Year festivities and mass gatherings between Dec. 30 and the eventual shutdown of Wuhan on Jan. 23. Guidance Communications lags can be costly Of course, the United States does not employ Internet censorship by keyword or a government-run firewall to block the flow of information. But China’s communication system exemplifies the consequences of compromised information channels. Breakdowns in China’s communication mechanisms, aided by censorship and the difficulties of passing on information deemed excessively “political,” hindered the movement of important information throughout the coronavirus crisis. Looking back, many in China certainly have ample reason to be proud of the scale of testing and response to the outbreak. However, the conditions necessitating these quickly built hospitals emerged in part because of government-exacerbated informational delays. If officials had prioritized getting health information out quickly and efficiently, China’s hospitals and health-care professionals may not have been strained to the breaking point. China appears well on its way to closing its medical policy books on the coronavirus crisis, both figuratively and narratively. But communications failures will have lasting effects in both China and the United States. As Wuhan residents know and many at-risk Americans have yet to find out, informational errors can come at fatal costs. Don’t miss anything! Sign up to get TMC’s smart analysis in your inbox, three days a week. Rui Zhong Read more: Red states are finally starting to Google ‘coronavirus’ 3 ways the coronavirus could end Trump’s presidency The House moved quickly on a covid-19 response bill. These 4 takeaways explain what’s likely to happen next. Trump declared two different kinds of emergencies for covid-19. There might soon be 52. China is also relying on propaganda to tackle the covid-19 crisis Wuhan officials tried to cover up covid-19 — and sent it careening outward Covid-19 reveals how China’s internal politics now affect the whole world China’s early warning system didn’t work on covid-19. Here’s the story. Why China’s politics makes it easier — and harder — to control disease outbreaks


FAA sends some workers home as coronavirus spreads among federal workers at airports

return home from those countries but are being funneled to 13 airports set up to screen them. Travelers arriving at Dulles International Airport Sunday, one of the designated airports, reported short waits, but only limited screening. One passenger showed a reporter a photocopied form asking for basic information on their health and where they had been. Another shared guidance from the CDC about staying home and keeping watch for symptoms of covid-19. D.C. resident Nik Kowsar, 50, said he was surprised that the only question he encountered while passing relatively quickly through customs at Dulles after flying in from London was: “Do you have any health conditions to declare?” “I thought they were going to be screening everyone and checking temperatures,” Kowsar said. Kowsar said he had been scheduled to return home Tuesday, but moved up his flight Saturday night after seeing photos online of passengers stuck in crowded, hours-long delays at Chicago’s O’Hare airport Saturday as they awaited screening. “The flight wasn’t that full last night, but there weren’t many empty seats, so many other people made that decision as well,” Kowsar said. A CBP spokesman said the agency was using “a combination of traveler history records, officer questioning and observation, and self-declarations to identify travelers requiring enhanced health screening.” Steve and Audrey Boyle, of Finksburg, Md. in Carroll County, said someone checked their temperature with a probe placed near their forehead after they landed at Dulles. They had arrived on a British Airways flight from London, but had filled out paperwork on the airplane saying they had been to Greece. Their cruise also had stopped in Egypt, Turkey, and Cypress, though they were not allowed to disembark in Israel. Neither of them had a fever, and both said the health screening seemed sufficient. “I think all they can do is check temperatures and notice if anyone is coughing or sneezing,” said Steve Boyle, 60, who works in construction. “What else are they going to do?” added his wife, Audrey, 56. She works part-time as a home health aide and said she planned to stay away from her elderly client for two weeks and would limit her trips outside her home, but would probably go to the grocery store. “I don’t see myself staying in my house for 14 days,” Audrey Boyle said, “but I can see myself being very careful for 14 days.” When Trump announced the restrictions


Europe is closing borders amid coronavirus outbreak. They may be hard to reopen.

Germany had yet to offer assistance to Italy. Chinese media has played up the international assistance efforts, even though the government’s halting response to the initial viral outbreak was seen as helping fuel the pandemic. Just outside E.U. borders, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic reacted bitterly to news that the E.U. this weekend imposed a bloc-wide export ban on equipment to protect medical workers, such as masks and gowns. The restriction is intended to help jump-start countries inside the E.U. to come to one another’s assistance, but it left neighbors in the lurch. “International solidarity does not exist. European solidarity does not exist,” Vucic said. “The only country that can help us is China.” Some observers caution that challenges in the heat of the crisis may seem less important in months or years as the E.U. adjusts — perhaps constructively — to a new world in which pandemics can challenge its basic operating model. They point to the 2015 migration crisis — when borders also sprouted up within Europe only to fade away — as an example of a problem that did not ultimately lead to the collapse of the bloc. Still, said Daniela Schwarzer, the head of the German Council on Foreign Relations, the initial resistance by national governments to cooperate with one another “doesn’t look good.” The E.U. institutions “are trying to push the more cooperative handling of the crisis, but as long as governments don’t really play along, this is very difficult,” Schwarzer said. “If not handled in a very cooperative way, this will increase the losses in terms of people, in terms of wealth.” Further challenging Europe’s fundamental, open-bordered model, some policymakers warn, internal borders may be difficult to pull down again. Unlike the 2015 migration crisis, when there was a clear influx of people that eventually subsided, the virus will probably offer no clear off-ramp. “When are we going to say that we are ready to lift those restrictions and bans?” asked Rinkevics, the Latvian foreign minister. “If we, say, reopen schools or all those facilities that have just closed, what if there is a new spike because we have not been able to completely get rid of it? This is something we are not yet discussing in national governments.” The border closures were serving “a legitimate goal” — to slow the spread of the virus, he said. “But how long can we do it?” michael.birnbaum@washpost.com


