COVID-19 news blurbs from around the world, 24 March 2020.
- Denver: National Jewish Health has developed a COVID-19 diagnostic test and established an Acute Respiratory Clinic for suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients. It is “the leading respiratory hospital in the nation. Founded 121 years ago as a nonprofit hospital, National Jewish Health today is the only facility in the world dedicated exclusively to groundbreaking medical research and treatment of patients with respiratory, cardiac, immune and related disorders.”
- Georgia: two health care workers in southwest Georgia, both in their 40s, have died of COVID-19.
- Greece: initiated lockdown on Monday.
- Indonesia: “only a few thousand tests have been done for an entire population of 270 million people.”
- Japan: although public gatherings have been discouraged, “crowds of people strolled under the cherry blossoms and spread out picnic blankets in Tokyo’s Yoyogi Park last weekend, all but ignoring the posted signs warning of the dangers of COVID-19 spreading.”
- Japan: the summer Olympic Games have been postponed to 2021.
- Malaysia: health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said that most COVID-19-related deaths have been due to late treatment. He said that there are “five stages of the infection but most of the patients who died came to hospital when they were already at stage three.”
- Texas: doctors at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) have designed and built a ventilator using common hospital and hobby store supplies.
- San Francisco: Google is reducing video quality on YouTube to ease network congestion.
- Switzerland: has the second highest infection rate in the world (following Italy) and has banned all gatherings of more than five people.
- United Arab Emirates: as in many countries, weddings have been banned; profiles of affected couples.
- Washington: 50,000 N95 masks delivered to UW researcher’s home thanks to Elon Musk, Tesla
- Washington: details on Gov. Jay Inslee’s Stay Home, Stay Healthy order.
- Washington: KUOW has stopped broadcasting White House press conferences on coronavirus disease because of a “pattern of false or misleading information”
- Washington, DC: Congress, White House reach agreement on $2 trillion response to coronavirus.
- Work From Home: every state in the U.S. has told businesses that remote work is either “recommended” or “mandated.” (Microsoft email to third party vendors like me)
See 24 March 2020 issue of Coronavirus Memo from a News Hound
