Coronavirus live news: Africa passes 200,000 confirmed cases after Burundi president dies of suspected Covid-19 | World news

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has confirmed 950 more deaths and 17,376 new cases, taking the official totals in the USA to 112,133 and 1,973,797, respectively.

Key developments in the global coronavirus outbreak so far today include:

• The Italian prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, is to be questioned as part of an investigation driven into alleged errors made by authorities. Prosecutors in Bergamo, the Lombardy province worst hit by the virus, will also question the health minister and the interior minister.
• Prince Joachim of Belgium has been fined €10,400 by authorities in Spain after going to a party in Cordoba, where he caught Covid-19. Joachim flew from Brussels to Madrid, then travelled to Cordoba to attend a party with 27 other guests on 26 May, at a time when gatherings were restricted to a maximum of 15 participants.
• France is likely to suffer 800,000 job losses in coming months, the finance minister has warned, as the economy reels from the effects of lockdown. Bruno Le Maire told a finance committee in parliament: “Our evaluation is that 800,000 jobs will be lost in the coming months, or 2.8% of total employment.”
• Moscow will report 57% more deaths for the month of May than in the three previous years, a leading Russian radio station has reported, indicating that the city’s coronavirus death toll for the month may be at least two times higher than official tallies for the month,
• The global economy will contract at least 6% this year, with the unprecedented loss of income and “extraordinary uncertainty” caused by measures to contain the coronavirus outbreak, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has said.
• Airlines are set to lose $84bn (£65.9bn) as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) has forecast. With most of the world’s airliners currently parked, IATA said revenue would likely halve, falling from $419bn from $838bn last year.
• China was accused of running disinformation campaigns inside the European Union, as the bloc set out a plan to tackle a “huge wave” of false facts about the coronavirus. The European commission said Russia and China were running “targeted influence operations and disinformation campaigns. in the EU, its neighbourhood, and globally”
• The total number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in Africa has passed 200,000, according to the World Health Organization’s office for the region. According to data later published by the Africa Centres for Disease Control, 54 African countries reported 203,899 cases, 5,530 deaths, and 91,398 recoveries by Wednesday evening.
• Denmark, the first country outside Asia to ease its coronavirus lockdown, said on Wednesday the spread of Covid-19 has not accelerated since it entered its second phase of reopening society last month. The Nordic country allowed restaurants, cafes and malls to resume business during May.
• Asylum applications in Europe fell to the lowest level for over a decade in April as borders closed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, European Union figures show. The number of asylum applications declined to 8,730 during April, an 86% drop from 61,421 in February, according to figures obtained by Reuters.
• South Korea cases spiked again. South Korea’s coronavirus cases spiked to 50 new cases on Wednesday, after two consecutive days of fewer than 40 cases. “All but three of the locally transmitted cases were reported from the Seoul metropolitan area,” the Yonhap News Agency reported.

France’s death toll has risen by only 23 – well below the average daily increase of 53 seen over the last two weeks – to 29,319. That is the fifth-highest nominal total in the world. On Tuesday, 87 deaths were reported.

But the number of new confirmed cases was up by 545 to 155,136 after that figure stayed below the 500 threshold during the last three days, Reuters has reported.

In the UK, the opposition Liberal Democrats are demanding the government commit to an inquiry into its handling of the country’s epidemic as the prime minister Boris Johnson announces the easing of a series of lockdown measures, including allowing zoos to reopen, while abandoning chaotic plans for a full reopening of schools.

Ed Davey, the acting leader of a party that accounts for 21 of the Commons’ 650 MPs, has said:

Parents and teachers will be asking why the prime minister is talking just about theme parks and zoos when so many parents want to hear about the practical steps to reopen schools safely in the weeks ahead.

The fact remains that a comprehensive test, trace and isolate system is still the only way to keep people safe as we move out of lockdown. Yet the government still hasn’t delivered on this, and apparently won’t be able to until September. Ministers can’t even provide figures for the number of people being tested day-to-day.

