12 Countries Report First Coronavirus Cases, Raising Total To 46

Potential pandemic looms, says WHO, as covid-19 spreads to 12 new countries in 24 hours and global markets slump

Nigeria reported the first case of coronavirus in sub-Saharan Africa on Friday, Feb. 28, one of 46 countries outside China reporting 3,700 cases and 57 deaths so far. Global markets had their worst day since the 2008, raising recession fears. World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva Thursday night that “all nations should prepare themselves for a potential pandemic,” as nations outside China now account for three-quarters of the new infections.

About 12 countries reported their first virus cases in past 24 hours, raising the total to 46 outside China with about 3,700 cases and 57 deaths. Nigeria, New Zealand and Estonia had just joined the list.

Mongolia President Khaltmaagiin Battulga and his accompanying staff who travelled to China on Thursday have been placed under quarantine. Battulga was the first foreign leader to visit China since the coronavirus outbreak.

In Iran, which has the highest reported proportion of coronavirus deaths outside China, Masoumeh Ebtekar, the highest-ranking woman in Iran’s government and a vice president, was confirmed as having contracted the disease, along with two members of parliament and the deputy health minister. Friday prayers were cancelled in Tehran and other cities. The Health Ministry spokesman in Tehran reported a death toll of 26 out of a total of 254 positive cases. This ratio raises questions about official figures and how the secretive regime is handling the crisis.

All Qatari citizens have been evacuated from Iran and arrived in Doha. They are all to be quarantined in a hotel facility for 14 days. The Trump administration has meanwhile slightly eased sanctions on Iran to allow for trade in medical supplies and food as Tehran struggles to respond to the coronavirus outbreak throughout the country. 

Fears of a pandemic are already having a serious knock-on effect on the global economy. The Dow Jones registered its fourth 1,000-drop in its history, followed by three major US indexes. Asian stocks tracked another overnight plunge in response to Wall Street, with markets in China, Japan and South Korea posting heavy losses.

People appear to be stocking up on food and essentials as covid-19 spreads to new countries, while fears and uncertainties are causing havoc in air traffic and the financial, tourism and other industries. Global corporations, like Facebook, are cancelling international conferences for fear of infection and staging virtual meetings while cultural events are faced with declining audiences.

In Israel, which has clamped down extreme precautions, the wife of a coronavirus patient who, four days after returning from Italy was diagnosed with the virus, has also contracted the disease and joins him in quarantine. Israel’s Health Ministry decided to deny entry to Italy’s swimming delegation scheduled to take part in the first round of the European Open Water Swimming Championships in Eilat in the second week of March. El Al, the national carrier, is cancelling flights to two covid-19 hotbeds – Italy as of Friday and Thailand from Monday – as well as extending the suspension of routes to Beijing and Hong Kong.

BBC: Iran's Virus Death Toll Is At Least 210

BBC: Iran's virus death toll is at least 210 -- six times higher than it says

The novel coronavirus has killed at least 210 people in Iran, according to a report Friday, more than six times higher than the death count reported by Iranian authorities.

Citing unnamed sources at Iranian hospitals, BBC Persian reported that the highest number of dead were in the capital Tehran and Qom, a Shiite holy city where the virus first emerged in Iran.

The locations of the hospitals were not specified in the report.

Iran’s health ministry, which earlier Friday reported a death toll of 34, rejected the report.

Health ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpur accused BBC Persian of joining the Islamic republic’s regional enemies in a “race to spread lies” about Iran.

“Iran’s exemplary transparency in publishing information on the coronavirus has stunned many people,” Jahanpur tweeted.

Jahanpour said 143 cases had been detected over the past 24 hours, increasing the total of confirmed infections to 388.

Among the new cases, 64 were in Tehran while the number of provinces hit by the outbreak rose to 24, Jahanpour said.

“We are currently in a phase in which infections are increasing,” he said, predicting that the situation “will continue for some days, even weeks.”

It is the highest number of new cases for a single day since Iran announced its first confirmed infections on February 19 in Qom.

The outbreak of the new virus in Iran has been dramatic — the head of Iran’s task force to stop the illness was seen coughing, sweating and wheezing across televised interviews before acknowledging he was infected. Then, days later, a visibly pale official sat only meters (feet) away from Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and other top leaders before she too reportedly came down with the virus.

Iran’s success — or failure — in combating the virus will have an impact far beyond the country’s 80 million people as the majority of cases in the Middle East now link back to Iran.

“We will have a tough week ahead,” Iranian Health Minister Saeed Namaki warned. “The main peak of the coronavirus will be next week and in the coming days.”