Cruise ships are scrambling to find open ports for passengers stuck in the coronavirus shutdown

of Marietta, Ga. — Scott Spencer’s parents — wrote that everyone cheered when the captain announced the plan. “The continuous changes from Suva, Fiji to Tauranga or Auckland, New Zealand, to Lautoka, Fiji, only to be denied docking and disembarking was concerning,” they wrote. “Overall, though, people are in good spirits and enjoying themselves.” They said trying to make flight arrangements with limited Internet availability — and then having to cancel those reservations — had been frustrating for many onboard. Family members of passengers aboard Celebrity Eclipse, which has been stuck off Chile’s coast, have been tweeting at politicians to ask for help. Ailynne Abarado, a school counselor from Houston, said Monday that her parents-in-law and two sisters-in-law were on the ship with a group of 20 and had been scheduled to fly back from Chile to Dallas on Sunday. “Many of the passengers are older parents, so naturally, the children are concerned,” she said. Tuesday morning, the cruise line, which is owned by Royal Caribbean Cruises, said the vessel would refuel and load supplies in Valparaiso, Chile, and then sail to San Diego. It had already been scheduled to head there later this month. The company said in an alert that the trip should take 10 days. One ship that had searched in vain for a port after five people onboard tested positive for coronavirus, Braemar, from U.K.-based Fred Olsen Cruise Lines, found respite in Cuba. The trip had previously been scheduled to end in Barbados, but then veered to the Bahamas, which would not let passengers off. It wasn’t clear how long it would take for the ship to get passengers off the ship in Cuba and for them to fly home. Forty-three people on the ship have been isolated with flu-like symptoms. Another ship that had passengers who were infected, Costa Luminosa, was sailing toward Marseille, France, on Tuesday after passengers were not allowed off in Tenerife. Three people — one who left the ship on Feb. 29 in the Cayman Islands and later died, and a couple who disembarked March 8 in Puerto Rico — have tested positive. Three more left the ship in Tenerife with symptoms, but their test results were not yet known. All passengers are isolated in their rooms. “At the moment Costa Cruises is in contact with all the authorities to coordinate the disembarkation of guests onboard,” the operator said in a


Cancel the Olympics? Postpone them? Every alternative has problems.

World Health Organization. “It is not the role of WHO to call off or not call off any type of events,” WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said Monday. “As each international mass gathering is different, the factors to consider when determining if the event should be canceled may also differ. Any decision to change a planned international gathering should be based on a careful assessment of the risks and how they can be managed, and the level of event planning.” While Dick Pound, a longtime IOC member, told the Associated Press last month that a decision probably would have to be made by the end of May, another IOC official said this week there is no deadline facing the organization. “The IOC didn’t recognize any dates that Dick came up with, and I think Dick backed off that as well,” John Coates, head of the IOC’s coordination commission for the Tokyo Olympics, told the Sydney Morning Herald on Monday. “It’s all proceeding to start on the 24th of July.” The considerations posed by any changes to the Olympic schedule largely fall into four categories: personnel and staffing; venues; equipment and infrastructure; and contracts and scheduling. Those familiar with the details of staging a Summer Games say all the possibilities present pros and cons, and each likely will cost money that’s not currently budgeted, will prompt major disruptions and surely will upset some athletes, sports, nations, broadcasters and Olympic partners. While many leagues and major sporting events halted operations last week, those mostly covered games and tournaments that were scheduled for the next several weeks, the Masters and the NCAA basketball tournaments among the most notable. But other summer events remain scheduled and have made no indications they are close to canceling or suspending plans, including the British Open, Wimbledon and the Tour de France. The uncertainty surrounding the virus means public health officials can’t predict what the landscape will look like in the warm summer months, which has given event organizers, such as the IOC, trepidation to race into a decision right now. The chance of an athlete carrying the virus into the Olympic Village or anyone contracting the disease in Tokyo and taking it back home could prove too risky. The health and safety of everyone associated with the Games will be a priority and, like much of the world, Japan has been going to great lengths to slow the