The prime minister needs to be utterly transparent about the barriers to opening schools, the limits to testing capacity and the issues affecting the test, trace and isolate system. As more and more questions are raised about key decisions throughout this crisis, Boris Johnson must now commit to an independent inquiry into his government’s handling of this pandemic.

If you prefer all your coronavirus news in one easily digested story, read our coronavirus global report, written today by Jon Henley.

The UK has reported another 245 coronavirus-related deaths.

According to the department for health, 41,128 people had died in hospitals, care homes and the wider community after testing positive for coronavirus in the UK as of 5pm on Tuesday, up from 40,883 the day before, the PA News Agency reported.

The Government figures do not include all deaths involving coronavirus across the UK, which is thought to have passed 52,000.

Health authorities also said in the 24-hour period up to 9am on Wednesday, 170,379 tests were carried out or dispatched, with 1,003 positive results.

Overall, a total of 6,042,622 tests have been carried out and 290,143 cases have been confirmed positive.

The figure for the number of people tested has been “temporarily paused to ensure consistent reporting” across all methods of testing.

Angela Giuffrida, the Guardian’s Rome correspondent, has more details on Italian prosecutors’ plans to question their prime minister today. She writes:

The Italian prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, is to be questioned as part of an investigation driven by relatives of coronavirus victims into alleged errors made by authorities at the beginning of the pandemic.

Prosecutors in Bergamo, the Lombardy province worst hit by the virus, will also question the health minister, Roberto Speranza and the interior minister, Luciana Lamorgese, over the failure by authorities to quarantine the towns of Alzano Lombardo and Nembro after outbreaks occurred there.

The move came after grieving families of Covid-19 victims on Wednesday submitted the first 50 complaints to Bergamo prosecutors as they push for an investigation into possible criminal negligence by authorities.

The files were brought together by members of NOI Denunceremo (we will denounce), a Facebook group set up in April.

“We haven’t identified culprits in the files but the other day we spoke to the prosecutor and explained that our main objective is to find out the truth,” Luca Fusco, the president of NOI Denunceremo, said. “We’re not interested in convictions, we just want to understand what happened. If we understand what happened we can change a system that made mistakes.”

Travel restrictions at the European Union’s external borders should be partially lifted by 1 July, the bloc’s top diplomat has said, according to the Associated Press.

Josep Borrell said on Wednesday that the European Commission will discuss a coordinated plan with member nations and “put forward an approach for the gradual and partial lifting of these restrictions as of the 1st of July, with certain third countries.”

All but essential travel from outside Europe is restricted until 15 June. Many ministers from the 27-nation EU suggested earlier this month that they wanted this deadline extended until early July.

As for the EU’s internal borders, Borrell said the executive commission took note that several countries are in the process of lifting internal border controls imposed to keep out people from other member states.

Prince Joachim of Belgium has been fined €10,400 by authorities in Spain after going to a party in Cordoba while the country was under its strict coronavirus lockdown.

A scandal erupted after Joachim flew from Brussels to Madrid, then travelled to Cordoba to attend a party with 27 other guests on 26 May, at a time when gatherings were restricted to a maximum of 15 participants.

He subsequently tested positive for coronavirus and all guests at the party were forced to quarantine themselves.

Joachim’s presence at the party, revealed by Spanish newspaper El Confidencial, caused an uproar in both Spain, which has one of the world’s highest death tolls, and in Belgium, which has one of the highest per capita death tolls.

After news of his The Belgian royal family said that Joachim had travelled to Spain for an internship. Since travelling for work was considered essential travel this allowed him to leave the country at a time when borders were closed.

On Wednesday, Spanish authorities slapped Joachim with the fine, not over the party but because he did not quarantine after arriving in Madrid, as had been mandatory at the time, Belgian Flemish-language news website De Morgen reports.

