MMA trainer pleads for help as he’s forced to wait with dead body of sister for 36 HOURS in coronavirus-hit Italy

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Italian mixed martial arts trainer Luca Franzese has posted a distressing video in which he pleads for help as the body of his dead sister lies in the background after she was infected with the coronavirus.

Franzese, who has also appeared as an actor on the popular TV series ‘Gomorrah’, posted a series of videos on social media last weekend in which he appeals for help as the body of his sister Teresa lies in bed behind him.

Teresa Franzese, 47, reportedly died on Saturday after showing symptoms of Covid-19 for several days.

“I am making this video for the good of Italy, for the good of Naples,” a distraught Luca says in the video.

“My sister died last night, probably because of the virus, and I’ve been waiting for answers since last night.

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“I had to force them to come and do the test. I’ve had to put myself in self-isolation. I might have the virus.

“To keep my sister alive, I tried to give her mouth to mouth resuscitation and no one cared, no one is calling me.

“We are ruined, Italy has abandoned us. But we must give each other strength.”

The trainer-turned-actor later confirmed that his sister, who had a form of epilepsy, had tested positive for Covid-19.

He said he had been forced to wait for 36 hours with her body at home – where elderly relatives were also staying – as he desperately sought funeral services who would come and take her body away for burial.

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Teresa Franzese was reportedly the fourth person to die of the coronavirus in the southern Italian region of Campania, where there have been more than 120 cases of the disease.

Local councillor Francesco Emilio Borrelli said that the confusion over Teresa Franzese’s death came from the fact that she had been the first person to die at home from the virus.

“It was the first case in Italy in which a person with the virus dies at home, so there was some confusion on what to do,” he said, Al Jazeera reported.

“The family [exemplifies] altruism, they are doing everything they can to protect their community, and the community is staying close to them by bringing food.

“Now the big problem is that they have been closed in there for four days, and no one is taking away their trash. It’s getting unhygienic and we don’t know what to do about it. Someone needs to help them.” 

A funeral home eventually agreed to come and take the body after Luca Franzese’s was widely shared online.

“It was surreal. We used masks, sterile shoes, hazmat suits, glasses, and gloves. Luca and another relative were there, but other family members were all in another room,” said Pasquale Pernice, an employee at the Aprea Funeral Home service.

Italy has recorded almost 12,500 cases of the coronavirus pandemic, with more than 820 people dying of the disease, making it the worst-hit country outside of China.

The country and its 60 million population have been placed on lockdown, with all bars, restaurants and schools shut, as well as most shops.

‘Ability to help may reach limit’: Italian doctor says medics ‘exhausted’ helping isolated patients amid coronavirus pandemic

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If the number of the infected keeps rising, patients with better chances of survival will have to be prioritized, an ER doctor at the epicenter of the Italian outbreak told RT’s Ruptly video agency.

In the city of Piacenza, in the heart of northern Italy’s coronavirus outbreak, overworked medical personnel are reaching their breaking point – and there seems to be no sign that the epidemic is letting up. With a population of just over 100,000, the city was placed on lockdown on Sunday, after suffering 50 deaths and more than 630 coronavirus diagnoses.

Visibly tired and with bags under his eyes, Davide Bastoni, who works in the emergency room of the Gugliermo Da Saliceto Hospital in Piacenza, told Ruptly that the battle against Covid-19 has been unceasing – and humbling.

“The night was very exhausting… This epidemic permits us to understand the fact that at the end of the day, we are all human beings, we are all the same, when facing these outbreaks or these viruses,” said Bastoni.

Dressed in a white smock and a hair net, the doctor confessed that protecting against the highly-contagious has separated patients from their caregivers.

“They are all patients who need human contact, who need some words of comfort, which is difficult to give them because we have the masks and all the protective devices,” the medical professional noted. He said that trying to make treatment more “humane” has forced clinicians to “reinvent” how they communicate with their patients.

There were more than three dozen patients with symptoms of the virus waiting to be screened and processed when the interview was recorded on Wednesday. But according to Bastoni, the epidemic is likely to get worse before it gets better.

The doctor urged his fellow Italians, especially young people, to take all possible measures to avoid contact with the virus.

ALSO ON RT.COMWATCH Italians line up in extended supermarket queues amid coronavirus lockdown (VIDEO, PHOTOS)

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“It’s clear that if the community doesn’t follow the restrictions and the numbers [of the infected] continue to rise, at a certain point, our ability to help people will reach its limit,” Bastoni warned.