Social distancing won’t happen until governments order it

create a genuine physical and spiritual democracy, a commonwealth in which the emphasis is placed upon the citizen's duty and the individual's responsibility to the community rather than on privileges and rights and escapes. ” The near destruction of the British Royal Air Force in the Battle of Britain, followed by the German Luftwaffe’s direct aerial bombardment of British cities, brought home to Americans how dire the situation in Western Europe was. This probably tipped the American debate, and in mid-September, Congress passed — however reluctantly — the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, some 15 months before the United States would go to war. Drafters of the legislation anticipated that it was likely to “induce” many men to enlist; they included a provision in the bill that provided selectees — men whose numbers had come up in the draft lottery — the “opportunity” to volunteer into either the land or naval forces before their formal date of induction, giving them the choice of where to serve. But the most powerful part of the law — its penalties — was what compelled many millions to comply: a fine up to $10,000 (in 1940s dollars) and/or up to five years imprisonment. The draft was imperfect, resulting in untold men ending up in an army occupation for which they were ill-suited. Although the FBI would investigate nearly a half million cases of draft evasion between 1940 and 1945, and many eligible men sought loopholes to evade service, the vast majority of Americans complied. That widespread compliance ensured the United States was far better prepared when war did come. And the system of selective service proved crucial to Allied victory. As the nation stares down a new emergency of global proportions, World War II can serve as a model of how we might address this new challenge. Leaders then did not rely on good will alone. The challenge was too great and onerous, and human nature, left to its own devices, too fickle. Today, the same is proving true, as we’ve seen frequently since experts started pleading with Americans to “flatten the curve” and “social distance.” Millions may be listening. Far too many have not. Nor has the federal government offered the necessary leadership in the midst of crisis. That’s why governors and mayors are starting to institute sweeping, compulsory measures to mitigate the threat. These measures impinge on our freedoms. But,


Don’t want to self-quarantine? The sheriff could send armed guards to your house.

most Florida beaches were still packed with sunbathers and spring breakers. And early Tuesday morning, Twitter trends reflected widespread frustration with people going out in hashtags including #HowToKeepPeopleHome. Even people who have symptoms consistent with covid-19 are socializing against the advice of their doctors and public health experts. In late February, a New Hampshire health-care worker, the first man in the state to test positive for coronavirus, was told to self-quarantine while he waited for his results. Instead of hunkering down, he showed up to a mixer for Dartmouth College students and doctors, the New York Times reported. Earlier this month, a father in Missouri took his daughter to a school dance even though he had another child home sick, waiting on test results for the coronavirus that eventually came back positive. Local health department officials said he broke a quarantine that applied to the whole family, but the man’s attorney said the quarantine applied only to the sick daughter at the time. Just last week, a man walked away from an emergency quarantine center at a motel in Kent, Wash., a hot spot for covid-19. He was waiting for test results that would determine whether he had contracted the virus, the Seattle Times reported. Those tests came back negative, but the quarantine breach raised red flags for local officials in charge of testing for the virus and enforcing isolation orders. The stubborn resistance to quarantine is not a uniquely American problem. Public health officials in New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom have threatened hefty fines for people who break mandated quarantines. Early Tuesday, authorities in New Zealand decided to deport two tourists from Southeast Asia who defied the country’s mandatory two-week quarantine that applies to most visitors coming into the nation from abroad. In the United States, both federal and local officials have some power to enforce quarantines, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At the local level, that authority has been exercised by judges declaring states of emergency and governors ordering public spaces to close. Strict quarantine orders are becoming more common as the coronavirus outbreak becomes more dire in the United States. On Monday, President Trump urged people to avoid gatherings of more than 10 people, stop eating out at restaurants and postpone any nonessential travel. The president added that coronavirus could continue to affect life in the country until July or August.


How countries around the world have tried to contain the coronavirus

How does the coronavirus pandemic end? Governments around the world are trying to figure that out, along with what role they can play. Some countries — including China, South Korea and Japan — appear to have had some success in slowing the rate of infection. But the United States and many European nations are still seeing exponential growth in cases. How many cases a country has confirmed reflects, in part, how many people it has tested. South Korea and Italy have conducted widespread testing; the United States and Japan have not. Certain factors may also make some societies more vulnerable than others. The virus has proved deadliest for older people, and Japan, Italy and Germany have the oldest populations in the world. Some researchers have further theorized that weather could have something to do with the spread, just as seasonal flu has a winter peak in the Northern Hemisphere. Others have suggested that population density and the degree of physical contact societies are accustomed to could affect transmission. All of that remains highly uncertain. But epidemiologists say how and when governments impose containment and mitigation measures can make a difference. China, after initially denying any problem and moving to silence whistleblowers, has gone after the virus aggressively with a mandatory quarantine in Hubei province. Italy has now extended its lockdown to the entire country, restricting freedom of movement on a scale unprecedented in a democracy — but it is still playing catch-up, trying to control a virus that spread in the country for weeks before anyone noticed. Other nations are beginning to promote social distancing, while assessing how much economic fallout, curtailment of civil liberties and disruption of routine their populations will tolerate. The first inkling of serious trouble came on Jan. 8, when Chinese authorities and the World Health Organization revealed that scientists in China had discovered a new strain of coronavirus responsible for a mysterious surge of pneumonia cases. The timing could not have been worse, coming just as millions of Chinese citizens were preparing to travel for the Lunar New Year holiday. Authorities soon began taking temperature checks at airports and tracing contacts between infected individuals and others in the community. It was already too late. Wuhan, an industrial city where an exotic animal market is believed to have been the source of the virus, became the epicenter of the outbreak and on Jan. 23 found its


