Georgia to reopen businesses Friday as U.S. deaths top 40,000

The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Tuesday that a second wave of the coronavirus is bound to be much worse next winter.

In an interview with The Washington Post, CDC Director Robert Redfield said, "There's a possibility that the assault of the virus on our nation next winter will actually be even more difficult than the one we just went through."

"And when I've said this to others, they kind of put their head back, they don’t understand what I mean," he added. "We're going to have the flu epidemic and the coronavirus epidemic at the same time."

Redfield said that having two outbreaks of similar respiratory illnesses will put enormous pressure on the U.S. health care system. He said even just a flu outbreak alone can put big strain on health care facilities.

Tom Brady has been working out — but outside in a Florida park that's off-limits because of the coronavirus epidemic.

The person who spotted the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' new quarterback in the Tampa park wasn't there for an autograph, she was a city worker telling him it was closed, Tampa's mayor said.

Mayor Jane Castor said in a live Facebook video chat Monday that with city parks closed, park staff have been visiting the sites to ensure that people weren't engaging in contact sports or other activities that violate social distancing measures that health experts say are key to slowing the virus' spread.

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West Virginia's effort to test all residents and staff of the state's nursing homes for the coronavirus illness COVID-19 began Monday, the governor said.

The effort has been called the first of its kind in the nation. Gov. Jim Justice issued an executive order mandating the testing Friday.  Nursing home residents can be particularly vulnerable to COVID-19. Justice said he believes that testing could be completed within a week.

"We’re going to have real, live data that we hope will help us to isolate and treat people, even those who may not have symptoms yet," he said in a statement.

NBC News reported last week that coronavirus deaths in long-term care facilities across the country had risen to 5,670, according to state health data. The rise was reported to have been driven by huge increases in hard-hit states like New York, where more than 2 percent of nursing home residents have died of the virus.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — While most countries are working on ways to contain the coronavirus, New Zealand has set itself a much more ambitious goal: eliminating it altogether. And experts believe the country could pull it off. 

Geography has helped. If any place could be described as socially distant it would be New Zealand, surrounded by stormy seas, with Antarctica to the south. With 5 million people spread across an area the size of Britain, even the cities aren’t overly crowded.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has taken bold steps, putting the country under a strict lockdown in late March, when only about 100 people had tested positive for the new virus. 

New Zealand has so far avoided a widespread outbreak, and new cases have dwindled from a peak of about 90 per day in early April to just five on Tuesday, leaving the goal tantalizingly close. Only 13 people have died so far.

“We have the opportunity to do something no other country has achieved: elimination of the virus,” Ardern told reporters last week. “But it will continue to need a team of 5 million behind it.”

Ardern on Monday announced the country would stay in lockdown for another week before slightly easing some work restrictions to help restart the economy. Most of the social restrictions will remain in place.

President Donald Trump said Monday that he is temporarily suspending immigration to the United States in response to the coronavirus pandemic and the "need to protect jobs."

In a tweet Monday night, the president attributed the suspension to an "attack from the Invisible Enemy" and the "need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens."

He added that he would sign an executive order temporarily suspending immigration.

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Reports of accidental poisonings from cleaners and disinfectants are up this year, and researchers believe it’s related to the coronavirus epidemic.

Such poisonings were up about 20 percent in the first three months of this year, compared with the same period in 2018 and 2019, according to a report Monday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The authors said they can’t prove coronavirus drove the increase, but said it seems likely the two are linked, given the number of stay-at-home orders and guidance to clean hands and dirty surfaces. They warned against using more cleaner than directed, mixing multiple products together or using them in poorly ventilated areas.

The report was based on more than 45,000 recent calls to 55 poison control centers across the country involving exposures to cleaning chemicals or disinfectants.

Some governors in the South have begun loosening restrictions put in place to contain the spread of coronavirus.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Monday granted businesses across the state permission to reopen later this week, an announcement echoed by a handful of other Republican governors who are beginning to lift stay-at-home orders.

Kemp's decision, which will apply to barber shops, gyms and other businesses that include close contact, comes days after President Donald Trump issued guidelines for the reopening of state economies. 

Some health experts have expressed concern that it's too early to be backing off lockdown measures.

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Vice President Pence described a call he had with governors in which he described each state's lab capacity and equipment in that state and locations where coronavirus diagnostic tests can be performed.