He expressed fear that it would soon become necessary to classify patients based on those who have a greater chance of surviving the illness.

“I really hope this doesn’t happen,” he said.

Italy remains Europe’s worst-hit country, with the number of confirmed cases reaching 12,462 on Wednesday and the death toll jumping by 196 to 827 in just 24 hours.

AMIDST CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC, SUBWAY POSTERS TELL NEW YORKERS NOT TO BE RACIST

Amidst Coronavirus Pandemic, Subway Posters Tell New Yorkers Not to Be Racist

Priorities.

 MARCH 12, 2020

An LGBT activist group called Pride Train has plastered New York subways with posters reminding commuters not to be racist during the coronavirus pandemic.

Asserting that “Facts, not fear, will stop COVID-19,” the posters tell travelers “No ignorance, racism, or xenophobia allowed at this station at any time.”

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Another poster states, “COVID-19 is not an excuse to be racist.”

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The posters immediately draw attention because they are designed to look like official MTA announcements.

Although previous posters were put up without the express permission of the MTA, Pride Train has described the Metropolitan Transportation Authority as a “silent (very silent) partner.”

Concerns over “racism” and “xenophobia” surrounding the coronavirus have repeatedly emerged, with the World Health Organization making numerous statements demanding certain words and phrases not be used in order to prevent people feeling “stigmatized.”

The irony of course is that the kind of border controls which countries like Russia imposed back in January would be decried as “racist” by groups such as Pride Train, yet they have successfully prevented the wider spread of coronavirus.

 

Russia Has Recorded Zero Coronavirus Deaths

Gee, I wonder why.

 

Even as coronavirus ravages the rest of Europe, Russia, which closed its entire border back in January, still has zero recorded deaths from COVID-19.

What a stunning coincidence.

The latest numbers out of Russia show that just 28 people are recorded to be infected with coronavirus. There have been zero fatalities.

Compare these numbers to other European countries.

– Italy has 15,113 recorded infections and 1,016 total deaths.

– Spain has 3,059 recorded infections and 86 total deaths.

– France has 2,281 recorded infections and 48 total deaths.

– Germany has 2,512 recorded infections and 5 total deaths.

– The UK has 590 recorded infections and 10 total deaths.

Why such a significant difference?

As the Moscow Times highlights, Russia closed “most entry points along its 4,200-kilometer border with China, ordering people returning from high-risk areas to self-quarantine and temporarily banning Chinese citizens from entering the country.”

They did this back in January, while the World Health Organization was simultaneously ordering countries not to profile and not to take any border control measures that would stop the international flow of people.

Singapore, which despite its proximity to China has recorded only 189 cases of coronavirus and zero deaths, also closed its border back in January.

Compare Singapore and Russia’s response to a country like the UK, which despite seeing coronavirus ravage Italy and Iran is still allowing people to arrive in the country from Italy and Iran while performing zero checks on them whatsoever.

Border controls work. Globalism is a vector for disease pandemics.

European Union Demands Greece Provide Asylum to Migrants Storming Turkish Border

The globalists aren’t having Greece’s border controls.

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Unelected bureaucrats of the European Union are demanding that Greece uphold asylum rights for the latest wave of migrants storming its border, weeks after the southern European nation suspended all asylum claims.

Thousands of itinerant migrants have been seeking to enter Greece in recent weeks after Turkey allowed the large migrant population it had been housing to pass through the country.

Ylva Johansson, the EU commissioner for home affairs and a Swedish national, is traveling to the country on Thursday to state a list of demands and mandates from Brussels for the nation. Johansson isn’t happy that Greece is refusing to provide a byzantine(no pun intended) legal process for so-called refugees storming the country.

Johansson claims Greece is treaty-obligated as a member of the union to permit migrants to apply for asylum.

“Individuals in the European Union have the right to apply for asylum. This is in the treaty, this is in international law. This we can’t suspend.”

It probably won’t go over well in the Mediterranean country that a foreign bureaucrat intends to lecture them on their response to the crisis of mass immigration flowing over the border from Turkey. Citizens of Greece largely expect the EU to assist them in dealing with the problem, namely in compelling Turkey to shut down the transit of migrants from the eastern parts of the country to its European border with Greece.

Greece is the latest country to question in policy the supposedly universal right to request asylum, a legal tactic often applied by illegal immigrants without a genuine case for refugee protections and utilized by human smugglers to facilitate illegal immigration in Europe and North America.