If he pays within 15 days he will only have to pay half.

The Italian prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, and the country’s health and interior ministers are to be questioned over their handling of the coronavirus pandemic, reports AFP citing news agencies reported.

Prosecutors from Bergamo, the city in the northern Lombardy region worst hit by the virus, have launched a wide-ranging investigation into the health crisis, which has officially killed over 34,000 people in Italy.

They are looking in particular at why a red zone was not enforced in February around the towns of Nembro and Alzano, with regional officials and the government blaming each other.

The government imposed its first red zone, around the town of Codogno, 24 hours after doctors discovered a patient with the virus. It would go on to shut down 10 other towns, and then large areas of the north before imposing a nationwide lockdown.

Conte, the health minister, Roberto Speranza, and the interior minister, Luciana Lamorgese, would be called on by prosecutors in Rome later Wednesday, according to the Corriere della Sera and the Sole 24 Ore dailies.

The team, lead by chief prosecutor Maria Cristina Rota, has already questioned the Lombardy region’s head, Attilio Fontana, and his health minister, Giulio Gallera, who insist it is the role of the national government to decide whether certain areas should be shut.

Guardian science editor Ian Sample explains how vaccines work, runs through some of the main obstacles to creating one for coronavirus and preparing it for public use, and tells us which scenario he thinks is most realistic in the next 18 months.

Poland will open its borders with fellow European Union countries on Saturday and allow international flights from next Tuesday, as the country unfreezes its economy despite an increase in coronavirus cases.

Poland closed its borders to foreigners in March to stop the spread of the coronavirus. However, it has been progressively loosening restictions on public life, with shopping centres, hotels and restaurants all reopening in May.

“In some countries…this pandemic is still behaving in a very disturbing way, so for now we limit this decision (opening borders) to European Union countries,” the prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, said.

Poland has seen a recent rise in infections, mostly centred around coal mines in the south. On Monday a record 599 new cases were reported.

As of Wednesday morning Poland, a country of around 38 million people, had reported 27,668 cases of the coronavirus and 1,191 deaths.

Austria said on Wednesday it was lifting checks at its border with Italy and ending quarantine requirements for more than 20 European countries as of next Tuesday.

The Coachella music festival in the Southern California desert is unlikely to take place this year, entertainment news website Billboard has reported.

The move comes as Anschutz Entertainment Group, the parent company of the music festival’s organiser Goldenvoice, is laying off 15% of the workforce, the report said.

Earlier in March, Goldenvoice said the music festival had been postponed for six months until October due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Coachella, one of the biggest music festivals in the world, brings half a million fans to an open-air site in Indio, east of Los Angeles, over two weekends and was originally scheduled to take place on 10-12 and 17-19 April.

France is likely to suffer 800,000 job losses in coming months, the finance minister has warned, as the economy reels from the effects of lockdown.

Bruno Le Maire told a finance committee in parliament:

Our evaluation is that 800,000 jobs will be lost in the coming months, or 2.8% of total employment.

The shock is considerable and calls for massive public policies to support and accompany all those affected.

Such measures include the furlough scheme, tax breaks for companies and financial incentives to hire apprentices, he said.

The Bank of France said on Tuesday the French economy will likely shrink about 10%, resulting from the countrywide strict lockdown imposed in March.

The economy will not recover to pre-crisis levels until mid-2022, it said.

Unemployment is expected to surge to above 11.5% by mid-2021, well above previous peaks, the bank said.

France’s economy shrank 5.3% in the first three months of the year, and statistics office Insee has said the contraction could reach 20 percent in the second quarter.

The country is bracing for its worst recession since World War II.

France is planning an outlay of some €45bn to support the sectors most in danger, according to the latest version of a budget presented by the government Wednesday.

The government has pledged €15bn alone for the country’s aviation industry, where thousands of jobs are on the line as the coronavirus crisis hammers the travel industry.