In Tehran and other cities, authorities canceled Friday prayer services to limit crowds. In the capital Radio Tehran, which typically carries the prayer, played only traditional Iranian music. Universities are to remain closed another week. Schools will be closed for at least three days, Namaki said. Parliament also will be closed, state television said, citing a lawmaker.

But questions still remain over Iran’s count. Experts, including at the World Health Organization, worry the Islamic Republic may be underreporting the number of cases in the country.

China Reports Rise In New Coronavirus Cases

China reports rise in new coronavirus cases, warns of risk of rebound

China reported 433 new cases of coronavirus infections on Feb. 26, the National Health Commission said on Thursday, up from 406 a day earlier, with a cluster of new cases in Beijing raising concerns about the management of employees returning to work.

The total number of confirmed cases on mainland China has now reached 78,497, the Commission said, though the number of new deaths on Wednesday stood at 29, the lowest daily rate since Jan. 28.

The outbreak has now killed a total of 2,744 people in China.

Hubei, the central Chinese province at the epicenter of the outbreak, reported 409 new cases and 26 deaths on Wednesday. Beijing and the provinces of Heilongjiang and Henan were the locations of the other three fatalities.

The number of new cases outside Hubei stood at 24, up from 5 on the previous day and reversing five days of declines. Ten of those were in Beijing.

A statement published by the Comission on Thursday, citing a meeting held the previous day, said that the situation in Hubei province and Wuhan is "still complex and serious", and added that the risk of a rebound in infection in other regions should not be overlooked.

Also, some coronavirus patients discharged from hospitals after recovery have been readmitted after testing positive again, health authorities said recently.

A health official in southern Guangdong province told state media on Wednesday that 14% of patients discharged from hospital experienced a resurgence of the virus, although they had not infected any others they had been in close contact with.

The number of new confirmed coronavirus cases in Beijing on Feb. 26 had jumped to 10 from zero the previous day. Pang Xinghuo, deputy head of Beijing Center of Disease Control, told a news briefing on Thursday that it was a cluster case.

The new cases all stemmed from a property management agency in Beijing's Chaoyang district, and had either been working in the same office or sharing the same dormitory, Pang said.

The case showed that companies were not putting in place adequate monitoring of staff during their 14-day quarantine period, Chen Bei, deputy secretary general of Beijing city government, told a briefing later on Thursday.

It has also highlighted the risks of crowded dormitories and poorly ventilated basement housing often used for some workers.

Chen said no more than six people should share basement dormitories, which should have windows. She also reiterated that people returning to Beijing must undergo a 14-day self quarantine before they're allowed to go back to work.

Chinese authorities are also turning their attention to potential sources of infection from abroad, as the number of new cases outside China now exceed those domestically.

The Shanghai government said it is trying to identify anyone who came into contact with a coronavirus patient who arrived in the city from Iran, another coronavirus hotspot.

More than 40 countries and regions outside mainland China have reported infections. On Wednesday, cases were detected for the first time in Brazil, Pakistan, Norway, Greece, Romania and Algeria. The coronavirus has infected more than 80,000 people and killed nearly 2,800, the majority in China.

A senior medical advisor in the Chinese government who won fame for combating the SARS epidemic in 2003 on Thursday said the original source of the coronavirus remains unclear.

"Though the virus was first discovered in China, it may not have originated from China," said Zhong Nanshan, an 83-year-old epidemiologist.

Zhong said he believes there are other wildlife species apart from the pangolin, which is suspected as the original source emerging from a seafood market in Wuhan that also sold wild animals, that carry coronavirus.

Zhong said China would present a video report to the European Respiratory Society to share China's experience in addressing the virus outbreak.

He again repeated an earlier forecast that the coronavirus outbreak in China will be contained by end-April after peaking in mid-to-late-February.

Coronavirus Updates:

Coronavirus Cases Surge Across Europe As Nigeria Confirms First Case South Of The Sahara: Live Updates

 Tyler Durden

On Wednesday, the coronavirus outbreak reached a new milestone when the number of new cases confirmed in the world ex-China finally surpassed the number being confirmed on the mainland. Two days later, and we're almost at the point where the number of Thursday new cases confirmed by Iran was roughly half the total coming out of Wuhan.

As of Friday morning, the number of confirmed cases worldwide had passed 83,000, while the number of deaths topped 2,800.

Since yesterday, we we first noted this chart, the number of cases outside China has soared, particularly in South Korea and across Europe, as the number of new cases in mainland China (but outside Wuhan) dropped into the single digits.

Of course, China still had nearly two months of lead time over the rest of the world, and it has been home to the bulk of cases so far.