church nationwide. South Korea has done the biggest number of covid-19 tests per capita, with more than 10,000 people tested daily over the past few weeks. People can even submit test samples at drive-through centers. Health authorities conduct robust contact tracing on all confirmed patients, then test identified contacts. Most controversially, the South Korean government is publishing the movements of people before they were diagnosed with the virus — retracing their steps using tools such as GPS phone tracking. The government has dismissed the idea of lockdowns. People can still travel in and out of Daegu. Local governments across the country promote social distancing, but there is no ban on mass gatherings, only recommendations. In late February, the Seoul mayor banned mass demonstrations typically held in the city center on weekends, but many protesters crowded Seoul’s main square the following weekend anyway. The Education Ministry has postponed the start of the new school year by three weeks to March 23. On March 13, South Korea reported more recoveries than new cases for the first time, though an emerging outbreak in Seoul threatens to undermine progress. In total, the country has confirmed more than 8,000 cases and reported 72 deaths. France announced Europe’s first known coronavirus cases on Jan. 24, one in Bordeaux and two in Paris, all affecting people who had recently been in China. By Feb. 8, a small cluster of cases was identified among British nationals who stayed at a ski chalet in the French Alps. Almost all of the 12 people diagnosed in late January and early February recovered; an 80-year-old tourist from China’s Hubei province, died at a Paris hospital on Feb. 14, becoming Europe’s first coronavirus death. The French government has lagged behind others on the continent with its interventions. While the streets of Rome emptied, life in Paris remained largely unchanged. On Feb. 29, after an emergency Cabinet meeting at a point when the country had 100 cases and two deaths, the French government announced a ban on gatherings of more than 5,000 people, leading to the cancellation of the Paris Book Fair. On March 3, Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer announced the closure of 120 schools, mostly in Brittany and the Oise region north of Paris, where clusters of community transmission were detected. “We will not paralyze the economic and social life of the country,” Health Minister Olivier Veran said in an interview published


March 5. The tone in France has shifted abruptly. On March 6, President Emmanuel Macron urged French citizens to “avoid visiting our elders as much as possible,” to protect that vulnerable population. On March 8, with nearly 1,230 confirmed cases and 19 deaths, the government revised its restrictions on public gatherings, banning events larger than 1,000 people. On March 12, Macron announced that schools and universities would close nationally starting Monday. And on March 14, with more than 4,400 cases and 91 deaths, the government moved to close all nonessential businesses, including cafes and restaurants. Germany’s initial outbreak is thought to have begun with a Chinese woman who traveled to the Bavarian town of Stockdorf for a workshop at a car parts factory on Jan. 21. On Jan. 27, a German man who participated in the workshop became the country’s first confirmed case. The factory closed for two weeks and asked all employees and their family members — some of whom were diagnosed in subsequent days — to stay home. Airline employees were asked to look out for sick passengers arriving from China as early as Jan. 24, but they did not administer temperature checks. Health Minister Jens Spahn said on Feb. 12 that checking temperatures “makes no sense,” because so many people with the virus are asymptomatic. He said flight passengers may be questioned about recent contacts. While Germany’s first cluster could be controlled through contact tracing and isolation, by Feb. 26, the country was starting to see cases that were harder to track; Spahn created a crisis management committee and told German states to activate their pandemic plans. On March 9, with more than 1,150 cases in Germany, Spahn said events with more than 1,000 people should be canceled. But this is only a recommendation; it’s up to each German state to decide what to do. The German government has issued travel warnings but no restrictions. Some state governments have closed schools, and Berlin is reducing public transport and shuttering all bars starting Tuesday. Germany reported its first two deaths related to the virus on March 9. Two days later, Chancellor Angela Merkel warned that coronavirus could spread to two-thirds of the country’s population before the end of the outbreak, but she did not announce new control measures. As of March 14, Germany had more than 4,500 confirmed cases and nine deaths. Italy’s first detected cases of coronavirus


with nearly 7,400 total cases, the lockdown was extended to the rest of the country, limiting travel abroad and across regions. On March 11, with nearly 12,500 cases, the government ramped up the lockdown even further, halting nearly all commercial activity aside from supermarkets and pharmacies. Italy has been testing fairly widely, performing more than 50,000 swabs. That partially explains why it has identified so many cases. The country, with the world’s second-highest proportion of seniors, is also particularly vulnerable. As of March 14, Italy had recorded more than 21,000 total cases and 1,441 deaths. The United States identified its first coronavirus case on Jan. 21, the day after a 35-year-old man who recently returned from Wuhan, China, showed up coughing at a clinic in Washington state. A few major airports had already begun screening passengers arriving from Wuhan. Health officials began tracing his contacts right away, locating 60 people, who all tested negative, and on Jan. 31, they established mandatory quarantines for certain passengers traveling from China. That wasn’t enough. Washington state has emerged as the pandemic’s largest foothold in the United States, with new cases confirmed every day across the country. On Feb. 6, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began sending out test kits, which turned out to be flawed, and weeks passed before new kits could be delivered. In that time, the virus continued to spread, and health officials were left blind. By the end of February, new cases had arrived from Italy and South Korea. “CDC and my Administration are doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus, including the very early closing of our borders to certain areas of the world,” President Trump said on Feb. 25. The country marked its first case of apparent community transmission in California on Feb. 28. Until late February, testing criteria remained narrow. A 56-year-old woman in Chevy Chase, Md., who returned in February from northern Italy and who had suffered from a cough and flu-like symptoms for 10 days, told The Washington Post that she could not get a coronavirus test at a hospital because she was not hospitalized or severely ill. The CDC approved widespread testing on March 3, but complaints about the availability of testing continued to mount. In the first two weeks of the month, a new normal rapidly emerged, with school and universities closures, workplaces going remote, state and local governments banning large


World tourism group releases estimate of job losses caused by coronavirus

The World Travel & Tourism Council today released the number of travel industry jobs the coronavirus could put at risk — an eight-figure estimate. To alleviate the impact, the organization proposed a multipronged strategy that would unite private industries and governments over a shared goal: to entice people to travel again. The WTTC, which represents the private tourism industry and counts more than 200 company members, said the epidemic could affect up to 50 million jobs worldwide. Both large corporations and small businesses are vulnerable. The organization said the crisis could eventually lead to a 12 to 14 percent loss of positions. WTTC arrived at this assessment by looking at the drop in international and domestic arrivals this year, plus figures related to spending and jobs. “It has a domino effect,” said Gloria Guevara, the council’s president and chief executive. “If a cruise ship doesn’t travel and there are no passengers, then no food is being purchased for the trip and tours are not being sold.” Guevara said the sector has already suffered job reductions, citing the tourism industries in Italy and Asia as examples. However, she remains hopeful of a comeback, a realistic aspiration as long as governments and private businesses combine forces. “We need a more organized approach,” she said. “We are all in this together,” Though the world is still in crisis mode, the organization already has several initiatives percolating. The proposals fall under five categories: “improve travel facilitation,” “remove barriers,” “ease fiscal policies,” “introduce incentives” and “support destinations.” For instance, WTTC said countries could simplify or expedite the visa application process, reduce fees or toss out the visa requirement. Governments could lower or eliminate taxes aimed at tourists, such as airport, port and hospitality fees. And destinations could increase their marketing budgets and put more muscle into tourism campaigns. Ultimately, the group wants to remove obstacles and make traveling easier and more appealing than ever — millions of jobs depend on it. “The travel industry will rebound,” she said. “We are very resilient. We just don’t know how long it will take.” andrea.sachs@washpost.com


Don’t want to kiss the Blarney Stone? Take a boat to a different rock: Skellig Michael.

[The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted travel domestically and around the world. You will find the latest developments on The Post’s live blog, which is continuously updated.] Besides the stone, Blarney Castle, crowded in summer, boasts gorgeous ruins and gardens Does kissing the Blarney Stone bring luck? No, it brings eloquence, and that is a sadly inappropriate skill for our 240-character tweet world. I’ve twice stared down the stone and refused to pucker: the first time out of fear — more on that later — and the second time, despite steeling myself, because I saw a lipstick smear and declined for the visible reminder of germs that surely crawled on the surface. With covid-19 on the loose, there’s even less incentive. Still, it’s a bucket-list item, and a charming one, too. “It’s such a unique experience,” says Paul O’Sullivan, 33, of Cork, Ireland, the marketing manager at Blarney Castle. “You’re lying down on your back at the very top of the castle, being held by the waist by a very nice Irish gentleman.” Yes, you heard right. You will be lowered backward over a gap in the wall, 100 feet in the air, and that’s where you kiss the stone. But, O’Sullivan adds, “Blarney’s not just a stone; it’s a whole complex.” The castle itself, built in 1446 by Dermot McCarthy, the king of Munster, is glorious, half-ruined and open to the sky. The 60 acres of gardens, O’Sullivan says, could be a stand-alone feature, including a horse graveyard, a 600-year-old “witch’s yew” named “Irish Tree of the Year 2019,” and a poison garden. Ireland is surely less litigious than the United States, but O’Sullivan reassures that the most deadly plants reside in domed cages “dutifully labeled with their uses now and in history — and if used for something more untoward.” Crowds can be an issue in June through August, with narrow stairs leading up to the smooch spot, but efforts are underway to enhance the wait time, including a pillory unveiled last month. This medieval punishment device holds your head and hands captive for kitschy photos, and hopefully no one will lob rotten eggs at you. Location: Blarney, County Cork, in Ireland’s southwest. Skellig Michael is a World Heritage site with birdwatching and fewer crowds For solitude — and a lower chance of picking up the coronavirus — you might skip the whole thing and head instead to another


