Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, jck, and Besame. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Man Oh Man, wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
Our photos of the week include these images of Good Friday from the New York Times, and these of Africa from the BBC.
It is hard to find news about anything other than coronavirus, so we will concentrate on those stories you might have missed, beginning with this from the BBC:
Aid agencies have expressed alarm after the first virus case was confirmed in Yemen, where years of civil war have devastated health systems.
Oxfam said it was a “devastating blow”, the International Rescue Committee called it a “nightmare scenario”.
Yemen is suffering the world's worst humanitarian crisis and millions are reliant on food aid.
From CBS News:
By Lucy Craft
Tokyo — The Governor of Tokyo, Yuriko Koike, announced on Friday a long list of businesses included in an official closure "request" for the coming month, as the world's most populous city fights to contain a widening coronavirus epidemic. A long list of businesses and private institutions are being asked to close, including universities, nightclubs, dance halls, bars, karaoke studios, driving schools, pools, bowling alleys, mahjong parlors, off track betting, pachinko parlors, theatres, internet cafes, athletic facilities, museums, art galleries and libraries.
From People Magazine:
Photos taken this week inside the maternity wing at one hospital in Thailand show newborns wearing protective face shields while being held by nurses
One hospital in Thailand is going the extra step to make sure that the babies who are born there won’t be infected with the coronavirus.
Photos taken this week inside the maternity wing at Bangkok’s Param 9 Hospital show newborns wearing protective face shields while being held by nurses, who are wearing face masks of their own.
Also about Thailand, this from ABC and The Associated Press:
Thailand is trying a new tactic in its battle against the new coronavirus: banning the sale of alcoholic beverages to try to curb irresponsible socializing
By PREEYAPA T. KHUNSONG
BANGKOK -- Thailand is trying a new tactic in its battle against the new coronavirus: banning the sale of alcoholic beverages to try to curb irresponsible socializing.
With bars already ordered closed, a number of provinces, as well as the capital Bangkok, have taken things a step further and temporarily outlawed the sale of beer, wine and spirits.
From Reuters:
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore has suspended the use of video-conferencing tool Zoom by teachers, its education ministry said on Friday, after “very serious incidents” occurred in the first week of a coronavirus lockdown that has seen schools move to home-based learning.
From ABC News:
The Chinese government released a new list of animals that can be farmed for meat as the country begins to reopen to a new normal following the
novel coronavirus outbreak that is thought to have originated in a wet market in Wuhan.
The draft list was released Thursday by the country's Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs and is available online for a public comment period.
From NPR:
In India, the coronavirus cloud has a silver lining: clear blue skies.
India entered the world's biggest lockdown last month and the government ordered 1.3 billion people to stay home as the number of coronavirus cases climbed.
The jury is still out on the effectiveness of those stringent measures in halting the spread of COVID-19. India has some 6,000 active cases and more than 200 deaths, with the number of new cases rising steadily. But the lockdown measures seem to have inadvertently solved, at least temporarily, another public health crisis: air pollution.
From the Washington Post:
NEW DELHI — For hours, the health worker ticked through a list of questions: How is your health? What is your state of mind? Are you running out of any food supplies? By the end of the afternoon, she had reached more than 50 people under coronavirus quarantine. Weeks earlier, that number was 200.
From The Guardian:
Peacekeeping and aid operations face disruption as outsiders are scapegoated in one of Africa’s most vulnerable countries
Since an Italian missionary was identified as CAR’s first coronavirus case last month, xenophobia has been on the rise. Unfounded stories widely published in the country’s newspapers and on social media have portrayed foreigners as unwelcome importers of a disease that could further impoverish the country.
From NPR:
Njube Mpofu normally runs a beer garden in Zimbabwe's capital city Harare. Zimbabwe is not an easy place to run a business. Water and electricity are rationed and the dollars are hard to come by.
Almost two weeks ago, and with just eight reported cases at the time, Zimbabwe announced a three-week nationwide lockdown to try to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Mpofu had to close his beer garden and, he says, the situation in the country has gotten worse.
"To tell you the truth, I really don't understand how we are doing it, but somehow we seem to be surviving," he said.
From CNN:
By Bukola Adebayo, CNN
(CNN)Africa's ailing presidents and powerful elites have been known to jet out to seek treatment abroad, instead of investing in healthcare in their own countries.
Zimbabwe's
Robert Mugabe died in a hospital in Singapore, and Cameroon's Paul Biya regularly seeks treatment abroad.
From NBC and AP:
Billions of the young desert locusts are winging in from breeding grounds in Somalia in search of fresh vegetation springing up with seasonal rains.
Weeks before the coronavirus spread through much of the world, parts of Africa were already threatened by another kind of plague, the biggest locust outbreak some countries had seen in 70 years.