Thousands of migrants remain camped on Greece’s border with Turkey. Unfortunately for them, they can’t count on solidarity and assistance from the European Union in dealing with the problem, but rather a set of mandates and demands to let them in.

(MORE FROM CHICAGO) – Coronavirus downtown: COVID-19 case at Prudential Plaza; nearby buildings alert tenants, employees

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By Ryan Ori – 3/11/2020

A worker in one of Chicago’s largest office complexes has tested positive for the new coronavirus, causing companies there and in nearby buildings to take measures to prevent the illness from spreading.

Tenants in Prudential Plaza and other buildings near Millennium Park have been told an employee at an unidentified company in the two-tower Prudential complex on Tuesday tested positive for COVID-19. Since being diagnosed, the worker has not returned to the property, according to building owner Sterling Bay.

The illness, the first confirmed case involving a large Chicago office property, adds to the challenge of containing an outbreak in Chicago, where some schools have closed and major gatherings such as upcoming St. Patrick’s Day parades have been called off.

Employers are responding with a range of preventive measures, including at least one company that is asking anyone who has been in Prudential Plaza recently to consider working from home for the next two weeks.

“We understand the Prudential building is a common lunch spot for employees working in the area, so please be aware of the situation and avoid the building until it is cleared,” employees of Crain Communications were told in an email Wednesday.

The company, whose publications include Crain’s Chicago Business, has its offices in the office tower at 150 N. Michigan Ave., just across Michigan Avenue from Prudential Plaza.

“If you were in the Prudential building recently, please be aware of your own personal health and speak with your manager about working from home for the next 14 days until the incubation period has expired,” the Crain Communications email said. “If you do not show symptoms during that 14-day period we’ll be happy to have you back in the office.”

Other employers are taking steps such as allowing or encouraging people to work from home.

A confirmed illness at Prudential Plaza is particularly troubling because of the property’s sheer size, at 2.3 million square feet, and its connection to other buildings via the Pedway. The underground walkway is used by thousands of office tenants connect to commuter trains, nearby lunch spots and other businesses.

The complex is along the north edge of Chicago’s biggest tourist destination, Millennium Park, meaning there is typically heavy foot traffic in the area.

 

“We take this situation extremely seriously,” Sterling Bay spokeswoman Julie Goudie said in an emailed statement. “As soon as we learned of the diagnosis, we immediately notified building tenants and advised anyone who feels ill to stay home and contact a health professional if they experience symptoms of COVID-19.

 

“We have been and will continue to aggressively clean One Two Pru in accordance with CDC and WHO protocol. The health and safety of our tenant community is our highest priority and we encourage all tenants to continue practicing good personal hygiene as we navigate this moment together.

 

The Chicago Tribune is based in One Prudential Plaza, and employees are being given the option of working from home. In an email to employees Wednesday, Editor-in-Chief Colin McMahon told employees the newspaper “asked Prudential services to increase their cleaning regimen in and around our offices, and they have complied. We will continue to work closely with the building on precautions and next steps.”

 

Goudie said Sterling Bay’s increased cleaning efforts included “the additional measure of an electrostatic sprayer application of a virus-killing cleaning product on common area touchpoints.”

 

Tenants in the neighboring Aon Center, Chicago’s third-tallest skyscraper, were told the ill Prudential employee does not use the shuttle buses that run between those buildings and commuter train stations on the western edge of the Loop.

 

“For the past two weeks, the Aon/Prudential shuttle implemented additional disinfectant measures on each shuttle,” said the email sent to Aon Center tenants.

Shuttle buses continue to operate on schedule, according to the email.

 

In an email, BOMA/Chicago, an association of 240 Chicago buildings, said it was providing its members with updates and guidelines and defers “to our best-in-class building owners and managers to implement the proper cleaning protocols and procedures to help ensure the continued safety of their building tenants.”

 

Dr. Fauci Warns “Worst Is Yet To Come”: Coronavirus Is “10x More Lethal Than The Flu,” Could Infect “Millions” Of Americans

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Summary:

  • First death in Indonesia

  • Washington State to ban events over 200

  • ‘Waffle House’ employee in Atlanta confirmed

  • Chicago cancels St. Paddy’s Day parade

  • NY sends in National Guard

  • IADB cancels meeting in Colombia as virus spreads across Latin America

  • Mnuchin says first part of virus stimulus plan will be ready in 2 days

  • Dr. Fauci warns virus 10x more deadly than flu and could infect millions if not handled early

  • FEMA evacuates Atlanta office over coronavirus scare

  • 3 Boeing workers test positie

  • Washington DC advises cancellation or postponement of all gatherings with more than 1,000 people

  • Harvard to prorate room and board for students

  • US cases surpass 1,000

  • UK Health Minister catches virus

  • Ireland, Bulgaria, Sweden report first deaths

  • UK total hits 456 following largest daily jump on record (83 new cases)

  • Global cases pass 120,000

  • South Korea reports new outbreak in call center

  • Japan reportedly planning to declare state of emergency

*  *  *

Update (1220ET): Three Boeing workers have tested positive for the virus, the company said. Though Boeing offered few details, we suspect the employees are probably based in Washington State, where Boeing builds its planes.