Tracking Trump’s false or misleading coronavirus claims

six people had died. Two weeks later, there were 1,000 cases and 28 deaths. “This is a flu. This is like a flu.” — Feb. 26 (news conference) The new coronavirus appears to have a much higher fatality rate than the seasonal flu, possibly 20 times higher, but the outbreak was too new for a firm death rate to be determined. Moreover, it’s a new virus, not yet a seasonal one, although it’s possible covid-19 will become seasonal in the future. “The flu in our country kills from 25,000 people to 69,000 people a year. That was shocking to me. And so far, if you look at what we have with the 15 people and their recovery, one is, one is pretty sick, but hopefully will recover, but the others are in great shape.” — Feb. 26 (news conference) Trump appeared nonplussed at learning some basic public health information. The precise number of deaths caused by the flu is not known, but the CDC offers estimates that in the past decade range from a low of 12,000 in the 2011-2012 season to a high of 61,000 in the 2017-2018 season (though that is a preliminary estimate). But Trump misleadingly compared those numbers with the known cases of covid-19 in the United States. Tens of millions of people each year come down with the flu — possibly as many as 58 million in 2017-2018. The fatality rate of the seasonal flu in the United States is 0.1 percent. The new coronavirus appears to have a much higher fatality rate. “I don’t think it’s inevitable. It probably will. It possibly will. It could be at a very small level, or it could be at a larger level. Whatever happens, we’re totally prepared.” — Feb. 26 (news conference) Here, Trump contradicted Nancy Messonnier, the director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, who a day earlier had said: “Ultimately, we will see community spread in this country. It’s not a question of if but rather a question of when and how many people in this country will have severe illness.” “But the same vaccine could not work? You take a solid flu vaccine — — March 2 (remarks) “No,” replied Leonard Schleifer, chief executive of Regeneron, which develops and makes vaccines. The executives meeting with Trump explained that the coronavirus was new and therefore could not be protected against by


Pro sports leagues start restricting reporters from locker rooms over coronavirus fears

the agency’s more general guidelines on mass gatherings and community events. In the NHL, some teams acted on the league’s advisement immediately. The New York Islanders closed their dressing room after their 3-2 overtime loss to the Carolina Hurricanes. The San Jose Sharks, who have continued to host games despite a recommendation not to from Santa Clara County, announced they would conduct news conferences in place of dressing-room interviews after home games Saturday and Sunday. The Washington Capitals’ dressing room remained open after Saturday afternoon’s 5-2 victory at Pittsburgh as team officials communicated with the NHL on when a formal policy might take effect. The Philadelphia Flyers told the South Jersey Courier-Post that dressing rooms would remain open for the time being. D.C. United officials said Major League Soccer left the decision up to each team. United kept its locker room open to reporters. The U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee announced Monday that it had postponed a media summit scheduled for next week in Los Angeles. There were 109 athletes confirmed to appear, as of Monday afternoon, including track stars Allyson Felix, Christian Coleman and Galen Rupp, basketball players Sue Bird, Diana Taurasi and Elena Delle Donne, swimmer Ryan Lochte, soccer star Carli Lloyd, and golfer Danielle Kang. “As we weighed this decision, we relied on the expert opinion of our USOPC medical staff, our Infectious Disease Advisory Group, CDC professionals and local leaders, and came to the joint conclusion that the potential of spread or infection, however remote or unlikely, could have a real impact on the athletes of Team USA,” USOPC CEO Sarah Hirshland wrote in an email to athletes. “With 136 days to the opening of the Olympic Games, and 168 to the opening of the Paralympic Games, that simply isn’t a risk worth taking.” The discussions and restrictions alarmed reporters, many of whom worried about both the short- and long-term effects of restricted access to players. In the days and weeks ahead, providing coverage could get more difficult. “I think MLB taking precautions makes a lot of sense, but when it comes to banning media from the clubhouse, I think that’s a step that should not be taken,” Paul Sullivan, president of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America and a columnist for the Chicago Tribune, said in a phone interview. “Obviously this concerns everyone, and it’s understandable, but players can catch the virus from other players;


Suspension of visa processing for Mexican seasonal workers hits U.S. farms, fisheries

American farmers are bracing for a shortage of seasonal workers following the State Department’s suspension of routine immigrant and nonimmigrant visa processing in Mexico, including for temporary migrant laborers, beginning Wednesday. The delay in visa processing for farmworkers comes just as harvest season begins in Florida. Companies responsible for feeding the country are already expecting fewer available workers to manufacture, deliver and unpack groceries as the coronavirus pandemic intensifies. The seafood industry, including fisheries and crab-picking in Maryland, whose hiring season starts in April, will also be affected by the U.S. government’s decision. “One of the most important things we need to do is to make sure that our supply chains for food stay in place, and guest workers are a big part of what drives that engine,” said Sarah Frey, founder and chief executive of Frey Farms, which operates in Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri and West Virginia. “We have to figure out ways to keep going. Right now, feeding people is an essential service.” Frey said she was making calls to lawmakers until midnight all week, extolling the important role migrant farmworkers play in the U.S. food supply. Of the 500 to 600 workers Frey employs during peak season, about 250 are on H-2A seasonal worker visas. Frey said she was expecting her first crew of two dozen workers to come from Mexico in 10 days to help with the watermelon and tomato harvest in LaBelle, Fla. She is expecting more migrant workers through the spring and summer, picking fruits and vegetables at her farms in Indiana and Missouri, and harvesting pumpkins come fall. The American Farm Bureau Federation warned that the suspension in visa processing in Mexico could have a major effect on agricultural production. “Under the new restrictions, American farmers will not have access to all of the skilled immigrant labor needed at a critical time in the planting season. This threatens our ability to put food on Americans’ tables,” federation president Zippy Duvall said in a statement. The federation said it is working with the Trump administration to find safe, practical ways to admit farm laborers as emergency workers under the H-2A guest worker program. “Failing to do so will impact our ability to provide a healthy, affordable domestic food supply,” Duvall said. Many seasonal workers will still be granted entry. The State Department is allowing laborers with previous work experience in the United


Hundreds of Americans are stuck in Morocco after flight bans. They’re pleading for Washington to help.

