World Coronavirus Dispatch: Over 4,700 die each day, LatAm leads mortality

Record daily rise in US cases, gold hits 8-yr high, Airbus to axe 15,000 and other pandemic-related news from across the globe

Coronavirus-related fatalities continue to pile up as the world and have passed half a million deaths. According to a Reuters analysis, more than 4,700 people are dying each day, based on an average from June 1 to 27. Globally, data shows, the share of deaths by region has shifted over time, from Asia to the Middle East, Europe and North America, and then to Latin America. Here’s an important info-graphics to put it into perspective.

Let’s look at the global statistics: 



Total Confirmed Cases: 10,302,867

Change Over Yesterday: 147,761


Total Deaths: 510,632


Total Recovered: 5,336,996

Nations hit with most cases: US (2,634,432), Brazil (1,402,041), Russia (646,929), India (566,840) and UK (314,160)

Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center

Record daily rise in cases in US: The US announced more than 48,000 coronavirus infections, the most of any day of the pandemic. Official in eight states – Alaska, Arizona, California, Georgia, Idaho, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas – announced single-day highs. Read more here 
 

Gold price highest in eight years: Gold futures rose above $1,800 an ounce for the first time in since 2011 as low interest rates and a resurgence in coronavirus cases drive demand for the metal as a haven. Investors are running to gold for insurance against further economic fallout. Read more here 
 

Airbus begins restructuring, 15,000 jobs to go under the axe: The European manufacturer will eliminate more than 10,000 positions across its main bases in Germany and France, part of an 11 percent reduction in global headcount. The company said its output will be 40 percent lower for two years. Read more here 
 

South Korea begins supplying remdesivir: South Korea began supplying Gilead's antiviral drug remdesivir on Wednesday. The first batch of the drug, meant to last through July, will come from a Gilead donation, while health authorities will negotiate prices for further supplies after August. Read more here

Specials

How Covid-19 contact tracing works on your phone

What Apple and Google have developed isn't an app in itself—rather it's an application programming interface (an API), plus some other fundamental technologies, that other apps can plug into. In this case, your phone will be logging other phones it comes into contact with, assuming both your device and the others are running a Covid-19 tracking app that's been fully enabled (which is why public support is going to be so important). These logs don't include any identifying information about you; they use random numerical ID codes that change frequently and get trashed completely once they're older than 14 days (the incubation period for Covid-19). Read more here 
 

Coronavirus threatens to wipe out gender equality gains, UN agency warns

Coronavirus and its economic consequences threaten to wipe out progress on gender equality at work as women are at greater risk of losing their job, more likely to be exposed to infection and take on more of the burden of unpaid care, the International Labour Organization has warned. It said global working hours were 14 per cent lower in the second quarter of 2020 than in the last quarter of 2019 — equivalent to a loss of 400m million full-time jobs. Read more here