Officials around the world have reintroduced a raft of restrictions – from beach closures to quarantine measures – to try to tamp down coronavirus hotspots as the official global death toll passed 650,000.

Officials around the world reintroduced a raft of restrictions – from beach closures to quarantine measures – to try to tamp down coronavirus hotspots as the official global death toll passed 650,000.
European countries trying to repair the economic damage caused by the earlier lockdowns struggled to balance keeping the lifeline of tourism open while guarding against new flare-ups of infection.
Spain’s tourism industry faced fresh misery after British travelers – and one major tour operator – cancelled flights there following the government’s decision to reintroduce quarantine for travellers returning from the country.
Hong Kong mandated wearing masks in public in response to a new wave of infections.
Belgium tightened its social distancing measures to try to halt what one expert called a “worrying” surge in cases.
In Washington, meanwhile, the White House announced that another senior administration figure, national security adviser Robert O’Brien, had contracted the virus.
As of yesterday, the US, the worst-hit nation in the world, had added another 57,000 cases of infection and its recorded death toll stood at 147,588, said Johns Hopkins University.
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Until Sunday, the number of US daily infections had exceeded 60,000 for 12 straight days, with some days notching more than 70,000 new cases.
But as the figures kept rolling in, the World Health Organization argued against a wholesale closing of borders.
This was “not necessarily a sustainable strategy for the world’s economy, for the world’s poor, or for anybody else,” said WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan.
A “global one-size-fits-all policy” was impossible because outbreaks were developing differently in different countries, he added.
Australia posts record number of cases
Australia posted its highest number of new coronavirus cases since the pandemic began, even as officials expressed hope outbreaks in locked-down Melbourne may have peaked.
A day after Australia reported its highest daily death toll, authorities confirmed yesterday at least 549 new Covid-19 infections – almost entirely driven by an outbreak in the southeastern state of Victoria.
Authorities admitted a second wave of clusters in Melbourne was taking longer to suppress than hoped.
But the state’s top health official voiced optimism that a partial lockdown of five million people, now in its third week, was working.
Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton said modelling showed “today should be the peak” even if the number of new cases continues to fluctuate and new daily records could yet be set.
Australia had dodged the worst ravages of the pandemic, logging around 15,000 cases in total – fewer than many hard-hit countries see in one day.
But the second outbreak is still proving deadly, with the nation’s death toll rising to 161 yesterday.
“The outbreaks are really volatile,” Mr Sutton said pointing to some virulent clusters. “In aged care settings the numbers can increase very significantly in a very short period of time.”
Hong Kong situation ‘remarkably severe’
The WHO said its emergency committee would meet later this week to discuss the crisis, six months after the organization declared the pandemic an international public health emergency.
Since emerging in China late last year, the virus has killed a total of 650,011 people – but more than 100,000 deaths have been recorded since 9 July, and the global toll has doubled in just over two months.
China reported its highest number of coronavirus cases in three months, part of a worrying swell of infections hitting Asia and Europe.
Indonesia confirmed its 100,000th coronavirus case yesterday, as the Red Cross warned that the crisis in the world’s fourth most-populous country risked “spiralling out of control.”
New infections have also surged in Hong Kong, which for weeks appeared to have infection rates under control.
Now, however, everyone in the densely populated territory must wear masks in public from this week.
“The epidemic situation in Hong Kong is remarkably severe,” Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung said as he announced the measure, as well as a ban on more than two people gathering in public and restaurants restricted to serving takeaway meals.
Spanish tourism badly hit
Spain, which has already paid a high cost in human lives and economic losses during the pandemic, suffered a further blow after tour operator TUI cancelled all British holidays to the Spanish mainland until 9 August over the UK’s decision late Saturday to require travellers returning from Spain to quarantine for two weeks.
“There have already been cancellations and more are expected,” said Emilio Gallego, secretary general of Spain’s hotels association.
“Nobody is going to come here for a week’s holiday and then spend 14 days shut away when they get back home.”
Other countries took a different approach to fears over rising infections.
New restrictions introduced
Germany will make coronavirus tests mandatory for travelers returning from risk areas, Health Minister Jens Spahn said.
“We must prevent returning travellers from infecting others unnoticed and thus triggering new chains of infection,” he wrote on Twitter.
Belgium announced that from tomorrow, people there would be allowed to see five people at most outside their family circle, reducing the permitted “social bubble” from 15.
The measures came after the country recorded 1,952 new cases over the past week, more than 70% up on the previous week.
Belgium’s second city Antwerp also announced a nighttime curfew.
In the city, a major business hub and sea port, bars and restaurants will close at 11pm and citizens will be obliged to get home by 11.30pm and to stay there until 6am (local time).
Everyone over 12 years old will have to wear a face mask in public places and crowded areas, contact and adult team sports will be banned and teleworking will be compulsory for anyone whose employment allows it.
Face coverings are mandatory in Antwerp
Antwerp governor Cathy Berx said in a statement that the situation in her city was such that she had decided to supplement the measures already taken on a national level.
France ordered night-time curfews for beaches in the Brittany resort of Quiberon on the Atlantic coast, after a fast-spreading Covid-19 cluster emerged there last week.
Tehran warned Iranians against wedding and funeral gatherings as the coronavirus outbreak showed no signs of abating in the Middle East’s hardest-hit country.
And Britain launched a campaign against obesity, days after a Public Health England report found that the condition increased the risk of death from coronavirus by 40%.
US biotech company Moderna began a final phase of clinical trials for a potential Covid-19 vaccine on Monday – the same day it emerged President Donald Trump’s national security advisor had contracted the virus.
Mr O’Brien, the most senior US figure so far to come down with the virus, “has been self-isolating and working from a secure location off site,” said a White House statement.