World Coronavirus Dispatch: UK to send contact tracers door to door

Infections stabilise in Australia's epicentre, big US firms to boost hiring of minorities, UK job losses worst since 2009 and other pandemic-related across the globe

UK to send contact tracers door-to-door: The UK government will now send Covid volunteers door to door to track-down those infected. The centralised army of officials tasked with finding people who’ve come into contact with Covid-19 patients will be replaced by locally-based teams who can knock on doors in their neighbourhoods, the government announced. The change will take effect on August 24. Read more here

Let’s look at the global statistics: 



Total Confirmed Cases: 20,092,855


Change Over Yesterday: 229,005


Total Deaths: 736,254

Total Recovered: 12,350,879

Nations hit with most cases: US (5,094,565), Brazil (3,057,470), India (2,268,675), Russia (890,799) and South Africa (563,598)

Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

Trump considers banning re-entry of citizens who may have coronavirus: Under the proposal, the government could block a citizen or legal resident’s entry if an official “reasonably believes” the person had been exposed to or was infected with the communicable disease. Federal agencies have been asked to submit feedback on the proposal to the White House by Tuesday. Read more here

Big US companies form group to boost hiring of minorities: Leaders from major US companies, including JP Morgan, Accenture, Amazon, Google and Goldman Sachs, have formed a group aimed at increasing the hiring of individuals from minority communities in New York. The New York Jobs CEO Council, has vowed to hire 100,000 people from low-income Black, Latino and Asian communities by 2030. Read more here

UK Job losses worst since 2009: There were 220,000 less people employed in the second quarter, the Office for National Statistics said. Separate tax data for July showed that the number of staff on company payrolls had fallen by 730,000 since March, sounding the alarm about a potentially much bigger rise in joblessness. Read more here

Coronavirus infections stabilise in Australia's virus epicentre: Victoria state, which currently accounts for nearly all of Australia’s new cases, detected 331 infections and 19 deaths in the past 24 hours, up from 322 infections and the same number of fatalities a day earlier. Daily infections in Victoria peaked at 725 on August 5 and have been trending lower in recent days. Read more here

Singapore warns of slow recovery as virus slams Asia's exporters: Singapore’s record recession was deeper than first thought in the second quarter, data showed on Tuesday, signalling a lengthy path to recovery. The government said it now expects full-year GDP to contract between 5-7 percent versus its previous forecast for a 4-7 percent decline. Read more here

Specials

Tech companies are transforming people’s bedrooms into ‘Virtual Hospitals’ 

In recent months, hospitals around the US, looking for ways to free up beds for coronavirus patients, have begun expanding their virtual offerings, launching video doctors’ visits and virtual therapy sessions, and rolling out programs to remotely monitor vulnerable patients, like those in nursing homes. As doctors and patients embraced these new, online methods of care, Medicare, Medicaid and many private insurers temporarily changed their payment rules to accommodate them. But many of these changes are only guaranteed through October, and plenty of regulatory hurdles remain. Read about this trend here

Advice from professionals who are staying better-than-sane in the coronavirus pandemic: You’ve seen them: your smiling friends, neighbors, family, and co-workers who are somehow making the best of the pandemic, the ones who talk about Covid’s “silver linings.” Who are these people? And how can you make lemonade, too? Here’s what they emailed about their strategies and the impact they’ve had on ensuring work-life balance: stay connected to friends, limit screen time, and most importantly, make time for exercise and hobbies. Read more here