Now the second wave of the voracious insects, some 20 times the size of the first, is arriving. Billions of the young desert locusts are winging in from breeding grounds in Somalia in search of fresh vegetation springing up with seasonal rains.
From The Guardian:
Nationalists renew criticism of Moscow’s handling of disaster which killed president and other senior politicians and military officers
Senior officials laid wreaths on Friday at a monument in the capital, Warsaw, to honour the late president Lech Kaczynski, who died. They walked in single file, guarded by police wearing surgical masks.
From CNN:
By Tim Lister and Sebastian Shukla, CNN
CNN)Much of Europe is still on coronavirus lockdown, with severe restrictions on movement and penalties for those who transgress.
But not Sweden. Restaurants and bars are open in the Nordic country, playgrounds and schools too, and the government is relying on voluntary action to stem the spread of Covid-19.
From The Guardian:
Party of 10 flew into Marseille-Provence airport to be taken by helicopter to luxury Cannes villa
Kim Willsher in Charny-Orée-de-Puisaye
A group of would-be holidaymakers who flew in a private jet from London to the Côte d’Azur in France has been turned back by police.
Seven men and three women arrived on the chartered aircraft to Marseille-Provence airport, where helicopters were waiting to fly them on to Cannes, where they had rented a luxury villa.
The men, aged 40-50, and women, aged 23-25, were refused permission to enter France and ordered by police to fly back to the UK.
From The Guardian:
People in deprived areas have less access to gardens and other green spaces, analysis shows
The most deprived Londoners would be disproportionately affected by park closures if lockdown measures on public green spaces were increased, Guardian analysis has found.
Londoners living in deprived areas and those from BAME backgrounds share less space and have less access to private gardens and public parks, according to an examination of mapping data.
From CNN:
(CNN)A teenager from an isolated Amazonian tribe who tested positive for Covid-19 has died, raising concerns about the coronavirus' impact on the region's indigenous people.
The 15-year-old boy, a Yanomami from the village of Rehebe on the Uraricoera River, died Thursday, according to Brazil's Ministry of Health.
From CBS:
London — Bárbara Delgado, a trans woman and health outreach worker, was distributing food near her home in Panama last week when she was detained by police for being out on the "wrong day" under the government's new, gender-based quarantine rules, the rights group Human Rights Watch told CBS News.
From The Guardian:
Reykjanes peninsula’s last active period started in 10th century and lasted 300 years
Kate Ravilious
Volcanic activity is escalating in a region of Iceland that has not erupted for 800 years, with scientists warning it could cause disruption for centuries to come.
From the BBC:
Balconies have always been designed to captivate and inspire the masses. But amid the coronavirus pandemic, they’ve taken on a newfound importance.
By Vittoria Traverso
Federico Sirianni, a singer-songwriter from Turin, Italy, was used to playing small gigs in his neighbourhood. But when he recently joined fellow musician Federica Magliano to play a live concert on the balconies of their building for their quarantined neighbours, things felt different.
“You could really feel a sense of wonder among those who were watching us from balconies,” Sirianni said. “A lot of people thanked us for making them feel less lonely.”
And another nice story from the BBC:
Special measures are being taken at the Miami Zoo to protect two highly endangered clouded leopard cubs that are vulnerable to catching coronavirus.
The cubs - one male and one female - were born on 11 February but have since been secluded in their den to allow time to bond with their mother.
Last month, a tiger at another US zoo tested positive for coronavirus.
And a couple of stories from the Arts, beginning with this from Time:
Sure, social media is filled with your friends’ photos of amateur stews, homemade sourdough and makeshift masks crafted while staying home due to the coronavirus. But look more closely, and you’ll find another layer of at-home concoctions: scenes reenacting famous paintings and photographs in creative ways. As the trend has continued to spread online since starting in March, helped by social media challenges broadcast by institutions including the Getty Museum in California and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, it’s become a welcome distraction and source of humor for audiences and creators alike. Step back, viral TikTok dances, livestream concerts and quarantine memes; this intensive form of expression is a whole new world of creative labor. In the middle of global uncertainty, it’s even become an important anchor for some.
From the Architect’s Newspaper:
Like virtually every other museum in America, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York temporarily closed down last month in response to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus. The decision, however, was unique for the world-famous museum, which had planned to celebrate its 150th anniversary with a year-long roster of events and exhibitions reflecting on the long and winding history of its impact on the art world.
The centerpiece planned for the celebration is Making The Met, 1870-2020, a large-scale exhibition juxtaposing over 250 artworks that reflects the museum’s encyclopedic archives, “from visitor favorites to fragile treasures that can only be placed on view from time to time.” Highlighting the growth of the museum itself into an institution with over two million works across 17 curatorial departments, Making The Met is designed to play the museum’s greatest hits.