What you need to know today about the virus outbreak
A woman wearing a protective mask walks by a shop with bears installed in line to show social distancing in Paris, Tuesday, March 24, 2020. French President Emmanuel Macron urged employees to keep working in supermarkets, production sites and other businesses that need to keep running amid stringent restrictions of movement due to the rapid spreading of the new coronavirus in the country. For most people, the new coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms. For some it can cause more severe illness, especially in older adults and people with existing health problems. (AP Photo/Francois …
Medical staffers wearing protective gear, part of a special unit performing house calls, work in Bergamo, northern Italy, one of the areas worse-affected by coronavirus, Wednesday, March 25, 2020. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (Claudio Furlan/LaPresse via AP)
Due to the new coronavirus outbreak Katja Kipping, center, co-chairwoman of the German Left Party, wears a scraf as a face mask during a meeting of the German federal parliament, Bundestag, at the Reichstag building in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, March 25, 2020. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)
Two persons walk through a tunnel between the plenary hall and an office building of the German parliament Bundestag in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, March 25, 2020. The parliament meet for a session to vote about new package of measures to cushion the devastating effects of the virus outbreak on the economy. In order to slow down the spread of the coronavirus, the German government has considerably restricted public life and asked the citizens to stay at home. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing he…
Travelers wearing face masks sit with their luggage outside the Beijing Railway Station in Beijing, Wednesday, March 25, 2020. Some train stations and bus services reopened in China's Hubei Province on Wednesday and people who passed a health check would finally be allowed to travel for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak surged in January. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
A volunteer nurse wearing a mask tends to an homeless in Milan, early Wednesday, March 25, 2020. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or deaths. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)
A man pets a dog that sits in a window downtown Prague, Czech Republic, Tuesday, March 24, 2020. The Czech government extended Monday its strict restrictions on movement and other activities until at least April 1, in efforts to contain the outbreak of the new coronavirus. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
Restaurant owner Hoang Tung holds up a "Corona burger" in Hanoi, Vietnam on Wednesday, March 25, 2020. As the world is fighting against the Covid-19 pandemic, the Vietnamese restaurant hopes to cheer people up with their new creation, in which the burger buns shape like a coronavirus. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (AP Photo/Hau Dinh)
The White House and Senate leaders of both parties have agreed on unprecedented emergency legislation to rush sweeping aid totaling some $2 trillion to businesses, workers and a health care system slammed by the coronavirus pandemic.
Meanwhile, India's 1.3 billion people joined the global lockdown, and Prince Charles has tested positive for the new coronavirus.
Here are some of AP's top stories Wednesday on the world's coronavirus pandemic. Follow APNews.com/VirusOutbreak for updates through the day and APNews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak for stories explaining some of its complexities.
WHAT'S HAPPENING TODAY:
— A “cacophony of coughing” in packed emergency rooms. Beds squeezed in wherever there is space. Overworked, sleep-deprived doctors and nurses rationed to one face mask a day and wracked by worry about a dwindling number of available ventilators as New York City’s hospitals become the war-zone-like epicenter of the nation’s coronavirus crisis.
— Despite what you may have read in a text message or on social media, there are currently no plans for a national quarantine, let alone martial law. Rumors of a military-enforced national lockdown have been debunked repeatedly by state and federal authorities who say their recurrence shows why it’s vital to find reliable sources of information.
— The coronavirus is waging a war of attrition against health care workers throughout the world, but nowhere is it winning more battles at the moment than in Italy and in Spain, where protective equipment and tests have been in severely short supply for weeks.
— The pandemic is also touching remote areas spread across rural America, with the people living in those communities where “working from home” can mean driving a tractor alone through a empty field. Tiny towns tucked into Oregon’s windswept plains and cattle ranches miles from anywhere in South Dakota might not have had a single case of the coronavirus, but their main streets are also empty and their medical clinics overwhelmed by the worried.
— Restaurants, hotels, airlines, automakers and entertainment venues have been hit hard around the world as cities, states and entire countries have ordered the closure of non-essential businesses and directed residents to remain at home. U.S. Department of Labor figures to be released Thursday are expected to shatter the old record for the greatest number of new unemployment claims filed in a single week. There are more suddenly jobless Americans than during the Great Recession. And more than in the aftermath of major natural disasters such as hurricanes, fires and floods.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death. The vast majority of people recover.
Here are the symptoms of the virus compared with the common flu.
One of the best ways to prevent spread of the virus is washing your hands with soap and water. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends first washing with warm or cold water and then lathering soap for 20 seconds to get it on the backs of hands, between fingers and under fingernails before rinsing off.
You should wash your phone, too. Here’s how.
Misinformation overload: How to separate fact from fiction and rumor from deliberate efforts to mislead.
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ONE NUMBER:
$300,000: The money donated by the Michael Jackson estate to help people in the entertainment industry hurt by the coronavirus pandemic. The donations will focus on Broadway workers, as well as workers in Las Vegas and in the music industry. Jackson's estate announced Wednesday that it will give $100,000 apiece to Broadway Cares, Three Square food bank in Nevada and the Recording Academy's MusiCares. The estate's co-executor John Branca tells The Associated Press the gifts are personal for the keepers of Jackson's affairs and legacy and are in line with the singer's charitable endeavors during his lifetime.
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IN OTHER NEWS:
PLAYING THROUGH: Many golf courses around the country have remained open during the coronavirus pandemic. The hope is that golf can provide an outlet for the stir crazy and a dose of normalcy. The question is whether recreational golf safe enough under the circumstances. Courses have barred touching the flagsticks and turned the hole cups upside down so golfers don't need reach in to retrieve the ball.
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Follow AP coverage of the virus outbreak at https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak