Health News at Your Fingertips

Unemployment assistance, eviction protections and other relief for millions of Americans struggling in an economy cratered by the coronavirus crisis were at stake as White House officials on Monday began fraught negotiations with top Democrats on a new aid package.

Aid runs out on Friday for a $600 weekly jobless benefit that Democrats call a lifeline for out-of-work Americans. Republican want to slash it to $200 a week, saying that the federal bump is too generous on top of state benefits and is discouraging employees from returning to work.

The US Senate’s Republican majority leader, Mitch McConnell, on Monday rolled out a proposal worth around $1tn, amid infighting in his own party and Democrats imploring him to come to the negotiating table.

The Senate’s top Democrat, Chuck Schumer of New York, called McConnell’s proposed relief package “totally inadequate”, at only about a third the size of what House Democrats have put forward.

“It won’t include food assistance for hungry kids whose parents can’t feed them, how hard-hearted, how cruel,” said Schumer:

Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro on Monday took off his mask in public as he greeted supporters in Brasilia, days after saying he had recovered from the coronavirus, which he said had not had a serious impact on his health, Reuters reports.

The right-wing leader tested positive for the coronavirus earlier this month and went into quarantine at his residence, but said on Saturday that his latest test had come back negative.

“I didn’t have any problems,” Bolsonaro said on Monday. “For people who have prior health problems and are of a certain age, anything can be dangerous.”

Brazil has the worst coronavirus outbreak in the world outside of the United States and Bolsonaro has been criticized for minimizing the severity of the disease and doing little to curb its spread as deaths mount.

Standing outside the Alvorada Palace, the Brazilian president’s official residence, Bolsonaro removed his mask after supporters asked that he take it off so they could snap pictures and selfies with him.

Initially, Bolsonaro said he would not take his mask off because he would end up “on the frontpage of tomorrow’s newspapers” if he did, but ended up doing so for brief periods of time in response to supporters.

The Brazilian Press Association filed a criminal complaint against Bolsonaro earlier this month because he took off his mask in the presence of reporters just as he announced he had tested positive for the coronavirus. The group alleges Bolsonaro endangered the health of those present at the news conference.

On Monday, Brazil reported a total of 2,442,375 confirmed coronavirus cases and 87,618 deaths. New cases totaled 23,384, while there were 614 new deaths.

Mexico’s health ministry on Monday reported 4,973 new coronavirus cases and 342 additional deaths, bringing the country’s total cases to 395,489 and death toll to 44,022.

The figures were published earlier in the day by Johns Hopkins University. Mexico has the fourth-highest coronavirus death tally worldwide.

The government has said the real number of infected people is likely significantly higher than the confirmed cases.

Anti-racism protesters plan to demonstrate in downtown Sydney on Tuesday despite court rulings that the gathering is illegal due to the pandemic threat, AP reports.

Organiser Paddy Gibson said the gathering would be safer than going to a crowded shopping mall or many Sydney workplaces.

“We all must be Covid-safe but we need to stand together to … say that Black lives matter in Australia,” Gibson told Nine Network television.

Gibson had organised the demonstration with the family of David Dungay, a 26-year-old Indigenous man who died in 2015 while being restrained in a Sydney prison after repeatedly saying: “I can’t breathe.”

The demonstrators have gathered more than 100,000 signatures on a petition calling for his prison guards to be charged.

A New South Wales state Supreme Court judge on Sunday accepted a police submission that the possibility of community transmission of Covid-19 made the demonstration too risky to proceed.

An appeals court on Monday dismissed the protesters’ challenge which contended the judge did not have the authority to prohibit the rally.

The court rulings increase the legal powers available to police to use against protesters. Outdoor gatherings are limited to 20 people in New South Wales due to the pandemic threat.

Here is more on the planned protest:

Thursday this week will mark six months since the World Health Organization declared the Covid-19 pandemic “public health emergency of international concern”.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters on Monday night, “This is the sixth time a global health emergency has been declared under the International Health Regulations, but it is easily the most severe,” saying that cases have roughly doubled in the last six weeks, as the pandemic “continues to accelerate.”

“When I declared a public health emergency of international concern on the 30^th of January – the highest level of alarm under international law – there were less than 100 cases outside of China, and no deaths,” he added.

Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.

My name is Helen Sullivan and I’ll be bringing you the latest global developments for the next few hours.

As always, you can get in touch on Twitter @helenrsullivan or via email: helen.sullivan@theguardian.com.

With Thursday this week marking six months since the World Health Organization declared the Covid-19 pandemic “public health emergency of international concern”, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters on Monday night, “This is the sixth time a global health emergency has been declared under the International Health Regulations, but it is easily the most severe.”

He added that cases have roughly doubled in the last six weeks, as the pandemic “continues to accelerate.”

Here are the other key recent developments:

• Global virus deaths passed 650,000 as new surges prompt fresh curbs. More than 100,000 deaths have been recorded since 9 July, and the global toll has doubled in just over two months.
• Donald Trump wore a mask and talked up the possibility of a coronavirus vaccine by the end of the year in the battleground state North Carolina. During a visit to a Fujifilm plant in Morrisville, the president wore a mask publicly for a second time and expressed confidence in the country’s economic recovery.
• Spain’s PM said the UK quarantine decision not justified. Britain’s decision to impose a two-week quarantine on people travelling from Spain is unfair, Pedro Sánchez said. He added that the Spanish government is in touch with British authorities in a bid to get the country to reconsider its position.
• Google employees will work from home until at least summer 2021. The company will keep its employees home until at least next July, the Wall Street Journal reported, marking the largest tech firm to commit to such a timeline in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
• Lebanon reimposed severe Covid-19 restrictions for the next two weeks. It has shut places of worship, cinemas, bars, nightclubs, sports events and popular markets, after a sharp rise in infections.
• The International Monetary Fund approved $4.3bn in aid to South Africa to help it fight the coronavirus pandemic. The country’s finance minister, Tito Mboweni, in June predicted the economy would shrink 7.2% in 2020, its deepest slump in 90 years.
• Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli issued scathing criticism of the Italian government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis. He said he was humiliated by a recent lockdown, surprise comments as the 61-year-old superstar was a symbol of national unity at the height of the lockdown.