In Washington DC, authorities are recommending the cancellation or postponement of all “non-essential” gatherings over 1,000.

As students leave campuses around the country either heading back home or hunkering down finish their classes on line, Harvard just announced that it would “pro-rate” students’ room and board.

*  *  *

Update (1220ET): With the committee in charge of the Tokyo Olympic Games reportedly planning to suggest that the games be delayed, more images of the coronavirus fears’ impact on international travel are circulating online. Check out this.

*  *  *

Update (1200ET): The CDC has released its latest batch of “confirmed” US figures: 29 deaths, 987 cases and cases confirmed in 39 states as of 10 pm last night.

  • U.S. CDC – 39 STATES HAVE REPORTED CASES AS OF MARCH 10 AT 4 PM ET VS PREVIOUS REPORT OF 36 STATES

  • U.S. CDC – 29 TOTAL DEATHS DUE TO NEW CORONAVIRUS AS OF MARCH 10 AT 4 PM ET VS 25 DEATHS AS OF PREVIOUS REPORT

  • U.S. CDC REPORTS ITS COUNT OF 987 CASES OF NEW CORONAVIRUS AS OF MARCH 10 AT 4 PM ET, VS PREVIOUS REPORT OF 696 CASES

Around the world, the virus has produced many “isn’t it ironic?” moments, and we just got another in the US when FEMA announced that it would close its Atlanta office after an employee was exposed to the virus.

  • FEMA ATLANTA OFFICE CLOSED AFTER EMPLOYEE EXPOSED TO VIRUS

Over in the UK, a total of 456 people have tested positive for coronavirus in the UK as of 9am on Wednesday, up from 373 at the same point on Tuesday, the Department of Health said. The jump of 83 new cases is the largest daily jump yet, following the previous ‘largest daily increase’ by only a few days.

Six have died in the UK and tested positive for the virus. Over in Ireland, authorities reported their first death on Wednesday. A 66-year-old Bulgarian woman also succumbed to the virus in the Balkan state, marking the first death there as well.

After the UK Health Minister Nadine Dorries tested positive for the virus, and started showing symptoms on Thursday, the same day she attended an event with the prime minister. Though the UK has elected to keep parliament open, Dorries and a Labour lawmaker who may have been exposed via a meeting with Dorries have decided to self-quarantine.

UK Chief Medical Officer Catherine Calderwood stressed that “we are still in the containment phase” despite an increased number of Covid-19 cases.

She said: “We have identified the first case of community transmission in Scotland which is unrelated to contact or travel. This was identified through our enhanced surveillance scheme.

Sweden has reported its first death from the coronavirus today, with a hospital in Stockholm saying an elderly patient had died in intensive care. Belgium has reported its first three deaths, with 314 cases of coronavirus. Ivory Coast has confirmed its first case of coronavirus, a 45-year-old Ivorian man who had recently travelled to Italy, the health ministry said in a statement. Denmark confirmed a batch of new cases, raising its total to 442.

While Washington State is apparently planning to ban all events with over 250 people, Washington DC has advised citizens to avoid such gatherings.

While

*  *  *

Update (1150ET): Rencap’s Charlie Robertson points out that it took 5 days since the first indication of human-to-human transmission happening at a wide scale in the US, and if our numbers track Germany’s, we should have 3,000 cases confirmed by Friday, and 6,000 by Monday.

Though that rate could double if many new clusters are discovered.

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*  *  *

Update (1100ET): With another day of non-stop breaking news headlines about the outbreak as it spreads across the US, Europe and Latin America, we’ve been having troubled keeping up.

Switzerland reported 148 new cases of coronavirus on Wednesday, with 645 cases in total, 58 cases in Zürich and 78 cases in Geneva.

Indonesia, an Asian nation that didn’t report its first case until more than a month after the global outbreak began reported its first death linked to the virus on Wednesday as well.