South Korea has confirmed an additional 571 cases of the novel coronavirus so far on Friday, bringing its total to 2,337, making it the largest outbreak outside of mainland China.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous country with more than 200 million people, reported the first case in Sub-Saharan Africa late Thursday night (ET). On Friday, Nigerian Health Minister Osagie Ehanire told reporters in Lagos that his government has contacted the airline on which the country's 'patient zero' traveled to try and trace people he came in contact with. Lagos Health Commissioner Akin Abayomi said the patient traveled to Nigeria on Turkish Airlines flight.

Perhaps the most shocking development overnight was the surge of new cases in Germany, confirming the dire warnings of health officials. Europe's largest economy has now quarantined about 1,000 people and affirmed "about 60" cases of coronavirus across the country.

Mexico's streak of being the only country in North America to have rebuffed the coronavirus is about to end: The country just reported its first preliminary positive test on Friday morning, according to Bloomberg.

In Iran, authorities have nearly caught up to a lawmaker's warning about 50 deaths  in the city of Qom earlier this week: The Islamic Republic reported 143 new cases overnight, raising the countrywide total to 388. It also reported 8 more deaths, bringing the death toll to 34.

"Iran expects an upward trajectory in confirmed coronavirus cases in the next few days," the health minister said.

Singapore has become the latest country to crack down on the South Korean Christian cult at the center of that country's outbreak.

German Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann said on Friday that the central bank's official forecasts for 2020 growth were probably a little too optimistic, given the supply-side shock rocking Europe's export powerhouse. Authorities in Germany's Heinsberg, which is situated near the Dutch border, asked people who came into contact with a married couple with the disease to stay at home.

An update on the hotel in Tenerife where an Italian doctor was diagnosed with the virus and hundreds of guests have been quarantined: The first 9 guests of about 700 who have been isolated since Tuesday have been allowed to leave.

"The Markets Are Really Panicking": VIX Explodes, Markets Crash In Worst Week Since Lehman



Friday's market performance has traditionally been the weakest, even during the meltup phase ahead of the recent coronacrash, and as such it will probably not come as a surprise that today's overnight rout which followed the biggest 6-day correction from a peak for the S&P on record...

Futures on American gauges were all down at least 0.8%, a more modest drop than elsewhere in the world, but still suggesting U.S. stocks will retreat for a seventh straight session, cementing the worst week since the global financial crisis. Wall Street shares plunged 4.4% on Thursday alone, the largest fall since the August 2011 US downgrade. Futures pointed to a modest 1% drop later, but the S&P 500 has lost 12% since hitting a record high just nine days ago, putting it in so-called correction territory

"Investors are trying to price in the worst case scenario and the biggest risk is what happens now in the United States and other major countries outside of Asia," said SEI Investments Head of Asian Equities John Lau. "These are highly uncertainty times, no one really knows the answer and the markets are really panicking."

And as the accelerating global coronavirus panic sent world stock markets skidding again on Friday into a angry sea of red...

...compounding their worst crash since the 2008 global financial crisis and pushing the week’s wipeout in value terms to $5 trillion. MSCI’s all country world index, which tracks almost 50 countries, was down more than 1% ahead of U.S. trading and almost 10% for the week - the worst since October 2008.

Chinese Destroyer Fired Laser Weapon At U.S. Surveillance Aircraft

A Chinese destroyer fired a weapons-grade laser at a US surveillance aircraft, US Navy says

• A Chinese destroyer lased a US Navy P-8A surveillance aircraft with a weapons-grade laser in the Pacific last week, the US Navy said Thursday.
• A Pacific Fleet spokeswoman told Insider that the weapon appeared to be part of the Chinese warship's close-in weapons system.
• "Weapons-grade lasers could potentially cause serious harm to aircrew and mariners, as well as ship and aircraft systems," a PACFLEET statement read, calling the incident "unsafe and unprofessional."

A Chinese destroyer used a weapons-grade laser to target a US Navy P-8A surveillance aircraft flying above the Pacific last week, US Pacific Fleet said Thursday.

The People's Liberation Army Navy destroyer's actions were "unsafe and unprofessional," PACFLEET said in a statement following the incident, which occurred around 380 miles from Guam, where the US has a significant military presence.

The laser appeared to be part of the destroyer's close-in weapon system, a PACFLEET spokeswoman told Insider. 

"The laser, which was not visible to the naked eye, was captured by a sensor onboard the P-8A," PACLFEET said. "Weapons-grade lasers could potentially cause serious harm to aircrew and mariners, as well as ship and aircraft systems."