Gayle Guynup, 68, is one of hundreds of U.S. citizens stuck in Morocco, on a vacation they can’t find a way to end. It’s become an all-too-familiar story with international borders closing as governments respond to the coronavirus pandemic, leaving people stranded. Guynup, of Santa Rosa, Calif., said her vacation deteriorated fast. She checked the news Saturday night to see reports that Morocco was suspending all international flights. By Monday, she was part of a frantic crowd at the airport trying to rebook a seat out to no avail. That same day, Morocco, which hosts around 12 million tourists yearly, ordered hotels, restaurants and entertainment centers to close. The country has 37 coronavirus cases and one related death. She said she feels abandoned by her government. “Egypt, Turkey, France and Great Britain have already taken actions on getting flights for their nationals out,” she told The Washington Post. “And our embassy [in Morocco] has not reached out to any of us.” She added: “It’s just a certain amount of anxiety as the days go by. The information we are given, the rumors we hear from the tour guides and the people that we meet … we still don’t hear anything from our government, so we don’t know how long this will go on.” A State Department official told The Post on Tuesday that it’s aware some countries have imposed new flight suspensions, and it’s “considering all options to assist U.S. citizens in these countries and are continuously assessing travel conditions in all areas affected by covid-19,” which is the disease caused by the coronavirus. On Tuesday, the U.S. Embassy in Rabat’s Twitter account urged U.S. citizens to try to book a seat on one of 50 commercial flights the British Embassy in Morocco was organizing to London until Thursday. The embassy’s website, last updated on Monday, urged “U.S. citizens who fall within identified high risk categories for COVID-19 to contact the Consulate General’s American Citizen Services.” People over age 60 and those with preexisting health conditions are at a higher risk of a severe, and even deadly, reaction to the coronavirus, according to medical experts. Guynup estimated that among the Americans stranded at her hotel in Casablanca, nearly all are above 60. “I think a 60-year-old would look like a teenager in this group,” she said of those who, like her, booked the trip through Gate 1 Travel. Rhonda Klein,


A coronavirus recession would hurt all kinds of Republican candidates — not just Trump

The covid-19 pandemic is wreaking economic havoc — crashing stock markets, shutting down travel, closing businesses and perhaps sending the world hurtling toward a recession. How will that affect the U.S. elections this year? As Michael Tesler wrote here at TMC, political scientists have long found that national economic conditions sway voters’ likelihood of voting for the incumbent president. But effects go beyond that: Voters reward or blame the president’s party in other elections as well. Here’s how a pandemic-driven recession could affect elections up and down the ballot this November. How we did our research Using election returns over the past five decades and economic data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, we compared election-year economic performance and votes for presidents, governors, senators and members of the House of Representatives. In the graphs below, you can see how growth or loss in average wages per worker and increase or decrease in the incumbent president’s party’s share of the vote are correlated during presidential election years, for all four types of elections. When wages increase, the president’s party tends to do better at all four levels. On average, over the past 45 years, a 1 percent change in wages is associated with about a 1-percentage-point change in votes for the incumbent president’s party. But how can you separate the influence of the economy from everything else? Of course, many factors affect national elections. For instance, Democratic candidates did poorly in 1980 — but it’s hard to tell how much that was because of the poor economy and how much was because of the Iran hostage crisis. Similarly, Republicans did poorly in 2008 — but how much of that was because of the Great Recession and how much because of the unpopular war in Iraq? To figure that out, we looked at local variation in the economy within particular states in a given election year. If a particular county’s economy was doing better or worse than its neighbors’ within the same state while other national conditions remain the same — if, say, “Springfield” is in a recession but “Middletown” is thriving — we can see whether people in Springfield and Middletown voted differently in the same year. Using this strategy in a new study, we compare administrative data on county-level economic conditions from 1969 to 2018 with election results for U.S. local, state and federal offices. Just as the graphs above


Does the coronavirus require a rethink of globalization?