National Guard troops have been deployed to a Health Department command post in New Rochelle. Chicago has followed San Francisco and cancelled its St. Patrick’s Day Parade. In NYC, schools will not close, but parent-teacher conferences will be held via phone.

An employee at a ‘Waffle House’ in Metro Atlanta (Cherokee County) has tested positive for the virus, raising fears about a mass outbreak in Georgia. The store has been closed and 12 employees are quarantining and will continue for a few more days.

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The Inter-American Development Bank postponed its annual meeting in Colombia, which had been scheduled for next week, over coronavirus fears as the virus spreads across Latin America. The Washington-based bank, the top development institution dedicated to Latin America and the Caribbean, announced the decision with Colombian President Ivan Duque on Tuesday evening.

With transports and financials leading equities lower on Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Mnuchin, who testified to Congress on Wednesday tried to offer some reassuring details about the White House plan, which remains very much in the ‘brainstorm’ phase. Still, Mnuchin insisted that Trump is standing by the payroll tax holiday to put more money in the hands of workers. The Treasury is also hoping to delay tax payments and leave $200 billion of “temporary liquidity” in the hands of Americans.

Mnuchin said the White House hopes to strike a deal on the first part of the virus stimulus plan within the next 48 hours. His testimony follows rumors about the administration offering a potential ‘bailout’ to the American shale energy industry. Other stimulus actions will take “a week or two” he added.

Importantly, the Treasury Secretary also insisted that no market interventions are being planned (so no PPT?).

In remarks on Tuesday, CDC Director Robert Redfield said that America had lost valuable time tracking the virus; some regions now can merely try to cope with its spread rather than stop it. And during testimony on Wednesday, Dr. Fauci said that when it comes to the outbreak in the US, “the worst is yet to come” because the virus is “10x more lethal than the seasonal flu”.

If the US doesn’t handle the virus outbreak correctly, “many, many millions of people” will get the virus, he said.

The global coronavirus outbreak has hit a new milestone: It surpassed 120,000 cases overnight. For anybody who’s still bothering to keep track, that’s 15x the number of cases from the SARS outbreak, which continued for nearly a year before it finally petered out.

In the US, the coronavirus outbreak has reached a grim new milestone. Thanks to the administration’s scramble to bring dozens of private and public labs on-line for testing across the country, the CDC has managed to confirm more than 1,000 cases of the virus. In the Westchester County town of New Rochelle, the epicenter of the outbreak in New York State, and the largest on the east coast, woke up to a 1-mile exclusion zone and national guard soldiers in the streets.

The town now looks like a “ghost town” according to several reports.

As the number of cases topped 1,000, the number of deaths has also climbed: Officially, there are 31 deaths and 1,039 confirmed cases, according to the Washington Post, which is significantly more than the number confirmed by Dr. Anthony Fauci during last night’s press conference.

Across the US, Washington State’s King County remains the epicenter of America’s worst outbreak, with 273 cases . New York is No. 2 with 176 (13 additional cases have just been announced). After hinting about ‘mandatory measures’ last night that set tongues wagging about the possibility of Italy-style travel restrictions, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee is reportedly planning to announce a plan to…ban all events with more than 250 people, according to MyNorthwest.

At a press conference scheduled for Wednesday at 10:15 a.m., it is expected that Gov. Jay Inslee along with regional leaders and city mayors could announce a ban on large gatherings and events of 250 people or more in at least three counties. Any ban would affect upcoming sporting events in the area, including a home game for the XFL’s Seattle Dragons on Sunday.

Inslee has been hinting at this for the past week as a possible preemptive move to curb the spread of coronavirus. Over the weekend, he stated that his office was considering enacting “mandatory measures” in the days ahead.

Monday night on MSBNC, the Washington governor spoke to Rachel Maddow, admitting that soon, the state was “going to have to make some hard decisions.”

He further elaborated on that point during a Tuesday press conference, when he cited the need to “look forward ahead of the curve in Washington state.”

“We need to look at what is coming, not just what is here today,” he detailed, estimating that given limits on testing capacity, experts have told him there could be at least 1,000 untested coronavirus cases across the state.

So much for ‘hard decisions’….

This immense build up, only to announce restrictions that are only ‘slightly’ more comprehensive than the milquetoast event bans embraced by Germany, France, Switzerland and others, brings to mind a tweet we noticed earlier highlighting the sometimes unintended consequences that half-measures can create.

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On the east coast, the State of New York is asking businesses to voluntarily consider having employees work two shifts as well as allowing telework, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said in an interview with CNN, the network that employs his brother, where he has been making near-daily appearances in addition to his daily press conferences.

Gov. Inslee

“This is about reducing the density,” Cuomo said. “The spread is not going to stop on its own.”

He also announced 20 new cases of virus, bringing total in state to about 193, with most of the new cases diagnosed in New Rochelle, where the virus has clearly been circulating for weeks.

There have been reports that Democrats are pushing for a national emergency declaration which would trigger  tens of billions of dollars in funding from FEMA to help with the containment effort, and possibly to help grappled with the economic fallout from the outbreak.

Despite a few notable screwups lately (including a collapsed ad hoc quarantine that left roughly one dozen dead and many trapped in the rubble for days, Beijing continues to insist that it is winning the war against the virus, and while the true scope of China’s outbreak might never be known for sure (some have estimated 1 million cases throughout China), officials did report a slight rise in cases on Wednesday which they blamed on ‘imports from abroad.’

Officials reported 24 additional cases of coronavirus and 22 additional deaths on March 10, compared with 19 additional cases and 17 additional deaths on March 9, bringing the total number of cases in mainland China to 80,778 and death toll at 3,158. China’s Hubei province said it will mandate a return to work according to different levels of risk in an orderly manner, adding that key areas of the Wuhan economy will be allowed to return.

After 11 days of falling case numbers, South Korea reported 242 additional coronavirus cases early Wednesday, bringing its total to 7,555, and 6 additional deaths, increasing the death toll to 60, reversing a streak of declines that had convinced many that Korea’s outbreak had ended.

The South has made remarkable progress in fighting the outbreak, however, a new mass infection incident has popped up that is jeopardizing the government’s widely praised response. Earlier, South Korean authorities told Reuters that they had tested hundreds of staff at a Seoul call center where the disease broke out this week. 13 of the infected workers at the Seoul call center used public transportation to commute, leading to at least 90 other people who had close contact with them being infected. Of the 90 cases mentioned earlier, 62 were in Seoul, and all were located near a public transportation hub connecting Seoul with Incheon and other major cities, via which the virus spread.

The spread has even made it into the armed forces, raising new fears about an outbreak in tightly packed barracks

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Elsewhere, Japan is reportedly planning to declare a state of emergency due to the coronavirus outbreak after the number of domestic cases rose by the largest daily number yet, with 59 new cases bringing the total to 1,278, while the total death toll has climbed to 19 and there were 427 discharged from hospital on Tuesday.

Italy’s total coronavirus cases rose to 10,149, from 9172, and the death toll increased to 631 yesterday from 463 in its largest daily jump yet.

ISLAMIC SCHOLAR WHO SAID CORONAVIRUS WAS “ALLAH’S PUNISHMENT” GETS CORONAVIRUS

Islamic Scholar Who Said Coronavirus Was "Allah's Punishment" Gets Coronavirus

Instant karma.

  – MARCH 11, 2020

An Islamic scholar who said the coronavirus was “Allah’s punishment” for China’s treatment of Muslims now has coronavirus.

How ironic.

Back in February, Hadi Al-Modarresi, who is based in Iran, said that the coronavirus outbreak was “undoubtedly an act of Allah that is divine punishment against the Chinese for their treatment, mockery, and disrespect towards Muslims and Islam,” reported MEMRI-TV.

“It is obvious that the spread of this virus is an act of Allah. How do we know this? The spread of the coronavirus began in China, an ancient and vast country, the population of which makes up one seventh of humanity,” said Al-Modarresi.

“More than a billion people live in that country. The authorities in that country are tyrannical and they laid siege to more than a million Muslims and placed them under house arrest. The journalists in that country began to mock the niqab of Muslim women and they forced Muslim men to eat pork and drink wine. Allah sent a disease upon them and this disease laid siege to 40 million [Chinese people]. The same niqab that they mocked has been forced upon them, both men and women, by Allah, by means of the state authorities and officials,” he added.

It is now being reported that Al-Modarresi has contracted coronavirus, meaning that Allah must obviously be punishing him for wrongdoing.

The scholar tweeted to his almost 1 million followers with a prayer to Muhammad and the revelation that “The health of His Eminence is in a marked improvement.”

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Twitter users reacted with little in the way of sympathy.

“Allah 0 – coronavirus 1,” remarked one.

“He shows a great capacity for convoluted reasoning. Of course it is all based on 7th century logic,” added another.

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