countries and between them. Relatedly, it is globalization and increased interconnectedness that have been a key vector for the spread of the virus.” But it’s not just conservatives. This week, Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman suggested in Foreign Affairs that the coronavirus was an “enormous stress test” for globalization: It would seem that advocates for economic openness and global governance would be hard-pressed to respond. After all, this virus spreads because people cross borders. Even critics of travel bans acknowledge that “this kind of security theater can be dangerous — but the absence of security theater can be dangerous too. Apparent inaction (or insufficient action) erodes trust in public health authorities, which undermines response efforts.” If global supply chains are being disrupted, isn’t this even more evidence for the nationalist idea? The idea of nationalism is far more potent in 2020 than in 2008, which is another body blow to a more coordinated response. But rather than just nodding along with the notion that the nationalists have a point, maybe it’s worth observing that even in this instance — an easy test for populist nationalism — their preferred solutions don’t work. Consider the travel bans. One can make the case for them, but the Trump administration’s implementation of a travel ban on Europe has been disastrous. By enforcing the new procedures, the administration guaranteed long lines at 13 major airports, leading to stories of chaotic wait times in which people could not practice social distancing. As my Post colleagues noted, “the measures intended to prevent new infections in the United States caused conditions that facilitate the spread of the highly contagious virus, with throngs of people standing shoulder to shoulder — in some cases for several hours.” If the primary concern was to halt the spread of infection, simply letting all the Customs and Border Protection officers go home would have been the better move. Better coordination with European partners might have made implementation easier. Either option was preferable to a drawbridge-and-moat approach. Similarly, on global supply chains, part of the reason the United States is hard up for some medical supplies is the ongoing trade war with China. Chad P. Bown of the Peterson Institute for International Economics notes, “In the last two years, Trump’s policy has forced China to divert the sales of [medical] products — including protective gear for doctors and nurses and high-tech equipment to monitor


Here’s one estimate of how much the curve needs to flatten in your community

It will probably end up being the case that no category of illustration in human history has saved more lives than those showing the need to “flatten the curve." You’re almost certainly familiar with the term by now, weeks after a new strain of coronavirus escaped containment and began infecting thousands of Americans. The thrust is that slowing the rate at which the virus spreads will similarly slow the number of people needing to go to the hospital — and, therefore, give doctors more space to treat not only those with covid-19, the disease caused by the virus, but to treat everything else, as well. The illustration generally looks something like this. An uncontrolled spread of the virus (red) could see a rapid surge in demand for hospital facilities. A slower spread (yellow) offers a better chance to care for all of the patients coming into the system. Push down the peak number of cases and stay below capacity. It makes sense in the abstract. In reality, though, it depends on a number of factors, including: Changes in any of those factors can dramatically affect a community’s ability to handle the coronavirus outbreak. A spike in new cases can overwhelm a health-care system. If you hold the rate of infections steady but a higher percentage of the population gets sick, you might still be in trouble. If you’re in a region with fewer available hospital beds, your hospitals may be overwhelmed more quickly than another place, even if your rate of infection is slower. This week, researchers from the Harvard Global Health Institute released estimates looking at how the three factors above vary in hospital systems around the country. The data, first reported by the New York Times and ProPublica, show how individual communities might fare under rates of infection and overall spread. It includes estimates relative to the severity of illness — is intensive care required? — and considering available bed counts (recognizing that hospitals have patients being treated for other conditions) and total bed counts, should every bad in every hospital be converted to use solely for covid-19. Inspired by the Times’s visuals, we took those data and made regionalized curves showing the percentage of capacity in any hospital system that would be required under different infection scenarios, including the number of people infected and the length of time over which those infections will occur. You can see


Postcards from a nervous world: Scenes from Europe’s battle with the pandemic

There are different ways to measure the global war against the coronavirus pandemic. One is stepping back to view the massive retrenching of border closings, cities on lockdown and every other major disruption in a nervous world. Another way is through individual lives and the daily observations just outside their doorsteps or right below their windows. These snapshots — postcards from a moment in time during the coronavirus outbreak — are fleeting by nature. But they are strands for the countless stories that will be told and retold for years among family and friends on what happened during the virus. The Washington Post asked contributors in Europe, now the center of the pandemic, to offer their postcards. Cafe Kick is the sort of London sports bar ready to pull pints at 8 a.m. or pour shots through midnight for its foosball-playing crowd. This week, you could have rolled a bowling ball down its empty floorboards. Owner Gareth Kerr usually counts on serving up to 50 lunches a day. On Monday, he sold three. In my neighborhood in central London, the local wine bar is running low on cash. Down the street, the oldest Italian deli/pizzeria in the city decided to order 100 cases of dry pasta Monday for customers who are too fearful to eat in a crowd. “I’ve sold more pasta like that in five days than I have in a month,” said Felice Sula, the co-owner of Terroni of Clerkenwell, one of the last vestiges of London’s Little Italy. “I might have to cut back on the dinner hours, but I want to stay open. This place is part of the community.” Quality Wines is an independent wine bar usually teeming with customers at dusk. Tuesday at 6 p.m., manager Gus Gluck was pulling chairs up on the bar and mopping the floor. For now, Quality Wines will rely on retail wine sales and takeaway orders. Gluck grimaced and pointed to his cellphone. “All day, all day, I was getting calls from people who were being sacked.” In Kyiv, restaurants, gyms, shopping malls, clubs and other public venues have been shuttered and the metro closed. My wife, Yana, and I are practicing social distancing as the government “recommends.” Both of us are working from home and venture out only as needed. From our window, we see pedestrians on the street and strollers in the park across the street,